The primary issue in NY is the subway service and the Amtrack trains coming in via the soon to be replaced portal bridge in NJ plus general Amtrack crappiness from other routes (not an NY problem). The commuter lines are decent. Though, with ridership destroyed it remains to be seen what impact the revenue shortfalls will have going forward.
That's only NY City though. If we consider the trains in Buffalo/Utica/Syracuse/Rochester/Albany I think you'll find it way more grim compared to equivalent German cities than what you're describing.
I'm not sure how that's relevant though when just trying to compare travelling by rail in NY State to Germany; is the claimed problem with Amtrak that they have to cover more states than the German train system, and train system management doesn't scale directly causing rail to be worse in NY State than in Germany?
