As we in the community understand that not everything we want, we get. We know it’s not always solely at the discretion of the folks at DTG, as far as we know. But a couple of examples would be two known American commuter operators, SEPTA and MARC, that don’t seem to be too willing to offer or come to satisfactory terms with license agreements. Here’s the question: Would it be an option to be able to acquire licenses from the manufacturers that have built trains for either MARC or SEPTA and just offer equipment unbranded along with routes that their licensed counterparts run on? I’ve noticed something similar has been done with UK equipment where the trains would be offered along with their respective routes and later offered branding. I’m asking this because in this community, it’s better to have something to represent what we want, than to not have anything at all. Usually best to offer as much content as possible even if branding itself is just the issue, and believe it would be much easier to get licensing from the manufacturers and offer them on or along with routes they run on. And let the community come up with their ability to fill in the blanks. This is certainly been the case with the San Diego/Los Angeles commuter as well as the Miami Commuter dlc. Anything you guys can give some insight/perspective on as far as being able to offer content without branding along with routes?
I certainly go by the logic that something is better than nothing. In this case, it's not really something vs nothing (if DTG can't get branding, they don't just sit around doing nothing, they do something else) and its more like something without branding vs something else with branding. With that in mind, I still think that DTG just defaults to the something else choice far too often, and that many good routes have been left alone due to licensing. As such, I think DTG should consider licensing after considering how good the route itself is. It may be Train Simulator, but the rails themselves are interesting part. (it's not railroad logo simulator!)
As I do believe that licensing is an important part to the simulator (to add to the realism), I do feel bad for the people that want Septa like a I want the LIRR, and they know they can’t get it. DTG could definitely make unbranded content with maybe a mimick of the logo and design and people could change it or pretend that it’s the real thing, that could definitely work well. I believe it’s important for DTG to of course listen to what the people want to some extent, and if it means making unbranded content, they should hop right on it!
By now they know people will produce logos on dlc to help make the experience feel more authentic. So it would be very much the same deal with unbranded dlc. And yes. Even a mock brand will at least be sufficient but they will simplify it to where putting logos on them would be a cinch. I don’t personally know how to do reskins. But I know even the some of the most experienced have trouble with the mapping of the models.
Mapping of models does tend to be very evil. There are reasons why the AC6000CW doesn't have many repaints. Shudders at the thought of AC6000CW mapping. But it seems that quite often unbranded things are designed in a way that makes it look like they were designed branded, then unbranded as an afterthought, so rebranding is ultimately not that hard.
