Kickstarter {for routes that haven't been made yet} I recently wrote a suggestion where rail fans outside of DTG get some funding together and launch our own venture. Pay programmers and coders. We could get skilled Japanese people who live in the area to collect details for the route. Those in the kickstarter would get the route for free. Those who put in more than the standard $50 would get a say on the next route. It will be separate from DTG and we would just need to contact them when for the development team to get access to the tools to make the routes. Since I havent heard back from DTG yet, let's have a discussion. Hopefully Matt or someone can chime in and give us some advice or at least let us know if they will correspond/aid with developers to help get the route made. There is Skyhook games and maybe another one or two private developers? Not only for a Japanese suburban route but could be done for Australia and other countries too.
Another thing to consider are licenses since that can't create trains, liveries, route without a license. But it would definitely be useful for certain parts of development
Not a huge fan of Kickstarter (been burned in the past) and $50 certainly at the current exchange rates (virtually GBP£1 to USD$1 thanks to our useless government) far too high an amount.
Dtg have said they aren't going to create unlicensed content. I would rather have a real train than an unbranded one so it feels more realistic.