fsx-se FSX: SE. A Dead End?

[Wizard-Bob 9]

Well said, Jonathan, well said ^_^

[Kinetic2080 5]

Right now FSX Steam Edition looks headed on the right track, the fact that serious third party developers like

 

* pmdg,

* orbx,

* fsuipc,

* active sky

 

... and more are backing it makes me more optimistic than in a long time!

 

My personal observation as good/bad as anyone else: Fsx se did indeed run smoother on my system. The official statement - 10% better framerates seems about right... Definitely worth the switch!

 

http://steamcommunity.com/app/314160/discussions/1/622954302093637525/

 

That said I'm a little worried about the quality of the first dlc , but they might just testing the market. Right now dovetail seems to have a good dialog with 3rd party developers, unlike the developers on MS Flight. If dovetail dlc and third party developers like orbx and pmdg can co-exist I'd say we're facing better times!

[Alan_A 1,650]

 

 

This might go some way to answering your question, worth watching

 

Thanks very much for posting that link - it was indeed worth watching.  I'm going to try to get deep into sim vs. sim debates and will just say that this is pretty impressive - I'm going to keep watching it and will consider it seriously.

[Gypsy Baron 10]

I have two issues with FSX-SE that prevent me from pursueing it as a 'replacement' for mt well-behaved FSX install.

 

The first is that I can not "Direct Connect" to the DTP servers where I do vitually ALL my flying. Until that is resolved FSX-SE is dead in the water for me.

 

Also, I was seeing excessive stuttering that I could not trace to the source...1 to 5 second stutters every couple of minutes. Removing some of my OrbX addons appeared to help some but that is not a workable option for me (I have pretty much all the regions except Wales and Norway, Global, Global Vector and Europe OpenLC plus Pilots 2010 FSX mesh.)

 

I also observed that at least one of my BGL files that I created to remove a lake in the middle of Bassingbourne (UKBA) that appeared in that custom airport when OrbX Europe was added does not work in FSX-SE. The very same (shared) scenery.cfg files in both FSX and FSX-SE are yielding different results.

 

FSX-SE was also reporting a lot of 'missing textures' when I set the flag in the CFG file to show those. The textures were actually present and FSX did not report them as 'missing', so there appears to be some incompatibllity at a very basic level. At the moment I am too busy with FSX projects to be able to spend any time with FSX-SE to identify the source(s) of these issues.

 

Having a sim that better handles VAS is definitely desirable and I hope that all the issues I have with FSX-SE can be run down so that I can take advantage of the improvements noted so far by others.

 

 Paul

[nathfs 0]

Microsoft sold it’s flight simulator source to Lockheed Martin some time ago. Lockheed is now fully responsible for the legacy of the platform and it’s marketing it under the name Prepar3D. Microsoft is in a licensing agreement, very limited at that, with Dovetail who is now responsible for FSX Steam Edition. Dovetail does not have the rights to make core changes to the platform. The net of it all is that Dovetail will eventually max out the performance capabilities that they have rights to. For most users that may be fine and it depends on what suites you. FSX add-on’s work just fine in Prepar3D as long as you use a 3^rd part migration software, but even now most partners are embracing Prepar3D and expanding their solutions to that platform. Some users will be stubborn and insist FSX will march ahead, but looking at the facts FSX/FSX SE is dead and its progression will cap out. The game technology today is making amazing progress with stunning realism. The demand for adopting the technology requires changes to the core software. Eventually FSX will look like FS98 compared to what’s to come. Once Prepar3D releases a 64-bit version I think it will make it more clear that it’s the future and is fully dedicated to keeping the flight simulation sector current.

[cmpbellsjc 2,963]

Microsoft sold it’s flight simulator source to Lockheed Martin some time ago. Lockheed is now fully responsible for the legacy of the platform and it’s marketing it under the name Prepar3D. Microsoft is in a licensing agreement, very limited at that, with Dovetail who is now responsible for FSX Steam Edition. Dovetail does not have the rights to make core changes to the platform. The net of it all is that Dovetail will eventually max out the performance capabilities that they have rights to. For most users that may be fine and it depends on what suites you. FSX add-on’s work just fine in Prepar3D as long as you use a 3^rd part migration software, but even now most partners are embracing Prepar3D and expanding their solutions to that platform. Some users will be stubborn and insist FSX will march ahead, but looking at the facts FSX/FSX SE is dead and its progression will cap out. The game technology today is making amazing progress with stunning realism. The demand for adopting the technology requires changes to the core software. Eventually FSX will look like FS98 compared to what’s to come. Once Prepar3D releases a 64-bit version I think it will make it more clear that it’s the future and is fully dedicated to keeping the flight simulation sector current.

You dug up a year and a half old thread to tell us that? I think your a little late to the party as this has all been covered and discussed since it was posted Jan of 2015.

[hs118 730]

You dug up a year and a half old thread to tell us that? I think your a little late to the party as this has all been covered and discussed since it was posted Jan of 2015.

 

No joke, and his first ever Avsim post too. That's some kind of splash....

[tf51d 284]

Microsoft sold it’s flight simulator source to Lockheed Martin some time ago. Lockheed is now fully responsible for the legacy of the platform and it’s marketing it under the name Prepar3D. Microsoft is in a licensing agreement, very limited at that, with Dovetail who is now responsible for FSX Steam Edition. Dovetail does not have the rights to make core changes to the platform. The net of it all is that Dovetail will eventually max out the performance capabilities that they have rights to. For most users that may be fine and it depends on what suites you. FSX add-on’s work just fine in Prepar3D as long as you use a 3^rd part migration software, but even now most partners are embracing Prepar3D and expanding their solutions to that platform. Some users will be stubborn and insist FSX will march ahead, but looking at the facts FSX/FSX SE is dead and its progression will cap out. The game technology today is making amazing progress with stunning realism. The demand for adopting the technology requires changes to the core software. Eventually FSX will look like FS98 compared to what’s to come. Once Prepar3D releases a 64-bit version I think it will make it more clear that it’s the future and is fully dedicated to keeping the flight simulation sector current.

 

 

You dug up a year and a half old thread to tell us that? I think your a little late to the party as this has all been covered and discussed since it was posted Jan of 2015.

 

Not only that, it's not entirely accurate. True DTG is limited to what can be done in FSXSE, They are however licensed the same way LM is for P3D, to use FSX code to develop their own Sim Platforms, which they already done with the 64bit Flight School, and the upcoming more feature rich DTG Flight Simulator, which will also be 64bit. So Lockheed is not the only developer that is responsible for the legacy of the platform. It has split in 2 different paths. Which ultimately comes out the best path for this community remains to be seen. P3D right now has a big head start, but it's still a 32bit platform, and with DFS coming right out of the gate in 64bit, can catch up pretty guick, depending on what features DTG includes in DFS.

[Matthew Kane 1,343]

The thing with Sublogic Flight Simulator 2 is that it has wireframe buildings and objects with solid colours for ground, water, sky and clouds, I can't wait for the detail to get better and imagine someday we will be flying desktop Flight Simulators that use a whopping 128 Kilobytes of RAM. Perhaps someday I will be able to see my own house.

 

Oh what the future will bring  :smile:

[nathfs 0]

Not only that, it's not entirely accurate. True DTG is limited to what can be done in FSXSE, They are however licensed the same way LM is for P3D, to use FSX code to develop their own Sim Platforms, which they already done with the 64bit Flight School, and the upcoming more feature rich DTG Flight Simulator, which will also be 64bit. So Lockheed is not the only developer that is responsible for the legacy of the platform. It has split in 2 different paths. Which ultimately comes out the best path for this community remains to be seen. P3D right now has a big head start, but it's still a 32bit platform, and with DFS coming right out of the gate in 64bit, can catch up pretty guick, depending on what features DTG includes in DFS.

Thank you for being neutral in response. It's not helpful to hear negative feedback. But in my defense I keep seeing the same questions over and over and I don't believe Dovetail has been good at being transparent about what their plans are. The truth is no one knows what their exact lisencing deal is, but the assumption can be made based on pure financials. Lockheed is a 46 billion dollar corporation and they have already released several versions and updates to their extension of FSX. Dovetail is a 100+ employee organization and their portfolio/marketing is not that impressive. If they have the means and funds to turn things around why has it taken this long? In fact read the fine print in any of their product "teaser" videos "...does not represent actual game play...". It's all smoke and mirrors and 10 years later we have yet to see anything substantial. It's a real shame.

[Bert Pieke 7,591]

You are right, no one really knows..

 

But Lockheed is focused on a professional training market which is quite different from our "hobbyist" aviation simulation market.

 

Dovetail has only just picked up FSX, certainly not 10 years ago.. so, lets see what they come up with!

 

In the meantime, all the major players (Orbx, Flight1, Aerosoft, Carenado etc) continue to release great content for both FSX and P3D, so this platform is not "dead" yet  B)

[Pastaiolo 1,688]

Are you so naive to think that Lockheed is using their full force on a simulator?

Woudn't you say that Lockheed, being what it is, would also had the power, if they wanted to, to develop their own graphic engine instead of basing it on the FSX ESP one?

As for the license of Dovetail, it's obvious it will be for entertainement since that is their market.

Using cinematics is something pretty much every game company does, the important thing is that after that there have been real gameplay videos, community contributors taking even more videos, live streams and so on.

[nathfs 0]

Are you so naive to think that Lockheed is using their full force on a simulator?

 

Woudn't you say that Lockheed, being what it is, would also had the power, if they wanted to, to develop their own graphic engine instead of basing it on the FSX ESP one?

 

As for the license of Dovetail, it's obvious it will be for entertainement since that is their market.

 

Using cinematics is something pretty much every game company does, the important thing is that after that there have been real gameplay videos, community contributors taking even more videos, live streams and so on.

 

The point is Microsoft spent decades and millions in development. This sort of game doesn't happen over night and LM has the upper hand because they can pick things up faster. Do you think Microsoft was going to sell the source at a discount? For all we know it has been a money pit for years, but MS kept it going because the write-off was a drop in the bucket compared to their revenue from the core business. Dovetail does not have the funds to buy the full rights. They even state on their site they "based" their code on FSX - that's the key word. They are a small organization and although flight simulator is a feather in their hat, FSX Steam was a fresh coat of pain on an existing house and I'm willing to be you the next version will be the same dog, but different fleas.

 

If I was Lockheed I would be doing exactly as they have done. Get it back on it's feet, fix the major bugs, keep it fresh while building out a 64bit frame to carry it off into the future. I'm putting all my money on Lockheed and I'm not wasting my breath on Dovetail. My only concern with Lockheed is their EULA. They don't seem interested in anything other than professional markets and its just not practical for the majority.

 

And I hate to keep going, but I cant help it now. You have a user base that has spend hundreds on add-ons that support a 10 year old system. The general consensus in all the threads has been a need for 64 bit and better graphics. I guarantee that you cannot make significant changes yet allow 10 years worth of backwards compatibility. If any of these two players make a significant advancement you can kiss your current investments goodbye.

[n4gix 4,961]

My only concern with Lockheed is their EULA. They don't seem interested in anything other than professional markets and its just not practical for the majority.

L-M is specifically prohibited from entering the "entertainment/game" market via the terms of their contract.

 

Even if they wanted to do so, they cannot. This has been cussed and discussed throughly over the past few years. What they have done is the best they can do.

[eelb 5]

Recompiling the source code will have a minimal, if any, impact on game performance.  What it will do, is make the game more stable for users employing modern operating systems (e.g. Windows 8).  To that end, it will have minimal impact; however, it will not, as you suggest, optimize the code  to take advantage of modern CPUs.  If only you could gain significant performance by simply recompiling the code! BTW, recompiling the code is a somewhat mundane task, unless you’re altering the source code to take advantage of the newer library.  However, DG has stated they haven’t altered any source code; so, we can assume this hasn’t happened. 

 

Matt

All I know is that I could never run FSX. Now with FSX-SE, I'm getting 40 fps, with an off the shelf $350 Dell from Best Buy.