DTG: What would you like to see in a new Flight Simulator?

[mgh 89]

 

 

Their main business is commercial/military contracts. The entertainment side is hardly thriving is it? You can browse the Eagle Dynamics forums yourself if you want more detail.

 

You raised the p[int about  DCS high entry barriers. You tell us what they are .

[Flying Penguin 44]

You raised the p[int about  DCS high entry barriers. You tell us what they are .

 

In summary, every developer must have a licence from Eagle Dynamics, this is for a specific aircraft (for which they have exclusivity) and for a specific length of time and ED sell it and take a cut.  ED have the QA veto at every stage and no product can be released without their explicit approval.  Add to that the SDK is not static, so each update still breaks third party apps.  There are about half a dozen teams that are trying to release addons (including a couple of FSX teams), but only three aircraft have been released by outside teams in the past three years (C-101, Mig-21, Hawk).

 

It's the best (imvho) military flight sim on the market bar none, but it's still a comparative ghost town.  If DTG wish to emulate that approach, by all means they are free to go for it.  I would however venture that this isn't the most profitable approach for the reasons outlined.

 

Also, unlicensed 3rd party addons exist for Train Sim, both Aerosoft and JustFlight have stores, as do numerous freeware addons, so their track record doesn't support your assertions.

[mgh 89]

 

 

In summary, every developer must have a licence from Eagle Dynamics,...

 

So what makes that licence has a high barrier - or do you think 3rd party developers get it for free, and perhaps a PC as well?

[Flying Penguin 44]

Maybe you missed the part about the veto?

 

As for the rest you are just being silly now, so I'm done here.

[dave2013 1,123]

A couple more features and comments:

 

1. Runways that conform to the underlying terrain, i.e. sloped runways

 

I think that the moving cars, ai traffic, airport vehicles, and hopefully trains in the future are important for a flight simulator, not for accuracy or realism, but for *immersion*.  All these little things like moving cars, moving vc shadows, water effects, etc. add to the feeling of really being there, that is, *simulating* what it's like to fly.

 

In order to provide all the features that FSX currently has plus the ones I and others have requested, I think any new sim will probably have to be priced relatively high compared to your average computer game.  Flight simulation is a niche market that doesn't have millions and millions of customers, so for that reason alone a developer is going to have to increase the price in order to get a decent return, especially if they have to hire the talent and do all the work necessary to give us what we really want in a flight simulator.

 

Personally, I'd have no problem throwing down $500 for a good flight simulator that offers everything i asked for, although I realize that this unfortunately might price some folks out of the market.

 

Dave

[scotchegg 4,169]

Maybe you missed the part about the veto?

 

As for the rest you are just being silly now, so I'm done here.

 

It's perfectly reasonable for a sim dev to want to have final say over what gets released for a sim. MGH isn't the one being silly.

[Flying Penguin 44]

It's perfectly reasonable for a sim dev to want to have final say over what gets released for a sim. MGH isn't the one being silly.

No, it's a perfectly valid and reasonable approach. One of many valid approaches, even if it's one I wouldn't advocate.

 

What is silly is snide comments about free pcs....

[mgh 89]

 

 

What is silly is snide comments about free pcs....

 

There are always costs in starting up any business. A new business will need to acqure computers, software, licences etc etc. Why should DCS be expected to provide free licences when its not going to provide the others?

[gizmosellsbunnys 106]

It's gonna have to take ms flight approach to sell airfields and DNC. I think it will be Xplane mix with European Truck simulator type buildings and objects setup, but to sustain itself gonna need to sell airfields as DLC. They may give you regions like North America or Europe free with regional autogen and vector data with moving cars, and trains, and two free airfields and cessna or cub plane to start with. Orbx will selling airfields by the boatload and if budget limited dovetail will provide Legos to build ga fields.

[Poppet 703]

A fresh new Sim might sound great i suppose But it took FSX and P3D years to bring it to its place now of glorious Add On's and so on.  Unless there has been a new one in the making on the quite :o

 

 

I think P3D has soooo much more to offer in the future,  by the time a new Sim is up and running properly, we will have P3D V4 or even V5,  maybe even an Orbtx Dublin Airport  B)

[Wink207 78]

I believe you should embark upon this endeavor as a large development project. Thus the first piece of paper you create should be your organizational chart for your team. Above all you need a chief architect whose responsibility spans the width and breadth of the development. Above all, the architect's job is to ensure that when the software architecture for the sim is defined, it provides growth paths to evolve as the hardware architecture grows and changes.

[jjjallen 37]

A good starting point is to take a look at Flight Unlimited.  Please make it a Filght Unlimited X!.  Whoops - can't use the X.  I did like that game but it was limited in its coverage area.

 

Regards

jja

[curbz 22]

For me the immersion level is key so I would like to see all the things that detract from the experience resolved. So.... everything Prepar3d has today (with the exception of bathymetry) but with...

• smooth transitions when texture LOD changes - same for autogen rendering to completely eliminate scenery popping into view 
• improved AI aircraft that use less resources
• more realistic road traffic that doesn't simply vanish at the end of a road (alpha fade for example)
• dynamic autogen management that reduces scenery LOD in real-time to ensure a minimum 30fps is achieved during flight
• cockpit and cloud shadows that are not jagged and wobble around

[HiFlyer 9,343]

All programs based on the Microsoft tech (Flight, FSX,P3D) have had streets with a hardwired east/west, North/South orientation that apparently can't be changed. This results in situations like New York streets being oriented at very unrealistic angles to the lay of the actual city, and buildings oriented against the angle of the streets!

 

This affects cities all over the world, and it's about time that hardwired street orientation is consigned to history.

[scotchegg 4,169]

All programs based on the Microsoft tech (Flight, FSX,P3D) have had streets with a hardwired east/west, North/South orientation that apparently can't be changed. This results in situations like New York streets being oriented at very unrealistic angles to the lay of the actual city, and buildings oriented against the angle of the streets!

 

This affects cities all over the world, and it's about time that hardwired street orientation is consigned to history.

 

Oooooh, really? Well that's P3D out for me then. I had been keeping half an eye on it as a future investment, but that's exactly the kind of thing that once I know about, I can't ignore it and I lose all immersion.