Atomic Systems

Hello,

as Maik of vR visits the forum from time to time I decided to propose the below here. I also ask for the opinion of others on the forum regarding the matter.

Seeing another release of vR this week with no BR189&101 fixes released yet and fully having in mind delivering these (and other fixes) causes vR to suffer financially (as Maik explained earlier) I propose that these AFB fixes are released as upgrades to the existing packages and a small fee (EUR 5 or slightly more?) is charged to obtain them.

I of course can't say people would be generally interested, but I certainly would: it is also to protect my investment in the add-ons. Fully fixed BR101 is now on steam, but I don't want to pay another 20 Euros to get almost the same content, not to mention SSD space taken and possible incompatibility with the driving trailer.

I think this approach could be used to upgrade some of the older models too: 143, 111 for instance... to bring them to the current scripting and other standards (newer PZB etc.). BR 143 is my favourite loco, but I don't drive it as you can clearly see it cannot compare to the newer vR models. Here the amount charged would naturally be higher...

Thank you, Maik, if you find a moment to reply. Thanks to everyone else as well for their opinions.

Ultimately I suspect the active members on this forum forum only represents a very small part of the customer base, the active members of the two German forums again a small percentage. If you look at the VR price politik thread over on railsim de you will get an idea of what the reaction will be to such a suggestion. I am against it for three reasons. 1. I doubt very much that such a small charge would offset the loss of income from a normal release, I think you underestimate the work involved, 2. This would set a precedent that other less scrupulous developers could and would exploit, 3. Development of new products would almost certainly be delayed. Nothing is perfect in life, and most of the issues with VR vehicles are minor compared to other vendors, and when you compare driving in this sim to driving in real life the limitations of the sim are all too apparent and make such issues insignificant. When I think about the old text sims from Deekay on the spectrum, even they had a random factor that meant you could get an ex works loco, a run down loco, and a couple of other options that all affected the performance of the loco. 30 years later we don't even have that in TS. In truth TS is only partly a sim, it needs a large suspension of belief to enjoy driving in it, having driven in real life both aids that, and at the same time makes it more difficult..

As an outsider--I don't have any of the assets involved--what worries/confuses/unsettles me is the precedent being set of *fixes* being something the user should pay for; enhancements, yes...no problem there as they're options (AP sounds/enhancement packs for example) but if something is sold as having features 'x,y and z' but 'x and z' don't work then why should there be a charge to the user for putting the item into it's advertised state?
Were the models advertised/sold as having a fully working AFB system?

I agree with Holz and Gary I wouldn't be happy with it at all and it would put me of that vendor, As Maik has already stated there are only two sets of arms to produce, script and model and the work involved is time consuming. I very much admire Christrains with his update policy though and I believe that is the approach a creator of such digital works should adopt, quite how he manages it all though is a wonder on his todd? However I am happy to be patient as far as VR models go.

PLease don't compare vR, where TS is the main business and income, with others like Chris oder even 3DZug where it is just hobby and who have other work for the main income. Totally different approaches. VR can't do like freeware or hobby developers can do. No income no vR. Updates and other stuff that is not mainly a new product, produces no income. And there is no way for the upgrade idea because at the end it is the same problem as updates; there is no time. It's bad, i know, but it is as it is.

Maik, hi, I wasn't making a comparison nor was I criticising Vr in anyway, you would know that if you had read my post properly! I was disagreeing with the OP in fact and agreeing with Vr's stance.

Hi,
I am also happy to wait for vR updates, whenever the arrive. Also, as it has been said previously, the small vR issues are very small indeed. I bought the other day, at half price, the VS ME 146 repaint pack from TaD. I hate to be blunt, but I like to be honest: the pack did nothing for the already bland DTG ME146.

Consequently I can not imagine a TS without the driving characteristics of vR models, I will put TS on the shelf to gather dusk.

Finally, I hope I did not upset anyone, but if I don't voice my opinion it will not be known.

P.S. by the way, I don't disregard the idea of paying 5Euros for updates or any other ways of obtaining the updates faster, I'm just saying I'm content to wait, I haven't yet found such convincing models. ...and other bland cardboard models cost the same...

OK, thanks a lot for your feedback, guys. So apparently there's no interest in such a solution. I didn't mean anything bad by posting this, was just trying to find a solution to deliver me what I want for a price that I would be more than willing to pay. I don't think EUR 5 fee for an AFB fix would be insufficient when you pay 20 for the whole loco.

However I think that upgrade packages for old EL locos could still be considered; this isn't about any fixes, nobody can expect vR to implement the newest PZB for BR111 for free. I think there would be interest in this among people and could be another type of product vR could offer. I would certainly pay, say, EUR 10-15 to bring some of the old EL packages to the current standard.

jstange wrote:this isn't about any fixes

jstange wrote:I don't think EUR 5 fee for an AFB fix

err...it's either a fix or it isn't a fix---are you saying AFB is a 'broken' feature or one you'd like to see added?

If it's the latter then EUR 5 probably wouldn't come anywhere near covering the costs of re-scripting and testing the loco, so it should really be considered a completely new offering. Nothing new in that principle, we've already seen it with recent sound packs which have re-visited ground covered in earlier packs, which whilst bringing new features these don't guarantee sales at a volume sufficient enough to pitch the price low.

I agree on the second part though. Would also pay for 143 and 111 with updated scripts and cab. On the german forums many people use the 112 in scenarios insted of the 143, because it is more up to date and basicly the same loco.
VR still can loads of stuff though.... as driving tailers can´t be mixed and only work with one loco at a time scriptvise. 112 Regio with zza and dosto driving trailer, updated 143 with dosto driving trailer, 146 with db regio modern dostos or metronom version dostos. Still a lot of stuff left to be desired on the expert line side of things. Allthough I am glad that VR works fulltime and pumps out expert line stuff on a regular basis. The TS would be a very sad place without them.
It´s a shame german routes take so long to construct and we only see a new route once a year or so. British routes seem to be way more easy to do, if I look at the speed routes are released for the UK.

I don't think it's the case that German routes take longer to construct, more that the German market has very high expectations of graphical and operational accuracy, and many of the route developers work very hard to meet those expectations.

There are companies like GBE and RSSLO that pump out routes at a rapid pace, but generally have lower quality standards. The teams that work to the highest of standards are rarely heard from, because so much work is involved in producing each addon.

The team that made the Koblenz - Trier route is now working on Freiburg - Basel Bad Bf, it has been under construction for some time now, with no particular end in sight. They declined to include the obvious extension into Basel (SBB) itself, because of the vast amount of work required to create accurate swiss signalling for it.

However, possibly the most ambitious project in the pipeline is the next route from the author of Berlin - Leipzig, which is the line from Münster to Bremen via Osnabrück. It has been under construction for sometime, and completion is not expected for another 18 months at least. The route developer spent five months building and placing 760 new custom objects, just for the city of Münster, which is slightly smaller than Plymouth. I may be doing the route developer a disservice here, but I am not sure the same level of effort went into building Plymouth for the "South Devon Main Line" route.

Good Post. I am informed on this projects, as I am building a german freeware route myself. I have only done landscape for about 40 miles and it has taken me 2 years. The area basicly looks like a cab ride now and is good enough for me. Most german builders have the aim to make landscape look great and very realistic. That makes the whole thing more time consuming. Just compare Konstanz-Villingen and the western mainlines. I would expect the latter to look less like "the real world". Also the whole PZB/Signal and catenary building seems to be way more complex than english railway systems.

Trackwork, signaling and OHE for Mosel, Basel and Münster done by vR and Co..

The trackwork\signaling of Konstanz-Villingen combined with the beauty of Berlin-Leipzig would be incredible.

I'm not happy with the idea to pay for updates that are basically bug-fixes, but I would be willing to pay for updates that bring new features to older EL locos.

For instance, the BR103 had a form of cruise-control that is not implemented in any of the BR103 EL models.

I'd love to see that implemented in it's most prototypical form allowed by TS, it's something I've always missed on this model. I'd be willing to pay a modest amount for receiving such updates.
Just like the BR143 is lacking in features compared to the more recently released BR112 and others would be willing to pay for an update to that.

Cheers,

--Tim