I want to bring something up respectfully, based on what Matt explained about route suggestions, accuracy, and how the community should present proposals. Players have been following the detailed format he laid out — explaining why a route is fun, what makes it unique, the stock it needs, what era fits, and how to scale it realistically. The community has posted hundreds of well-structured suggestions that follow those exact guidelines. But the recurring concern is that none of these suggestions ever seem to be acknowledged or visibly reviewed, which makes the process feel one-sided. There’s no feedback loop from DTG on: whether suggestions were seen, which ones were passed on internally, or which ideas helped influence a release. Even a brief “we’ve noted this” or an occasional acknowledgment on threads would go a long way. Rolling Stock Accuracy Concerns Another issue that keeps coming up — and ties directly into why suggestions matter — is the amount of rolling stock reuse happening. A recent example is the newly released Sante Fe Gameplay Pack where the Dash 8 modeled for Santa Fe appears to be a direct copy-and-paste of the CSX version, despite Santa Fe’s units having noticeable differences in: body details, cab features, paint/lighting variations, equipment configurations. This isn’t about nitpicking — it gives the impression that content is being reused without proper adaptation, which makes it feel more like a quick cash grab than the effort to deliver accurate, high-quality models the players expect. What makes this more frustrating is that the community constantly highlights these differences in their suggestions. People break down exactly what’s unique about specific locomotives and why they matter. But when releases reuse trains with minimal changes, it feels like that feedback is being ignored entirely. The Real Ask This isn’t meant as a complaint — it’s a genuine request for clarity: How are suggestions and community feedback being used internally, especially when it comes to route accuracy and rolling stock differences? The community is more than willing to help DTG get things right. We just want to know: Is our detailed input being seen? Is it being considered? And how can the suggestion process be more transparent? This can continue to be a great game just need to get it right here Thanks for taking the time to read this. The players care about the game — that’s why we’re asking.
It is rare if at all for DTG to respond directly to suggestions. I guess part of that is they don’t want to give either false hope or crushing disappointment to those posting. Part is they probably already have a two or three year plan of content they intend to build sketched out (though the suggestions may be of use to third parties). Finally it’s primarily an echo chamber to keep ideas and suggestions out of the other main forum areas.
If they commented on a suggestion, then everyone would get their hopes up that said suggestion will come, only to disappoint themselves and rant about it.
Plus you'd get people demanding a comment because their suggestion deserved it, then ranting when they don't get one. Best to take it that DTG's comment is "thank you very much, we'll note how much it hits the LAMPOIL for future reference".
