Is Tsw2 Dead In The Water?

Discussion in 'TSW General Discussion' started by dangerousdave, Aug 2, 2022.


  1. Thanks for popping in. Let me start by saying future routes or releases is something that game developers like to keep some secrecy around, this doesn't bother me. Neither does route suggestions, I know as a company you're going to make routes that sell rather than routes a handful of players want.

    The main problem for me is the silence, a few other forums I use the developers or admins generally acknowledge a problem that's reported on the forum, they will be in touch with the development team and within a couple of days will post an update on what's being done and a rough time frame on when the problems gonna be solved. I know things don't always go to plan and a quick fix can turn into a long one! If you was to say we know there's a problem and there should be a patch inside of a week, then at the end of the week turned round and said this problem is taking longer than expected to solve, atleast there's communication. And we aren't left in the dark.

    Honestly when it was posted about a fix for the derailment issue I was quite annoyed that in 2 months that was the only fix, more annoyed that its not solved the derailment issue entirely.
    Maybe my expectations were a bit high, if dtg had of posted updates on the current issues then possibly I wouldn't of been expecting a fix for all.

    I'm not speaking for everyone but if dtg had of said we are rolling back sos why we work on a fix i would have been a lot happier playing other routes on tsw without having time wasted getting half way through a service or scenario to find myself stuck at a red signal or derailing for no reason at all.

    Regarding the state of sos on release there's ways to avoid this in the future. Sabre or focus interactive have whats called a public test server. At various stages of development of dlc users can play the dlc on the public test server and report problems back to the development team on the dedicated forum section. This doesn't cost the developers time or money looking for bugs or contracting the work out to third parties. Once the dlc is ready for release the test server is shut down and the users then have to purchase the dlc for the main game.

    Thanks for taking the time to acknowledge our concerns.
     
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  2. Commiee

    Commiee Well-Known Member

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    It's pretty ridiculous that some people seem to think introduction of multiplayer would mean the singleplayer option being taken away from them. Don't want to socialise with others in MP? Click that singleplayer button to keep doing what you're now doing in the sim. And what MP community will be like in a game depends on the behaviour of the playerbase in that game, community mods, enforcement tools, etc. Saying one game's MP community was bad so TSW MP community will also be bad is not serious - by that logic every single videogame's MP community should be awful.

    It's become a completely unreasonable clique thing in TSW community, there is no actual basis for it other than to keep bonds between some people who would rather brandish hate for an idea instead of letting people who are into that enjoy it while they keep playing with their scripted AI environment in singleplayer. DtG seem to think MP will add a positive experience to the sim, those of us who want MP agree - the rest will be seen in development.
     
    Last edited: Aug 3, 2022
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  3. SHINO BAZ

    SHINO BAZ Well-Known Member

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    This game TSW2 so buried in unresolved technical issues so what good is multiplayer gonna be if it just sinks this game all the way to the bottom of the sea.Save multiplayer for TSW3 at least.
     
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  4. tallboy7648

    tallboy7648 Well-Known Member

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    Fair enough. But I think part of the problem is that there is silence on what is being worked on. Specifically, bugfixes. Supposedly dtg is working on bugfixes and some but we don't know what's being worked on. Here are some more examples

    LIRR Bombardier M7 audio issue (No propulsion on the train when moving) has been like that for two years. It was said that DTG would put the m7a audio to the M7 a while ago. No news since

    Supposedly, the rest of the preservation crew updates are being prepared/readied-no news at all since

    (Not related to bugfixes but still valid to my point) New Bakerloo line timetable is in testing-no word at all when that was announced since

    I can go on but the point is that there is something concrete to say. Your just not doing it. People should know the status of some bugfixes or if they are at least being worked on or done with testing. I know that game development always changes but surely it wouldn't be difficult to say what's being worked on or the status of certain things rather than just complete silence. You can even put that on seperate articles rather than make an article about british heritage railways that some don't even care about

    Another problem I have pertains to the roadmap. The reason for the monthly roadmap was so more things could be announced, but arguably they have become more useless. Now personally I don't mind the lack of new dlc's, but the problem I have is that they seem to have useless filler to cover for the fact that nothing new has been announced. The hiring of some new employee to work on german route for instance could easily be put on a separate DTL article, not on the roadmap. Not to mention that the streams are just corporate filler and then if players have questions, there is a short period of time for those questions to be answered. Now I know it would be impossible to answer every question, but when there was that q&a, not all of the questions were answered and not all of them had questions pertaining to release dates or asking for new features. For instance, on that Q&A thread, I asked if SEHS would receive a Preservation Crew update/rush hour passengers and there was no answer to that. That would be an easy yes or no answer. Some have felt the roadmap has become useless and it's easy to see why.

    Im not surprised that this thread was made and if the silence continues than I wouldn't be surprised to see more threads. In life it's better to say something concrete rather than be silent
     
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  5. Tank621

    Tank621 Well-Known Member

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    Personally, I think the 'Developer Deep Dive' and 'Team spotlight' are not adding anything to the roadmap beyond making it more cluttered and harder to find the actual roadmap part of the roadmap. I'm not saying get rid of these sections but why not stick them in their own articles throughout the month?

    It'll keep the roadmap focused on the roadmap and give you a couple of extra articles to post each month, spreading out the communication across weeks, especially when there's little in the way of articles on new and upcoming content.
     
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  6. tallboy7648

    tallboy7648 Well-Known Member

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    To your point of the public test server, TML Studios "The Bus" is in early access. I like when games do these things because it allows players to play to see what problems or bugs are there and report them so they can be resolved. It would be cool if dtg did something along those lines for pc at the very least
     
    Last edited: Aug 3, 2022
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  7. tallboy7648

    tallboy7648 Well-Known Member

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    I agree. If people don't like the idea of multiplayer. They don't have to use it. I don't use livery designer but I don't think it should be removed or shouldn't have been added because I won't use it or don't like it. Sure some may have had bad experiences in other multiplayer games but that doesn't mean it's bad overall. That's like saying games like acc or every multiplayer game is bad.
     
    Last edited: Aug 3, 2022
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  8. tallboy7648

    tallboy7648 Well-Known Member

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    I agree. I personally couldn't give a toss about some new dev or some deep dives. I don't think they shouldn't be done as they could offer something new to the table but they should just be in separate articles and not on roadmap streams or articles
     
  9. Crosstie

    Crosstie Well-Known Member

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    Thousands? Well it's good to know that there's actually a long list and that list is triaged. What would be useful to know is what the " highest priority " fixes are. Are they the same as those of the community. Surely that can be revealed.

    Well there's obviously a gag order surrounding that subject, so I don't think we can expect DTG Alex to talk about that.
     
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  10. OldVern

    OldVern Well-Known Member

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    Indeed. the first rule of NDA is you can't mention there is a NDA...
    Thought it worth posing the question though.
     
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  11. gazz292

    gazz292 Well-Known Member

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    i still haven't read what multiplayer in a train driving game would actually give us,

    Do we get to wave at other players as we pass them (providing there is someone driving another train at that exact time on the same route as me... say when i'm driving a German route at about 4AM real time)

    Do we get someone who stands at the guard panel, ready to open and close the doors for me? that sounds real fun for the person playing as guard on a 1 hour long journey with 2 station stops on the way.

    is it supposed to be that they play as signaller / dispatcher? again this means i have to choose to drive a route where there is a 'live' signaller working, and at the same real and in game time for it to work... what happens when they need to loo, or are called by the wife/gf/bf/kids etc just as i need a route setting up etc.

    do they play as passengers?!!! wandering about the track searching for collectables and hopping on a player train as it goes past... again all this timing thing, there's thousands of timetables across 20+ routes etc.


    Is it supposed to be some social thing, where people can type texts to each other... or bod forbid, bloody voice chat, where all that's really going on is people hoping to find someone to try and chat up....
    with people chasing after the one person who has choses a female avatar with 'wow, a real girl train gamer, will you be my GF' flooding the chat box ... or vise versa.. or same sex etc... i'm not being sexist here ... just pointing out what seems to happen a lot in other online multiplayer games, when you are not trying to kill each other that is.

    and along that line of political correctness etc, what happens when you get a dispatcher who doesn't share the same views as you, one wrong word like referring to a fireman instead of fireperson, and they are reporting you and trying to getting you banned.



    Will there be a griefers server where they wear a dunce hat and get to play with a thomas the tank engine push along train set until they learn to behave?



    Then we get to how this will all work, who's paying for all the servers, moderators, admins etc, who gets to choose if someone is a griefer or not, who's job is it to be available 24/7 to police all this.

    And how will this affect performance, is it supposed to work across all platforms from PC to gen 8 consoles?

    we get enough stutters and pauses as the game unloads objects etc,
    how annoying will the gameplay be when it's having to pause... or your train suddenly teleports it's self a mile down the track to catch up with different peoples internet ping times and all that?



    I just can't see how it'll all work.
     
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  12. Jpantera

    Jpantera Well-Known Member

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    Why nothing can be mentioned is what interests me. Its hardly that there are masses of rivals. This train simulation genre is niche and the other software such as Trainz and Zusi is quite niche too. We all want to see progress and like others have said something to look forward too. It may not be the West Highland line in full and in 1988 like I may want but I would settle for something enjoyable which is how I found SoS but would really like some of its issues ironed out also...

    Definitely time to show your hand now DTG other wise Graham Farish will get more of my pocket money instead.....
     
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  13. Swisstrains

    Swisstrains Well-Known Member

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    Thanks Alex for breaking the silence!
    Personally I love to get my hands on new dlcs, but I also like if they work, so I am glad you are working on fixes and I’m happy to hear that you are looking to find ways to get the community a bit more informed. Regarding that, I also thought about something like having a live diagram of the states the updates are in? For example like Trainworx who made trains for TSC. On his website you can see the state of everything he is working on in percentages. That way we could get a quick overview on the situations and how long it might take till release. On the other hand you don’t have to give dates for releases and everyone could take a look whenever they want. I’ll leave a link to what I meant: https://www.trainworx.nl/news/ scroll a bit down and you will find the roadmap!

    Another thing a few people already spoke of are the streams. The fact that the roadmap streams are once every month now makes it harder to get some answers. For example: Since about six months I am waiting to somehow get an answer on when we might expect to see the Br185.5 and Br182 on the other routes like SKA, MSB, RSN and so on? Someone from DTG once said that it’s being worked on, but that was way back when we hadn’t even gotten the completely new timetable for SKA- which hadn’t got the MRCE locos as I might have thought :/

    Anyways, thanks for keeping us in touch! :D
     
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  14. SJA

    SJA Active Member

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    New content still boils down to access to the editor - there's only so much DTG can do :) Look at TSC. Just in the UK, with Just Trains, ATS (on the payware/subware front) and the likes of DP Simulation and Backdated Trainsim on the freeware front. Plenty happening with German/Austrian content too, via RSSLO et al.

    TSC started slowly, but had an available editor and places like the UKTS Forums where people could gather and learn how to use the tools available, which within a couple of years started spawning quality freeware and launched the dev careers of some payware developers.

    TSW operates on a different basis and suffers as a result. It has been out - in some form or another - for half a decade. Don't get me wrong, it's a lovely introduction to train simming for kids, casual players and those limited to consoles. But in terms of anticipated new content, operational scope, fluidity (i.e. era specifics, etc) it still can't lay a glove on TSC in my opinion.

    It's a case of pick one - close-up graphics out of the box and cross-platform coverage + a timetable, or oodles of choice and customisation. When DTG find a way to bridge the gap between these two, we'll have a proper next-gen simulator on our hands.
     
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  15. fakenham

    fakenham Well-Known Member

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    Definitely. Just think what we would have by now if we had an editor a few years back. So much content.
    Come on DTG, sort it out!
     
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  16. tallboy7648

    tallboy7648 Well-Known Member

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    I doubt thks game will have an editor to be honest. I guess Train Sim Classic is the future of train simulation after all. Oh the irony
     
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  17. londonmidland

    londonmidland Well-Known Member

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    Seriously, why does DTG decide to do this?

    There are so many third party developers in Train Sim Classic who show early, mid and near completion screenshots of their routes and products. This also allows the community to give any constructive criticism they may have, to help the product become more accurate and immersive.

    With DTG its months of silence before you decide to finally show us any screenshots or articles, at which by that point, it is too late to change anything. Anything that may be fixed is always a post release fix, which for DTG's standards, is likely to be a further 6-12 month wait.

    No disrespect to you, and I'm sure it is out of your control, but communication since Sam and Nat have left really has took a nosedive.

    Us long term players have been here before, with it seeming like DTG are making an improvement, before doing a full 360 and starting from the beginning again.
     
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  18. SJA

    SJA Active Member

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    Exactly :) They need to re-examine the model that made TSC so successful (it's still doing the business in 2022), and figure out a way of marrying that to what has shifted copy of TSW. It'd own the market.

    It's like how one of the golden rules of promoting one's business is to be so good that others promote it for you via reviews and word of mouth. In train simulator parlance, part of that is letting good modellers, developers and scripters in to dig beneath the surface and come up with things the overwhelming majority didn't think were possible, and to their own deadlines and timelines. Get enough people in and there will be something new coming out 2-3 times a month. That shifts copy of the base - it was Armstrong Powerhouse's soundpacks that got me into TS in 2011/2012. Without AP, I wouldn't have bothered and DTG wouldn't have the cash I've spent on their routes.

    Come on DTG indeed! Smell the coffee...
     
    Last edited: Aug 3, 2022
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  19. chieflongshin

    chieflongshin Well-Known Member

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    I kind of think it says something about DTG as a company if (and I may have interpreted it wrong) they're doing streams out of work hours.
    These streams an advocacy is a huge sales benefit to them.
    Surely they don't expect them to
    Work all day and then do a stream. Let them start later on those days . Poor show otherwise
     
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  20. tsw2

    tsw2 Well-Known Member

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    First they need to fix TSW.
    TSW2 could not fix TSW, hopefully TSW3 can.
     
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  21. eldomtom2

    eldomtom2 Well-Known Member

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    Such objections only make sense if you assume multiplayer would be mandatory, and I see no reason why it would. Of course, you could still object on the grounds of it taking dev time away from other things...
     
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  22. Kangaroo Conductor

    Kangaroo Conductor Well-Known Member

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    Exactly. I in fact would like for TSW to have something for everyone. Missions for people being passengers? Additional "jobs" like checking for tickets? Or being the conductor? The one helping in the yard to build the trains, cuppling them? And all of that in cooperative gameplay online?
    Sure, they might not touch any of that ever, but who does it hurt if it's part of the package?
     
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  23. Commiee

    Commiee Well-Known Member

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    This sounds like an admission of failure, coming from that username :D
     
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  24. tsw2

    tsw2 Well-Known Member

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    Before MP becomes a thing, they first must fix the core of TSW.
     
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  25. gazz292

    gazz292 Well-Known Member

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    re: multiplayer... i'd rather they work on the driving aspect of this game and get that perfected before diverting workers to multiplayer stuff.
     
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  26. tallboy7648

    tallboy7648 Well-Known Member

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    I agree
     
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  27. tallboy7648

    tallboy7648 Well-Known Member

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    Judging by your username, this sounds like your admitting failure ;)
     
  28. JesseBlue

    JesseBlue Active Member

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    Hear, hear!
    TSW2 is a great game in general.
    But it also has too many issues/bugs!
    And it takes AGES for many of them to get fixed - if ever.
    Even important and general issues like the save function have not been fixed for years!!!
    In what world is this acceptable???

    Like you said, it's a terrible business practice and many companies already paid the ultimate price for doing this for too long.
     
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  29. Redbus

    Redbus Well-Known Member

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    If community managers do streams on an evening it’s surely part of their role and therefore their working hours, so surely they should be allowed to start work for example after lunch on those days (seems logical to me)?

    I’m pretty sure DTG are beavering away on UI improvements such as the moving map, straightening out QoL issues like the buggy save game functionality, as well as making those new routes, and adding in the long-awaited DLC selective loading fix. All this will likely end up becoming TSW3 in a few weeks and I for one am very keen to see what they have up their sleeve.

    If they’re keeping quiet it’s because they got their fingers burned last year by announcing too much, too soon. Complete radio silence is admittedly a little extreme; as someone said they could announce an outline of what’s coming without going into detail about release dates, or giving away too much info about routes to avoid controversy over culled branch lines etc.
     
    Last edited: Aug 3, 2022
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  30. Lamplight

    Lamplight Well-Known Member

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    I’d say look no further than DTG themselves. Ask Sam about his time as community manager or find the streams/articles from back then. May not have been perfect but it was certainly better than the current situation by a long shot.
     
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  31. WVUadam

    WVUadam Well-Known Member

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    Well if there is a new title then TSW2 would become end of life, as history tells us each TSW so far is a two year cycle.
     
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  32. Pipe

    Pipe Well-Known Member

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    Just don´t release patches that fix some bugs .......... and introduce a load more of different bugs (the derailing issue is a classic!)
    As simple as that.
    It´s like the plumber fixing the sanitation but "hey sorry, I´ve torn down your roof".
     
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  33. Purno

    Purno Well-Known Member

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    Well, if you want to learn from another company, I'm quite happy with the frequent blog posts on https://blog.scssoft.com/
     
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  34. It's a good idea. I know dtg probably wouldn't wanna let us see routes in the early stages of development or until they are announced but there's still room like a week or 2 before launch.

    Snowrunner is one I use the test server and you report bugs on the forum, the bugs are acknowledged and patches delivered promptly. By the time the dlc is launched most of the problems have been sorted.
     
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  35. DTG Alex

    DTG Alex Community Manager Staff Member

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    I've read through this all again and i'll reply more generally - there is actually a good amount of positive feedback to take on here when it comes to Roadmap, how we handle public knowledge of updates and bugfixes, and new ways to present our goals to you all.

    The roadmap was only changed to a monthly take so that we could talk more about the larger updates coming, and we found that on a two week basis it didn't reveal enough / same questions would still be unanswerable so it felt too frequent. However, I do believe shifting out the Dev Deep Dives and Team Spotlights may be the best call and keeping the Roadmaps just to new content and fixes, then perhaps more articles for additional DTG content.

    There are some questions in here that I won't be able to answer, just know that if we thought it was the right idea to talk about new features coming we would be, so they'll come when the time is right.

    There was also mention of some questions / threads being unanswered, and another comment about DTG not responding to posts about bugs / problems. I know in the last week I have jumped into a few threads on fixes to help report bugs and gather more information, but there are alot of fixes and requests across this forum and being visible in them all is very time consuming - usually we do see most of these threads, but the time to properly dive into them all and reply is a greater ask. An idea we can look into is getting some community forum moderators to help us collect useful information and be able to respond and let players know their issues have been sent higher up, rather than not knowing.

    I do think this thread has shown some really good points we can improve on, and I'm writing these up to create a plan we can work on. I would ask for any more ideas sharing to keep coming in this thread, although this will be my last input for now. Thank you all for sharing, we are listening.
     
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  36. Purno

    Purno Well-Known Member

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    You mean like DTG pressing the 'like' button on our posts so we know they've been read? It was an idea that came up a loooooong way back on one of the roadmap streams I believe, but for some reason unknown to me it was never realized.
     
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  37. tallboy7648

    tallboy7648 Well-Known Member

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    I mean, some people read posts without liking them. That doesn't mean they weren't read so I am a bit in the middle on this idea to be honest
     
  38. Purno

    Purno Well-Known Member

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    It was something suggested by DTG themselves. I believe it was DTG Protagonist in a roadmap stream with DTG Natster .

    I believe the whole point was to let people know DTG does read the post, while not consuming as much time as posting a reply would.

    The reason I brought it up again is because DTG Alex is asking for ideas to improve communication. This was an idea brought up by his own colleague (although from an era a few community managers ago, as we seem to be running through them quite quickly). To me it sounded like a pretty good but simple idea, so it surprised me it never actually happened. I don't know why. I also don't know if the idea that Sam/Nat came up with was ever passed on to their new colleague Alex. Sometimes I get the feeling the players know more about DTGs history about community communication that DTG staff themselves. I lost count how many community managers I've seen coming and going.
     
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  39. chieflongshin

    chieflongshin Well-Known Member

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    I do think DTG liking posts or marking them as helpful wouldn’t be a bad thing until someone has a post liked and thinks their suggestion is now in development
     
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  40. OldVern

    OldVern Well-Known Member

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    That is the problem, or conversely if a post or thread doesn't get marked as read some people will start jumping up and down, flagging DTG staff etc.

    The other thing that might help here is clarification of the support process. There's a bit of dubiety as really bugs ought to go through the official reporting process (forget its name now). However there seems to be a mindset - myself included I must add - that something dropped in the Technical Reports form here and added to by others suffering the same issue, is sufficient to count as a report - DTG will see it and sort it. If DTG regard the TR as not necessarily monitored then maybe the header needs to reflect the official process still needs to be followed.
     
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  41. I would have thought if a couple of dozen people write separate posts complaining about the same issue then dtg would see that as a priority but the way it seems is dtg dont prioritise problems that way. It seems more of what dtg thinks are priorities.

    I hate to bring up sos again but 2 months! If it only affected sos I'd expect a fix within days, but messing up most routes in one way or another is taking the.
     
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  42. wxtr7

    wxtr7 Well-Known Member

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    I'll share my thoughts here too...
    I took a break from TSW and the forums for most of June & July as the game hasn't had much forward movement and got stale and the forums have basically become threads of the same complaints and I just needed to get away from that for a while. Returning though has me thinking...
    IMO, DTG are dangerously slipping into their old communication habits where there isn't much being publicly communicated and there's a lack of desire to do so from fear of "being burned." This isn't just related to the lull that was planned following Spirit of Steam, this has been a trend since last year's rush hour release (or thereabouts).

    The roadmap: I'll admit, I still fundamentally disagree with what DTG thinks a roadmap is, even from when it was originally started by Sam, so my POV here is more biased. Despite my break, I still read the roadmaps the last couple of months and I have to say this new format is a joke. The lengthy article preceding July's roadmap details made me actually forget I was reading the roadmap. It's great you want to highlight things, but that needs to be a separate dedicated article. The roadmap needs to focus on giving us the details of what you're working on and nothing more - concise and focused. That also allows articles and the roadmap to stand out individually and aids in preventing miscommunication.
    With each change, the roadmap has become less of a "roadmap" and more of just a "list of things." One critical feature that the roadmap is missing is timing information. Dates/times don't need to be specific (e.g., "this DLC will release on August 4"), but any roadmap I've seen gives indications of when features are targeted for implementation (i.e., by Q2, by the end of summer, etc). This could easily be done on the roadmap by listing: "New US Route, expected time frame approx: 6 months" and then disclaimer the roadmap "dates and expected time frames are subject to change". Said time frame would get updated each month/new roadmap to give and indication of how the project is moving along. I realize this is a sensitive topic for DTG, but seriously get over it. No matter what you say, how you phrase it, or how many times you repeat it, somebody is always going to misconstrue your words or take things too seriously and complain if the time frame wasn't met for whatever reason.
    There's also the point I've seen raised that because of the Riesa-Dresden fiasco, things are now being specified on the roadmap later in their project cycle - which does in fact make the "if it's not on the roadmap" cliche, a moot point now. If you're holding things back because of potential backlash if you have to cut details out, then you can't use that saying anymore.
    However, I do want to say one thing I like about the intention of the new format is that it shouldn't be the place for announcements of new DLC or features. That should be a separate article or post to make it stand out and highlight it. However, this also means you shouldn't list "New US route" or "New German route" until you've made the announcement and the details are closer to finalized.

    I also don't understand why projects have to be kept completely secret until 2 weeks before you release them. I'm not talking about the early stages where you're sorting details out and haven't even announced it yet - I get the element of surprise there. I'm talking about where something has been announced and just sits on the "roadmap" for months and we hear nothing about it's progress. The roadmap stream is just "it's coming along, you'll get it a some point between now and the end of time". This would be a great opportunity for sharing behind the scenes content about the route or new features in the game you're working on. Even interacting with the community to spot potential flaws before its released and too late to easily fix.
    Spirit of steam did an ok job with this, mostly toward the end - there was still a lot of silence between the announcement and that point though. Granted that was mostly engineering work in the core code of the game, but it would've been a good place to highlight Simugraph and the process of getting it to understand steam locos and other core internals of the game.
    Matt also generally did a good job sharing details about how the Xbox audio fix and PS5 DLC limit projects were coming along, although too many roadmap streams were just him reiterating the same thing - especially before serious work on those projects began. Even though I play on PC, hearing the transparency of what's going on behind the scenes for those issues was refreshing.

    There's also the fact that you continually keep things secret even after a "leak" causing the forum community to run rampant. Yes, I'm talking about TSW3. I understand that you're probably not ready to talk about TSW3 based on past comm mistakes. But here's the problem I'm seeing right now: By keeping silent, you've basically told me you care more about drumming up drama on your forums than you do about effectively communicating with your customers. Instead of making a simple announcement like "yes TSW3 is our next big project and we'll have more details on what that means soon" or "no, TSW3 is not something we're planning right now and you've just seen some experimental projects", you've gone absolutely silent except for...JD's post in the TSW3 leak thread which was littered with sarcasm, and then Sam on the 8up last week joking with JD about not being allowed to use Teams anymore and that it's too late now to try to hide TSW3. To be clear, I have no problem with the sarcasm or humor - it was actually pretty funny. My problem here is that you've basically acknowledged the rumor is true in this reaction, but you're too afraid to speak about the matter because you want all the details to be sorted perfectly so we don't have another Dresden fiasco - but now the TSW3 threads are run over with speculation and arguing about what TSW3 means. Speculation's fine by the way, the arguing is getting tiresome though. Again...drama over communication. Any other company, especially in this day and age, would be attempting to get the rumor under control, even if it means confirming it earlier than intended.

    Finally there's also the release and forget pattern that seems to plague the majority of routes, where a route is released, we find a bunch of bugs, get promised a hot fix for it, and then it ends up at the bottom of Adam's TODO list for sometime in the future. My biggest example here is how Boston was treated over Dresden and London commuter in the rush hour releases. Both of the latter routes got threads for reporting issues with timetable services, and at least Dresden got a fix that fixed most of the issues (despite then introducing the backwards running freight trains). They also still have their issues, but the fate of Boston went completely silent about a week after release. The signalling is still messed up, the Amtrak brakes still don't function correctly, there's a host of issues in the MBTA stock (some of which come from starting with the Caltrain F40 model). And IIRC it's received one "significant" patch that fixed only a few issues, and you've otherwise gone silent on anything being done to fix the route. I understand you're a business and time constraints mean you need to move on to the next project, but not placing priority in quickly fixing large bugs in new releases reflects poorly on you as a company. These issues like I mentioned are player-impacting issues and need to be treated with the same priority as game crashes - especially if you want TSW to stand out. I mean, how are new players supposed to advance and learn how to work with signals, safety systems, and other realistic train features if they're not even implemented correctly and you don't prioritize fixing them because "most players don't use them".

    It would also be a nice addition to specify at what point a new release becomes a "preserved collection" item. Probably could be done in the roadmap. Once a route is stabilized (use whatever definition you want there), a little section at the end of the roadmap that just states the route is now under Adam's control for upkeep. This lets us know we need to turn our attention to the preservation crew for updates instead of wondering whether the main team is still working on it or if they've moved on to the next project.

    Anyway, that's my thoughts on what I personally see wrong and things I'd like to see better implemented.
     
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  43. tallboy7648

    tallboy7648 Well-Known Member

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    Fair point
     
  44. Anthony Pecoraro

    Anthony Pecoraro Well-Known Member

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    What's wrong with the Amtrak brakes?
     
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  45. bart2day

    bart2day Well-Known Member

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    Somebody buy this guy a pint! So much sense in this post on how DTG can improve things rather than lurching from one mishap to another.
     
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  46. londonmidland

    londonmidland Well-Known Member

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    wxtr7 Has hit the nail on the head.

    I just don’t understand how DTG manages to allow this communication failure to happen time and time again. You’ve had plenty of feedback as to how it can be improved in the past. Why are you constantly going back to the start after slowly making improvements? It gives us players no hope or faith in what you now say you’ll do.

    Secondly, regarding TSW 3, what’s the big secret? Just announce the damn thing and get it over and done with. Teasing the community with ‘leaks’ whilst simultaneously staying silent on the topic isn’t doing anyone any favours.

    Regarding the roadmap, it is now as useful as a chocolate teapot. What happened to the proposal of that it’ll be updated every couple of weeks with more information added to it? That never came into fruition. It was just yet another thing DTG said but was shoved under the carpet.

    Today’s practice seems to be stay silent for several months before announcing a new product 2 weeks later. That said product most likely wouldn’t have sufficient time developed on it, and released with bugs which won’t get fix and will be forgotten about. This is applicable for several TSW DLCs.

    Finally, what has happened to the preservation updates? After a significant period of holding them back, you release a few before halting them again.

    On the topic of is TSW 2 dead? Yes, at this stage I think it is. TSW 3 will be the next new thing. There’s nothing wrong with that, but the way it has been managed and communicated, with everyone staying silent and no one sharing a thing of what is being worked on, has been absolutely abysmal.

    If anything, DTG are digging themselves a hole. They’re simply giving it the silent treatment before saying ‘*surprise* look what we’ve been working on’ which is possibly the worst way to announce something, as players aren’t going to suddenly forget all the issues that TSW 2 has by simply announcing a new game.

    DTG, you have A LOT of work to do, in several areas…
     
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  47. tallboy7648

    tallboy7648 Well-Known Member

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    DTG never seem to learn these days. I guess this is Matt's vision of the product after all.

    At least there are interesting games coming out this fall
     
    Last edited: Aug 4, 2022
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  48. SJA

    SJA Active Member

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    Quite right, squire.

    I think they need to understand that there is scarely anything new under the sun. They need to look at the success models of other niche products, as well as the successes of TSC that they have overseen for yonks, and apply those principles. They're backing themselves into a corner if it's only them plus a select 2-3 other developers churning stuff out. And it should never be churned - it should be produced with care and attention. And as a community, many of us, bar the hard of learning, understand that good things take time :)

    An accessible editor + loco building tools, with some accompanying documentation is absolutely huge. When they're unable to meet deadlines, someone else is publishing something and that keeps the sim ticking over.

    3-4 years ago people said TSC would be dead in the water by now, yet there are teams producing better locos, units and routes than we've ever seen before. All because of a more open content creation model, which no doubt sells copies of TSC today, to more discerning railfans who do their homework.

    In this niche, with the demand for routes and locos from all eras from the 1940s to the present day, there's no reason at all for an organisation to put their staff under this level of pressure. They need to ensure TSW3 is open, accessible, cross-platform and frequently delivering the goods. Easier said than done, obviously, but I'm almost certain that it can be done :)
     
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  49. tallboy7648

    tallboy7648 Well-Known Member

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    But dtg would have to overcome the licensing hurdles to allow for an editor in game which let's face it, won't happen
     
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  50. SHINO BAZ

    SHINO BAZ Well-Known Member

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    It will be interesting to see what just trains decides to offer out of gate.Something really new or something mostly just recycled as always.Yea i know this is abit off topic but there the newest comning dlc provider so i'm just hopeful they provide something well new.DTG needs a boost from some where maybe this might be it.
     
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