DTG Protagonist was excellent at raising issues live on the stream (and saying what us players were saying and thinking - no holds barred). No offence to JD, but he’s nowhere near as tough.
When will they start making longer routes now that they have the tech to do so with current gen consoles etc. It's guff they keep Releasing short routes with the price hike
I wrote about this before but recently the streaming strategy has fallen apart. They had very informative and useful streams that kept information flowing between the company and its customers and they were really making efforts to reach out. It feels that ever since the failed previews of TSW3 they have shut this down and only stream when they have something to sell. I appreciate Alex's stream last week where not only was it a let's play stream but he seemed to be streaming from home, hopefully the guideline that streaming should be from the office will be relaxed and also they will do evening streams again as 5pm is very difficult to watch live.
I agree. First BCC and now the Bremen route which, although the price has yet TBC, will probably come in at £30 with no preorder discount. The Niddertalbahn will be an albeit interesting but again short route and it's almost certain whatever Rivet are working on will very unlikely be much over 20 miles. (Happy to be proved wrong). That's why I keep getting drawn back to TSC, from time to time. It seems like their project bucket is now running on empty, after the lengthy routes with the Rush Hour pack and the three which came with TSW3 plus Tharandter Ramp for Germany.
Dtg can't make a 100+km route each time. Even with the improved tools, still a lot of manual labor involved. Autogen can't build everything. Also, depends on the gameplay and the length should be reasonable. I wouldn't want a high speed route that is 10km. A short route can be busy and have a lot of different service patterns. A short route also appeals to people who like shorter runs. I don't want runs to be over an hour each time with is why I rarely okay American freight or other routes cuz I either don't have time to do it in one sitting or I don't have the concentration. Some routes like Harlem required dtg to get the environment correct so it feels like new York which took away a lot of dev time so they couldn't make the full route. If they had, they wouldn't have been able to get the environment correct. So the length also depends on the complexity and how much they can do in the deadlines that are placed.
In an ideal world there should be several teams, one working on a longer project while another works on shorter quicker to produce routes which keep the revenue coming in.
Personally it doesn’t matter to me what time the stream actually starts, I can just replay it YouTube. Okay so you can’t ask live questions, but these days it’s pretty much scripted anyway.
Just a question to date DTG does not offer a pre-order discount for this new line coming out on 06/12/2022??? Sincerely, tof
Pre-order discount? That was always just PC only so maybe in the interest of fairness the discounts have been shelved in favour of a smaller price increase for everyone. I’m sure those affected by this new stealth tax can just not order a coffee at the end of their expensive dinner date to save that £3, safe in the knowledge that their sacrifice is for the benefit of everyone else.
Maybe, but I doubt very much that the elimination of the pre-order discount was done in the interest of fairness. If it was, why not announce that in the forum. That would have been an acceptable reason, even good PR. No, if it really has gone for good, it's a business decision, no doubt.
Then announce specific details on the roadmap when they're finalized, that avoids both issues, problem solved! And before I hear the inevitable "But they can't confirm everything!" reply here's the thing, they don't need to announce every detail on a route right away. If they say made Marias Pass, and weren't sure if they're gonna make it to Glacier Park, Shelby, or wherever, they don't need to list that detail. They could list it on the roadmap like this. Marias Pass: Whitefish to ???, with ES44DC Or alternatively not even list the specific locations, and just list it like this. Marias Pass with ES44DC This would confirm where it's set, and in the former case where they've started building from, while leaving the specific end point (or points) for when they can confirm it. Same applies for locomotives, if they want to have two locos, but can only confirm one, just list the one loco they can confirm. Worth noting that Sherman Hill actually had this happen when it was first put on the roadmap. The SD70ACe was the only engine planned, but the SD40-2 got added later. (Old Roadmap without SD40-2 listed)
It would be interesting to see the economics. I'm going to bet that keeping multiple teams of highly talented graphic and infrastructure designers employed long term is beyond their means. You don't walk into a monster project like this off the street and become competent and experienced with the project in one week. Plus people here whine about the price of the add-ons, another factor that may make them hesitant to pour money into new routes.
This is all stuff ive been curious about aswell. Theres no doubt that TSW dev costs are very high and likely require a very high number of sales to recoup that cost compared to TSC. Without actually knowing the number of active playes and thus the potential number customers. It could be a case of the market cant support the required dev costs for some of the more desired routes at the current pricepoint. Without a substantial increase in price you cant increase your production cost requirering you to sell 400k of something to recoup your investment when your market only has potential sales of 100k. Looking at what DTG make for TSC i dont doubt their desire to make stuff like the WCML in TSW. So what we get is probably a result of economics determining the budget and time they can spend and subsequently the type and quality of product they can produce.
Thank you for the info which if it turns out to be correct I understand it and gladly support it, but is this really the reason??? Sincerely tof
Im sorry but the southern portion of the Harlem line in Manhattan has so many inaccuracies. The Manhattan Skyline is just awful and there are many missing landmarks. Funny how one makes a route short to focus on scenery only to get it wrong in so many ways
Completely agree. Metlife building, Yankee Stadium, overpass for Interstate 95 Cross Bronx Expressway are all missing. It would be cool if the devs could use some actual NYC buildings. In Trainz, there was a tool that allowed for conversion of buildings from Sketchup using Google Earth imagery. I am not sure if something like this would be possible in Train Sim World but it would be cool if we had more accurate buildings
I honestly wish DTG would focus on some unique buildings on these routes, various routes are missing iconic structures and it just makes em plain and bland.....
