Considering purchasing RW3 as a Christmas gift...

[OniNoKen]

Hi...

My father and his father both worked for the ATSF as a breakman/conductor, and I thought this might be a good/enjoyable app for him.

I was looking at the page on steam and found that the game is reasonable, but then the DLC is the cost of another game! My question is this: will there be stuff for him to do with the base game, or even the deluxe version? Or will he have to buy a bunch of DLC for it to be an enjoyable experience?

Thanks for your time.

Ken

[LoneWolfDon]

Well, looking at the Steam's Store Page for RailWorks3, http://store.steampowered.com/app/24010/ ,it now comes with:

Cutting edge graphics and detail
8 Realistic lines
16 highly-detailed locomotives including Hitachi Super Express
More than 70 scenarios
Realistic weather and seasons
World Editor to modify and build routes
Career System leader board
Driving tutorials

And for a few dollars more, you can get the Deluxe version, which includes the "Horseshoe Curve Expansion Pack" that comes with "EMD GP7 and F7 locomotives plus unlock-able scenarios which allow you to work your way up as an engineer on the Pennsylvania Railroad."
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So, there's already lots included and to do with the base RailWorks3 program and one could potentially get hundreds of hours of enjoyment just exploring the routes, scenarios and trainsets that come with it. So, just start with the base program at first should be fine.

As for DLCs / Addons, it's all completely optional, and a User might only decide to get what catches their interests. And here's a tip; A lot of us more patient and budget-minded RailWorks Users tend to wait buy any of the Official DLCs that we might have our eye on, during the occasional Sales that Steam tends to have anyways. (For example; not too long ago, during the Autumn Sale on Steam, RailWorks3 and all DLC was 50% off, and had one day it was all at 75% off. And more recently, there was a bonus 50% Off coupon that RailWorks Users could use to buy a choice of DLC).

Speaking of which Steam tends to have a good Sale right around Christmas (chances are the Christmas Sales on Steam will start very soon), and though I can't say for sure, chances are that RailWorks, and the various DLCs for it, will be on sale then for a good discounted price.

Also, if you look around, there's also lots of Freeware Addons available too; For example, the RailWorksAmerica File Library has a nice selection of freebies.
There's also some independent Developers, like myself, that offer some free addons as well (My own site here: http://www.rryard.com/ , and though I do have a couple of PayWare Addons listed there in the Routes and Scenarios section, I also give away several Scenario Addons for free as well).

Cheers!

[arizonachris]

Hi, Ken! To add to what Don said, the hardware requirements for RW should be considered. You will need a pretty high end PC to run the sim at a resonable level of detail and frame rate.

But, with all that said, it's a really great sim, very accurate on prototypical routes, you can even join a group called VORA, they have a section here. You actually can run what is basically a real time consist that you put together yourself! Amazing, actually.

[SMMDigital]

I see one problem with this. If he has already worked for a prototype railroad, how will he react to the unrealistic operations - AI, physics, signaling, etc. - presented by Railworks 3? If he might enjoy tweaking and tinkering with the game, as many have done, to get the operations up to speed, then it will be a great gift. If the expectation though will be that this game will run realistically out of the box, then maybe not so much.