BR Class 101 Announced

[Varney]

Well RSC has finally responded to the comments left on facebook.

Comment from User
It would be nice to see RSC do the decent thing and reply, on here, to people's comments about this 101 pack being released as a 'new' product; and to reply as stating whether or not owners of the existing Class 101 Pack will get what is in effect the same product with a few fancy graphical tweaks as a free upgrade. If not, why not?.

Over to you, RSC, many are watching...

Response from RSC
We appreciate all the feedback that we have received regarding reskins and upgrades, and have taken your comments on board. As a company that has a diverse following for our products, we respond to many different customer demands with our releases. Whilst some players only want to purchase one variation of a model, other players want to purchase different variations and liveries of the same model. This way, we are giving players the opportunity to customise their own collections in whatever way they wish and going a long way to responding to our customer’s different and varied wishes. We are always happy to receive your feedback and will continue to listen and consider your opinions on this subject, all of which helps us to develop and evolve our products. For those looking to expand their collection with new locomotives we have ALOT of completely original content scheduled for release over the coming months.

A politician would be proud of that non-answer

[pacerfan]

Some of you know that at times I have been critical of RSC with their policy of "re-releasing" stock with a bit of rain and one skin......In this case I feel perfectly fine with what RSC have done and have bought the new 101. Why? RSC have delivered in this case. The original flaws of the creepy inner glow and the cat being dragged down the ECML we got from a rear Power car have been fixed, there is both a cab light and a instrument light so I can actually see the brake dial while driving a stopping service at 2.00 in the morning (after all virtual railways need not close for maintenance ). There is not just one skin but two and that is a disappointment. But that is RSC's problem and after just reading the comments under the 101 articles on Facebook it seem everyone is universally fed-up with the policy and my theory is that RSC are starting to take notice hence there being two skins and not one instead.....and 25% to entice people which worked on me but I was looking for a 1st gen DMU for the BR era I could use...plus a passenger view too which is good as I sometimes like to drive from that viewpoint. And it is RSC's product after all other outlets like Just Trains charge for an upgrade, albeit one that keeps all of the original livery's and adds advanced stuff like a starting sequence...not much of an argument I know but as said earlier it seems the outpouring of anger might have caused RSC to take notice.

Still feel free to ignore my little comment and continue to whine and complain I'm not forcing you at gunpoint to buy it

[deltic009]

I see that people are asking (I note not everyone) why this isn't a free upgrade. Is this a serious question? Employees of RSC, drawing a salary from the company have spent many hours working on the upgrades and improvements to the train. Some people seem to have their wires crossed between what constitutes a business and a charity.

As I didn't own the original I shall certainly be purchasing the 101 and probably producing a few reskins, but the hyper-critical and never satisfied attitude on here means it will probably only ever be for personal use.

[SquidvT]

Well I bought it to see if there had been any significant changes. TBH I always considered the engine whine and glow as "bugs" rather than features. So in effect I (and you) have paid £9 for those bugs to be corrected, and some rain and light effects.

Even at the discounted price I think thats a bit too much to ask for such minor upgrades. I was hoping for a full cab, but I guess that would of required time investment that RSC arent willing to make.

What they should of done is offer an upgrade to existing owners and parceled in at least another livery at a cost nearer £5. I think they would of done better with sales. And its not just us moaners on these boards that think so, just look at all the negative comments that are on RS facebook (and thats not counting the ones they've been deleting all day). If you never had the model, then yes £9 is worth it.

Regardless of RSCs intention, I a pretty sure the vast majority of its customers think that selling this at the price of a full addon is pretty questionable behavior.

[deltic009]

A couple of years ago I paid £10k for a car, now Ford have made a more efficient and better equipped replacement and they still wanted me to pay full price despite me having the older, flawed model. I hope that they rethink this before I stop buying their cars - it's ridiculous, if there's a problem with the car they still expect me to pay to fix it!

[Varney]

A couple of years ago I paid £10k for a car, now Ford have made a more efficient and better equipped replacement and they still wanted me to pay full price despite me having the older, flawed model. I hope that they rethink this before I stop buying their cars - it's ridiculous, if there's a problem with the car they still expect me to pay to fix it!

How is this relevant?

It is in no way comparable to non-refundable software DLC purchases.

[theorganist]

In isolation it is a fair price, if this was its first release I would say fair enough. However, against the original release it does not look like good value neither does the 08.

I don't get their facebook reply I would rather have the original seven livery schemes to run on a variety of routes!

Peter

[AndyM77]

A couple of years ago I paid £10k for a car, now Ford have made a more efficient and better equipped replacement and they still wanted me to pay full price despite me having the older, flawed model. I hope that they rethink this before I stop buying their cars - it's ridiculous, if there's a problem with the car they still expect me to pay to fix it!

Upon the TS2012 upgrade it was said (almost promised) that all content would be upgraded to 2012 standards for free, although it wouldn't happen overnight. In reality only some DLC received free upgrades and suddenly RSC had a massive change of heart.

That alone is a BIG part of the problem..

edit: to back the above up read the following paragraph

Yes! AnyDLC you have purchased fromRailSimulator.comfor RailWorks or RailWorks 2 will continue to work with Train Simulator
2012. AnyDLC you purchase fromus up to and afterthe launch of Train Simulator 2012 will also be compatible.We also plan to
upgrade existingDLC overtime to take full advantage ofthe new Train Simulator 2012 technology. This programme will commence
shortly afterthe release of Train Simulator 2012,starting with theNEC. A fullschedule ofDLC upgrades will be announced in due
course.

This was taken from the official FAQ for TS2012 when it was about to be launched - http://www.railsimulator.com/microsite_ ... index.html (http://www.railsimulator.com/microsite_ ... te/faq.pdf) No where does it say that existing DLC would be need to be repurchased for the new "Bells and whistles", so somewhere along the line RSC changed their mind.

With the above in mind, if the next TS has even more new effects, then would you repurchase everything again? don't think so.. (I wouldn't)

[davejc64]

To be fair, it's just Bob's 'thought', not an official policy:
It is a bit catch 22 though - if we complain nothing is released because there's too much complaining, if not then nothing is released because there is no demand .

Thank you for clearing that up, I would have been slightly concerned if that had been the official view, as far as I am concerned I won't be buying eiether the Class 101 or the 08 pack as neither of them add anything the originals don't have, that I can't live without.

[gnash]

Response from RSC
We appreciate all the feedback that we have received regarding reskins and upgrades, and have taken your comments on board. As a company that has a diverse following for our products, we respond to many different customer demands with our releases. Whilst some players only want to purchase one variation of a model, other players want to purchase different variations and liveries of the same model. This way, we are giving players the opportunity to customise their own collections in whatever way they wish and going a long way to responding to our customer’s different and varied wishes. We are always happy to receive your feedback and will continue to listen and consider your opinions on this subject, all of which helps us to develop and evolve our products. For those looking to expand their collection with new locomotives we have ALOT of completely original content scheduled for release over the coming months.

A politician would be proud of that non-answer

[ My Bold ]

Their comment doesn't actually stipulate how many times the ' New' 'Original' content will be rerereleased though

Back to the ether ..( actually a coffee and facebook )

Have fun all.

[smarty2]

I'm happy with my originals with the marvelous tweaks the community has endeavoured to create to fix the bugs RSC should have fixed with the model in the first place, but what concerns me is, say I upload a scenario with a livery that isn't covered by the "new?" 101? As has been mentioned earlier will they remove the old 101 listing from the workshop in preference to the "new?" 101? Then new users are going to be mighty confused when downloading and finding it doesn't work! Or as has been hinted at, the old pack being updated? If that is the case then that should clear up my concern. And if not then what a bloomin shambles.

[xguerra]

It is almost like they pretend nothing preceding TS2012 happened, and so are starting everything from scratch.

I don't like the policy either but things won't clear up overnight, and I doubt I would make any difference whatsoever if I was to stop turning out my pockets in protest.

[donny]

Whats with the horrible black cab window surrounds on the blue grey version? It makes it look damn awful, if they do update the original I do hope they don't change the liveries to include this.

It'd also be nice if they could do away with that damn centre headlamp on the blue grey version as this was more a post 90's feature (with some exceptions, granted) and spoils the look of the unit.

[adrianinwales]

Have just spent a bit of time reading through the five pages of postings on this subject – topping up with a read of the extended comments on RSC’s own Facebook page.

Phew! - it makes for pretty depressing reading guys. I suspect, it’s not an exercise that RSC are keen to undertake. Understandably so, I feel - if we’re honest not many folk would want to take so much public criticism.

I’m not commenting on the validity of the views that have been expressed - but the force of them is so great that if I was RSC I wouldn’t enter the discussion.

I can’t help thinking that this episode, the previous one on 08s and I suppose others before, demonstrate how forums (on whatever subject) can become a bit of a feeding frenzy. Would you really want to demonstrate your prowess by jumping into the middle of an active pack of Black Tipped sharks?

Unfortunately, perhaps that’s the problem – there seems to be no obvious way that RSC can embark on a constructive dialogue with its customers. Forums and Facebook aren’t too good an idea for them – it’s a no-win situation.
I don’t know much about Flight Sims (though the way things are going, maybe I should!) but I’ve seen there’s something called PCPilot – a magazine, I guess?

I wonder if a genuine intermediary of some kind (equivalent of editor/specialist writers) could report from the trader and from the customers – facilitating a worthwhile exchange.

As it stands, at the moment RSC are getting serious stick (okay, many would say legitimately) but they can’t really be blamed for not engaging the open forums and Facebook. Read back over the postings yourself – it’s vicious out there!

There is a real problem and it doesn’t look like it’s going away too soon.

So, to my point, I wonder, could some of the more learned minds on this forum maybe focus on finding workable solutions ie two way dialogue.

I for one would be very disappointed if RSC called it a day – but their MD is only human.

After all, “looking for solutions”, isn’t this as much a part of the ethos of such an interest group/forum as UKTS as the launching of exocet, cruise and any other destructive verbal missiles!!

Adrian

[Varney]

To what end?

It's clear that they have a clear marketing and pricing strategy. It's also clear that many disagree with it. What can RSC say that will change customer's opinion?