Personally, i'm not interested in making expert level locos - the amount of access and research required is enormous and that comes up extremely rarely - and if you're not going to do it 100% then why start? In the case of the BR101 they've had just that level of access so it makes perfect sense. I'm excited to see where it goes. Personally, i'd rather be making trains as deep as possible for the majority audience - i'm always looking to see where we can sustainably push things further, but as part of the "normal" offering. Honestly i'd rather have more trains, then fewer but simulated at a level 90% of people won't interact with or understand. As an occasional thing it's cool - but while ringing the bells for expert study level locos, there are more people crying out for more trains and asking why packs dont have more in them. I want to make the base experience richer (and more consistent), not just create some elite locos and dumb down the rest. Matt.
So glad Matt pointed out that the LIRR licensing matter isn’t unique to the USA. Not sure why folks are making it seem that way. I think it’s a fair compromise with the way everything was handled.
Agree 100% Matt. I would rather have something with decent physics but relatively straightforward to drive (not necessarily one handled though ). Back to the flight sim comparison, the only study level aircraft I really got on with was the Level D 767. Real class act and one of the main reasons I still keep FSX about on the PC. Even then, it can get tedious spending 10 minutes copying the flight plan into the FMC before you can set off and taxi out to the runway. But having been stung with a couple of PMDG products, the MD11 and 747, I long decided £60 or more for “expert” level aircraft was not a price worth paying when something from Just Flight or similar would suffice for less than half the price.
Don't worry, Deutsche Bahn will have them retired by 2025. Besides that, stuff like this already happens, people with ill intentions don't need a TSW expert line DLC for that :P
they were supposed to be retired long ago, but private operators mostly helped find new uses for them... and DB as well... cos there is a niche in train services that doesnt require the fanciest of trains but likes the speed and versatility 101 can give... I mean, you dont just throw away a loco that can go 200 kmh and pull long IC/EC trains... as long as you can maintain/repair it, it will find a place
Honestly, I doubt the 101 has much of a future with private EVUs if DB sells them in the first place. While they were designed as universal locos on paper, they never really lived up to that and now they’re run down after more than two decades on heavy duty IC services. Their frames are probably also pretty much done just like with the 120s.
A little older than that - delivery started in 1996, so 28 years in service currently. They rack up so much mileage on IC duty though that 30 years is sort of the expected life span for these locos in Germany. Especially the 120 but also the 101 always had problems with their frames cracking - seems like the frames were a bit too lightly constructed for the heavy loads. Given the general wear and tear and frame issues, they’re not suitable for freight and if you as a private EVU need a 200km/h passenger loco, you likely already got a Siemens Eurosprinter or Vectron. I imagine some of the 101s will stay with DB as a reserve just like 103s did previously for quite some time but by and large, the days of the 101 are numbered. The first couple have already been scrapped, in fact! They won’t reach the 60 service years of a trusty 140 or 110.
I don't think the 101 was ever a "universal loco" in the way the 120 was intended to be. Rather the 101 was a straight-up replacement for the 103 as DB's express passenger locomotive for the Intercity. Ironically, it was Austria which hit on a genuine universal loco, the (German-made) Eurosprinter/Taurus/182; its successor the Vectron would be (IMHO) DB's best bet. Of course, with sectorization no segment of DB actually needs a universal loco.
I thought some of them that have ETCS were kept as rescue locs. like the current ingame Dispolok on KWG. It also wouldn't suprise me if railadventure buys one or two. For freight they will be highly unlikely.
DB has already been selling them. RDC and Train Charter Services have a few 101s each in service now, both in rather fetching blue liveries.
THIS. If what DTG is saying about LIRR's upcoming timetable is true, this could be up there with the totally-insane timetable on London Commuter. Again, the LIRR is the busiest commuter railroad in the United States. Pre-pandemic, MBTA averaged 119,000 commuter rail passengers per day (MBTA May 2019). LIRR comes in at nearly three times that using roughly-similar data (here), claiming pre-pandemic ridership ~315,000 per day. (more stats) So of course, it won't be free content for us if the route is being totally resignalled and with a new train, updated scenery, and a crazy-busy new timetable. LIRR 2.0 could be epic if it's well-executed. Everyone seems to forget that the devs have learned a thing or several about their own toolset since the early versions, too.
Hence why I said on paper. When she was drawn up, there were still talks of possible 160km/h freight trains and using 101s for freight at night. But for obvious reasons, she was never intended to be a true universal loco in-line with the 120, just like you said. I do always find this to be one of the great ironies in German railroading history. Decades were spent trying to construct the elusive universal loco and just when that dream is actually achievable for the first time, DB is split up and they don’t need a universal loco anymore. Good call. I wasn’t aware some hab been sold already.
It's always good to have a bit of innovation so long as the core game remains the same ,as I think as it stands it's a good balance between simulation and accessibility for all players ,though it can never be a bad thing to try new things out
Clearly you have never been to Penn Station at rush hour, even post-pandemic. That place is crazy busy
My guess is that you don't live in NYC or Long Island. The LIRR is still extremely busy. Rush hours on the L.I.R.R is a nightmare with overcrowded trains and still is very busy especially with the opening of Grand Central Madison
The L.I.R.R has 947 trains every day as of 2024. It is still the busiest Commuter Railroad in the United States and very busy
Just out of pure kidding something to compare towards, for our US friends. Departure board of Zürich HB. Timeframe from beginning to end of the board is 36 minutes.
I believe the Peninsula Corridor's code name is "C2C" so just fill the DTG inbox with requests for C2C.
We also have no feedback to the expert loco, yet. The customers don't know what its exact features and associated price tag will be. As stated in the other thread about it, we don't know a lot of things to even get a clear, transparent and undistorted point of view on the manner. It's all just speculation at the moment. While there will be of course enough people interested in an expert loco (including myself) and even people who will buy it regardless of its price tag and features, it all depends on the features and the price tag in the end to at least create my opinion and my will to purchase it. This is something many people seem to forgot and if we all come back to the OP's initial thought, still something which requires testing. Saying "We want more! Give us more!" is just too early. I'm not saying that an expert loco wouldn't sell nor that it won't be the opposite - a number 1 in sales -, but just at this moment in time it's simply too less to say about whether a new product type - the expert loco - will be the thing the majority of the audience is looking for. So, producing locos in the best ratio of quantity to quality is the best for the future I guess, even if the expert loco will become a complete success on its own.
Why is it irrelevant? I'm pointing out that as a frequent user of the L.I.R.R for the past 10 years the railroad is busy and has more services today than in 2021 due to the opening of Grand Central Madison.
Well Penn Station sits at about 1200 daily trains, a number which might drop with the Grand Central link, while Zurich is at 3000.
The point is that the number of services in the 2021 LIRR timetable is the only relevant number here. It's irrelevant because the new LIRR route is based on the 2021 timetable.
OK and... The timetable im 2021 does have less services overall than today but it was still busy back then
Most of the service increase Post GCM is from the Atlantic-Jamacia shuttle. Most lines got about 1-3 or 4 new trains and the diesel branches got none.
Most terminate at basel now, but some still are sceduled to go into switzerland, with a sceduled 45min stop at basel to compensate any delay from DB. If they still dont make it them theyre ofc not allowed in either. Funnily enough direct trains from Switzerland to Germany arent affected from service cuts at basel iirc
Ahh. thought they terminated at Basel Badischer Bahnhof just before the border. but yeah if I see them here coming through Utrecht they do still say Basel.
Stadler Kiss? I thought they had Flirts... even better *drool* ... although I got to admit I would also welcome Westbahn's KISS, either as DB IC2 or Westbahn (Wien-Munchen / Salzburg ...)
I think they definitely would. Caltrain were quite friendly and open when dtg went to record the diesel engines.
Not an apples to apples comparison. New York is served by two terminals that split traffic from four operators -- Zurich has HBF, everything in one place as far as I can tell. Add up all the trains leaving Grand Central for metro north and LIRR and all of the trains leaving Penn Station for NJ Transit, LIRR, and Amtrak, and then it'll be like for like. This is nitpicking though, since either will have an enormous aggregate level of service.
now that is some nice piece of metal \m/ ... is it the "slower" model (vmax 160 kmh) or the faster one (vmax 200 kmh)? 6 or more cars?
Grand Central has the impressive "honour" of having the highest number of platforms of any station while definitely not having anywhere near the highest amount of services.
Grand Central was a former intercity service with services to towns upstate and cities as far as St. Louis but that died and all that’s left is commuter
That is true; however it should also be considered that Zürich is a city of about 430000 people while almost 9 million people live in New York City.
I don't think there is a set line. I think it's clear when developing a train when something has gone beyond easy to understand and entered the realm of complicated. In Train Simulator, AP's packs from ten or more years ago like the Class 142 and 321 were amazingly detailed and very complex when they came out compared to what was the norm at the time. Nowadays, the 321 is considered antiquated and the Class 142 isn't even on sale anymore. AP trains are very easy to set up most of the time, with the standard flow being Shift+W, S, Ctrl+N, Q, W, go. Despite their flaws, the ATS 185 and MPV are significantly more complex and you really do need the manual to drive them, but I don't think that makes the AP trains worse, even if they do have their own problems. When it comes to functionality on paper TSW is roughly where it should be right now, with the exception of functioning Ebula and GSMR, among other things. In practise however, some of the things that have been introduced don't really work properly and that where the issue is - there's no point making something if it doesn't work and too often that is the case. And of course sounds and accuracy are also very important. The white Class 375 is woefully incorrect, the Class 465 has the wrong moquette despite being patched and raised as an issue multiple times, the model and sounds of the Class 37 are not right, the RHTT pack uses the wrong train running for the wrong operator, the Doppelstock coaches sound like shopping trolleys as do most wagons, and I could continue ad nauseum. My recommendation for DTG if they plan on making their own expert line DLC is to get the basics right first before adding advanced functionality.
