Its funny for me because I'm not an enthusiast or a train spotter or anything like that.
I used to do the job in real life around London and now I'm a train driver in real life. I enjoyed the driving aspect of buses but it was everything else that goes with it, getting up for shifts, finishing late, difficult and sometimes dangerous passengers, its the same on the trains now, I enjoy the job itself but all the other stuff can put a bit of a dampener on it, in omsi or train sim I can just whack on the pc and do the bits I enjoy, ie driving, without having to worry about setting alarm clocks and getting up at 3am or having bad encounters with passengers.
Of course it will never be the same but its the closest you can get in my opinion in terms of physics etc, its a shame it wasn't developed further and the engine upgraded but we all know the story behind that one lol.
Basically to me I can do my job at home without the hassle that comes with it in real life