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DTG Flight School: certainly NOT not for us simmers

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In case anyone still wondered if the upcoming DTG Flight School might offer an in-depth and realistic experience for us simmers: it won't. It will mainly be fun. Check this quote from the Q&A topic. 

 

I personally for instance LOVE reading 'dry and boring' manuals for hours to get a plane going. And I personally like a sim to show me how to fly a real aircraft. I sincerely hope all of this will not apply to the later to be released full sim...!

Jeroen, I am sorry, but while I'll reserve final judgement of Flight School/DFS until I have it in my hands, I fundamentally disagree at the outset. While I have been simming since FS4, seen several simulators coming and going and been on AVSIM for a lot of years (does this qualify as a simmer?) I would not like to be included into "us".

 

Why should we reject an approach making simming more accessible to a broader auditory, including public promotion and advertising which has been completely missing since FSX times? No one is forced to use DFS, but it can breath new life into a hobby I aready thought dying a few years ago.

 

I think I spent 50 % of my gross simming time for tweaking, configuring, reinstalling etc., thats just unhealthy. I would *love* to have more time for simming, but I am a poor man with a family and just a simming hour left now and then in the night after hard word. No time to read long manuals even if I wanted. A glance into some books on my shelf (including Stern's still excellent Flight Simulator Handbook) has to do. I would be more than happy if DT managed to provide tutorials accessible to people not willing - or able - to read long manuals. As others already said, there are alternatives available for those gearing towards a real PPL. And even for those DFS might become a spring board.

 

Kind regards, Michael

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MSFS, Beta tester of Simdocks, SPAD.neXt, and FS-FlightControl

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And THAT, Gentlemen, is exactly what it means to be a 'Simmer'.  Bravo Michael! :Applause:

Edited by n4gix
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Very well put Michael!

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Cheers, Bert

AMD Ryzen 5900X, 32 GB RAM, RTX 3080 Ti, Windows 11 Home 64 bit, MSFS

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Our approach has not been to “dumb down” the overall simulation experience but rather to present that experience in a way which is readily accessible for anyone who wants to try it and does not intimidate them. Our aim is for simmers to experience the thrills and challenges of learning to become a pilot. 

 

- Martin 

 

Of all the forums I visit, Flightsim forums are the ones that use the phrase "dumbed down" the most often. I usually see this as a community codeword for any flight sim experience that regular people might enjoy. Like the ones that originally got most of us started in the first place.

 

I've likened this to a community that's climbed up a rope ladder and then gradually pulled the rope up almost out of sight afterwards, leaving it very hard for the those coming afterward to perform the same climb.

 

If flight school was DTG's only offering, I think sheer outrage at the usurpation of our entitlement (all sims are belong to us!!!) would have many people try to hound it into an early grave. Fortunately you've thrown in the possibility of a juicy steak dinner (DTG sim) later, and perhaps anticipation will prove soothing to help avoid the type of riot that accompanied the release of Flight.

 

Good luck to you in both endeavours, even though I admit that I as well was hoping for something more. (on the visual front, at least)

 

Such is life!


We are all connected..... To each other, biologically...... To the Earth, chemically...... To the rest of the Universe atomically.
 
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I think part of the problem is that I grew up when GPS didnt exist (or at least Id never heard of it) and HUDs were in military aircraft. It certainly wasnt technology you'd find in a small civilian aircraft.

 

The first flight sim as I remember it put me into a cessna with a 2d graphic representation of the cockpit sitting at Meigs field and I dont remember a lot of instructions available. Im not sure when the maps started showing up. I had to figure it out on my own and I stuck with it because Id always loved flying. I wouldnt have known flight sims existed if my brother didnt have it among his game collection.

 

Fast forward to MS Flight which seemed to focus on finding rotating green rings and arrows in the sky and, although there was entertainment value in trying to locate a spot under an archway on one of the farthest out Hawaiian islands, it just felt hollow somehow - following VORs had been replaced with green arrows that didnt even exist.

 

MS Flight was not anywhere near as bad as some said. Hawaii and the Van's RV were great. there were weather related missions. I think they should have started out with the complete Hawaii package.

 

It isnt about 'pulling up the ladder behind you'. Its about keeping what I first loved in the sim.

 

and aircraft should get MORE complex - not less. (hopefully).

Edited by n4gix
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|   Dave   |    I've been around for most of my life.

There's always a sunset happening somewhere in the world that somebody is enjoying.

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It isnt about 'pulling up the ladder behind you'. Its about keeping what I first loved in the sim.

 

But in the process, longtime users demand levels of complexity that they themselves mastered only after a long (often years long) period of familiarization. This is all too often done with scant patience (and using phrases like dumbed downed it seems like scant tolerance) for those starting lower down the ladder.

 

Witness Flight school, which stressed from the very beginning that its mantra was going to be accesibility to beginning users, and what immediately happened? People here began right away talking about high level PPL training, following a syllabus, and every sort of detailed and complex minutia of the type that was pretty much guaranteed to chase off beginning/casual users, and would once again be of primary interest mostly to the established market and community.

 

DTG Flight School: certainly NOT not for us simmers, said the thread title.

 

But....... who exactly defines what a 'simmer' is?

 

I think its not, nor should it be, always about the community here. Other people deserve their chance to start out and grow they way we did, and not be faced with a 'simmers sim' like X-plane that sits you (horrified) at the controls of a jumbo jet with no clue what the heck to do next. Or like P3D that did away with those 'silly' game-like lessons that caused such consternation in Flight. (pulling up the rope behind us)

 

Where is the ladder upwards now? It's not always about us.

 

Just my 2 cents.

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We are all connected..... To each other, biologically...... To the Earth, chemically...... To the rest of the Universe atomically.
 
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But in the process, longtime users demand levels of complexity that they themselves mastered only after a long (often years long) period of familiarization. This is all too often done with scant patience (and using phrases like dumbed downed it seems like scant tolerance) for those starting lower down the ladder.

 

...

Yes. and these levels of complexity are what we all sought after after becomming familiar with the more simple. The levels of complexity should and must be there. It should be the overarching direction of any good sim.

 

I personally think it will be.

 

I dont want to take away the beginning. I want to add the more complex that we seem to enjoy. It probably doesnt matter. Addons are the more complex...just like in FSX.

 

concerning those in game lessons: I actually found those challenging. I kept getting points deducted becasue I taxied too fast or couldnt keep straight down the taxiway. I hope that in DTG flightschool or flightsim that I am not required to pass any tests that require manual dexterity becuase not everyone who sims actually can follow a straight line. I would hate to be locked out of major parts of the sim simply becuase i cant pass the computers idea of perfection.

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|   Dave   |    I've been around for most of my life.

There's always a sunset happening somewhere in the world that somebody is enjoying.

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Yes. and these levels of complexity are what we all sought after after becomming familiar with the more simple. The levels of complexity should and must be there. It should be the overarching direction of any good sim.

 

 

I suspect it won't be in Flight School. At least not the way some seem to be hoping. I think that would essentially mark it as a niche product, not at all in line with DTG's stated intentions to draw new people into the genre. At 4.99 FSX-SE could get away with that and live due to the "Eh, its only 4.99" demographic, but what will Flight School cost? That's going to be an important question.

 

As for the complexity, I get the impression that that would be for DTG sim. (mostly)


We are all connected..... To each other, biologically...... To the Earth, chemically...... To the rest of the Universe atomically.
 
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I am afraid I'll have to revise my initially positive account. Here is a direct answer to the posed question by someone certainly more knowledgeable on things behind the scenes and sure more knowledgeable than me, i.e. ORBX' John Venema:

 

"Here's something that may surprise you all: has it not occurred to you that hard-core simmers are not the #1 target demographic for DTG? Their target is the 140 million Steam accounts and Flight School is the vehicle on getting 'bums on seats' so to speak."

 

The context was ORBX will charge full for the DFS converted versions of their sceneries and give no rebate to previous owners of their sceneries (http://www.orbxsystems.com/forum/topic/112404-dovetail-games-continues-orbx-partnership/?page=3)

 

Kind regards, Michael

 

 

 

 


MSFS, Beta tester of Simdocks, SPAD.neXt, and FS-FlightControl

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"Here's something that may surprise you all: has it not occurred to you that hard-core simmers are not the #1 target demographic for DTG? Their target is the 140 million Steam accounts and Flight School is the vehicle on getting 'bums on seats' so to speak."

 

This part at least, is not even remotely surprising. Like I said, it can't necessarily always be about this particular demographic. 


We are all connected..... To each other, biologically...... To the Earth, chemically...... To the rest of the Universe atomically.
 
Devons rig
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The same way lockheed´s #1 target isn´t the hard-core simmer.

 

I guess the only FS that really focus on the hard-core simmer is X-plane, and it isn´t my number one simulator. 

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The same way lockheed´s #1 target isn´t the hard-core simmer.

 

I guess the only FS that really focus on the hard-core simmer is X-plane, and it isn´t my number one simulator. 

 

I can understand why it isn't everyone's cup of tea. Not yet, anyway. But at least it's an alternative, and it's still under development with constant patching, updates, and a new version out there on the horizon somewhere. With PMDG starting to support it now, and constant customer pressure for better ATC and weather modeling, the next version of X-Plane should give the upcoming DTG flight sim a run for its money. And vice-versa.

 

Competition in the marketplace is good. I think both FSX (in the P3D incarnation) and X-Plane have been coasting for the last couple of years, without enough direct competition. Interesting times ahead!

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X-Plane and Microsoft Flight Simulator on Windows 10 
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The context was ORBX will charge full for the DFS converted versions of their sceneries and give no rebate to previous owners of their sceneries (http://www.orbxsystems.com/forum/topic/112404-dovetail-games-continues-orbx-partnership/?page=3)

 

Kind regards, Michael

Providing a link to a "closed forum" is especially useless, not to mention frustrating... :blink:


Fr. Bill    

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     Avsim Board of Directors | Avsim Forums Moderator

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Fast forward to MS Flight which seemed to focus on finding rotating green rings and arrows in the sky and, although there was entertainment value in trying to locate a spot under an archway on one of the farthest out Hawaiian islands, it just felt hollow somehow - following VORs had been replaced with green arrows that didnt even exist.

MS Flight was not anywhere near as bad as some said. Hawaii and the Van's RV were great. there were weather related missions. I think they should have started out with the complete Hawaii package.

 

I think, the green arrows you refer to were not in Flight but an option in the missions of FSX. And yes, Flight had those silly arcade game style ring catching challenges. But for example the Aerocache hunt was quite fun and for the more difficult ones quite a good detective challenge finding them. Also, it's worth remembering that MS Flight contained some great ILS landing challenges with the Maule and the RV-6A. I think they were part of the Alaska package. So, it would be great to see similar challenges in the new Simulator. I guess such gamification elements are frowned upon by some serious simmers - but to appeal to a wider market, they are IMHO necessary, and actually quite fun.

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Providing a link to a "closed forum" is especially useless, not to mention frustrating... :blink:

I am very sorry Bill. Neither did I want to quote the whole lengthy text nor risk to be accused for quoting out of context. Thus I though it might help at least those with access to the ORBX forum.

 

Full quote of JV's contribution is  appended

 

I'll never do it again, Michael

----------------------------------------

A reality check guys: DTG is a company that has to make profits for its shareholders, simple as that. It is unreasonable to assume that vendors such as Orbx and others are going to allow DTG to publish their addons as DLC and ask DTG to give them away for free to customers who purchased those addons on 32-bit platforms.

 

When Sega, Sony and Nintendo moved from 32-bit hardware to 64-bit hardware, did all the games developers give their customers free or discounted copies of title ported to the new systems? Companies such as EA, Ubisoft, Codemasters etc have sold essentially the same titles up to ten times to the same customers due to changes in console hardware or a new year passing. I don't remember being offered F1 2012 for free just because I had bought F1 2008 four years earlier.

 

By the same token we don't expect customers who are very happy with P3Dv3.x and have invested many thousands in Orbx addons to simply abandon that sim and their investment in licenses on the day DFS is released. I know many of them will buy DFS to experience 64-bit / DX11 for themselves, but their investment in DLC will be gradual as the new sim matures and wins the minds and hearts of very hard-to-please simmers.

 

Here's something that may surprise you all: has it not occurred to you that hard-core simmers are not the #1 target demographic for DTG? Their target is the 140 million Steam accounts and Flight School is the vehicle on getting 'bums on seats' so to speak.

  • Upvote 1

MSFS, Beta tester of Simdocks, SPAD.neXt, and FS-FlightControl

Intel i7-13700K / AsRock Z790 / Crucial 32 GB DDR 5 / ASUS RTX 4080OC 16GB / BeQuiet ATX 1000W / WD m.2 NVMe 2TB (System) / WD m.2 NVMe 4 TB (MSFS) / WD HDD 10 TB / XTOP+Saitek hardware panel /  LG 34UM95 3440 x 1440  / HP Reverb 1 (2160x2160 per eye) / Win 11

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