General North American 3rd Party News

accurately describes the current state of US locomotive and rolling stock DLC sold through Steam, plus you forgot to add 'forget' since yet another look alike GP or SD type of locomotive doesn't add much to the overall picture ...

but it is sort of surprising apart from Searchlight Simulations porting over Jointed Rail rolling stock, no other independent third parties have tried to get themselves a position in the USA market?

poked around in the file structure to give the locomotive proper AAR Type-F tightlock couplers, typical of passenger engines and an independent cabview linked to the proper texture sheet, only to find those grab irons on the top of the nose aren't modeled

 

Oh No! The horror.

 

LOL, Schnauz's verbal description of RWA's mods and their 'policy' is quite correct after all.

Still, it is a pity this beautiful locomotive isn't modeled as accurate as it could have been, another chance missed to get it right first time.

 

A freebie and yet whining and moaning. I repeat wash rinse and repeat. It must be nice to create nothing and complain about everything.

 

I wouldn't waste your time with Buzz, it's just a waste time, since you are apparently not allowed to give any criticism to any released content, no matter how bad it is.

 

An excellent and free model is available here: https://www.dsgddr.com.br/
Modifications to it: https://www.trainsimcommunity.com/m...s/i2196-atsf-2900-performance-and-light-patch
and: https://www.nyctarailfan.com/fan-railer-railworks-dlc-mods/dsgddr-simulations-at&sf-2900

This big 4-8-4 ran along the F and PA units pulling Santa Fe's passenger and fast mail trains, so it also could really use those heavyweight head end cars and streamlined coaches etc.

 

You miss my point completely. This public navel gazing nit picking rivet counting accomplishes nothing except to discourage creators from presenting anything to the community. Just to make myself clear things that I find to be a problem of accuracy I report to the individual privately via message of some sort courteously . I find almost all to be friendly and co-operative when approached in this way.

 

and what good has your courteous private messaging achieved? Most of DTG's, DTM's full price USA content of the past years is still as broken as when it was released, and the quality trend isn't even improving ...
wash-rinse-cut-copy-paste-repeat since enough fawning RWA fanbois still buy anything at face value
the only way to break this cycle is to point out those glaring errors right after release, here, on Steam and everywhere (apart from Buzz's board that is), refund your Steam purchase and perhaps buy the DLC again at a discount later when and if the errors have been corrected and you still really want it

 

Whatever. I have dealt with many other creators other than DTM and found the same thing to be true. As far as RWA we encourage all constructive criticism just don't appreciate rude negative snotty remarks. I still recommend you get a lot more response by private contact than public rivet counting otherwise known as gotcha stuff.

 

There's been a lot of constructive and well reasoned criticism concerning DTM's flawed products, and a payware developer must deal with such (See what happened after the forum uprise on Skyhook's MML for TSW - they are dealing well with the community now.) That's one purpose of a public forum. I'm not sure why you're acting as an advocate for DTM, dismissing everything that was shown as being seriously wrong as "rivet counting".

 

Since there is so much anti RWA rubbish spouted here I won’t bother telling you that G-Trax have released a New Haven liveried PA, using the B&A loco as base, into the RWA library.

 

Thanks John.

 

As usual on this forum with almost everyone you are just talking past me not to me. For starters I am not a advocate for DTM. I was and am trying to make constructive comment about how I think suggestions, comments, criticism should be handled, that being by contacting creators directly instead of publicly. Take this for what it's worth or not. I think I have said all I have to say on this subject.

 

It would appear that the PA1s were put into service without the grab irons on the nose. These were retro fitted by the individual customers where they wanted them so if DTM had fitted them they would probably been in the "wrong" place.

 

News on Machine Rails IC 1500 Class:
https://www.machine-rail.com/post/machine-rail-s-is-in-full-steam


In addition, there will be some Freight Cars included for this loco.

 

G-Trax's next free ALCo PA on RWA, this time in SP Daylight:
https://railworksamerica.com/index....nt&id=4170:alcopa-sp&catid=18:engine-repaints


(Also requires the B&A route to make it work)

 

nice, but somehow a most important detail doesn't match up ...


seems the SP plow is much more curved backwards under the nose, closing the gap between the pilot and lead truck

also, none of the locomotives have the drop shadow texture.

 

Have you reported this to Rick or are you just into another "gotcha"?

 

"a most important detail doesn't match up" As in number of axles? What you spotted might be incorrect, but exaggerating its importance won't increase your enjoyment or that of others. Be objective, they are minor errors. All models have them.

 

If it wasn't a 3rd party FREE repaint I would expect the smaller details to be more accurate, but they are passable for now.

The paint itself however needs a bit of touch up to the colors

 

The first of IC Rolling Stocks from Machine Rails

 

Wow! Those look goooooood!

 

Now with additional loads & unloaded

 

A new teaser from Milepost for their next route.

EDIT: Alot of fingers point to DRGWs Tennessee Pass.

 

Bernard Deschamp has released the RGS Goose #7.
Can be found here for free: http://deschamp-bernard.chez-alice.fr/content2.htm


Schnauzahpowahz's overview of it.

 

Damn that's some impressive attention to detail

 

Thanks for this - will also check railsim.fr for his routes.

 

As usual with Schnauz review lots of word salad not much content unless you are unfamiliar with with the Goose.

 

Schnauzahpowahz ^

 

I ended up purchasing the RIo Grande Southern route just to run this in it's "native" environment. I must say this is insanely great quality and attention to detail for Freeware, heck, this beats many payware products

 

So, for some reason DTG never posted this in the Live Article chat, but Machine Rail's Western Maryland H-9 2-8-0 will be released on steam (Probably next week)
https://live.dovetailgames.com/live/train-simulator/articles/article/steam-era-workhorse

 

The loco has been available since August in more than one form. It's a good one (in all its variations).

 

Not much content lol - sounds like your paints.

What would you like to see extremely sour & unwise one?

 

How about you stop the personal attacks and insults?

 

Pot and kettle.

 

There are people who don't buy content unless it's on steam so the news is for them. Still odd DTG still hasn't posted anything about it.

 

The difference here is that there are included rolling stock and scenarios. If you purchased from Machine Rail directly it only came with the 3 versions of the locomotive no rolling stock or scenarios.

 

How about a RWA video review of the latest products for the US market? Independent, detailed, respectable, constructive, praiseworthy?

It needs to surpass the superlative HIS announcements, so it needs to be hyperlative in praising the next cut-copy-paste-rinse'nrepeat EMD or GE lookalike locomotive. Note there are still some gaps, FT, F2, E5, SD24, GP38, SD38, a whole lot of U-boats, not even mentioning the long gone makers like ALCo, FM, Baldwin?

Plus it will be nice to hear the voice of RWA's little dictator, and in what accent he speaks and the fluency and vocabulary used, because to non-US ears, Schnauz does sound very american, southern if I am correct.

Apart from all this fun and not so fun stuff,

why is the USA market so poorly served with DLC of the same quality, while the UK is having and still getting seriously good stuff by and/or enhanced by the likes of Caledonian, VictoryWorks, Armstrong Powerhouse, BMG, GA, VP, even JustTrains or god forbid ATS?

Yes, the US geography is more varied, a typical route has several times more mileage than UK or Europe, but settlements, stations and industries are sparse and far in between and the rolling stock is very uniform nowadays.
Most of TSC's original Kuju freight and passenger cars are ancient, bare models, and what has been added of late often looks like upscaled "N' scale toy models with those 10 inch wide wheels, or ported over from MSTS with crude details and poor textures.

To go with those PA units of which there are now five, a nice set of heavyweight head end, express and pool coaches, diners, sleepers, some observation cars with markers in the paint schemes and carrying the drumheads of those name trains of the fifties. Add some streamlined coaches, sleepers or observation cars for pool service in the lesser trains the PA's often were assigned to, and you have a winner DLC.
There are still some excellent paint schemes outstanding, like DRGW, Pennsylvania, Erie, Wabash, Nickel Plate Road
I'll gladly pay for those instead of yet another poorly executed look alike DTM or TBT

 

You never give up do you?

 

Then neither do you
Thank you for proving my point

 

I have a few theories, feel free to yay or nay.
1., UK has busy passenger stuff while US less so. Thus the target audience, particularly paying customers is different.
2., UK keeps trying new classes, also visually, while US trains are relatively identical and mass produced.
3., UK is small and like much of EU, public transport is viable. In the US, it's all about cars, big thanks to geography.
4., Heritage stuff I don't follow enough, but US steam is way bigger and complicated.
5., US railroads are allergic to cab rides, behaving exactly like the USSR, protecting their infrastructure from spying. (Might be the next point actually. A few decades ago some routes were released on VHS, forgot the creator. But seriously, the only one cab ride I ever saw is CP on Kootenay.)
6., US is a country of lawyers and other greedy folks, resulting in lots of licensing troubles.
7., Not entirely sure how it compares but route building might be a little more difficult as the environment is more diverse. Scenery, flora, houses... UK routes feel like dime a dozen in comparison.

Consequently, what was available was a bunch of fictional stuff (All Aboard), a couple big cooperative railroads (UP, Amtrak, NS, CSX), some nice tries which ended up removed (such as Portland Terminal) and a myriad of free reskins, partially invalidating payware attempts.

 

6. For sure.

 

...

 

Western Maryland H-9 Class is out now on Steam. https://store.steampowered.com/app/...tern_Maryland_H9_Class/?curator_clanid=958135

 

Ugly, and inconsistent headlight flares emulating a camera star effect filter again (which on top of that looks wrong when viewed from an angle). He'll never learn. DTM seems to refuse taking advice, and I'm refusing to give him my cash.

Wash-rinse-repeat.

 

You're an tad bit late https://forums.dovetailgames.com/threads/tsc-wild-mary-steam-h9-class-out-now.70843/

 

Soooo what has that got to do with the price of fish as my post was posted in the General North American Third Party News.

 

More progress from Milepost.

 

D&RGW perhaps?