Questioning My Patronage of Jointed Rail

C

charlielima

Member
First of all, let me thank all the creators at Jointed Rail for all my past purchases and aquisitions. They are very talented people with an eye for detail that makes their "art" remarkable. I have enjoyed their creations immensely.

Recently I was automatically billed for a Club Car Membership which I thought I cancelled last year because I hadn't purchased or downloaded any Club Car items for quite awhile as nothing appealled to me.

Over 2021, I have noticed that the majority of all content in both the store and Club Car has all been 2nd and 3rd generation locomotives and rolling stock with many fallen flag railroads represented.
For those who are into these eras, this is a godsend and judging from reaction on this forum, they must be happy with the content they have access to. I congratulate them on being able to download items for their 2nd and 3rd gen railroads and routes and to Jointed Rail for providing them the items they relish.

I, however, like to model 4th and future generations of modern power and rollingstock in Canadian livery and these items have not been forthcoming of late from JR. Historically, the creators introduced 4th gen BNSF, UP, NS, CSX, and a few Canadian locomotives and railcars but that was some time ago and, although they still work on TRS19 Plus, they lack the extreme details that their latest cousins possess. As a result, I have purchased items from the competition without having to pay a membership.

My question to the artists at Jointed Rail; are there plans to create any modern day power, rolling stock, and railroads in our future? If not, I do not see the point of giving my scarce dollars to something that I will not use.
Thank you for your attention.
CharlieLima
 
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Not speaking for Jointed Rail, but rather in general.

Content creation is a lengthy process, even more so when you consider the amount of features and detail available these days. By the time a piece is ready for consumption, it's either outdated by the railroad's standards or the sim itself. To get it right, you must have the resources available to create the latest and greatest locomotives and equipment; ie plans, photographs, and the like, which can consume time and resources in itself. So, even though you may not think creators are working on that SD70ace-t4, or ET44AC, chances are that they are in progress, but have hit snags because of the aforementioned reasons.
 
To preface this, I agree to a certain extent the lapses in releases as far as club car content did trouble me a bit. I also understand that these men have lives outside of this space and other business ventures and thus the priority of releasing new content will take a backseat. I also state I am not affiliated with JR, though I do use a lot of their content.

I understand you may be frustrated about the lack of post-1990s/21st century/modern day era content. What I do not understand and do not appreciate is to phrase it in simple terms "downplaying or writing off" an entire era of North American railroading, much less the people who enjoy the content focusing on this era. IMO this era is pretty underrepresented in the larger train simulation space, especially pre-1980 era content. You have the right to not use this content in your version of Trainz. In a bit of a knee-jerk response thoughts like your opinion on late-20th century North American content is why I simply refuse to focus on or use current day era content in Trainz. If anything I appreciate vendors going back in time and focusing on overlooked or much needed fallen-flag equipment. The great thing is choice is abundant in this simulator and even though you harbor your opinions I can understand where you are coming from to a degree. The beauty of this game, train simulation, and the larger model railroading hobby is the availability of choice as far as era, operation, rolling stock, et. al.

Getting to the topic at hand, JR have teased content such as Tier 4 GEVOs from time to time, but due to certain insidious individuals who prefer to illegally leak and pirate payware content those plans are indefinitely scrapped.

Echoing crazytrain, it honestly takes time to create content for this game especially at the level Mr. Cornell and his team are able to reach. As such the lack of currently available diagrams from places such as trainiax, much less easy access to the interiors of modern day locomotive models such as the ET44AC or the SD70ACe-T4 does not make it easy for JR's team or other content vendors to be able to use software and build them.
 
It's good to see pre-1980 content being made. I agree with mbv67 that, up until recently, it has been an under represented era in both the simulator and model railroad communities.
 
mbv67 said:
To preface this, I agree to a certain extent the lapses in releases as far as club car content did trouble me a bit. I also understand that these men have lives outside of this space and other business ventures and thus the priority of releasing new content will take a backseat. I also state I am not affiliated with JR, though I do use a lot of their content.

I understand you may be frustrated about the lack of post-1990s/21st century/modern day era content. What I do not understand and do not appreciate is to phrase it in simple terms "downplaying or writing off" an entire era of North American railroading, much less the people who enjoy the content focusing on this era. IMO this era is pretty underrepresented in the larger train simulation space, especially pre-1980 era content. You have the right to not use this content in your version of Trainz. In a bit of a knee-jerk response thoughts like your opinion on late-20th century North American content is why I simply refuse to focus on or use current day era content in Trainz. If anything I appreciate vendors going back in time and focusing on overlooked or much needed fallen-flag equipment. The great thing is choice is abundant in this simulator and even though you harbor your opinions I can understand where you are coming from to a degree. The beauty of this game, train simulation, and the larger model railroading hobby is the availability of choice as far as era, operation, rolling stock, et. al.

Getting to the topic at hand, JR have teased content such as Tier 4 GEVOs from time to time, but due to certain insidious individuals who prefer to illegally leak and pirate payware content those plans are indefinitely scrapped.

Echoing crazytrain, it honestly takes time to create content for this game especially at the level Mr. Cornell and his team are able to reach. As such the lack of currently available diagrams from places such as trainiax, much less easy access to the interiors of modern day locomotive models such as the ET44AC or the SD70ACe-T4 does not make it easy for JR's team or other content vendors to be able to use software and build them.
Click to expand...

MBV67,
You may want to reread my post.
This is not a knee-jerk reaction, as you state, and nowhere did I downplay any other era in railroading. Nowhere in my questioning of the future of JR content releases did I EVER diss the post 1990's train enthusists. In fact, I wished them well and congratulated them on having the content offered by JR as well as thanking and appreciating the work that they do.
I am not complaining about the 2nd and 3rd generation content, but rather questioning whether JR will inevitably release 4th gen content such as they have in the past. You and many others are more than welcome to appreciate everything that Jointed Rail is providing for your preferred era of railroading. It's just not my preferred era and I hope this would be appreciated.

To that end, if modern locos and rolling stock are not be released in future, all well and good, but I would like to get a clue as I would sooner spend my money on items that I am interested in than just sit and wait and hope for something to come around that I would use.
It's too bad you took my comments the wrong way.
Take care.
CharlieLima
 
IMO, all content is good content :)

My preferred generations are 1st to late 2nd gen (FT-GP50/SD50) but anything in any generation (except 4th) is good news for me. 4th Generation is not very creative anymore, its just making my garage roof look like it took a ride on the rear of an ES44AC or getting rid of the 710G for some GE-sounding prime mover. :hehe:
 
charlielima said:
First of all, let me thank all the creators at Jointed Rail for all my past purchases and aquisitions. They are very talented people with an eye for detail that makes their "art" remarkable. I have enjoyed their creations immensely.
Click to expand...

Thank you we appreciate that.

charlielima said:
Recently I was automatically billed for a Club Car Membership which I thought I cancelled last year because I hadn't purchased or downloaded any Club Car items for quite awhile as nothing appealled to me.
Click to expand...

Please open a support ticket on this issue. We would be happy to address.

charlielima said:
My question to the artists at Jointed Rail; are there plans to create any modern day power, rolling stock, and railroads in our future? If not, I do not see the point of giving my scarce dollars to something that I will not use.
Thank you for your attention.
CharlieLima
Click to expand...

We of course want to represent all that we can because a cutting-edge representation of favorite things is likely what everyone wants to have, but it simply is not possible to work on everything at all times. The short answer simply is yes, we will have more modern day power and rolling stock at some future point in time.

mbv67 said:
Getting to the topic at hand, JR have teased content such as Tier 4 GEVOs from time to time, but due to certain insidious individuals who prefer to illegally leak and pirate payware content those plans are indefinitely scrapped.
Click to expand...

This is quite a large part of it, but the plans are not scrapped, merely moved back as there is plenty of fruit within reach that also deserves to be picked. Personally my favorites echo that of DARTrider, and it is quite frankly far easier to produce those things having been around much longer than the modern day railroad line-ups. There is more information and research available and that becomes an advantage of not having to start with a blank slate. If it were easy, there would have been no problem for any xyz creator to produce the same level of output and simply leave JR behind as a memory.

I can assure anyone reading this, that barring disasters, death, or acts of God, the tier 4s or any of the other modern content that has been displayed will be released and will be better both visually and functionally than it would have been had it been released last year or earlier. The NS dash 9 rebuilds will be the first but beyond that I have no new information or set plans.
 
norfolksouthern37 said:
This is quite a large part of it, but the plans are not scrapped, merely moved back as there is plenty of fruit within reach that also deserves to be picked. Personally my favorites echo that of DARTrider, and it is quite frankly far easier to produce those things having been around much longer than the modern day railroad line-ups. There is more information and research available and that becomes an advantage of not having to start with a blank slate. If it were easy, there would have been no problem for any xyz creator to produce the same level of output and simply leave JR behind as a memory.
Click to expand...

I agree with your statement, it makes loads of sense and is what I'd expect from someone making real life-quality content! My grandfather saw a video of people messing with your content and he thought it was real! :hehe:
Best wishes and good luck with any future endeavors (SD24, GP20 or U33B happening soon?)!
 
Norfolksouthern37,
Thank you. You answered my question in the manner in which I had hoped.
Yes, all your content is truly amazing, detailed and accurate. I acknowledge that it takes tons of research to get it that way.
I have never been against nor have I sought to dismiss the early generations of railroading and its fans. I'm just not into it.
I just wanted to get my money's worth from Jointed Rail.
Again, thank you.
Charlielima
 
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