ORBX XP11: What are your predictions?

[Murmur 3,944]

My point is ; NOBODY should be held accoutable for predicting the future wrongly, foresight vision or call it what you want , it may all go wrong.

 

True. But you know, even if it's an immature and useless thing to do, it feels so good to say "I told you so!", even after 4 years. :wink:

 

That being said, I'm no trashing or spiting on anyone, on the contrary I'm very happy that the big names are also coming to X-Plane in flocks.

[Luis_KMIA 242]

I'm a big fan of competition, and having such a high quality developer dive into P3D, XP, and DTG is great!

[Guest]

I wouldn't be excited for ORBX texture replacements and the like. I hope "R&D" really means they are going to investigate what they can do with XP11 that can't be done with the other sims.

[GoranM 3,772]

Just so I understand some of these bizarre comments ... some (not all) of you want THE largest scenery/airport development company in Flight Simulation to NOT work on projects for Xplane because of some comment JV made over a year or two ago?  And this is good for Xplane user base how?  Sorry, but if you really love Xplane, get over it ... put your spite back in 2014 and leave it there.

 

Yes, scenery developers want to make money after 1000's of hours working on producing scenery ... something to do with feeding their families/kids and paying their bills and mortgage ... just like the rest of use with jobs.

 

Cheers, Rob.

 

I don't think people DON'T want OrbX to develop for X Plane.  What I have seen is comparisons between OrbX payware for FSX and default X Plane scenery, and, at least in my opinion, X Plane 11 default scenery is extremely hard to top.  Deep down, it's "Oh NOW you like X Plane?  2-3 years ago you said it had no future...but NOW you like it when it's more popular."

People were screaming for FSX dev's to make add ons for X Plane.  The reason they didn't was "There's no market.".  So it was up to dedicated X Plane developers, freeware and payware, to make add ons while making so little money, they had to work a full time job at the same time.

In my opinion, X Plane is where it is now because of these developers, the team at Laminar, and the fantastic collaboration Laminar had with developers in what they wanted in a sim.  All the hard work was done and that paved the way for FSX developers to say "Ok, now there's a market.  Now we'll go over." not knowing what it took to get X-Plane to where it is.

It has absolutely nothing to do with spite.  The arrogance and ignorance John displayed was something these hard working developers don't easily forget.  Especially after dedicating thousands of hours to a payware product just to make enough money to buy a happy meal.  Trust me, I've been there and done that.

FSX users get ropeable when someone criticizes anything about FSX.  And that's just opinions flight simmers have.  A developer with a reputation doing the same thing, based on very few facts, is a serious blow below the belt. And as a developer, he should have known better.

[jcomm 5,939]

The only problem with ORBX stuff is that it is expensive... Good but expensive, and X-plane users are acostumed to excellent freeware alternatives in this area...

 

With aircraft and weather add-ons, it's a bit different. Aircraft can be made really nic graphics wise, but have no content systems and flight dynamics wise.. Creating a complex aircraft for X-Plane 10 and 11

is certainly an hard task because although the core FDM is powerful, it is also very immature in some important aspects, and developers have to really put their neurons to work in order to get as close to

what they want as possible certain characteristics of an X-Plane-modeled fixed or rotary wing, or lighter than air, or rocket / space ship...

 

With weather, the limitations imposed by the underlying platform justify the desperate need for something that changes the present state of the art, and that's why users are willing to pay $70 for a weather

injector like X-Enviro, or even more for a combination of products... The NOAA plugin is, nonetheless a very good freeware alternative in as far as injceting weather goes.

[Guest Mik75]

I don't think people DON'T want OrbX to develop for X Plane.  What I have seen is comparisons between OrbX payware for FSX and default X Plane scenery, and, at least in my opinion, X Plane 11 default scenery is extremely hard to top.  Deep down, it's "Oh NOW you like X Plane?  2-3 years ago you said it had no future...but NOW you like it when it's more popular."

People were screaming for FSX dev's to make add ons for X Plane.  The reason they didn't was "There's no market.".  So it was up to dedicated X Plane developers, freeware and payware, to make add ons while making so little money, they had to work a full time job at the same time.

In my opinion, X Plane is where it is now because of these developers, the team at Laminar, and the fantastic collaboration Laminar had with developers in what they wanted in a sim.  All the hard work was done and that paved the way for FSX developers to say "Ok, now there's a market.  Now we'll go over." not knowing what it took to get X-Plane to where it is.

It has absolutely nothing to do with spite.  The arrogance and ignorance John displayed was something these hard working developers don't easily forget.  FSX users get ropeable when someone criticizes anything about FSX.  And that's just opinions flight simmers have.  A developer with a reputation doing the same thing, based on very few facts, is a serious blow below the belt. And as a developer, he should have known better.

Very well said, Goran!

[GoranM 3,772]

Thx!

[tonywob 4,770]

Well said Goran. 

 

I remember what JV said a few years ago, but the guy often says loudly what he is thinking and that's just who he is, I'd guessed the time would come when they would rethink their strategy and when I was heavily into FSX I thought X-Plane was awful as well :wink: . After that comment (and other ones in the past), X-Plane continued on without them and freeware and payware developers continued and made a name for themselves aside from the large FSX companies, pushing the sim forward, and now with the large amount of interest in XP11, they have changed their tune. Can't say anyone is surprised anymore, XP is becoming more popular (I've never seen this forum so busy as it is now)

 

Of course I'd love to see ORBX (who wouldn't?), but there are two things that worry me. One is I hope it doesn't kill the freeware scenery side of X-Plane, and number two, as jcomm said, their stuff is actually rather expensive. I'd love to see their airports ported over (and be as good as Beti-X ;-). A lot of the airport devs I followed in the past (Russ and Bill Womack) from ORBX have gone their own separate ways now anyway, but I'll be first in line to buy their airfields if they start releasing them.

[hhbrbg 139]

there was a discussion in June the at the x-plane.org forum

 

http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/forums/topic/105231-why-hasnt-a-developer-made-better-ground-textures-like-ftx-global/#comment-1038562

 

I wrote this..

 

As I see it, it's all a matter of X-Planes success. If the number of X-Plane users continues to grow (we see many positive signs), at a certain point a critical mass will be reached. Then Orbx can no longer ignore the x-plane community, because someone else could jump in. I assume that the guys at orbx understand their business. Therefore, they cannot tolerate another company to be very successful in their core business. Imagine you would run the company ABC and you have success with X-plane sceneries. Will you voluntary limit your expansion when the X-Plane market is saturated or will you expand to new markets (FSX, P3D)? Success brings opportunities...

Disclaimer:

What I wrote above relies on my assumptions only and could be (is?) completely wrong. I have no internal knowledge in any way.

 

 

on June the 30 th I added this...

 

I've heart that the Orbx boss owns not just a small ego. I think it's safe to assume that Austin is not a shy guy also. Maybe they cannot get along with each other? Who knows this for sure. I'm a relative new x-plane follower, but what I have seen so far is, that the true strength of x-plane lies in its dedicated community. People here help each other, they code, fix, create things in their spare time. It’s a bit like a big (not too big) family. Orbx appearance in the x-plane domain would be graphically a step forward, but could be a step back in a community where so many give so much for free.

[CFIJose 5,485]

I'm no longer the ORBX fan that I used to be. That's due in part to their treatment of some customers, the way they run their forums, and their support for a 32bit limited platform.

 

According to JV, his (ORBX) goal is not to be the biggest or the richest, but to innovate. Right now XPlane 11 is still in beta and in need of affordable seasonal textures with better looking coastlines and this is where maybe a dev like FTX can be a blessing.

 

This will only serve to improve XPlane and bring more simmers on board.

[barrel_owl 304]

Confirmation from Orbx:

Project X. Coming 2017.

http://www.orbxsystems.com/forum/topic/127182-orbx-2017-roadmap/

[Humpty 751]

Confirmation from Orbx:

 

Project X. Coming 2017.

http://www.orbxsystems.com/forum/topic/127182-orbx-2017-roadmap/

 

 

 

Not an Orbx customer so no forum access , can you copy paste the entire thing ??

[Glynn 405]

Xplane users have been crying out for more developers to come over the Xplane, and they will eventually come.

But be very careful what you wish for, because just as it was in FS9/FSX, your very lively freeware scene will eventually dry up and almost disappear.

These days FSX/P3D has become a very expensive hobby as we continually buy the next big release, in many ways it has taken a lot of the community spirit away that we had in the days before everything became focused on the payware scene..

[barrel_owl 304]

Not an Orbx customer so no forum access , can you copy paste the entire thing ??

 

It is the same announcement posted yesterday by John Venema (and already pasted here by other users). The shot comes from their FB page.

[Humpty 751]

It is the same announcement posted yesterday by John Venema (and already pasted here by other users). The shot comes from their FB page.

 

Ok thanks.  Is that Xplane ?