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Can i ask a genuinely serious question.
Ive never played a train sim. In my head it is push W to go forward. Push S to stop.
It must be more to than that, Am i correct?
Depending on the train and the task, you as the engineer may have more or less to do and keep track of.
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Yes. In most trains you have to do a bit of a cold start (get the battery going, raise the pantograph, start the systems). Then on the move you interact with the train systems (you can set how intense you want this to be, full realism or more relaxed). And then keep an eye out for the signals and signs. On commuter trains, it can be quite intense with all starts and stops you do, and all the signalling you deal with. Cargo and Intercity trains usually have quite long stretches of max-speed travel.
I bought TSW3 on a sale a long time ago and kinda liked it. But what gets me is that for many trains thereās only a handful of routes available unless you want to to buy extra routes.
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Having a previous version will get you a free copy of TSW 5 until I believe the 19 of october.
That also includes any previously purchased routes.
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Super mega thanks! Snatched the free upgrade, will check it out
Depends, you have different types of brakes and huge inertia to deal. Its not as simples as accelerate or brake as in an racing sim.
Here if you are in a descend you need to fine tunning the correct brakes to deal because to not accelerate or brae too much, in some lengthy trains to remove brakes spend much time to you need to brake the correct effords and not much to avoid stopped and spend time. In many pax tasks you need to deal with very hard scheduled where 5 mph less is arrive too late and 1 mph more you are overspeeding and it will trigger the speed protection and auto stop your train.
Some locos have very complex systems with multiple multifunction displays.
About signals you have 1000s of them and with complex rules, some like this:
āMagnets-----------------------------------------------------------
ā1000Hz (green light) - Distance Signal
Should press Wachsam/Vigilant within 4s - KPEnt
O (light) - from 165km/h to < 85km/h in 23s
M (medium) - from 125km/h to < 70km/h in 29s
U (heavy) - from 105km/h to < 55km/h in 38s
After 700m from 1000Hz you can use Frei/Free (out from magnet 500Hz) to free the restriction, the Main Signal should be clear with >40km/h
ā500Hz (blue light)
O - from 65km/h to < 45km/h in 153m and keep until 250m
M - from 50km/h to < 35km/h in 153m and keep until 250m
U - from 40km/h to < 25km/h in 153m and keep until 250m
ā2000Hz - Signal
Active when red light
You can use Befehl40 to ignore and have a limit of 40km/h - KP0
If within of 1000Hz or 500Hz the train goes:
- 0 km/h
- +15s with < 10km/h
It enter in restriction limit of -20km/h (45km/h) and only go out if use Frei/Free outside of magnets (70 and 85 lights alternate)
So popular culture think that driving a train is only like 2 handles, 1 for move and 1 for brake. And car drivers joke that running a train is boring and easy.
For some reason a car driving license is 35h and cost 400usd (+/-) and a loco driving license is 1200h and cost 15.000 usd (+/-) so that means something.
Whatever you can joke you will have more trobble and spend more time to learn how to correctly drive a loco than a car eve in a simulator.
See this manual of this dlc, more easy than a car driving ???
https://store.steampowered.com/manual/2662170 and this not even talk about signals etc
See here a tiny example:
Railway signals in Germany - Wikipedia
Also many countries have diferent signals rules and even exist countries like USA that have diferent rules depending of the line.
So, if you wanna learn, drive by the rules and control heavy machinery, train sim is a great hobby!!!
Interesting, here if youāre over 16 you can take the test for I think $25, and thatās it. The materials are on the website to study. Theoretically you donāt need any road practice time before hand, and depending on where you do your test the only thing that would have any difficulty at all is parallel parking. And to be honest some places arenāt going to make you do it as thereās no need.
At itās most basic yes, @stavka did a great job breaking down just some of the signaling challenges. Even skipping that part, getting a modern diesel electric cargo train moving involves the correct application of power to go with the releasing of the brakes to get the slack out of the train, followed by the correct application of power to get rolling. Slowing down can be dicey unless youāve got a lot of space/time to work with, as you donāt want to have the cars all crashing together, and you donāt want to exhaust air reservoirs or overheat anything. Doing it on a steam train is a whole different kettle of fish with its own attendant issues.
In short you can simplify driving a train to a āgo forward, go backwardā lever, a āhow fast leverā, and a āstopā lever. Just like with an 18-wheeler itās the same set of controls with pedals for 2 of the 3, but thereās a whole lot more to it (range splitters anyone?).
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I assumed the rules and regulations side would be more involved, but i didnt realise to be honest that a modern train would be a complicated thing for a driver to operate. No more than a truck would be, turn it on, put in D and go sort of thing
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Haaaaa and i forgot, if you go to steam locos, omg thats a great challenge to finesse tunning your levers and valves to have sustained power without the loose of steam pressure, if you consume more than produce you ran out of power.
Imho its a great funny hobby, you can start simple with a sub-urban electric train and later progress to steam locos, complex german railway speed protection systems, huge cargo trains, tight pax schedules, etc.
In some train simulators it even are simulated the couplers weakness, so if you are like in an american cargo train with like +100 wagons totaling 1000s of tons and in a climb if you do it wrong, you ca break the couplers because the 1000s Tons trying to ran away descending from gravity while you are trying to climb it breaks the couplers. To avoid it, you should have tail locos doing more power than from front locos to push the cargo instead of pulling it. So, train driving have many cool and fun challengings to keep you entertained learning and deal with it. Also with some train sims with well done real routes, its also fun the travelling part.
Check the links from my first post and all are modern locos and rules and judge yourself if its as easy as a truck.
I really wasnt arguing, i was genuinely interested by your whole post
Also its like airplanes, more modern more systems to learn, its like a dc3 vs an a320. modern locos have multiple digital screens with many menus diagrams etc, also the eletric ones are hugelly more complex than old diesel ones and the driver/engineer should deal with all controls and valves inside the engine compartments to deal with starting, failures etc
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If I hadnāt already sunk $100ās into locoās and routes for Dovetailās Trainsim I would be very tempted.
And @Victork2 as others have summed up nicely it isnāt quite as simple as go and stop. Plus there are some really cool and/or historic locomotives to tryā¦ The Flying Scotsman, Class 55 Deltics, and some real 'oddballs like:
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if in future you wanna see them, we can schedule an discord session and i can show you some examples of train sims with screen sharing 
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An engine i would love to explore
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Someone just informed me of a large DLC sale ending tomorrow!
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Iām in the same boat as Harry for the flatscreen train simsā¦ but I still need to try Derail Valley VRā¦
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The Class 55 is probably my āmost usedā train, purely for the sound
This guy built a working scale model of the Napier Deltic engine:
You are in the UK so I bet he lives just down the road from you 
, maybe pay him a visit?
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