is this game worth it?

[Kato1144]

So fist off I did not realise this game is from 2009 and that's not necessarily a bad thing but the textures sure do show there age...

anyway I started looking in to mods, then I saw how mush "DLC" there is, I grabbed the Deluxe edition on sale for like 24$ish thinking I was getting at least a good chunk of content but as I take a look it looks like I might have very little to do in this game if they pieced it out a ton.

So what I'm asking is this game I purchased worth it in any capacity as it seems there is a pay to play model here and should I just cut my losses and refund this game?

or is there a Legacy game that has been taken care of by its developers over the years with mods and community support like texture pack so you can read the dials with optional DLC content that is desirable not because it is required to have fun but adds to the fun?

or is it more in the middle were there is mods and community but it is based off of you having certain "required" content and if you want good textures your going to need to pony up for some DLC trains?

anyway I have only 30mins in the game, I did the primary and secondary tutorials for the train controls thing it was fun and i can see the appeal but thats as far as I got as I wanted to see if I could "fix" the textures (I thought the game defaulted to low textures),also lot me know if its like Euro Truck Sim were you can pick up jobs and "Routes" that i guess you have access to that sounds like it can be fun or is it like Flight Sim were you need to "pretend" and you can just add weight "cars" and go were you please? I guess I should have looked in to that before purchasing it but I was running out of time on the summer sale...

anyway let me know is there a game worth playing here right now, a game worth "investing" in too as it is split across a thousand DLC's or should I be running for the hills.

[x1Heavy]

The economic base for the game is to make revenue buying things you would like to have in the game world. About that time period (2009) I was playing FSX which is a complete DVD based flight sim online with live humans in tower talk and so on. A complete game for I think 110 dollars then. I actually still own the full FSX on DVD set. no need to buy the Steam version.

The FSX on steam has been parted out to sell for 5 dollars here, 10 dollars there and 10,000 dollars will probably get you the complete entire game this year on Steam in DLC.

I am paraphrasing, but its a economy system to extract dollars over a very long period of time.

The quality of the game is adequate. I have a basic gaming computer that runs it well from last year when I bought it to replace one that burned up after 8 years. So the savings in not building another gaming monster in the thousands of dollars of hardware parts is useful elsewhere in this years budget.

TSC I have owned from the beginning and have spent thousands of dollars for DLC Content mostly from sales which happen a few times a year. I spent about 60 total this last weeks sale. 25 of which went to a Western Maryland Steam Engine and three Trips among other things.

The other 30 or so went into older content such as the BNSF Shelby DLC and ES44DC and rolling stock which dates from the beginning. That contains certain freight cars which is required by other Scenarios in other parts of the TSC to work without missing content on loading and breaking. So indirectly by not including complete assets one could extract more dollars in this way.

The People who built and coded that content are into other things in their lives, they are not going to go back and patch problems with missing textures in road numbers and other glaring problems in the DLC because its essentially too old. Its AS IS.

I do not worry about the dollars in TSC very much this late in my life because after everything else train game spending is the absolute bottom of my budget list. So I am happy to buy a few things for the game now and then. The Sales are the key.

Without the regular sales a few times a year I would not participate in the game at all. This is the only game with this economic model I own. All other games are prepaid and require no money to continue to play.

That retail model from previous gaming sales is ended and everyone is trying to migrate the new generation who are becoming of age to become accustomed to DLC Model, Lootbox Spending and Micro transactions in particular off Smart phones and so on.

The old days of buying a complete game for 60 dollars at the store in person and then going online to play has died decades ago. Online buying of complete games to go play online has also died. Everything is now being made into Subscription based gaming as in pay every month to play, even decades old computer games that are free once you bought it.

You probably will hear from some posters who grow tired of this old dinosaur writing walls of text about days gone by. But you should be aware of the current DLC system being in play as a form of extracting dollars over a long period of time when you see something shiny you want to play and pay for it.

Bottom line, the game provides me with a range of benefits when I play. Particularly in the American West. And also a way to travel overseas and visit places that I know will never happen in real life. So its not necessarily just trains involved in my view. So its worth it yes. No problem.

[Kato1144]

ok fair enough, I can see it has been worth it for you over the years but ya im just going to refund i dont have to need to be getting in to this now, especially if im going to be tempted by content that I have to pay for but is not longer supported any more and everyone is moving on to bigger and better things at this time, and I too hate that everyone is try to go for the "Live service" model for every game out there and I'm personally not a fan but for massive sim games it does make more sense to pay for a small monthly sub to access everything over paying 1000$ to "own" some of the content.

Either way I'm not getting in to a eco system of a 2009 game thats on its way out, I all ready got burned on buying FSX DLC back in 2017 for the AIR BUS A320 to A380 off of steam to find out the steam DLC was broken and I had to rebuy it all off of AreoSoft to get working planes, then like 3 years latter MSFS 2020 came out and I only flew them planes a hand full of times before I moved over to MSFS 2020 and uninstalled FSX... Now they want everyone to move over to MSFS 2024 >:(

just cant win with these sims man.

[Duke Dudeston]

Originally posted by Kato1144:

ok fair enough, I can see it has been worth it for you over the years but ya im just going to refund i dont have to need to be getting in to this now, especially if im going to be tempted by content that I have to pay for but is not longer supported any more and everyone is moving on to bigger and better things at this time, and I too hate that everyone is try to go for the "Live service" model for every game out there and I'm personally not a fan but for massive sim games it does make more sense to pay for a small monthly sub to access everything over paying 1000$ to "own" some of the content.

Either way I'm not getting in to a eco system of a 2009 game thats on its way out, I all ready got burned on buying FSX DLC back in 2017 for the AIR BUS A320 to A380 off of steam to find out the steam DLC was broken and I had to rebuy it all off of AreoSoft to get working planes, then like 3 years latter MSFS 2020 came out and I only flew them planes a hand full of times before I moved over to MSFS 2020 and uninstalled FSX... Now they want everyone to move over to MSFS 2024 >:(

just cant win with these sims man.

Well I bought this game way back when and have dipped into the DLC from time to time, the game is old, as for the textures they seem fine for me, sure I am using a 3rd party add on that helps "tune" things up (Railworks Enhancer or something - I dunno I bought it years ago) and that has helped.

However this game isn't about "fancy graphics" for me it is about having a virtual "model" railway, I don't have the space, time or the actual money to setup my own model railway as much as I would love one, and even then I would probably want to keep changing the layout from time to time.

When you see what this game has to offer over the others, and really get into it then you may have changed your mind. This game allows you the full control over scenarios, you can even try your hand at route building.

Yes you will need to buy some DLCs to get this game going but it is the DLCs that have kept this game alive for so many years, people have expanded on these DLCs in the steam workshop as well as other sites, or even merged a lot of them up (I am a UK player and I own a lot of the UK routes, and there have been some great merges and extensions to a lot of these routes available in the workshop)

For me this game is all about creating my own scenarios, or driving the ones my friends make. If all you want to do is drive trains with super pretty graphics then you're better off grabbing TSW as that will tick everything you want. However it will still require DLC to make it "come alive"

The fact that this game is still going and is still having DLC made for it shows how much love the game has, again yes it has aged, but each year the developers release an "update" and they do try to add in some features. The problem is though the game engine is out of date, and there is only so much they are willing to do, if they change to much they could potentially break the game completely and render everyone's DLC useless, could you imagine the backlash? This is the reason why they keep the legacy 32BIT version as part of the game, because they were worried when they bumped the game to 64BIT that a lot of older DLC may not work, and done this to "keep people happy"

Its also why there is now an "experimental DX12" version too, because they can't ensure that all the DLC from way back when will work with it, and they really don't have the time to go through each and every one to check, especially as the game is very heavily modded to the point that the DLC also gets modded.

For example I own a lot of the UK routes and trains (obviously) and there are 3rd parties who "enhance" the base models beyond what DTG the developers release. There is no guarantee that these enhancements will work.

The engine is old and is on life support, a lot of us have accepted this and will continue to play it knowing its limitations, and some even still enjoy it so much (me being one of them)

So yeah I suppose for someone coming into this now may seem to be a "waste of time" but then I don't see this game going anywhere any time soon. DTG knows this game is their real "cash cow" and will continue to support it for a long time.

[Kato1144]

Like I want to like it but the DLC barrier with everything else makes me not interested, I'm glad the ppl who have invested time and money in this game can still enjoy it but for me to get in to it today and try to make something that I can justify the cost of when I see post here talking about broken content that will never get fixed ect... I just makes me think of the FSX Air Bus DLC on steam and i spent like 120$ on that for 4 planes that I ended up re buying because of just poor 3rd party support (I think it was because AreoSoft was "Unable" to update the content or something like that, in fact all the DLC I got for FSX on steam had to be repurchases as non of it worked right, SkyActive, REX the Airbus Stuff ect and because I did not test my purchases and request a refund right away i got stiffed with it all) ....

Anyway I'm not knocking ppl who are still playing this game, if I had the disposable income to buy this game and a bunch of routes and trains to play with I would, but I live on a fixed income and I just cant start another expensive sim hobby, so for now I'm going to stick to planes.

thanks for all the advice everyone but I'm just going to refund and move on :)

[x1Heavy]

I also live on a very fixed income.

This year was redoing the food budget. First I had to figure out what I was taking in and then figure out how to say make a bag of rice or pound of steaks go several days. So I pretty much reduced the month cost of food by several hundred.

Since I dont have debt and do not have medical bills anymore by choice in life theres a little left over after bills.

A tiny amount goes to trains.

The other poster reminded me that yes TSC is being updated which is a long process. I already saw improvements in the game situation as such and am happy with it. However there are minor or imperfections that I choose to overlook.

The other Poster also reminded me of one of the reasons why I enjoy this game product. In relation to the memories of where I have been in life thats rendered pretty good such as New Oxford in the Hanover DLC in game (Used to be a little Jacks Hobby Shop in two rail cars there) and its replicated accurately.

The amount of trains in game would be at one time about equal to the physical buying of choo choo model trains in the past at the hobby store. Some of my model stuff is a thousand or more each. Im driving them here for pennies. Its fun most of the time.

I still have a handful of trains for one corner after the new flooring is put into my place next year. That would be the first layout since childhood in my life which is a very long time.

I hear you on the FSX the DLC system here is similar.

I suppose if I lived a few years or a little bit longer I will eventually buy the whole game. But thats money the hobby shop wont get in cash downtown. So its a interesting situation.

[OldAlaskaGuy]

It's a niche market. You must love trains. Some play it arcade style and collect points and awards, but most enjoy the driving trains and using the creative aspects. The majority of my assets were freeware. The only real way to judge the worth is to calculate the hours of enjoyment is cost per hour. A $29.95 (US) DLC bundle will easily give you 30 playable hours and more if you use the creative tools included in the game.