APongr (and other frustrated citizens)...It might help to follow Mike T's lead in his post above and think about this project differently. It's not just an engineering project with a linear timeline - it's creative work. If you've ever done creative work, you know that it can sometimes get messy and fall off the timeline. You think something's finished, then you come up with a better way of doing something else, but in the course of making that improvement, you introduce changes into the first thing so you have to go back to it and rework it. Overall you're making progress and improving things, but there's a lot of backsliding and a lot of circular motion. But if you're conscientious and disciplined, the results in the end are worth it.So let's all step back and let these guys paint, or sculpt, or write, or whatever it is they're doing.Peace!

If you can't follow through with what you tell us, then I prefer you don't tell us anything. As customers we don't deserve to be strung along like this and on a constant hype craze for 5 months straight.

Hi AJ (is that ur first name?) So you've done all things in the world to go and look for Captain Randazzo's posts? I think you need a "chill-pill" and go out and realize that there is an actual world out there. Or maybe since you're so good at this maybe tell them what to do and what not? I bet you that Robert is a much better leader than you. And please note "Close" and "Very Close" is actually not an excact time/distance.Regards,

I must say, I am very pleased with updates. Because updates make waiting okay! As long as I'm not in the dark, I'll wait as long as you want me to. You've been giving us photos, specifics, etc. and for that I am very thankful. Sometimes when developers keep us in the dark for years...we start to lose interest. Well done, PMDG.

I agree with APongr... Nobody wants that PMDG does not give us updates, but the way they do hype everything up is somehow riddicoulus. We want updates and i love it that they give us updates and ireally like those detailed descriptions about the technics in the NGX, no questions here but then at the end Robert always says something like "We are very close" or "A few days more" and then the next 3 weeks nothing happens. Many forum members are sitting in front of their computer and hoping for any kind of news because you always say soon... and nothing happens. Robert, Ryan, Jason, Vin, Dr. Vaos ( :( ) and all the others, i don't want you to get me wrong. I love your products, and i like the informations you give us about the NGX although it isn't released yet. BUT if it needs time then tell us that it will take some month longer instead of telling us it will only take 2-3 weeks and afterwards you couldn't hold what you said. Telling us it will release soon while knowing that there are some minor bugs which have to be fixed is not the best way to handle this whole thing. Everybody wants you to get it right, the same way you want it. But you should be honest.Don't want to attack you guys anyway, it is just a little thing that would improve your update-threads.With this said, i hope you guys won't have any problems any more so the NGX will release this summer. Kind regards,Alex (Wow, this was long...)

We aren't customers?Almost everyone in this forum has bought something from PMDG in the past...but that doesn't make us customers?So if I go the grocery store and I ask when they'll have more bread available, they can treat me however they want because since I haven't bought anything at that exact moment I'm not a customer?Hilarious.

We haven't purchased the NGX, therefore, they have absolutely no responsibility towards people regarding the NGX. If they had done preorders, then yeah, they would have an issue, but they don't.

all you wanted to do was play some flight sim. Am I right? I am just being silly.

'Play'?!! :(

Please stop the complaining about how pmdg runs business. Great update guys cant wait for the next one.

Guys this is getting frikkin ridiculous again. GROW UP! JackColwill

Calm down it will be released when it is released. Take a chill pill.

So far all the updates have been great. When you release the product after such a long time my concern is, is there going to be a problem and will we have to update it again?If it is flyable why cant it be released?

Because it is not about whether it is flyable or not... It is all about the development team deciding when they feel it is right to enter final testing, package it up, and release it. They are the ONLY ones capable of knowing when is the right time.We have seen enough releases on to the market of unfinished projects. Everyone is quick to complain then as well, all those who spent months moaning that the project should be ready by now and should be released... I for one do not want to see that here. I quite happily wait as long as it takes for this to reach the point at which the team decides it is ready, no sooner and no later.Many here seem to air the concern that PMDG doesn't really want us to have their baby Boeing. My guess is that that is as far from the truth as you can get. They want it out and our money in their pockets. That is the way business is, though here they want us to have the best they can offer and as bug free as possible... remember the MD11X? One of the most bug free releases for a complex airliner sim around if I remember correctly...Andrew

Because it is not about whether it is flyable or not... It is all about the development team deciding when they feel it is right to enter final testing, package it up, and release it. They are the ONLY ones capable of knowing when is the right time.We have seen enough releases on to the market of unfinished projects. Everyone is quick to complain then as well, all those who spent months moaning that the project should be ready by now and should be released... I for one do not want to see that here. I quite happily wait as long as it takes for this to reach the point at which the team decides it is ready, no sooner and no later.Many here seem to air the concern that PMDG doesn't really want us to have their baby Boeing. My guess is that that is as far from the truth as you can get. They want it out and our money in their pockets. That is the way business is, though here they want us to have the best they can offer and as bug free as possible... remember the MD11X? One of the most bug free releases for a complex airliner sim around if I remember correctly...Andrew

+1

I really doubt they make much profit from these aircraft. The add-on market is a lot smaller than most add-on users think. To be honest I'd be surprised if it covered maintaining the website between releases & various personal expenses incurred during development, mileage, time off from the day job to make a Boeing trip, more or better cameras/storage/recording equipment, upgrading development software from time to time, etc...If they really wanted to make PMDG a profitable or even just viable self-sustaining business with a full-time development staff (which they sorta do have considering their level of commitment) they'd probably have to charge $500 a pop for their releases.I could be way off, but this seems like a reasonable train of thought to me...

On a side bar.. I hope you have a very good tutorial for this VNAV/LNAV stuff for us non-real life pilot types. I have never used it, and have no clue how to use it. I usually just do ILS landings everywhere that has it, or I just eye ball my way in using the PASI. Either way I will start reading now, but most likely will need a translator by the time it is over with to break it down for me. :(

The tutorials will cover it, don't worry!

Look amazing and no doubt it will be a great product when finished. but sitll, i already lost the interest...too tired to wait for it. :(

I don't understand this sentiment at all - it's going to be the same product whether you got it a few months ago or in the future... most people will fly it for many years to come. What does it matter when you get it if it's good?

It DOES look great. Quick question - will there be two verions of the cockpit? For example, one where the cockpit looks brand-spanking-new and one that shows some wear and tear?

This may be considered in a future update, but the initial release will not have a "clean" cockpit. This is exactly how the real 737-800 that was photo surveyed looked - we actually really like it, the wear and tear gives the product a lot of character that we think is missing from the absolutely immaculate sterile VCs that you see elsewhere, where it almost looks like a CGI rendering instead of a real object. Doing clean textures would also be a ton of extra work - we'd have to survey a clean airplane and then all the photos would have to be turned into textures - that process took many months with the worn textures. I think everyone would probably rather we spend that time on more meaningful enhancements to the NGX or on development of the 777.

@macbellette - I presume that the part of making the PAX cabin alive (flight attendants announcements etc.) will be taken by the FS2CREW software. A must have item I would say.

The thing here is that it's unrealistic to really ever hear that stuff from the cockpit. The pilots are dealing with taxiing the airplane, running checklists and talking to ground ATC - they aren't listening to the passenger safety video. Even with the cockpit door open it's unlikely you'd hear that stuff - the packs and recirc fans are quite loud on the NG.

Well! I checked for any updates before I went to work and in that TIME! Who's the great dev Robert that did this center console?

Vin Scimone is responsible for all the 3D modelling in the VC. The variable lighting is Vin and Michael Frantzeskakis. The displays are Alex Bashkatov's work. The photos that became the textures were taken by myself, Vin, Paul, and RSR.

This "introduction document" - is it something we are likely to see before release or is it something that comes with the purchase of the product?

Yes it's likely that the intro and tutorials will be released for free download first. We can't release the actual FCOM, FTCM and QRH for free because of Boeing's legal concerns, those will come only with the product. The intro is over 100 pages though and explains everything you're getting quite well.

Hi Rick,RSR and others have said the NGX will compare in performance with the MD which is a much more efficient aircraft FPS-wise than The Queen so you should be fine.(Actually the 744X is a bit of dog FPS-wise imho).

Actually what we said is that we expect it to be in line with our other products and that we will update on performance as we get closer to release. There's a lot of debug code still in the airplane that slows things down, it gets much faster when we take that stuff out at the end.

Jeez looking at the screens though, this thing is scaring me every so slightly regarding frame rates/performance...with all these super textured knobs and stuff. I believe there was a comment though that the CB's weren't modelled (graphically)? if so that will be a god-send for performance.

I'm just going to say that we have more experience with FSX than probably any other development team out there - we've been working with it since before it was released, which is coming up on 6 years now. We have found some pretty innovative ways to maintain performance while still having this level of detail present. We're not going to release something no one can run - in fact it's going to run better than a lot of products that look a lot worse.

Hi Robert and everyone at your end . . . I can't even imagine the programming work required to produce a simulation of this sophistication. The project has everyone amazed and we haven't even gotten our hands on it. So that speaks volumes about the quality of work seen so far. Two quick questions and apologies in advance if I'm getting ahead of myself. When you talk about going for final testing starting on Monday, do you mean the wider Beta test? Perhaps the tweaking is still going on but just wondering if it's possible to say how this bird compares now to other PMDG products when it comes to frame rates. Thanks for the update.

Yes, he's referring to wide beta starting on Monday. See above on performance.

Absolutly amazing suits this shot perfectly, thank you for the candy :( :( Rich

Simply LOVE it! I just looked at the picture for the past 20 minutes or so and I just can't find anything that is even a little bit less detailed. It's 100% pure stunning magic you guys pulled off.Thank you very much for all your efforts!