I'll caveat this first with the following: I know there's no real analogue in railways for small, private companiies providing passenger or cargo services like there is in the airline business, but... I wondered, listening to the Roadmap stream yesterday, when hearing about the API section whether or not there was now the opportunity for some kind of external career mode built on elements of in-game activity? For example, the external career mode (there are plenty of these available for MS Flight Simulator, so for an example, search up OnAir) might be: Simulating a train driving career, beginning with training, before moving onto certification with specific trains, getting "hired" for specific routes, etc. And then you have choices about where that career takes you (probably with some willing suspension of disbelief with different periods, etc) Maybe some kind of private enterprise could exist, even if it's not particularly realistic, where you start a company and buy your own rolling stock, which is then hired out to operators (and you can either drive yourself, or hire NPC staff, etc). I'm sure there are many other smarter ideas than these, but you get the point. Of course, this wouldn't be of much interest to some folks here, which is great and I acknowledge, but based on the popularity of "career/business building" modes or apps for other simulators, I think there'd be a solid appeal. Thoughts?
interesting idea you got there it might be possible an external career rewarding point or some sort of Train Sim World Ladder system aka an Ranking System should be doable? even a site like Home - TSW Tracker could maybe use the api to collect data?
I've been reading through the API spec and set things up to enable it on my installation. First, I'll say this: the documentation is incredibly thin, and the data available is very large. Exploring what data is available is only possible while the app is running, which is why I set it up to listen on all interfaces, so I can use a separate PC for data collection. Next, the first thing I thought was to do something similar to what trucksbook does for ETS2/ATS. In case you're not familiar with it: - each player signs up for an account on trucksbook.eu - start the client app on your PC - start the game on your PC with the API enabled - play as usual (timetable services, scenarios, tutorials) - the TB client collects information about your trips (obviously, this depends on whether this data is available through the API or not). For example: for each service completed, it could collect total distance driven, AP collected (with the breakdown for bonuses for using safety systems, timing, and stopping accuracy, and penalties for speeding), and so on. The TB has a Premium feature that collects geo data as well, so you can see your location on the map. - on the TB website, you can start your own "company" where other players can join; there are standings for "companies" (total kms driven) and for individual players, where you can compare yourself against others. I would love to spend some time and resources on something like this. First, I will explore the data available through the API, to see what can be collected.
