Upcoming Release Master The West Midlands!

That's relegated to a sale then. Sorry DTG you just priced yourself out of the train sim market. Short route, one train, you ask too much - not even a preorder discount to sweeten the hike.

 

JD posted this in Announcements:

____________________
Birmingham Cross-City release date update:
After reviewing the most recent build of the route overnight, we need a little more time to iron out a couple of lighting issues that the team have identified.

Whilst we are confident in providing a fix, as it is so close to release it does mean we need a couple of extra days to implement and test it ahead of submitting it to the respective platforms.

As a result, we will be delaying the release of the route by a couple of days, and moving the preview stream to next week.

This means:

• Pre-order remains live today on Steam (and is available for pre-purchase now)
• Release will move from Tuesday 15th to Thursday 17th November
• The live stream preview for the route will now be Tuesday, 15th November, at 17:00 UTC

Thanks for your understanding. We want to ensure the finished product is as good as it can be, and the extra time will allow us to sort the issues we’ve seen today.

 

It's a no new dlcs day from today for me.

 

I think it is still £25 for the DLC alone which is about right surely?

 

Actually, I think the reverse- would you rather they went "Well, there are bugs in it but what the hell, we'll release as is"?

 

see above, it’s £29.99 either way.

 

It's just an absolute joke to be honest, why not use the additional time to add a damn depot to the route? It's less than 4 miles... Why was it not even considered? I seriously do not get this at all, even the sounds were reproduced there. Literally every bit of reference detail could have been sourced, especially if your source person (Daisy) works on the route. Why oh why on earth??

 

No it's not. Just called the product up on Steam and it is showing as the image above - £29.99 for either the starter pack or the DLC alone.

 

48 hours to build a depot?

 

It would appear not... something about lighting apparently.

Anyhow still not worth £30.

 

It's been postponed today so I'd take that as 9 days?

Price increase but offering less, can't go above and beyond?...

 

I get the feeling DTG we’re a little surprised with the feedback regarding this route and may have stalled to further polish and hopefully add a bit extra in.. maybe not.

I’m so glad MSFS 40th Anniversary edition is out on Friday. I’ll be keeping myself entertained with the study level Airbus A310, that’ll pass the time for me and if the BCC doesn’t peak my interest then it’ll definitely be a sale purchase.

 

Still, I don't think 9 days is enough. Not only do you have to model it with all the assets, textures, lighting, whatever but the timetable might need to be modified to add the services in. And they all need to go through testing to make sure nothing breaks and everything works so it would definitely take longer than 9 days. And who knows, maybe they haven't even built the track at all, requiring more work to create it and the depot.

 

One of these days you may actually post a happy post these forums. Every time I see your name it’s you complaining about something

 

Fully get that, though it has been announced roughly 1 week ago and many comments on the forum and Facebook have stated that this should be implemented. I am sure Cathcart circle has a depot around the same(ish) distance, just can't understand the flaw in why this was excused from the route.

 

where have they said the delay is to include the depot. You’re just speculating at this point. Did you even read the article.

 

It's my local route, so obviously I will be vocal. Sorry for the inconvenience. (I also work in customer services and rarely, if at all get complaints regarding my personality or service)

 

it’s every new product you appear and all you do is complain over and over again.

 

I was more referring to the comments that claimed a depot would come in 48 hours. Not for the right comment but just saying that it would take a long time to include a depor

 

It's hard not to complain about this no? We are getting one of the shortest routes in ages for a higher price. Getting less for more is not something to celebrate is it? If they'd included a second train or made significant improvements to the usual sparse scenery often seen in TSW routes, then a price increase would be justified, but as things stand, no, it's not.

 

My best advice is not to retaliate to my replies as it is heading off topic. I am not alone in my view regarding my query and disappointment. We will always agree to disagree but it is something, (an issue) that many other users of this Simulator are finding hard to understand, as to why a depot for your flagship EMU has been missed, when it's depot is within an acceptable distance of the main route itself. Plus the price surge on top of this.

 

DTG routes have been 24,99 for years and years. When everything else has gone up in price over the years they have kept prices the same. Inflation has gone sky high recently so obviously they have had no choice but to increase costs for this route. Is it something they wanted to do probably not but have had no choice I imagine.
It’s amazing how we can all spent hundreds and thousands on computers and hardware etc but when it comes to paying for software they will give us hours of enjoyment oeople complain.
I wonder how much money people spend on a night out on alcohol or cigarettes it’s amazing they never complain about costs rising on those and just accept and pay

 

Fully appreciate your reply and respect that we have mouths to feed, bills, energy etc.

However, with the growing amount of criticism on the forum regarding the depot being missing and an increase in price of DLC, I would have thought yourself, or another member of your company (as a representative) may have gone to the board to at least try to consider including the depot into your route. I wish I could find a valid reason (except time) as to why this wasn't included, but I am struggling. Ultimately, to increase a price of a DLC, which seemingly will be one of the shortest, a 4 mile 'relevant' extension, would not be too inconvenient to add onto this, even if we had to wait for a patch which would then add this on at a later date..

 

When TSW1 debuted five years ago a AAA game release cost $40 in the US. Today they are $60, if not $70

 

SO DTG going to pay their staff with Gummy bears and Oreos now are they?
They also have overheads as well as you and me. Everything is going up in price and yes you will have to make that decision on whether to buy or not.
As for Soho Depot It wasnt in the TSC version, yes it could have gone in they chose not to. Its just something you have to deal with.

Hentis

 

I know I am probably alone on this but I am not concerned about spending £30 as I am sure plenty of blood, sweat and tears have gone into making this route but I think the main issue, for me at least, is that I have been left in the dark about the price, up to now, and going into the future it may be better just to announce the price of the route, whether it be £25 or £30, in the announcement article of the route so everyone knows where they stand from the get go.

 

It's irrelevant if it was or wasn't included in an old, outdated version of a simulator. It's how you move forward with the times. We were issued new routes recently that equate to between 75-90 miles of track, so to see routes being released with lesser miles makes me feel we are back to the old times again. It isn't something that should be dealt with because if you don't stand your ground now, it will never happen and in all fairness, this is a make or break to some people, on whether they choose to purchase this route at all, or wait for a sale. Try to work with me, it would be a better addition that a missed one.

It is the principal of a price increase, I am not saying they shouldn't increase the cost but go above and beyond.

 

Price increase was probably overdue tbh, but once again the communication is very lacking. They should have made it clear when TSW3 launched that this would be the standard price going forward (if it is actually the standard, since they said subsequently they'd evaluate each release's pricing case-by-case, which just adds confusion).

Obviously a 2 day delay isn't a big deal but once again (after the leak of the route itself) they don't have messaging ready to go and have to scramble when the delay goes public on Steam.

 

I mean it could have been worse..... You could have had this BCC route as an official TSW 3 release route instead of SEHS....

Hentis

 

Ultimately it doesn't matter how much blood and sweat has gone into this, it's still a short route with one train (and no depot ). Everyone's perception of value will be different - if they were asking £30 for Euston to Birmingham or Carlisle to Glasgow I would hand over the money in a heartbeat. Probably happy to pay £34.99 for a route like that.

I am not anti DTG and know there are costs and usually happy to support them. But a line has to be drawn. Just hope that the number of people keeping their wallets firmly in their pockets on this one, will be sufficient to force a rethink. Do you want 5000 sales at £25 or 2000 at £30? (With the remainder drifting in at £15 in six months or a year when the thing is discounted in a sale)?

 

Potentially that could have been the case and guess what, as a Game Pass user this would have been free. But it is not and therefore if I am to purchase at a higher rate for a shorter route, I am making a statement regarding the inclusiveness of a depot which is, in hindsight, fundamental to the route.

 

Hmmmmm maybe PC releases were $40, but $60 has been the AAA standard for console releases since at least the 360/PS3 era, until the recent increase to $70 by some publishers.

 

I remember when you could buy a triple A rated came for £10.99!
We had it so much easier back in the day!

 

Costs have been going up for a long time. It’s clear DTG planned to up the prices permanently once TSW 3 came out, maybe they should have announced their intentions beforehand to soften the blow and reduce the backlash from some people.

 

let’s hope you never try flight simulation then if you think £30 is expensive for dlc steer clear of flight sim.

 

$60 CAD after taxes for 1 DLC add-on is not "fair".

 

and I can get a flight, that is ~2000KMs (Toronto to Winnipeg in this example), for $10 more than a train simulator addon.

Maybe the price increase isn't justified?

 

But then again, what if the route you want is really poor quality and only includes 1 train and nothing else lol. There will be routes that are more worth the price we have to pay for but quality does not always equal the price.

 

Well obviously it would depend on the exact circumstances, guess the point I was making is for this sort of price I expect to see a lot more for my money than BCC. If it had added more of the West Midlands network - Coventry, Wolverhampton, Walsall or Worcester then yes £30 would have been a fair price.

 

Looks fantastic from the screenshots on the recent timetable/layers thread.

I am intrigued to know if they would layer in the 7-8 car GWR HST on an hourly service because what we could do then is reskin it with XC/NMT livery and then would make it extremely interesting!

DTG Alex DTG JD Joethefish please can this be done,I will be happy then and never complain ?! (Big promise)

 

WTH…. 36 euros on Steam?!! *Facepalm moment*
Time to change hobby perhaps? Bad timing as I’m building a new PC.

 

For context about the pricing, over at ATS, there's a freakout that Texas might cost $17.99 rather than the standard $11.99.

 

At the rate I paid this week, £30 would get me a little over 16 litres of Shell VPower for my car, and that will almost certainly entertain me for less time than the BCC route, even with only one train. What you've already dismissed as a disappointingly short, sale-fodder route is still over an hour (of varied scenery) from end to end and that doesn't factor in layers, RHTTs or potential future DLC. With inflation as it is, an extra fiver is hardly an outrage after years of stable pricing.

 

well unfortunately for me I have to fund this route from my You Tube donations (which isnt alot) as I am an unpaid full time carer* and the money from the government is LOVE.

Hentis

*24/7 carer I add. Not just 9 - 5

 

Entirely up to you old bean, everyone has their own notion as to what represents value for money and what doesn't. As it stands, the need to have this particular route (when I already own it and barely touched it in TSC) means I will quite happily wait for 50 or 60% off in a sale just as I'm doing for Harlem, Lubeck etc. etc.

 

Personally I also don't feel like there is enough in the route to warrant the £30. But I'll still watch the preview to see how it handles. Potentially pick it up on a sale in the future

 

Really hope this isn’t the case. NTP and TVL are two of the best UK routes, the older BR diesels are more interesting to drive than the plastic modern units of today, especially the BR Class 101 with it’s gear changing. Not diesel but Spirit of Steam is one of the best selling TSW routes, 2nd to SEHS according to Matt on a previous stream. So there is an audience for historical content.

The UK content will get very boring, very fast if they only do modern content.