Are you the guys from darkforge games?

I've seen a post over on reddit about a flight simulator render that looks exactly like what you are presenting here.

Good luck with your new venture

Dont forget to factor GTA-5 into the equation. Great graphics and great flight fun.......

 

https://youtu.be/lbiMJ3Dl1BM?t=300

 

Dear PropheadX,

 

This is not alone Stephen's new venture - its OUR - new venture... so I hope you come aboard and post your views and ideas in the forum. GTA-5 ofcorse has to be taken into the equation... and there is a video already on the website which can be found here:

 

http://nexgenflightsim.com/then-vs-now/

 

We need to discuss the benefits and the down sides of all available graphic engines. So your participation is highly appreciated...

 

kind regards

The unfortunate fact is that it is going to be extremely difficult, if not impossible to collect a team from this community. There simply aren't enough experienced game programmers in this community and that are willing to work for free. Microsoft Flight took, I think 3 years and 50+ experienced full-time Microsoft employees to develop, and that was even with reusing some code (parts of the terrain, weather, and effects engines) and assets. Starting crowd funding would be risky because of the same problem mentioned before - lack of programmers. You'll have the money (maybe, if enough people backed it), but who are you going to be able to pay? Finding a gauge programmer for an aircraft addon in this hobby is challenging enough.

 

I wish you luck in this, but I don't think it's going to happen unless you're paying people to treat this like an actual job. Simulating a spherical globe is no easy task in code. I'm not trying to be negative - I'm trying to help you understand what kind of team is needed for this, and it's not an easy or inexpensive one to put together.

GTA-5 ofcorse has to be taken into the equation... and there is a video already on the website which can be found here:

 

Cheers.

 

I personally dont think the GTA 'flight-school' videos do GTA justice. Instead I suggest you post a few GTA 'flightsim' videos made by this chap....

 

 

Fast forward  to final landing ...

 

https://youtu.be/C9I3agbYRhc?t=377

 

Full video

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9I3agbYRhc

 

Or this guy....

 

The unfortunate fact is that it is going to be extremely difficult, if not impossible to collect a team from this community. There simply aren't enough experienced game programmers in this community and that are willing to work for free. Microsoft Flight took, I think 3 years and 50+ experienced full-time Microsoft employees to develop, and that was even with reusing some code (parts of the terrain, weather, and effects engines) and assets. Starting crowd funding would be risky because of the same problem mentioned before - lack of programmers. You'll have the money (maybe, if enough people backed it), but who are you going to be able to pay? Finding a gauge programmer for an aircraft addon in this hobby is challenging enough.

 

I wish you luck in this, but I don't think it's going to happen unless you're paying people to treat this like an actual job. Simulating a spherical globe is no easy task in code. I'm not trying to be negative - I'm trying to help you understand what kind of team is needed for this, and it's not an easy or inexpensive one to put together.

 

If you jump on over to the Next Generation Flight Simulator SIM-Posium and read the articles you would soon learn that nothing about the next generation flight simulator is "free". Those developers who get involved early on in the project will become candidates for "FULL TIME POSITION" with a salary and benefits. If we can't find the talent needed within the community, we'll look outside the community. 

 

A few posts back I addressed this very same topic... and rather than rewriting it... I would like to make the following suggestion - please read all the posts in this thread as well as explore the NGFS SIM-Posium.

 

Every rebuttal that has been written, thus far, has been addressed in the SIM-Posium if you would first take the time to do a little reading. 

 

A half glass full vs a half glass empty... 

 

- Stephen Borick

Hi,

 

 

 

I personally dont think the GTA 'flight-school' videos do GTA justice. Instead I suggest you post a few GTA 'flightsim' videos made by this chap....

 

Well.... <_<, the Graphics are stunning and a Flight Simulator with graphics like this + Planes like PMDG + decent ATC + "real world scenery" not some fiction land.... etc...YES - that is what we want - however, this guy should definately work on his landing technique.... :Whistle:

 

kind regards

Are you the guys from darkforge games?

I've seen a post over on reddit about a flight simulator render that looks exactly like what you are presenting here.

 

I forgot to answer this earlier...

 

No... we're not darkforge. I'm familiar with the thread over on reddit, but it appears to have died out a couple of months ago. Also, I did a quick check on darkforge's website and didn't see any mention of their project... I could have missed it though.

 

What I gather from the thread over on reddit that darkforge was considering a flight simulator based upon smaller geographical areas... which a mighty roar from the readers quickly went up in protest. 

 

 

"I personally dont think the GTA 'flight-school' videos do GTA justice. Instead I suggest you post a few GTA 'flightsim' videos made by this chap...."

 

I purchased GTA 5 for one reason only and that was to get an idea of the fidelity offered first hand... unfortunately, I've been so busy I haven't had a chance to actually fly within GTA 5 yet... darn it.

 

I posted the videos that you see on the NGFS SIM-Posium simply as examples (also because they were short and had no talking) and to give folks a heads up regarding the fidelity that is capable from using a modern 3D Engine. I figured that those who were interested in seeing more would head on over to Youtube and check it out for themselves. 

 

- Stephen B.

the Graphics are stunning and a Flight Simulator with graphics like this + Planes like PMDG + decent ATC + "real world scenery" not some fiction land..

 

GTA isn't set in some fictional land but is actually modelled on L.A.....

 

 

GTA isn't set in some fictional land but is actually modelled on L.A.....

 

 

 

Excellent, now let's do that for the whole world...... :rolleyes:

At the risk of being a broken record, from what I read and from a practical standpoint, Outerra is probably the closest to nearly ready-made engine.

 

It covers the entire world.

Its in active developement

It currently uses the JSBSIM Flight dynamics library used in Flightgear, and completely open-source.

It already in fact has working planes as well as ground vehicles and boats.

The developers and users are already working on clickable cockpits and other more advanced aircraft functionality.

Its easily modded, and its been shown that both FSX and X-plane aircraft can be ported to it.

Its already a very fast engine incorporating effects such as Ambient occlusion, Realtime atmospheric scattering, Shadows, Unlimited visibility, Vector data support, bullet vehicle physics.....

The developers are working On 64bit and Mac/Linux support..... 

 

At some point a more suitable engine might be found, but right this instant, Outerra is practically a no-brainer. Avsim actually has an outerra Forum where much more information can be found..... 

I applaud the efforts of the OP, it seems like a really interesting project, and I wish you the best of luck, but, if he spent any time in the so-called Flight Sim community, he must know that nothing positive can ever come out of Avsim, and the answers that he got here so far confirm that. 

 

Good luck with this, I'll explore the site fully when I get home tonight. 

 

Cheers!

Excellent, now let's do that for the whole world...... :rolleyes:

 

Yes it would be incredible having that level of detail and damage modelling on a global scale.

As it stands many enjoy that experience now on a smaller scale in GTA-5.  

As I've mentioned on previous threads: FSX and X-Plane have no crash detection and damage modelling as such..and so if you had to make an emergency landing on a highway in FSX for example, your plane would simply pass right through cars, overhead bridges and buildings etc ..unlike in GTA-5 where every object features damage modelling and every vehicle Ai ....

 

Emergency landings

https://youtu.be/gZzp9irhVx8?t=408

 

So its good you're looking at different flightsims and virtual environments for a future sim.

If you jump on over to the Next Generation Flight Simulator SIM-Posium and read the articles you would soon learn that nothing about the next generation flight simulator is "free". Those developers who get involved early on in the project will become candidates for "FULL TIME POSITION" with a salary and benefits. If we can't find the talent needed within the community, we'll look outside the community. 

 

A few posts back I addressed this very same topic... and rather than rewriting it... I would like to make the following suggestion - please read all the posts in this thread as well as explore the NGFS SIM-Posium.

 

Every rebuttal that has been written, thus far, has been addressed in the SIM-Posium if you would first take the time to do a little reading. 

 

A half glass full vs a half glass empty... 

 

- Stephen Borick

 

Does it address the fact that it could take over $2 million dollars to fund such a project? Paying 10 full-time employees for 5 years at a salary of $45,000 per year would be $2,250,000. That's not considering the fact that you still need a graphics engine (which you'll likely need to work out some licensing deal if you use any non-free engine - Outerra seems like a good solution since it already simulates the globe). You also need world road, terrain, land type, seasonal, airport, building, ocean, lake, and river data. That could easily cost thousands of dollars. You'd likely need to get a licensing deal with some of the aircraft manufacturers you'll be simulating the aircraft of. That could get pricey. So my question is, without having to find and read such lengthy articles, where do you expect to get the funding for this? This community certainly isn't big enough to generate such a sum of money, and I don't see anyone outside of our community funding a project they have no interest in.

 

Let's not forget that not only will you need artists working on aircraft, each of which could take a year or more to develop (and lots of reference for each - not always easy to get), your team will also need to create buildings, trees, landmarks, and other miscellaneous objects as well. An easy to use and powerful API for developing addons is also quite important, but not a quick easy task to develop and test.

 

This is a HUGE project and it took Microsoft Flight Simulator, X-Plane, and FlightGear many years to get to where they're at today. Again, not trying to be negative, but rather realistic. I just don't want to see you waste your time on something that this community physically doesn't have the manpower to support. I want this to work out just as much as anyone else here, but I have a feeling we're going to be relying on existing software/game development companies to give us the next best thing.

Well, 

 

If I would calculate the 193.000 members of avsim, and each would give $15 for this project..... which is not even the value of a normal addon... then there you've got your 2.8 million..... 

 

however - getting the community together is a bigger problem.... especially if people try to find reasons it's not gonna work.... instead of looking for reasons and way's to make it work.....\

 

I do understand your scepticism... but then again, the glass is either half full - or half empty, its up to you!

 

regards

10 employees at $45k?

 

You're not going to get good software engineers for anything less than $125k, more on the coasts. Plus benefits. I would expect you're looking at $1.5m every year, just for the software folks.

 

Don't forget you're going to need a few aeronautical engineers who actually understand how this whole "flying" business actually works, plus some GIS folks, bizdev folks, licensing, etc. etc. You're looking at around $3 to $5 million every year for 3-5 years to get something off the ground.

 

Finally, professionals don't have any time for "I don't know anything about what you do but I'm still going to make suggestions or demands on how you do it". It's quaint to see a bunch of completely non-technical folks suggest that if they think enough positive thoughts with no domain experience they can get this off the ground.

 

The universe doesn't care about your enthusiasm. Either you have the money (and lots of it) or the talent (and lots of it), or you don't. If you don't, it isn't getting done.

 

Cheers!

 

Luke