HomeFeaturesDerail Valley
The Flare Path: Derail Valley DiaryThe parable of the greedy engine driver
The parable of the greedy engine driver
My favourite Thomas the Tank Engine book is ‘Zlatko the Shunter’, the one where Thomas travels to Yugoslavia for his holidays, makes friends with aSeries 621, and becomes a committed market socialist. Sadly, the little orange Zlatkos that are everywhere inDerail Valley: Overhauledhave nothing to say on the subject of planned economies, worker self-management, and the perils of unchecked incentivisation. If they had perhaps my week with Altfuture’s better-than-ever Early Access rail sim wouldn’t have ended the way it did.
Returning toDerail Valley, an unusually physical freight-only train game set Somewhere in the Balkans, for the first time since May’s root-and-branchline’Overhauled' update, I make a bee-line for one of the new Class DE6 diesels. When I find a “This locomotive requires a licence” message affixed to the locked cab door, I go looking for an office in order to purchase the relevant paperwork. The office’s multi-function ATM delivers bad news. Of the $200K licence price, I possess roughly two percent. For a fleeting moment I contemplate a save file text edit then self-respect kicks in and, rolling up my sleeves, I stride over to the jobs table.
Unlike other train sims DV doesn’t do scenarios or timetables. Each of the sixteen towns and industrial sites on the map periodically generate new tasks that pay according to the length and mass of the train, and the distance, complexity, and risk of the journey. You’re very much your own boss, but until you’ve purchased licences, can’t take every job on offer. Of the fairly meagre selection of contracts I’m eligible for, I settle upon a relatively short $15K container run from my current location, Food Factory, west to Machine Factory (One thing Overhauled didn’t overhaul was the utilitarian place names. An option to toggle South Slavic sounding ones would be nice).
Although it has been months since I last operated a little orange DE2, my right hand has little trouble recalling the sequence of flicked switches and lever adjustments needed to coax the dinky 0-4-0 into motion. Leafing through the game’s beautifully designed book of track diagrams, I locate my wagons, couple up, and am on my way.
My rustiness shows too in my route selection. Rather than approach my destination from the north I come at it from the south, not appreciating that the junction arrangement there means an awkward reversing movement of around a mile. As the sim doesn’t feature AI traffic or signals at present, there’s no danger of aSPADand little chance of a collision, but reversing a train while simultaneously switching points with the infra-red remote is something of an art.
Choosing the next job is easy. Scanning the contracts table at Machine Factory a row of tiny tractor icons darts me as consummately as any Cupid. It looks like the nine redIMT 533sare destined for export because they are wanted in Harbour, far away to the SE.
The complicated cross-country trundle goes swimmingly until, winding eastward through a valley in the centre of the map, my loco’s engine suddenly gives a cough and lapses into silence. What a clot - I’ve managed to run out of fuel! Cursing my stupidity I weigh-up my options and decide the best thing to do is to quit the footplate, and hotfoot it across hill and vale to Steel Mill. I should be able to collect aThunderbirdthere.
Unencumbered, the rescue loco goes like the clappers as I hurry back to the scene of my ignominious breakdown. Even though I know I’ve blown my chance of an early delivery bonus, I’m eager to get the cargo moving again.Tooeager it turns out. When the rear wagon of the abandoned train looms unexpectedly into view as I round a blind bend, I know instantly I’m not going to be able to stop in time. Brakes squeal, tractors embiggen, a mortified idiot braces himself for the inevitable. The impact when it comes isn’t hefty enough to cause a derailment, but the rescue loco’s cab glass explodes with a condemnatory crash, and the damage ravages the payment I eventually collect when I reach Harbour. Two blunders in one trip? If I carry on like this, acquiring that DE6 licence could take weeks.
It’s at Food Factory that I succumb to temptation and buy one of the new ‘Hazmat’ licences. The purchase all but wipes out my DE6 fund. but will, I reason, ensure my bank balance grows rapidly in the days to come. I’m not best pleased when I realise that the only Hazardous Materials jobs to be had in the locality also require a Shunting licence – something I can’t afford. The promise of a $24632 payment at Machine Factory & Town eventually persuades me to attach Zlatko to a string of eight boxcars and container flats loaded with meat, dairy products and pet food.
My longest and heaviest train to date needs delicate handling on the grade out of Food Factory – delicate handling that initially I seem incapable of providing. After my first ascent attempt ends in failure, I roll back into the yard and try again with a longer, more vigorous run-up. This time the sander does the business, the temp needle stays out of the red zone, and momentum is maintained. I reach the summit with sweat beads on my brow, a satisfied smile on my face, and a thought circling my cranium like a bottled bluebottle. “When was the last time Train Sim World worked me this hard?”
Ninety hatchbacksfronts is a heavy load for a small loco, but I’m starting to get comfortable with the new physics now. With judicious use of sand and careful throttle modulation we reach City SW without incident. Rolling cautiously towards the deserted destination siding, infra-red gizmo in hand, I find myself picturing apeopledDerail Valley. Right now the sim is a model railway layout withoutNoch figures. An occasional glimpse of a permanent way crew clad in hi-vis orange or a shopping-laden town dweller shortcutting across weed-invaded tracks would work wonders.
Desperate to use my Hazmat licence I spend some of my earnings from the car delivery on a Shunting Licence so that I can tackle a fiddly but lucrative contract unloading and moving oil tanks within City SW. Things start inauspiciously when I clout a buffer-stop while reversing light-engine. The jolt deglazes the cab and reminds me that not all freight yards have mainline access at both ends. Another schoolboy error late in the task persuades me to hang up my shunting pole for the day and climb the wooden hill to Bedfordshire. Page 1 of ‘The Idiot’s Guide to Shunting’ - “When dropping off wagons in a dead-end siding, it’s wise not to enter the siding loco-first.”
Zlatko is less enthusiastic about the oil job. It takes a Bondi Beach of sand and all my skill and persuasive powers to nurse him up the long incline from the river bridge. Several times during the ascent the overheating bell tinkles and the wheelslip warning light glowers at me from the dash. But we make it to Harbour, albeit forty minutes too late to claim the prompt delivery bonus. Another three jobs like that and I’ll have my DE6 licence, I think to myself as I feed and water my faithful orange workhorse in the local roundhouse.
Although Job #8 doesn’t pay as well as its predecessor, the $20K I pocket after hauling five containers of tools and electronics the short distance to Goods Factory is not to be sniffed at, and the run puts me close to Oil Well North, a location likely to furnish the kind of NLEs (Nice Little Earners) I now crave.
Sure enough Oil Well North comes up trumps. Ignoring Zlatko’s howls of protest and defeatist doom-mongering, I say “Da” to a methane moving job that promises to net me a cool $88K in under an hour.
No more pocket money jaunts for Tim and Zlatko. Shunning the nearest office I make for Oil Well Central where I find a contract that makes my heart hasten and my wallet drool. Job #10 is going to make me rich – well, rich enough to upgrade to a DE6 in one fell swoop. Someone wants a train of crude oil tanks delivered to Harbour and is willing to pay $117K to the deliverer.
It’s only when I’m back in the sunshine (oddly, it never rains in DV), the job spec in my hand and the rake of wagons in front of me, that I fully appreciate what I’ve taken on. Fifteen tanks of liquid methane on the fairly flat line from Oil Well North to City South-West was gruelling. Eighteen tanks of crude oil through the mountains to Harbour may just be impossible. There’s only one way to find out.
The yard at Oil Well Central is as flat as a billiard table but Zlatko, bullish after his recent triumph, still needs plenty of sand under his hooves to coerce the first revolution from the train’s 76 steel wheels. We snail through Farm under a cloud of sooty clag. Approaching the journey’s first incline, a mile or so of curving grade beginning just beyond the river, I glance at the temperature gauge and, not liking what I see, decide to stop to let the engine cool before attempting the ascent. It’s a tough call. The momentum was precious, but restarting after a shutdown on the slope would have been impossible.
Once the temp needle has retraced its arc I open the throttle, prod the sand button, and wait for the scenery outside to start sidling. It doesn’t. The lineside fields stubbornly refuse to budge. Unwilling to give up on that huge paycheck, I decide to split the rake into two parts and haul each section to Harbour separately.
So much for that bright idea. Even with his burden halved, Zlatko strains to no avail. Perhaps I’ve inadvertently stopped on a slight slope.
Frivolous/reckless 20200709102225_1.jpg is the reason Zlatko II’s buffers biff Zlatko I’s buffers much harder than intended. At first shattered glass seems to be the only consequence of the tooth-loosening collision. Until inky smoke starts belching from the underside of the closest tank, I have no idea that escaped black gold is dripping onto hot axles.
Do DE2’s carry fire extinguishers? I’m frantically scouring the gloomy cab (DV’s cab lights are ridiculously feeble) for something red and cylindrical when the punctured tank goes off like a bomb, knocking poor old Zlatko I onto his side.
Instinct kicks in. I bail out sharpish then watch impotently from a safe distance as my lovely oil train – my life-changing $117K – goes up like a string of firecrackers.
Thank heavens for DV’s automatic insurance scheme (every purchased licence increases your cover). Without it I’d now owe the local environment agency, the oil company, and the owners of the immolated train a grand total of $1.6 million in damages rather than $9K. Assuming I rein in my greed and resist the urge to take footplate snaps while shunting, a DE6 before lunchtime still isn’t out of the question.
Watch on YouTube
Watch on YouTube
