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Summary

• Release Year: 2018
• Genres: Simulator
• Platforms: PC (Microsoft Windows)

EEP TSM Gotthard – The Swiss Shunting Sim That Puts Your Nerves on the Rails
By [Author Name] | 1,200 words | 7-minute read

If you’ve ever watched a 1,800-tonne freight claw its way up a 2.7 % grade while an impatient passenger service breathes down its neck, you already know the Gotthard Railway is no place for heroes—it’s a place for people who read brake tables for fun. EEP TSM Gotthard, the latest standalone module in the long-running “Eisenbahn.exe Professional” (EEP) series, dares you to run the notorious North Ramp between Immensee and Göschenen for real. No health bars, no rewind button, no cute XP pop-ups—just a dispatcher’s headset, a 400-page rule book, and a timetable that will laugh at you.

What it is – and what it absolutely isn’t
EEP TSM Gotthard is a hard-core shunting and timetable operations simulator built on the 20-year-old EEP engine that German hobbyists keep alive with religious fervor. Think of it as model railroading without the attic dust: you place rolling stock, set routes, throw switches, couple air hoses, and—crucially—drive nothing with an arcade “W/S/A/D” scheme. Every control is a 1:1 replica of the real Swiss cab: the Re 460’s combined throttle/brake lever, the Siemens “Vectron” dashboard, even the classic brown “Schurzen” buttons on the Ae 6/6. If that sentence made you bounce in your seat, keep reading. If you’re here for a Train-World-meets-Derail Valley party game, bail now.

First impressions – a love letter to rivets
Boot the sim and you’re greeted by a utilitarian German UI that looks like Excel’s grumpy uncle. Dig past the spreadsheets, though, and the 3-D world is surprisingly alive. The 42 km North Ramp is modeled down to the kilometer stones. Stone viaducts at Erstfeld and Amsteg are textured with lichen and weather streaks; catenary masts carry real Swiss numbering plates; even the red emergency phones at the end of each platform are present. Dynamic snow coverage, 24-hour lighting, and PBR materials mean stainless-steel EMUs reflect the low winter sun like mirrors. It’s not Unreal Engine 5, but on a 1440p monitor the screenshots look convincingly like a September morning on the N-Südrampe.

Gameplay loop – 80 % planning, 15 % praying, 5 % actually moving
TSM Gotthard ships with 40 scenarios ranging from “simple” yard drills in Immensee to the nightmare titled “Gotthard Forwarder 8, delayed 27 min, rush-hour insertion, snow.” Each job is a self-contained logistical puzzle:

1. Read the Waybill – 37 gravel hoppers need to be split at Erstfeld, with through-cars continuing to Biasca.
2. Build the Consist – drag the correct wagons out of the siding, remembering that loaded RRes-hopper > 80 km/h only.
3. Test the Brakes – you literally walk the consist (first-person) twisting every brakewheel to “Auf 4” and back. Skip three cars and your first downhill will end in a runaway.
4. Get a Route – open the dispatch panel, request a slot, watch the red signals flip to white “Rf” (Räumung fahren) only after the dispatcher confirms.
5. Drive by the Book – observe ZSI-127 cab signalling; acknowledge every 500 Hz magnet; reduce to 35 km/h before the tight S-curve at Wassen or risk a “Fahrtüberschreitung” instant failure.

You can jump into any scenario in “semi-pro” mode with gentle assists, but the medal-worthy challenge is “TSM-Real”: no HUD, no external camera, no pause while you scroll YouTube for braking tables. Misjudge one downhill kilometre and the 1,200-tonne train will push your Re 6/6 through the red at Göschenen—scenario over, no mercy, no “continue for 50 gold.”

Shunting, the Swiss way
Where American sims treat switching like a puzzle of points, TSM treats it like surgery. You control the individual air hoses: click to open the cocks, hear the hiss, watch the pressure needle crawl to 5.0 bar, then release the handbrake. Forget to bleed the auxiliary reservoir and the first curve will spray graffiti of hot brake dust across the Alpine sky. Coupling at 0.2 km/h too fast damages the buffers and costs you points. The sim even models the “Zwangsbremsung” (emergency stop) if you pass a distant signal at 85 km/h instead of the mandated 75 km/h. It’s micromanagement paradise—some will call it tedious, aficionados call it Tuesday night.

Rolling stock catalogue – a museum in motion
All the North Ramp celebrities are here: crocodile-style Ae 6/6, Re 4/4ii in classic SBB red, Re 460 “Faïencerie,” and the new Bombardier “Traverso” EW-IV push-pull sets. Freight ranges from sliding-wall boxcars to the eye-catching silver “SBB Cargo” containers. Each model carries working cab indicators, selectable PZB variants, and custom physics files for axle load. Modders can import their own consists using the bundled ShapeViewer, though the lack of a Steam Workshop equivalent means you’ll be scrolling German forums at 1 a.m. for repaints.

Difficulty & learning curve – bring a notebook
Expect to spend your first evening learning how to read “Kursbuch” tables and decode Swiss signal aspects. The PDF manual is 112 pages, only half in English. Thankfully the community has subtitled a 20-video tutorial series. After roughly six hours you’ll nail a simple Erstfeld–Altdorf transfer without overrunning the siding. After thirty you’ll feel comfortable enough to try “NightICE 810,” and that’s when the sim reveals its sadistic heart: a 3 % gradient, a 1,000 m tunnel, and a passenger train that absolutely must keep its 75 km/h slot. You will fail, repeatedly. The payoff is the dopamine hit when every signal box along the line turns green in your honour.

Performance & tech – an old engine that could
Built on 32-bit code, EEP won’t win benchmarks. On an RTX 3060 / Ryzen 5 5600X rig the sim hovers around 55 fps at 1440p with dynamic shadows on. Drop to 1080p or disable reflections and it locks at 60. Loading times are swift—scenarios boot in under 15 seconds on an NVMe. The bigger headache is stability: expect one crash every three hours if you alt-tab relentlessly. Save often; the autosnap occurs only at signal boxes. Controller support is excellent: the sim recognised a RailDriver natively and let me map the combined throttle/brake on the slider within seconds.

Sound design – the clack that sells the fantasy
Sound is where TSM Gotthard quietly shines. Wheel-rail harmonics change pitch when you enter a 200 m radius curve. The Re 460’s blower ramps up in 3-D as you walk past the locomotive. Station announcements echo with the correct Swiss-German dialect: “Zug nach Chiasso, Gleis 3, Abfahrt 14:27.” Outside, cowbells tinkle in the meadows, and when you open the cab window you’ll hear the faint roar of the Reuss river. Wear headphones—this is ASMR for rivet counters.

Longevity & replay value – infinite if you speak “Fahrt”
Because every scenario relies on dynamic dispatch, no two runs are identical. A late northbound IC can throw your freight into a siding for 12 minutes, forcing you to recalculate your brake cooling. Add the bundled editor and you can script your own 1990s timetable before the base tunnel existed. The small but obsessive community already posts weekly challenges: “Hazardous goods to Göschenen, storm warning, 45 min delay, no helper locomotive.” If you crave global leaderboards or cosmetic unlocks, look elsewhere—progress here is measured in personal pride and screenshots of flawless paperwork.

Price & value proposition
At €34.99 on the developer’s store (Steam release is “planned but not 2024”), TSM Gotthard is cheaper than a new TRAXX model locomotive for your basement layout. You get 42 km of hand-crafted Alpine railway, 40+ scenarios, a timetable editor, and lifetime updates. No DLC roadmap, no season pass, no cosmetic coins—refreshingly old-school. For comparison, a single Swiss add-on for Train Sim World costs more and gives you half the drivable route.

Who should buy it

• Veterans of Zusi 3, OpenRails, or Run8 who want shunting depth.
• Model railroaders who can’t fit the Gotthard in their basement.
• Swiss commuters nostalgic for the old mountain route before the base tunnel.

Who should skip it

• Players who need crash helmets rather than reading assignments.
• Anyone allergic to German-only voiceovers and PDFs.
• Gamers hunting for photo mode filters and Twitch-friendly “let’s plays.”

Verdict – 7.5 / 10
EEP TSM Gotthard is a niche inside a niche: a slow, meticulous, Swiss-German love letter to moving freight on the edge of human error. It’s ugly in menus, gorgeous on the rails, and utterly merciless if you treat it like Railroad Tycoon. Embrace the learning curve and you’ll discover one of the most immersive railway experiences on PC—just don’t expect the game to hold your hand; it’s too busy guarding the 1,000-metre drop down to Göschenen.

Review Score

7.5/10

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