From X-Plane.com= = = Microsoft has laid off it's entire Flight Simulator development team, and many people are not sure what to do next.Many tens of thousands of people have been switching over from Microsoft Flight Simulator to X-Plane for quite a few years, and the current situation at Microsoft would seem to indicate that this trend will continue at an accelerating rate.We at Laminar Research are ready for the influx of new customers that is coming in now, and will be facilitating the move from Microsoft Flight Simulator to X-Plane to make the transition as easy as possible for everyone, and continuing to make X-Plane the most powerful, accurate, flexible, and fun flight-sim there is.With or without Microsoft, I believe that X-Plane is by far the best flight-sim on the market, and the development of new versions that we have going on behind the scenes right now... ooo boy, what's coming next will blow everything away that you have seen so far.This page will be devoted to helping people convert from MS to X-Plane. We will post tools to convert airplanes and scenery, and tutorials explaining how to use and develop for X-Plane that are oriented towards people that have been using, and developing for, MS in the past.Many people make their living creating add-ons for MS, and those people may be anxious about the apparent demise of MS Flight Simulator... I don't think they NEED to be worried, though, as 2008 was the best year ever for X-Plane (thanks largely to the Apple iPhone, and the huge swath of customers that came over to X-Plane when they discovered from the iPhone version how cool X-Plane is) and X-Plane is NOT going away.In fact, X-Plane sales are INCREASING each year, and X-Plane is actually quite a bit EASIER to develop planes and scenery for than MS Flight Simulator.Plane-Maker is very user-friendly, and if you can just enter the GEOMETRY of the aircraft in Plane-Maker, then X-Plane will predict the way the airplane flies FOR YOU, so you need NOT enter aircraft performance into X-Plane, like you need to with MS... X-Plane does all of that FOR YOU. The X-Plane aircraft visual system is based on this geometry you enter in Plane-Maker by default, and can be over-ridden with incredibly detailed 3-D models if you like.. 3-D models that can be easily exported from AC3D.As well, tools exist to convert scenery from MS to X-Plane format, and we will soon be posting those tools to make the transition easy for you if you develop, or have a large collection of, MS scenery.As well, we have PLUGINS (see the 'Plugins HQ' link at the front of X-Plane.com) to interface third-party tools with X-Plane... with Plugins, you can read and write data from X-Plane very easily, allowing you to write third-party add-ons, which we enthusiastically support.The bottom line is that we at Laminar Research are ready to accept the inflow of customers from Microsoft, will continue to make X-Plane the best flight simulator in the industry, have new things lined up that will knock your socks off, and will post tools and information here that will make your transition from MS to X-Plane be as painless (and fun!!) as possible.This applies equally to both customers and add-on developers.Signed: Austin Meyer, Author, X-Plane= = =

This statement doesn't sound very ethical IMO.Let's say that this is not the right moment for this kind of advertizing and that's not very fair for the ACES team.

This statement doesn't sound very ethical IMO.Let's say that this is not the right moment for this kind of advertizing and that's not very fair for the ACES team.

To be fair this statement has been taken from the X-Plane website (as I understand it). I would not be happy if it had been posted here (or to a forum) initially. A lot of people have just lost their jobs and work colleagues, perhaps it might have been better to have let the dust settle a bit!However, it may well be that x-plane becomes the future of flight sims for many of us and I guess that x-plane are entitled to "set out their stall".

This statement doesn't sound very ethical IMO.Let's say that this is not the right moment for this kind of advertizing and that's not very fair for the ACES team.

Its also blatant commercial advertising.... on the FSX forum. :(

Austin would have to pay me an annual salary of a minimum of $1,000,000 U.S. to develop for his X-Plane.There's a very long list of why... which isn't appropriate to discuss here. However, I'll stop developing for flight sims before I develop for his.

I have Xplane9 with the latest updates. Been flying it for a while and comparing it to MS FSX. And let me tell you something right now:FSX BLOWS XPLANE9 AWAY!!! Period. I don't care if FSX is an 800lb. gorrilla, The results when it works well are far better than Xplane.Austin is full of it. I had respect until that statement he made. Xplane runs smooth, that's it. Graphics suck, aircraft exteriors suck. Flight dynamics are just ok.-jkEdit: More to the point, Austin should apologize publically for this rude and insensitive statement. Either that or be ready to receive TONS of hate mail.

Not a single word of concern for the displaced crew that brought us the best flight sim for the last 27 years, very poor taste in my opinion. I for one will be flying FSX for a long long time, right up until the next FS version becomes a reality, and it will.

Not a single word of concern for the displaced crew that brought us the best flight sim for the last 27 years, very poor taste in my opinion. I for one will be flying FSX for a long long time, right up until the next FS version becomes a reality, and it will.

Me, too. I love this sim, and am on the point of throwing down another two gs for an i7 940. X-Plane?? I, too tried X-Plane during the end of last year, but hmmph.......Nice effort maybe, and it has its adherents, but its a cartoon compared to FSX.

That's one of the most opportunistic and self serving comments I've seen from any developer, and I've been participating in the hobby (can you believe it's been that long?) a quarter century. As others have said, the timing of Austin's comments is very poor. Also, unless the excerpt you posted is incomplete, nowhere do I see empathy from Austin about the team members at Aces who are out of work. When times get tough the true character of people come out. There are some who will give you the shirt of their back when they have nothing to give, and some who will paint a smiley face on the shirt, stand on a street corner, and tell you it's the best shirt on the planet and how it's been the best all along.Regards,John

I see nothing wrong with the above text by Laminar Research. This was posted on their website not on this forum. They are obviously within their rights to claim that X-Plane is the best simulator. As to the inclusion of "empathy" clause for laid off workers, give me break, this was text directed at the customer, how often when one airline goes belly up with layoffs you see competitors include empathy on their websites, or for that matter in any other industry. Lack of such language doesn't imply someone is insensitive. This is not a funeral procession. The problem is over-analysis of such texts and desire to find flaws and crticize.

Also, unless the excerpt you posted is incomplete, nowhere do I see empathy from Austin about the team members at Aces who are out of work. When times get tough the true character of people come out. There are some who will give you the shirt of their back when they have nothing to give, and some who will paint a smiley face on the shirt, stand on a street corner, and tell you it's the best shirt on the planet and how it's been the best all along.Regards,John

No unfortunately it's a direct quote! http://x-plane.com/ms_to_xp/ms_to_xp.html

I see nothing wrong about the above text by Laminar. This was posted on his website not on this forum. He obviously is within his rights to claim that X-Plane is the best simulator. As to the inclusion of "empathy" clause for laid off workers, give me break, this was text directed at the customer, how often when one airline goes belly up with layoffs you see competitors include empathy on their websites, or for that matter in any other industry. Lack of such language doesn't imply someone is insensitive. The problem is over-analysis of such texts.

I would normally agree with you -- I work in the design wing of a company that develops software and of course we have to be the best and we're not going to publish and advert saying otherwise. But I still think, in this case, Austin is jumping in too soon and using the misery of a talented team as advertising. He's using the layoff as a segue into pushing his product. His website is quite visible, that's why the text of his comments appeared here so soon. Simulation isn't the airline industry--it's a pretty small community where even competitors know each other on a personal basis. I think that's what impresses me the most, as we have many vendors here with competing products who still step in to lend a helping hand. It will be interesting to see how this thread pans out, I am sure some will agree with you and it would be interesting to hear what their reasoning is. I just don't recall any company I've worked for doing that.

Suppose we had never been told about the closing of ACES and the cancellation of a never-officially-announced FSvNext?Would we really be in any different position than we are now? All we knew was that if there was going to be an "FS11," we couldn't possibly expect to see it released until at least late Q4 of 2010.Now I know that there wasn't even any "Alpha" code yet for FSvNext. A lot of pre-planning had been done, and the advances being made for TS2 were widely announced. It was likely that much of what was going to be in TS2 would have also been incorporated into any future FSvNext......but aside from that there was nothing but sheer conjecture that any FSvNext would ever be announced officially, much less released.So again I ask, how would the situation really be any different? We still don't know if - or when - any future FS will be produced.From my perspective, nothing is different at all. Freeware and Commercial modelers will continue to support FS9 and/or FSX as they see fit, irrespective of any possible future FS release.Good grief! There are still folks (admittedly few) who're producing FS98 models! ;D

I do agree that a little empathy in the letter would have gone a long way. Having said that I am equally impressed that X-Plane has progressed to the level it is at now (it does show a lot of potential) and this coming from a team of coders probably smaller than most of the big FS payware addon companies.

From X-Plane.com= = = Microsoft has laid off it's entire Flight Simulator development team, and many people are not sure what to do next.Many tens of thousands of people have been switching over from Microsoft Flight Simulator to X-Plane for quite a few years, and the current situation at Microsoft would seem to indicate that this trend will continue at an accelerating rate......

The problem with posting this 'out of context' is we get to miss all the CAPITALIZATION Austin used in his post on the X-Plane site. It (the original) shows his real character IMO, and does not make me likely to support this guy...at all, ever.Bottom line, this guy seems 'full of himself'.