Having just finished watching the first preview stream for South Eastern Highspeed I must say I am extremely dissapointed with the outcome. Firstly I would like to start with the route building, the foliage seemed quite well executed in some places, which is a step up from previous routes. However, there is a very obvious lack of any fences at all anywher on the route yet there are little light boxes that can be turned on and off? Come on DTG. Not to mention there are ereas that are completely inacurate, the main offender being whatever that tunnel was at Lomdon St. Pancras on the CTRL lines. The old Station at Rochester was also a mess with the yellow lines being basically freshly painted on a station that has been closed for 5 years and is now full of plants. Hoo junction look very empty as expected but that does not mean you can miss out buildins next to it. And the last thing is the track ballast, which is completely wrong and has nothing to do with HS 1 track ballast. There were also a few floating Assets and a hole or two in the tunnel, but I trust DTG will be able to fix that before release. Next up is the lighting, while that has always been a bit of a difficult topic for TSW this route had massive problems. I must note that this was indeed on a devbuild so the lighting is not final, but I will mention the problem regardless. The whole route was way too dark, and about the only place which should be dark at Chatham is way to bright. the transition into the tunnel is awful and Stratford International suffers from the darkness more than anywhere else. Now on to the biggest problem for me personally, the timetable. One of the best features in TSW is the 24 hour service mode. It allows anyone to pick any service on the route and drive it from end to end, before then leaving that train and looking for another service to drive. However in SEHS said service mode is a joke. The Class 395, whixh is definately supposed to be the main train for the route only has 59 services. Which is less than half of what one would find on the real route at over 160 services, that is not only really disapointing it is also laughable for a route that is literally next to DTGs office. One of the reasons this Timetable is so sparse is the fact that the low level platforms at Ebbsfleet International are NOT accesible in any way, which I find extremely surprising. Adding those plaforms would massively increase the drivable services of the route and would make it a much more enjoyable experience, especially for those who enjoy driving along as a passenger. It seems like the TT used was the COVID-Timetable which, if true, is absolutely unexplainable. We now get to the actual point of this post, I strongly recommend that DTG delays the release of this route by a few weeks to allow for all these things to be adjusted, fixed or overhauled. Especiall the Timetable need a big update and the extra time would not only allow for that, but also give the Route Builders some time to fully implement the lower level platforms. It would also allow someone to come in and add the much needed fences across the route and add some detail in places where it was extremely obvious that they haven't been touched since the autogen tool was used at the start of development. This would also give the sound artist/s some more time to implement the sound for the Class 395, considering the fact that they have less than two week and stressing this would have a negative effect on the product. Lastly the lighting issues could be attended to, and any mistakes that appear when baking it can be fixed. I really hope DTG listen to the community and take the delay into comnsideration becausw what we have seen today was not up to the standards many of us expect from DTG.
Because a Developement build that is two weeks away from release will not be changed in enough ways to fix any of the problems mentioned. The stream was very dissapointing to a lot of people, I am not only speaking for myself, and seeing a few of the larger problems beinf fixed would defenitely be appreciated.
Realistically there are a couple of minor issues with the route, as there are with all routes. They are not going to delay the release for anything that has been complained about so far, as most of it is as they intended it to be, or are the general complaints about TSW2 that aren’t specific to this route. I hope this trend of members of the community demanding releases are delayed doesn’t continue. Everything gets released with a certain number of bugs and they are sometimes very slow to be addressed but delaying a release is only going to happen for something major. There isn’t anything major stopping the release of this just like there wasn’t anything major with LGV. They are not going to change the timetable. 59 services might seem like a low number for the 395 but on SKA the ICE 3M ran only once every two hours in each direction, so for the equivalent train type, the 395 has its fair share of services. The low level platforms at Ebbsfleet are on a different route essentially. Keeping the services that stop there off the timetable is no real loss to the player and will have been done for a reason, possibly planned loco DLC on the depicted route for the future. TSW routes are just not very busy. The core of the game can’t handle it. Delaying the route until the core is able to handle a lot more traffic would be a very long wait indeed.
You've got a point, but GWE had more than twice as many services and that route is a few years old now. So I don't believe the core would struggle with a more realistic amount of services. The lack of fences and the low amount of services maes the route feel very rushed and delaying the route would help with that. An update would of course work just as well, but DTG have proven time and time again that that won't happen. Having thought about it I realize that delaying the route isn't quite necesary but it would be great to see some of these issues fixed as the route is clearly not finished.
Honestly, I do think the route should be delayed. There were too many things that we seen during that stream of the route that were questionable. A Build that is 2 Weeks away from release should not look like this, and with them having only 2 weeks until release, I just don't see them fixing much of anything from now until release. About the Sound: Why does the 395 sound like a 377? I know they said that the sounds aren't done on the 395, so they might just be replacement sounds for now, but it just doesn't sound right. Also, the 375 has no differences in sound to the 377, even after it was pointed out by the community that the 377's sound was missing some higher tones.
Yes I knwo what you mean, and the route isn't finished. But in the grand scheme of things they can't justifiy delaying the route like this. According to the steam chat a lot of people are very happy with it, and DTG have to consider that delaying a route would annoy anyone who doesn't care about the mistakes and/or pre ordered.
Well, I hope they make the right decision (whatever they think that is), when they're debating whether or not to delay it. Steam chat may not have had an issue with that, that's them. A "small" portion of people who may not be on the forums, or anywhere else. But us, here on the forums, the TSW subreddit, and other places are all noting the various issues with the route. Some of these issues are major and need to be adressed.
i think the fact that they have included the services to the lower level ebbsfleet platforms as undriveable AI isnt good, and the route would greatly benefit from those services being driveable in timetable mode
You are less likely to hear positive feedback. Southern trains run on time 57.5 % and within 5 minutes 82.7%. Yet you don't hear any praise without people being surprised. 57.5 % isn't amazing but it doesn't reflect in comments with more that 50% of people complaining about Southern Rail being late, no one being positive sometimes.
Well said you cannot blame DTG if people still got old equipment the facts speak for themselves that the new consoles perform better than the old DTG cannot be blamed for that
Yes, the route would massively profit from having the lower lever platforms at Ebbsfleet. Not only from a driving standpoint but also from a passenger one as a lot of people like driving around the route as a passenger. Sam did say they could add them in later, which basically translates to it's not going to happen.
But are they really undrivable or do these services just donˋt appear in the timetable? There are many services on almost every Route you canˋt select, but drive if you are there at the right place and time. If AI Trains are going to use the lower level Platforms, theyˋll be accessible somehow.
They are really undrivable, the services are set up as AI only so it will have the same affect as trying to take over a service that leaves the map. On top of that, the whole service mode is based on the COVID timetable so that means there are two factors that reduce the frivable services. The service mode in this route really is a joke, especially when compared to routes like HMA.
