rcervel wrote:
Me:
- more commuter routes
- weather effects gameplay
- realistic signaling
- dynamic radio
I'd love to have more commuter routes, but if scale model railroading is any indication, freight is preferred over passenger runs by most people, so I wouldn't expect to see too much of that (though an updated NEC, at least as far north as NYC, would be great).
Dynamic (or at least well-scripted) radio ranks very highly on my list; done right, it could used to simulate some of the older methods of operation (e.g., track warrants).
I'd really like to see Flight Sim's handling of AI traffic incorporated into this. For those who don't know, the way that it works in Flight Sim is that there are predefined flight paths & times, but the AI control towers and centers can make alterations (especially at departure and landing) to adjust to the actual situation. This would probably be a little harder with train dispatching (since you're limited to the tracks you have and not a whole open sky) but it would be great to be able to pick any time (not just Morning/Day/Evening/Night), hop in a train and run either as a scheduled train or an extra with AI traffic, without needing a whole activity prepared ahead of time. (Activities are great for yard work and where switching is involved, not as necessary for straight mainline runs).
From the route/activity development end, I'd like to see the new version be much less limiting; there are a lot of routes that could have included a lot more trackage, but ran into tile size limits. There was also the "great white wall" problem when a route crossed certain lines. I would also absolutely love to be have a whole bunch of routes, all connected, so that you could (for example) take a train from the N&NJ and onto the NEC, without burdening one person/group with simulating the entire system in one route.
Multiplayer! It's been around forever in FS, and with the newest version, Microsoft added the ability for players to operate the control tower. It would be great to have multiple people running trains together, where you can actually see and interact with them, and use either AI dispatching or have someone working a desk/tower.
