FTX Global very soon

[bonchie 2,305]

An uninstall of GEX I can see. An uninstall of Ultimate Terrain would only make sense if you no longer plan to fly in the area covered by it, as FS Global offers virtually none of the enhancements you would find in Ultimate Terrain.

Well, it might when Orbx get's their LC out over the next year but even then your statement isn't entirely true. Several features of UTX will be replaced by FS Global on day one.

 

For those who mainly use UTX for the night lighting (I'd dare say a big part of it's appeal), FTX Global completely replaces that, does it much better, and with no performance hit. UTX also installs several different replacement texture sets (for vegetation and urban classes) that will no longer be necessary as well.

 

UTX still is needed to improve coastlines and urban landclass for now though.

[mmann 72]

Quote from John Venema (Orbx CEO):

 

"Despite the many announcement topics and further explanatory posts there is still some confusion about what FTXG is. First and foremost it is a TEXTURE replacement and not much more. Sure, we include custom autogen textures, trees, some minor landclass mods and of course 3D lighting, but those are just a bit of icing on the cake. It is mainly designed to take a pristine virgin FSX installation and turn it into Orbx-land in a single installer.

 

So it won't make cities look like they appear in Google Earth, or add custom building models in key cities or add accurate road networks, coastlines, railways, mesh, etc. That is what our full-fat FTX regions do, and as you all know those take many months each to produce, typically 3-9 months depending on a region's size."

 

Those accurate road networks, coastlines and railways is what UTX provides. If you are prepared to uninstall UTX you may as well uninstall the FTX regions and save even more memory (sarcasm intended).

[bonchie 2,305]

 

Quote from John Venema (Orbx CEO):

 

"Despite the many announcement topics and further explanatory posts there is still some confusion about what FTXG is. First and foremost it is a TEXTURE replacement and not much more. Sure, we include custom autogen textures, trees, some minor landclass mods and of course 3D lighting, but those are just a bit of icing on the cake. It is mainly designed to take a pristine virgin FSX installation and turn it into Orbx-land in a single installer.

 

So it won't make cities look like they appear in Google Earth, or add custom building models in key cities or add accurate road networks, coastlines, railways, mesh, etc. That is what our full-fat FTX regions do, and as you all know those take many months each to produce, typically 3-9 months depending on a region's size."

 

Those accurate road networks, coastlines and railways is what UTX provides. If you are prepared to uninstall UTX you may as well uninstall the FTX regions and save even more memory (sarcasm intended).

 

 

Your point?

 

No one said otherwise. It all depends on what people are using UTX for. A lot of people primarly use it for the better urban enviroments and night lighting and not necessarily because a road is more accurately placed. For those people, FTX Global replaces what UTX does in these areas.

 

Otherwise, UTX still has plenty of use until Orbx releases their LC products (assuming they are any good).

[ShawnG 1,823]

a couple points from the above posts:

 

Orbx is NOT adding buildings or Poi's  all the buildings in the global screenshots are already there in your fsx.

 

the "open" part of openlc stands for the fact that they are using openstreetmap for the data.  the textures from global with the exception of the new asian and middle eastern textures are just overwriting the default texture files, so if you do make your own landclass, it will call the ftx global textures just like it would have called the default textures.

 

all the screenshots on the product page were taken from posts in the "preview screenshots" section of the orbx site, so if you sort through those posts you will see where these shots were taken.

 

please read Mr. Venema's posts on the orbx site about Global before you make a purchase.  he goes into very honest detail about what he's trying to do, and the possible ramifications for a few sceneries that use custom autogen.  (basically he's updating lclookup.bgl and that might not work with a few sceneries and ftxglobal until orbx and those developers get together on a solution.)

 

please don't look at this as orbx region quality for the world, look at it as a cheaper,(compared to all GEX packages together) IMO better looking GEX on steroids.  then you won't be dissapointed

Oh, and the UTX lighting will probably need to be deactivated in the UTX control panel.  It always lay on top of the ftx regions for some reason, and according to ORBX could not be excluded.  if you don't do that, you will see orbx night lighting and utx lighting together,  which might be your thing, I don't know.

[mmann 72]

Several features of UTX will be replaced by FS Global on day one.

 

 

Your point?

 

No one said otherwise.

 

I guess it was your initial remark about several features of UTX being replaced by FS Global on day one.

 

As I don't even have UTX night lighting enabled, I never realized that it would be that critical to so many.

 

[ShawnG 1,823]

It replaces very few features of UTX.  I'm leaving my UTX completely on with the exception of the few urban textures, and maybe the night lighting.  I'll see how that looks first

[bonchie 2,305]

I guess it was your initial remark about several features of UTX being replaced by FS Global on day one.

 

As I don't even have UTX night lighting enabled, I never realized that it would be that critical to so many.

 

 

You said it "offers virtually none of the enhancements you would find in ultimate terrain."

 

I just pointed out that's not entirely true and I gave you the features that potentially overlap. Not sure why you'd get so defensive over it.

 

 If you don't use the night lighting, cool, but I'd say the vast majority do and it's a big feature point of UTX.

Oh, and the UTX lighting will probably need to be deactivated in the UTX control panel.  It always lay on top of the ftx regions for some reason, and according to ORBX could not be excluded.  if you don't do that, you will see orbx night lighting and utx lighting together,  which might be your thing, I don't know.

 

I've used them together and it looked pretty cool but it just destroyed performance and it wasn't practical.

 

Luckily, over on the Orbx forum someone made a batch file to deactivate the UTX lights just in the Orbx regions so there's no conflict.

[mmann 72]

It replaces very few features of UTX.  I'm leaving my UTX completely on with the exception of the few urban textures, and maybe the night lighting.  I'll see how that looks first

 

+1

Exactly what I plan to do, with the exception of the night lighting.

[bonchie 2,305]

the "open" part of openlc stands for the fact that they are using openstreetmap for the data.  the textures from global with the exception of the new asian and middle eastern textures are just overwriting the default texture files, so if you do make your own landclass, it will call the ftx global textures just like it would have called the default textures.

 

Does OSM provide landclass data for texture/autogen definitions or just vector data (roads, water bodies, railroads, etc.)?

 

Orbx says their OpenLC with be both landclass and vector data. Curious where they are getting landclass data from.

[mmann 72]

J.V. quote:

"openLC, airports, POI packs, cityscapes etc which we intend to develop from sales of FTXG and sold for between $5-$20."

 

Sort of a pay as you go type of thing. FTX Global will come only with a demo of FTX Global OpenLC.

[bonchie 2,305]

J.V. quote:

"openLC, airports, POI packs, cityscapes etc which we intend to develop from sales of FTXG and sold for between $5-$20."

 

Sort of a pay as you go type of thing. FTX Global will come only with a demo of FTX Global OpenLC.

Again, that's not entirely true.

 

2 days ago from JV...

 

"We will ship the openLC Base pack with FTXG at no cost, which enhances Asia for the most part, plus some other corrections in South America."

 

OpenLC is going to come in large regions (same as UTX...Europe, NA, etc.). The Baltic demo to show how it all works comes in August.

 

"I am not 100% decided on the first openLC pack, likely Europe, then Asia, then North America. It comes down to how quickly we can process the huge amounts of data being sourced for it."

 

On June 24th, JV posted in his new product roadmap that they plan to have the entire world done by December. That's pretty ambitious but more power to them if they pull it off.

[Richard Sennett 2,499]

Experience X and FTX Global lights together should be awesome, they look very similar.  :biggrin:

[ShawnG 1,823]

Does OSM provide landclass data for texture/autogen definitions or just vector data (roads, water bodies, railroads, etc.)?

 

Orbx says their OpenLC with be both landclass and vector data. Curious where they are getting landclass data from.

I personally have not perused the osm data, but I do have some sceneries from OpenVFR who already use the osm data to make vector and landclass addons. So yes osm includes landclass info, or at least data that can be extrapolated into landclass data. My experience with OpenVFR is that I prefer it to UTX in some areas, not in others. And the more remote areas of the globe are the least detailed.

[Manny 1,293]

anyone know if they have solved the switching from default to NA to Eu etc thingi?

 

Would this cause confusion...under what settings we have to install then how we go about swtiching back and forth where we fly? That whole thing under what circumstances I have to install other addons have messed my FSX up.

 

I have been installing all add ons with orbix in NA mode...thats it.. I don't switch to any other mode and I am ok with it so far...but not sure how this would mess that up. I don;t use their EU products or Oz products.

[Jimmy RFR 406]

 

 

so if you do make your own landclass, it will call the ftx global textures just like it would have called the default textures.

 

I'm pretty sure I read on at least one of the posts over in the FTX fourms that they have a completely custom lookup table implemented - I'm not so sure it's that simple to create your own landclass using the FTXG textures.  I'd really love to be wrong though, so I won't mind to be proven to be so.