March 9th, 2005

Going to try and turn the direction of this "blog". Since Bernie does such a great job of summing up new releases at WebDotTrainSim I was covering much of the same ground. For that and several other reasons I think I'll stick to editorializin'

Got the June issue of Model Railroader this weekend. Aside from a couple of the usual ads' from 3DTrains and such there is no mention of Train Simming. Too bad, folks are really missing out of an excellent part of the Model Railroading hobby...

Perhaps one reason is the level of advertisement of V-Scale versus all the other scales. There is a ton of money invested in modeling in real space. Cyber space modeling will probably never be the money making proposition represented in other scales. Too much freeware, and payware prices must be kept too low to make a killing. The average payware vendor gets to charge pennies for a locomotive that would fetch hundreds (or thousands) in real space.

A good example is a new locomotive review in MR. A Missabe "Yellowstone" and caboose set for $1100! An N scale model, no less. What hurts even more is the price for the caboose without the locomotive....$129! For an N-Scale caboose?

I guess I don't have the disposable income needed to throw that much money after an object less than 4 inches long. I would have a hard time justifying that kind of expenditure in any scale. Maybe it's the degree of realism I'd be paying for? How realistic can a 4 inch long railroad car get? No matter how much detail you add, it's still only an N scale caboose. Unless I view my layout through a magnifying glass positioned right where that caboose is parked, I'd never notice. Wouldn't that one car detract from the level of detail over the entire layout? Wouldn't I have to start paying $150 for every object, just so it reached the standard set by a single car?

In the May (I think) issue of Model Railroader, Terry Thompson made a good point in his editorial "How far is too far". How expensive do we want this hobby to get? What if we added lights and sound and smoke to our little caboose? What if we added DCC so we could control the lights and sound etc?

Are we willing to pay $200 or even $500 for such an item?

Which leads me to this point...I can build the same caboose in V-scale for nothing. I can detail it, give it sound, smoke, a crew, a desk with papers, a fire in the pot belly stove and even see the train from the cupola (try doing that in any other scale). Even if I purchased it, I doubt it would cost more than 10 bucks. Of course I cannot hold the thing in my hands, but after paying $150 plus I'm not sure I'd want to.

I've heard that one about being able to "hold" the model quite a few times. What strikes me as funny is the fact that with very fine models the idea is to NOT handle them. Clumsy fingers can remove intricate details and rub off weathering. In the end it works out. I can't touch my models, but apparently neither can folks in other scales.

I've also heard all the arguments about the current prices, accounting for inflation, etc. Might as well talk yourself into paying $3 a gallon for gasoline. I don't know about most people but "paying more" means paying more in this neck of the woods. My salary hasn't increased to keep up with fuel prices or the cost of an Athearn Genesis. It's getting expensive. Period!

V-Scale is an excellent alternative to the high price of this hobby. It's a great way to enjoy model railroading yet still be able to feed and clothe your family.

Well that's about all for now...See ya' next time.