I have trained at KOQN (formerly N99) and regularly flew into KPHL as part of the training in Class B airspace and at any given time, I have seen ground movements of at least a half dozen planes on the ground, not to mention the ones in the pattern - I am not even mentioning KPHL. I recently moved to the UK where the airspace is a lot tighter and congested, where you have to be exponentially more careful and have to look everywhere when flying VFR. And what about the heavy-iron flyers? Heathrow certainly has more than 4-10 planes "in play" at any given time.Happy Weekend.

Your complaining about 80? How much do pay for one little ORBX airport? 30-40?

I don't use Orbx products, so I'm not in that camp.My $60 investment into FSX Deluxe in October 2006 gave me worldwide textures and landclass/autogen appropriate for the locations, a dozen or two highly detailed airports across the globe, dozens of custom buildings in cities across the globe, generic hangars and buildings at nearly all airports in close proximity to their real-world counterparts, highly accurate taxiways and runway alignments, bathymetric data to represent the differences in water, and partial roadway coverage with mostly just major roads/expressways. FSX had a good set of crayons to color its world, and did a good job of keeping inside the lines.My potential $80 investment into X-Plane10 gives me textures and landclass data which are not yet completed, ONE highly detailed airport with Aerosoft purportedly working on a few more for release sometime in the future, seemingly no custom buildings in any cities, unconfirmed reports of missing scenery content for the autogen buildings, absolutely no structures at any airports, community-dependant airport layouts, one generic water type across the globe, and very solid road coverage based on OSM. Due to these unfinished items, XP10 produces a completely unrealistic impression of the area I fly in, and most if not all urban areas are not at all realistic looking either. That said, XP10 in rural/mountain areas is stunning - and properly superior to FSX as one would expect 5 years later. X-Plane 10 has a brand-new, gorgeous set of crayons to color its world, however the box is missing far too many of them and it seems to use the wrong colors in too many spots. We have no idea if or when the crayons will be sent to us, and we don't know if or when the coloring will be corrected down the road.I'm disappointed that Laminar Research sent X-Plane out the door with an incomplete box of crayons. :)The chances are very high that I will end up purchasing XP10 in the future if they can actually complete the product. I want it to succeed! I'm not a one-sim-only sycophant who will disparage one product or another simply because I am entrenched in another camp and feel that I must defend it as some sort of extension of my own personal soul. I can only compare what I know of my experiences with other simulators against the demo of XP10 and what I've seen in various screenshots.As a potential new XP10 user, the problem I now have is when will it ever be considered complete? By releasing with so many things missing, will I really want to keep up with the point releases and changes as the weeks and months go forward to figure out when all of these items are now included? I don't want to have to keep up with reading about point releases and re-running the demo as things move forward. Besides, the demo of Seattle was an area which a fair amount of attention was paid. Seattle is "more complete" than other parts of the world. Since I can't see how things look outside of Seattle, I'll have to rely on outside sources to let me know when the remainder of the world has been remediated.I keep telling myself to shut up and just buy it - there are single airplanes for FSX which cost about as much as the whole of XP10 - but without knowing exactly what is currently missing and the roadmap for completion, I fear that the XP10 Disc 1 would gather months of dust on my shelf instead of being spun up to start a flying session.Here's to hoping we get more information on things!

I would expect feature improvements and bug fixes over time with the point releases, but not releases designed to catch up with critical content and items which were left out of the initial product. From what I am gathering from various posts here and elsewhere, XP10 shipped without the full compliment of models, textures, and objects - thus causing scenery elements to either populate with generic textures or not populate at all. It appears these were not oversights, but that it was planned and accepted. Now, paying customers are left wondering when these things will ever be completed. Potential customers, if they are being vigilant, are left wondering about what else is missing. Brand new customers to XP10 might be left with a bad taste in their mouth if they aren't studying forums and blogs. Laminar Research is left with a black eye because of the state of affairs. A month or two more in the incubator to allow for all the elements to be completed would have been good for all involved.

Ding ding ding! We have a winner, great post Greg, I'm going to snip this section because it was written so well. "Potential customers." That's me Laminar! At one point I was close to purchasing this but then I keep reading about features that are not included and I delay again. I will give LR credit for fixing certain issues users have been complaining about though. Still, I don't want to be a beta tester for $80.

Valid points, however, developers have been recommended to halt updating XP9 products for XP10 until we have a stable version of X Plane that is out of beta. I don't think most people are trying to rationalize the flaws in the product. We're just saying maybe we should wait and see what gets addressed and what doesn't before voicing the issues and concerns.In all fairness, it is a downloadable, free demo and people are encouraged to try before they buy.

Just saw this section... interesting... I think that's a smart move by LR. I wish they'd stop selling the product in its current form as well.

It's an $80 flight sim. Time for a little perspective.[/end rant]

Before you ouright reject what I have to say, understand that I have used X-plane for over a decade now. In each of the versions, X-plane always shows the potential, hardly ever delivers or even comes close to delivering the full potential.If Seattle, as is showcased in the demo, is what people are supposed to accept as a "plausible" city/urban environment, they need to define "plausible" and in what century ! X-plane has always played by different rules and at times, more often than not, gets away with murder. If I had not experienced first hand, as a user, the intoduction and subsequent evolution of v8 thru updates, I would be as nervous and disappointed as any newbie or a potential MSFS migrant.BUT, I KNOW BETTER.What troubles me is why would they release such a crappy demo ?Why would Laminar go all the way to Europe to introduce v10 so grossly unprepared ?Did they not learn enough or learn the right lessons or draw the right conclusions from the experience of introduction and subsequent evolution of v8 and v9 ? Cities and urban landscapes in later updates in v8 looked like "plausible" cities.THAT'S WHAT DISAPPOINTS ME - this alzheimers in Laminar.

Someone left the door open!

Valid points, however, developers have been recommended to halt updating XP9 products for XP10 until we have a stable version of X Plane that is out of beta. I don't think most people are trying to rationalize the flaws in the product. We're just saying maybe we should wait and see what gets addressed and what doesn't before voicing the issues and concerns.In all fairness, it is a downloadable, free demo and people are encouraged to try before they buy.

Which brings up another concern I've mentioned before: the poor job Laminar does educating their customers. When you go and buy a copy of X-Plane 10, no where is it mentioned that you're paying for an $80 public beta and that it won't be what could reasonably be called release quality for another few of months. The average consumer who doesn't spend time reading blogs and enthusiasts forums is likely to be very disappointed when he boots up his boxed copy of X-Plane for the first time and sees "X-Plane 10.03 Beta 3" on the splash screen (assuming he's even aware that the installer on the disc is broken and he needs to download the working version from the website).

I keep telling myself to shut up and just buy it - there are single airplanes for FSX which cost about as much as the whole of XP10 - but without knowing exactly what is currently missing and the roadmap for completion, I fear that the XP10 Disc 1 would gather months of dust on my shelf instead of being spun up to start a flying session.

I agree that XP10 in its current state has some shortcomings, but I really think you're blowing things out of proportion. Right now, XP10 feels like a full and complete flight simulator that works well and is fun to fly. Things aren't nearly as dire as you're making them out to be.

Right now, XP10 feels like a full and complete flight simulator that works well and is fun to fly.

...for you! :) (and others)I'll freely admit that for many XPlane enthusiasts, v10 is a great product! Many people care a great deal about the flight dynamics, the new weather engine, the nighttime look and feel... all of which are exceptionally well done. Some others do care about the scenery, but will primarily fly in areas which are well done and don't need much additional work, such as rural areas. And still others like me will find the way the cities and towns to be a showstopper. It's all a matter of how much weight we all put on various elements in the simulation.Cheers!-Greg

Yes, there are many things that need to be addressed, some of which were apparently removed (?) from the XP9 version. I switched planes in XPX from single to the Baron and there is no way to assign more than one throttle to a single-throttle controller like the CHPro Throttle, so the only way (at present 1.0.3 beta 2) to fly multi-engine aircraft is to use the keyboard for throttle and pitch and mixture. I looked through the files and in Plane Maker and did not see a solution which is no doubt buried in the .exe file. Still trimming and tweaking ...

...there is no way to assign more than one throttle to a single-throttle controller...

Are you sure about that? If you assign an axis to "Throttle" then I thought it controlled everything. There are additional settings for Throttle 1, 2, 3, etc. that can be independently assigned, but I'm pretty sure if you use just Throttle then it will slave all of an aircraft's throttles to one control.

I'll freely admit that for many XPlane enthusiasts, v10 is a great product! Many people care a great deal about the flight dynamics, the new weather engine, the nighttime look and feel... all of which are exceptionally well done. Some others do care about the scenery, but will primarily fly in areas which are well done and don't need much additional work, such as rural areas. And still others like me will find the way the cities and towns to be a showstopper. It's all a matter of how much weight we all put on various elements in the simulation.

First of all, I wouldn't call myself an "X-Plane enthusiast", more a general flight simulator enthusiast. I've had a long history with Microsoft Flight Simulator (5.1, 95, 98, FSX), and this is the first time I'm giving X-Plane a shot.Secondly, when I say that XP10 is a "full and complete flight simulator", I simply mean that it works out of the box with no significant or game-breaking issues, and I say it to counter your criticisms which almost make it sound like XP10 is barely functional.So I say again, XP10 is not without its shortcomings, but I think you could give a little more credit to its strengths.

Secondly, when I say that XP10 is a "full and complete flight simulator", I simply mean that it works out of the box with no significant or game-breaking issues, and I say it to counter your criticisms which almost make it sound like XP10 is barely functional.So I say again, XP10 is not without its shortcomings, but I think you could give a little more credit to its strengths.

Fair enough. It's strengths are quite strong, but the shortcomings are important enough to me to make continued mention of them in relevant discussions.Am I throwing the baby out with the bath water? Perhaps. :)

Is it not everything Austin promised? I have not followed the media behind this product and have not really seen any posts that would suggest any misleading media up to the time of release, so I cannot say if they missed the boat so to speak. I hear disappointment, which generally means that "it did not meet my expectations". I have been disappointed in many areas with FSX and that is partly due to my expectations and sometimes misleading media. It is somewhat like the talking heads taking something out of context. So can a product be misleading in the same way?Bob

Seriously? How can XP10 call itself a simulator if crashes are not modeled?

it is not a crash simulator and crashing is not apart of the flight experience. A bit odd you would need the crash simulated.

This is quickly becoming my sense of the situation as well.Something tells me that Laminar Research would comment that they only have a handful of people working on the program and that issues such as these are to be expected, but as the $80 which remains in my checking account can attest, one should not advertise a product as one thing and deliver something else. To put it in more comparative terms, Microsoft would be CRUCIFIED if they released a product in this condition and I don't see why Laminar should be given a pass.I would expect feature improvements and bug fixes over time with the point releases, but not releases designed to catch up with critical content and items which were left out of the initial product. From what I am gathering from various posts here and elsewhere, XP10 shipped without the full compliment of models, textures, and objects - thus causing scenery elements to either populate with generic textures or not populate at all. It appears these were not oversights, but that it was planned and accepted. Now, paying customers are left wondering when these things will ever be completed. Potential customers, if they are being vigilant, are left wondering about what else is missing. Brand new customers to XP10 might be left with a bad taste in their mouth if they aren't studying forums and blogs. Laminar Research is left with a black eye because of the state of affairs. A month or two more in the incubator to allow for all the elements to be completed would have been good for all involved.Again - I know and recognize that XP10 has a great many things which are good about it, so it's not a FAILED piece of software by any stretch.... but I have to agree with Mountain Man in that XP10 a significant feeling of not being completed. The apparent approval of this philosophy by Laminar Research/Austin Meyers will be one of the key reasons why XP10 might remain a niche simulator for the small cadre of flight sim enthusiast, and never be something which will be enjoyed by the masses.-Greg

Exactly. So many people seem to get offended when dealing with the reality that Lemar Reserch released a product that is less than advertised, defending it to the death, as if they were the developers of the game itself. Most people that point out the flaws of the game are fans of BOTH major sims, and are not just "bashing" because they are "homers" to their sepecific platform. Microsoft WOULD be crucified, as evident of the FSX release, and so should XP10 for what IT lacks. You can't just completely delete aspects of simulation that has been around for years, and mask it by saying, "hey look, we inovated sooo much in our sim though". You didn't inovate anything if you leave out so much. XP10, as should Flight, when released, should have EVERY aspect of what was already there, PLUS the inovation of the new stuff.

it is not a crash simulator and crashing is not apart of the flight experience. A bit odd you would need the crash simulated.

It's not part of "flight" but is part of Aviation. Airports, and city lights, have no aerodynamic effect on the plane you fly either, should we leave them out too?