Maybe I picked the wrong areas to fly, but oohh so boring with 200+ mile cargo/passenger runs in the Maule without an AP to at least be able to go to the john.

 

You mean you couldn't trim the Maule for level flight an walk away for a few minutes? I do it all the time.

 

Yeah I was thinking the same thing. I mean, a little trim goes a long way. How long are you in the john for?

I have done many long haul jobs in the Maule and been able to step away for a few minutes, once trimmed and cruising.

Hello

 

I would also like to have autopilot when i need to go to the bathroom or whatever or when looking at the map.

 

Corrected for you....... thanks

 

Sorry for the bad language It's just how we express ourselfs where I come from. Didn't mean to offend

 

I have done many long haul jobs in the Maule and been able to step away for a few minutes, once trimmed and cruising.

 

Someone pointed out to me in an earlier post that in MS Flight you could not take your hands off the stick because the way wind and turbulence affected your aircraft and that it is very challenging...

But now It Isn't, you can just let the plane fly for itself...

Someone pointed out to me in an earlier post that in MS Flight you could not take your hands off the stick because the way wind and turbulence affected your aircraft and that it is very challenging...

But now It Isn't, you can just let the plane fly for itself...

 

It depends on what weather you are flying in.

 

If I'm doing short trips, I'll take some rough weather and enjoy the ride.

 

if I'm doing a 200nm flight over mostly water or plains, where I'd be using the autopilot, I'll set Low & Threatening for the smooth air at lower levels and cruise at 3500' or 4500' (well, 4350'ish because things start getting hazy at 4500'). Trim it out and keep an eye on it, but it shouldn't wander too far off course if you step away for a few minutes.

 

Anyway, I do feel that Alaska, for all it's vast expanse of new scenery, is a bit underwhelming. I'm having a lot of fun with it, but I keep finding little things that just didn't get the needed TLC to make it right.

 

And it's usually a 75' spruce 10' off the end of a runway.

In god weather settings that may work fine but Im not sure if it works in bad weather conditions. I would also like to have autopilot when i need to take a ######/###### or whatever or when looking at the map.

 

I would agree about the bad weather, forgot about that. They say that the escape key acts like a pause, so you can pause it and come back to it I suppose. I haven't tried it yet, so don't know if that is true or not.

You could consider just hitting pause while you take care of business. That's not realistic, I realize, but neither is taking a number 2 mid-flight in a single engine piston plane. Unless you don't mind getting a little messy. But of course you can simulate that right at your computer without autopilot.

 

Like I said, try pause.

You could consider just hitting pause while you take care of business. That's not realistic, I realize, but neither is taking a number 2 mid-flight in a single engine piston plane. Unless you don't mind getting a little messy. But of course you can simulate that right at your computer without autopilot.

 

Like I said, try pause.

 

Yes, I know there are some workarounds for that but It's not what Im looking for. I want a autopilot just as in the real planes, this is some sort of simulator after all.

I don't know if it's a make or break from the player side of the experience, but I must say that I'm wondering about the dev team and the future. Alaska was released with zero PR, seriously, apart from a dozen of screenshots, there was absolutely no promotion for it... It seems there was just no budget at all for ads, yet we're talking about a developer team part of a giant corporation, and with the absence for any side DLC (such as a Deluxe aircraft), I'm wondering whether we're now witnessing the closure of this studio.

In any case, it proves that Microsoft doesn't seem to care so much about the revival of flight siming, and it almost seems like a miracle to me that Flight is even out there- for that, I have to say kudos to the dev team, this doesn't sound like a great environment to work in and they are probably more passionate about their baby than some people seem to think.

 

In short, for me Alaska is not make or break (I'm still somewhat hopeful, but I really want more planes with VC...), but I hope it's not past the make or break point already for the developers... Time will tell, and pardon me for this bit of speculation.

I think they sold a fair number of Alaska. I can tell these forums got hit pretty hard the day of the release. I would suspect that a good number of people were quite anxious for the release.

This just proves that everyone likes to talk about 'Number Two :Peace: ' more than having a working autopilot :unknw:

We are nothing but human after all...

Just came back to Flight this week after after quiting Hawaii 3 months ago(played a lot on the Beta so not knocking Hawaii).

Had some MS points left over so decided to check out Alaska.Why have they downgraded the graphics?Textures in and around most of the airports are really bad.Would have thought from seeing the screenshots that Alaska was going to be a visual feast,I was mistaken.

As for the few challenges I only completed the 1st landing challenge as they make me use the Cub for the next couple(have tried to fly the Cub without the VC and just can't do it with no instruments to line myself up for approach).Have no interest in doing the Gold rings challenges after doing them in Hawaii.

I would consider myself a ''casual simmer'' for the past 25 years and have enjoyed all sorts of flight sims/games so have been left really confused and extremely dissapointed by what seems to have been a half hearted rush job on Alaska,hence the very reasonable price for it.

Plus side it's great to have Trackir implented and works really well in Flight.

Anyway Im not finished with Flight yet,going to wait and see what happens over the coming months as I think MS are really testing the waters with Alaska and seeing what they can get away it.

I see a lot of fellow members that really like Alaska so maybe I have too high expectations after what I considered a solid start for Flight.

Really hope that MS starts to get serious about Flight in the upcoming months(don't mean make into FS11)as there is still huge potential for it.

p.s. Great to see the Flight section of Avsim a nice place to visit again after the turmoil pre and post release, as I much rather read constructive and helpful posts without having to trawl through the no VC/not FSX nonense and flaming/trolling posts.

So thanks to Tom and the mods for rescuing the Flight forum.

have been left really confused and extremely dissapointed by what seems to have been a half hearted rush job on Alaska,hence the very reasonable price for it.

Plus side it's great to have Trackir implented and works really well in Flight.

Anyway Im not finished with Flight yet,going to wait and see what happens over the coming months as I think MS are really testing the waters with Alaska and seeing what they can get away it.

I see a lot of fellow members that really like Alaska so maybe I have too high expectations after what I considered a solid start for Flight.

 

Agree on all points. Alaska should have confirmed our expectactions that Flight will evolve into the best GA sim ever. But now there is a big question mark and no answers. As we all keep saying "only time will tell". Well, if it does not succeed, I think this will be a huge wasted opportunity.

I agree with the OP. No aircraft with a cockpit, downgraded scenery, no autopilot, GPS or ATC. Thanks MS you saved me some money. I'll use the money I saved to buy some add ons for X PLane. ,

Agree on all points. Alaska should have confirmed our expectactions that Flight will evolve into the best GA sim ever. But now there is a big question mark and no answers. As we all keep saying "only time will tell". Well, if it does not succeed, I think this will be a huge wasted opportunity.

 

They are doing just enough to keep me interested, which in itself is disappointing. Nobody likes "just enough" except for the bean-counters paying the bills. They are still testing the waters, seeing how much interest there is, and trying to leverage funds off minimal effort to fund more.

 

What the Flight devs touch seems to be done very well; they just don't have a budget that lets them touch enough. If only somebody in a decision-making capacity at Microsoft would have a little confidence in the project...

We all know that Flight has been worked on by MS's devs. for well over two years (including some 3RD party input) and as of today we all know what Flight is and what it is not, so looking at what was done so far how much more time should MS take to achive what some of us simmers were really expecting Flight to be by now....

 

There is no problems to whom like Flight unconditionally no matter what but for the others the question is "How long should I give MS my money to keep Flight going expecting it to be a full-blown (kind of) simulator on the next scenery released?

 

Flight is what it is, a game, downgraded in a lot of places and upgraded in some other places from their last sim.