A fare comparison of both sims during the day:

Tough choice as of now with X-Plane10, but I think X-Plane 11 will definitely look better visually than P3D. 

Tough choice as of now with X-Plane10, but I think X-Plane 11 will definitely look better visually than P3D. 

 

I agree. Some people have expressed disappointment at LRs focus on visuals for 11 (at least 11.0) but I think it's a smart move if they aim to become the main FS platform in the coming years. People like eye candy.

That's assuming X-Plane will develop while Prepar3d will stagnate. Which assumption I don't share. 

 

Kind regards, Michael

As this is an X-Plane forum and I use X-Plane I would say X-Plane.

If this was a P3D forum and I used P3D I would say P3D.

If this was a neutral general flight-sim forum I would say X-Plane

As always, the X-Plane demo is downloadable for testing and evaluation.

Coming from a P3D and X-plane user, the cost of X-Plane is cheaper and a lot of addon airports are either lower priced than their P3D counterparts, or free!

Both? or is that not allowed

 

P3D looked oddly washed out in that video, but from a visual point of view they both have their strengths and weaknesses.

 

I'm playing with the 10.50 demo again, and will likely get XP11 when it comes out. Running 10.50 with RTH gets me some lovely looking visuals, but it is some way off my P3Dv3.4 at this point. Clouds, water and trees all look quite poor in the 10.50 demo, but obviously some of these things can be improved with the right add-ons. I'm very interested to see what the new lighting technique (PBR) will bring to v11.

I'm playing with the 10.50 demo again, and will likely get XP11 when it comes out. Running 10.50 with RTH gets me some lovely looking visuals, but it is some way off my P3Dv3.4 at this point. Clouds, water and trees all look quite poor in the 10.50 demo, but obviously some of these things can be improved with the right add-ons. I'm very interested to see what the new lighting technique (PBR) will bring to v11.

 

Hi Novation! I like a lot your atmospheric screenshots of P3D.

 

Don't want to derail the thread, but if you want, you can try my tweaks for X-Plane 10 that should improve both atmosphere and cloud rendering. Still work in progress though (especially the clouds).

 

Here's the file: http://s000.tinyupload.com/index.php?file_id=13688961621026576590

 

You just have to extract the archive inside your main X-Plane folder (if it's done correctly, it should ask you to overwrite/merge several default files and folders). It requires FlyWithLua to work, but I assume you've already installed it since you're using RTH. You also have to disable RTH to avoid conflicts between the two scripts. Of course, running the X-Plane installer will allow you to restore back all default files.

 

Here are a couple of screenshots, left is default, right is tweaked with my script:

 

 

 

Tough choice as of now with X-Plane10, but I think X-Plane 11 will definitely look better visually than P3D.

 

Irrelevant to me if P3D continues to simulate the commerical airline environment better than xplane does or can in future.

Fortunately, the world and community of flight simulation is much, much more than just the IFR tubeliners ops.

One thing to point out in that video is that X-Plane is using free addons (MisterX San Francisco) for the scenery, whereas P3D is using Payware (ORBX). That being said, to also be fair, the video should have been clearer that once you fly out of the area of San Francisco it changes to the default scenery, which the payware ORBX beats hands down.

 

 

That's assuming X-Plane will develop while Prepar3d will stagnate. Which assumption I don't share. 

 

I don't think either sim can stay as the "replacement for FSX" for much longer. Unfortunately LR could have chosen to go for the FSX crowd when Microsoft cancelled, but they didn't (and also didn't try when Flight was also a failure). DTG's Flight Sim will supposedly be a direct replacement for FSX and not for the professional market (i.e. professional prices for addons) and will likely have ORBX behind them. I guess P3D will gradually fade out into a small niche unless DTG get it horribly wrong and alienate third-party devs or users. As for X-Plane, this one will forever remain a mystery, but I think it will continue as is with a slowly increasing share of users and increasingly better payware products.

Don't want to derail the thread, but if you want, you can try my tweaks for X-Plane 10 that should improve both atmosphere and cloud rendering. Still work in progress though (especially the clouds).

 

I will certainly give your tweaks a try, thank you. From the comparison shots what you've done looks stunning.

Irrelevant to me if P3D continues to simulate the commerical airline environment better than xplane does or can in future.

 

You're saying that like LR has any choice on what developers bring to XP.

Being a huge XP 10 user but regardless of the tweaking of the sky and terrain fly in North America or Europe in the winter. Poor. This has to be some kind of priority for XP. Seasonal terrain textures.

Not sure what to make of this thread.  Each sim has its own strength and weakness.  I found XP is still trying to find its place.  Some loyal fans love it, lot of free stuffs and the community free contribution is rich.  However, it still lacks some key features: seasons, ATC, etc.  I personally found no times to maintain two sims, too much work.  Not sure if P3D is the answer either, as 3rd party developers loads it down with gunks.  For the purpose of real pilot "practicing" skill both fit the bills.  For the casual "just for the heck" of enjoying the occasional flight, P3D wins hand down with its more complete support of weather, ATC, sophisticate 3rd party plane models and scenery.