XPlane full-featured, really  ?  

 

Hey, I never claimed all the features worked perfectly. 

 

 

In FSX/P3D putting this many click spots into the airplane takes about 20fps

 

Not sure why this is being suggested (unless it's just marketing), but either way the claim is one of FPS issue not VAS issue.

 

The MJC Q400 for FSX/P3D aircraft has many more click spots with working circuit breakers in the Pro version: http://majesticsoftware.com/mjc8q400/products.html ... no FPS issues or VAS issues at all, the MJC Q400 is very efficient with VAS and it's FPS performance is outstanding and it's a very complex aircraft with shared cockpit capabilities and it fits very well in 32bit address space.

 

 

 

it was suggested that even moving to 64-bits wouldn't be enough to cure VAS, OOMs, etc.

 

Again, don't know who is suggesting that, but again I would be extremely skeptical of such a statement ... but more importantly how could such a statement be made without any real world example to validate the claim?  Such a statement would suggest there is no point to moving to 64bit for any sim platform ... that's just not accurate.

 

Aircraft "systems" aren't the big users of VAS ... textures and geometric complexity are ... for example PMDG's recent update to the 777 enjoyed a rather impressive VAS reduction and yet none of it's system functionality has changed at all ... they "discovered" something

 

I personally would love to see more PMDG in Xplane and P3D and DTG's future product ... in most cases I would guess at least 70-80% of the work done can be used for all 3 platforms ... and I'd bet we'll start to see more tools to make cross platform conversions easier.

 

Sure you can discuss Xplane so long as it's not deemed trolling.  If you want to do X vs. Y vs. W vs. Z platform compares, best place to do that is probably general discussion ... sadly it will most likely end up with "risk of closure" and eventually locked (most have in the past).  I personally haven't seen anyone do a full impartial compare of all the platforms ... probably because it would get cut off as people seem to get very emotionally charged on the topic which is often tied to financial investment in their platform of choice and not the reality of the good, bad, and ugly which all platforms share.

 

Cheers, Rob.

 

 

Again, don't know who is suggesting that, but again I would be extremely skeptical of such a statement ... but more importantly how could such a statement be made without any real world example to validate the claim?  Such a statement would suggest there is no point to moving to 64bit for any sim platform ... that's just not accurate.

I made the statement, and to justify (since it appears necessary now to do so with anything said), it's due to a rhetorical question about when it'll be "enough".  There are so many developers now for flight simulator related material that you have to ask, when will it all be enough?  How much more real do we need sims to be, and to that end, what will be the optimal computer setup be so no one will have to complain?  As an aside, there just doesn't seem to be no pleasing people.  People complain, argue, clamor over things not being real enough, as if they need a full virtual world, with tactile feedback and full AI interaction, it almost seems like that is going way too far.

 

Again, it's a rhetorical question, with no hidden meanings and most certainly, no need to quote me.

It'll never be enough Jim, and that's ok ... but don't confuse that with pleasing people, that's an entirely different construct which is defined by individual goals and expectations.  Some people have very high expectations and some very low ... regardless of expectations, new and future technology defines the boundaries of how close to reality we can get.  I'll agree some of those high expectations are unrealistic given today's hardware (and probably future hardware), but chalk them up as dreamers.  I adjust my expectations by what I know top tier hardware of today and near future can do.

 

There are never enough developers for a Flight Simulator ... my only fear/observation of this particular flight simulation market niche is it's just too small to have this many different development paths/groups working on essentially the same concept ... a flight simulator with an SDK.  But even if LM, LR, DTG (and anyone else) all combined to make a single "unified" flight simulator platform, it would still not be enough (compare to companies like EA that had over 500 artists/designers/developers working on some aspects of the original Crysis and CryEngine, later trimmed down to 100 devs for Crysis3) ... compromises must be made with one's expectations and once over that hump, enjoyment usually follows ... hence my frequent references to "the blind eye" (which you need for ALL platforms).

 

My primary desire is to see progress ... the unfortunately reality is that there is a lot of development overlap in that progress.  LR is working on features already accomplished in other platforms and LM are working on features already accomplished in other platforms and DTG are working on features already accomplished in other platforms.

 

Some believe there is plenty of room in this market, I'm not so sure ... but at least there is progress happening on multiple fronts even if overlapped.

 

Cheers, Rob.

I can't disagree with you there.  The mentioning of companies like EA is another good point.  You did touch on something that bugs me though.  With all of the development and research all of the companies do, when are they going to get much more accurate land data?  I've come across a lot of postings from people, stating that many areas of the world aren't accurate.  What I mean by accurate is what we see on the ground, from above, doesn't always jive.  Prime example would be the ability to fly over your house and really see your house.  There's photo ground scenery, but what is the accuracy of that?  I'm not being sarcastic, I'd like to know if we will ever see a day when we can get that sort of accuracy, combined with already proven mesh data to create a better "world"?

 

That would go a long way with me and I'd be happy to pay for that.

 

Another aspect is autogen.  Autogen needs a serious overhaul.  While I don't use X-Plane, I do see them progressing much further than the others, but again, accuracy of buildings, unique buildings, would be nice to have.

 

I think the weather aspect is pretty much spot on, so no need for too much more improvement.  I could be wrong, so feel free to tell me.

 

I see that too many people complain about the wrong things.  Getting down to the gnat's behind for dust, dirt, fingerprints in a flightdeck is pointless.  Flight dynamics, good environment, lighting especially are high on my wish list.

The new plane (DA42) makes Flight School pretty much unusable, not to mention causing crashes. The steam forum is already beginning to buzz........

The new plane (DA42) makes Flight School pretty much unusable, not to mention causing crashes. The steam forum is already beginning to buzz........

Seriously?  What's the issue?  I only ask because DTG made a big deal about it being an add-on you got when pre-ordering.  That's a bummer that they give you an aircraft that causes performance issues.

 

I just happened to visit Steam (Haven't in ages) and I see a little over 200 positives and almost 200 negatives for DTG FS.  Is it safe to say that overall, it is a neutral opinion?  I saw a few reviews saying FS is basically FSX...what I assumed all along.  I'm not here to bash though, I still have some curiosity and for only $11.99 right now (It came DOWN in price??), it's pocket change to try it out, right?  Is it worth it if there are aircraft issues?

Seriously?  What's the issue?  I only ask because DTG made a big deal about it being an add-on you got when pre-ordering.  That's a bummer that they give you an aircraft that causes performance issues.

I can report the same... disappointing frame rates and I literally couldn't fly it more than 5 minutes before it crashed to desktop.

 

There's another thread about the plane to keep this one on topic.

I can report the same... disappointing frame rates and I literally couldn't fly it more than 5 minutes before it crashed to desktop.

 

There's another thread about the plane to keep this one on topic.

 

Cool. I only placed this here because I didn't feel like starting a new topic.

I see that too many people complain about the wrong things.  Getting down to the gnat's behind for dust, dirt, fingerprints in a flightdeck is pointless.  Flight dynamics, good environment, lighting especially are high on my wish list.

I think the need for advancement and betterment is ingrained in our DNA as humans. We are never satisfied.

For one person it is the missing fingerprint in the flightdeck, for others it is 'I want to fly over my house', for some both and more.

There is nothing wrong with that as long as it happens in a civilized manner.

 

I personally think that flight sims have been stuck with old technology for far to long and I wish for more advancement of environment, that includes weather and ground resolution/texture/representation.

 

Weather is often very localized. We get the weather from weather stations that in most parts of the world are very far apart.  There are 'only' approximately 11,000 weather stations in the world and approx 44,000 airports (data is a few years old) ....

That means weather is only given as a sample, I want weather like it is right here right now, not 5 km away at my airport. I know, it is too much to ask, but is it?

Will we one day have a real weather engine that can do that? Probably not in my life time, but I can long for it! Call me crazy!

But there are other things that I long for, like much more realistic looking buildings/cities/neighborhoods, they still look too cartoonish to me in any of the sims.

 

They are getting really close, especially with the buildings, at some of the newly released airport representations for X-plane and P3D/FSX.

 

I think the problem with ground data is the cost. It is all available, but very expensive to get a license to use. Until then I think we only will have, again, just a sample of your and my neighborhoods and the world. 

 

In general I feel the 'main' sim are on the right track in the past year making bigger steps in advancement. I like that and I appreciate it!

 

But there is a long way until I am 100% satisfied.

Well said.

 

I just have to wonder, at what point can we just use the data in google maps, as it models in 3d all features we need and is always on my phone available... the data is there, just need to access it in a sim platform properly.

 

Googlemaps + Streetview + a quality mesh + an Orbx FTX Global texture package to fill in the blanks would be awesome.

 

Add your full globe weather engine you mention along with the proper cloud modelling package and we are set ha

The new plane (DA42) makes Flight School pretty much unusable, not to mention causing crashes. The steam forum is already beginning to buzz........

 

It works great for me, I just did a free flight and it was smooth as butter on an ASUS ROG laptop. They fixed some problems with the GPS I had reported previously.

 

Small drop in FPS in the DA-42 compared to the Cub, but with a G1000 that's not really surprising.

 

Pretty much standard FSX tweaks and balancing settings apply. The main problem I think is that DTG ships this thing with all sliders maxed and the "beginners" don't know how to tune the sim to perform well. EDIT: I used to find maxed autogen on FSX totally destabilized the sim. I think autogen is impacting FSc performance even more than it did in FSX. Setting AUTOGEN_DENSITY=3 works very well for me.

Pretty much standard FSX tweaks and balancing settings apply.

 

Thing is, I don't think the "Noobs" DTG is aiming for are interested in being lured down the evil tweak path (that leads to the dark side) common in this community. Kinda defeats the point.

 

Heck, I hate tweaks, too!

 

If this is necessary, then DTG could be failing in its stated goal of accessibility.

Things is, I don't think the "Noobs" DTG is aiming for are interested in being lured down the evil tweak path (that leads to the dark side) common in this community. Kinda defeats the point.

 

Heck, I hate tweaks, too!

 

If this is necessary, then DTG could be failing in its stated goal of accessibility.

 

Agreed. DTG needs to fix this fast. Besides tweaks Nvidia Inspector or equivalent settings are needed to make the AA look good. This should all be automated. They'd be getting much better reviews if the address this problem.