Both on sale and I’m looking to pick one up. Maybe both if I am in a good mood. I know DRA has way more services and layers than DCZ but it’s a matter of can my gen 8 console (for now) handle it ?
How big are the sales. Both are pretty decent. I like DRA better simply cuz of the variety. You get multiple locos and service patterns. All I know is that you will have 2 separate timetables. One with the ice and one without cuz the ice is a resource hog and was causing crash issues. I play on pc so idk what the performance is like and stuff. DCZ is also decent. More on the quiet side. Very scenic, twisty, steep, tilting train. Idk what ai traffic gen 8 users get on dresden. Both routes do have some issues people have reported in the past but I have yet to experience them, but then again, I rarely play tsw so idk if there are still issues or not.
jack travers What Xbox do you own? DRA had an ugly memory problem ob Xbox One and Xbox Series S (and some Xbox Series X owners complaint about it, too) which causes crashes around Dresden Mitte, but for me they are gone on my Series S since one of the last updates. DTG never told what they did to prevent this, maybe it happened by chance and will come back sometime? Who knows, keep fingers crossed! But beside this I must admit that DRA is my favourite DLC in TSW. The variety of routes is very cool, you have different destinations to travel to, like of cause Dresden, but also Riesa Hbf, Riesa freight terminal, Großenhain, Meissen. Two different track layouts for the Dresden - Riesa route. A lot of AI traffic, especially if you own other German DLCs and trains. And it is very challenging if you like to go with PZB enabled, because there are three different signal systems implemented, like HV, Hf and KS. Some GPAs, too and because of the high rate of AI traffic you really have to be aware of the signals. Quite cool. The drawbacks in my opinion are the much too dark tracks by night (going with the ICE 3 by night is nearly impossible) and those inconsistencies like on the Dresden - Meissen Route where are stopping points after Coswig station which you need to hit precisely. DCZ is cool because of the BR 612 which is very challenging to drive. In my opinion much closer to a car than every other train. And going downhill with 140 km/h and the tilting system enabled is really thrilling. If you like going with the BR 442 Talent 2 you will like the track as well. But it is not very challenging in terms of signals, especially with the BR 612 because you don’t need to take care of them while the tilting system is enabled. Biggest drawback is the badly implemented timetable for the DoSTos and BR 143 with no destination times displayed for most of the stations. But you can‘t use them anyway if you don‘t own the corresponding DLCs, so that might not be important for you. My advice is to buy DRA first and DCZ sometimes later if you can afford it. I play DRA much more often than DCZ because of its variety and due to the reason that I find it very stressful at some days to drive the 612.
I would say dresden-riesa, bigger timetable, more variety of trains, 2 branch lines and an ICE and regional line running parralel to each other. I play dresden-riesa on xbox one s and I'll say the performance is good enough although it get's a bit slow near dresden.
Maybe then DCZ would be the better choice because DRA needs a lot more resources. And I don‘t know how DRA currently behaves on Xbox One in terms of the crashes. It was nearly unplayable heading towards Dresden Hbf back then when I owned an Xbox One. It always crashed. As I mentioned it is currently ok on Series S, although it is lightly stuttering at some points near Dresden Hbf. But not too serious.
Like most of the comments I agree with DRA. I have them both. If you're afraid of performance issues I have to say that it probably doesn't really matter which DLC to choose, because both of them have Dresden Hbf. I played it very short on the xbox one (the old one) and can't remember any stuttering at all. I later on switched to Xbox Series S and I only get some slow moving screen (no stuttering) when I set it on 4K so for that reason I play on UHD. But both DRA and DCZ are my favourite routes, with DRA as number one.
Both are fantastic routes, and recommend the two if you can. But, being honest, I'd recommend DCZ over DRA. Why? Well, DCZ is very exciting to drive with all the twists and turns as well as gradients (great if you like MSB or RSN) in comparison to DRA. Regarding rolling stock, while DRA wins by far with the plethora of different locos, DCZ makes up with the unique BR 612 which has become one of my favourite locos, it offers a completely different experience for passenger services compared to the other German routes - also another bonus is that with the new Bremen route, the BR 612 is layered into the timetable if you have DCZ, so another consideration. Finally, I'm not sure how much of a difference there would be on Gen 8, but around Dresden there is a lot more AI traffic on DCZ in comparison to DRA.
