Few opinions on X-Plane 11, and PMDG products for XP11

[qzpmtfgh 4]

Lately I've been trying the X-Plane 11 public beta, and I have to say, It is superior in a lot of ways compares to P3D/FSX(Again, im not saying one platform is better than other one, its all personal preference, P3D has lot more 3rd party plug-ins, XP11 has better techonolgy etc.). And as someone who spent lots of bucks on P3D on plug-ins, after trying XP11 for few weeks, I really want to switch over to XP11 all together. But one huge factor is that there isn't that many 3rd party adds on. Now, we could argue that wait for P3D V4, but imho, P3D V4 might be 64bits..yes, but I highly doubt anything revolutionary will happen, from business stand point, LM is a military company after all lol, there "real" customers probably wont bother with fancy graphics or PBR rendering etc. It's more likely to be a move towards 64bits than a "brand new" product. I don't think there will be a brand new graphic engine or any fancy new tech. And I also noticed that X-plane has one of the fastest growing community, the X-plane forum is very active. 

I do believe that the XP11 has a very bright future, it's a big step up from XP10, but it's only lacking 3rd party plug ins, Flight Factor 757/767 and JARDesign A330/A320 are okay, but don't think they are on pair with PMDG quality wise. I just wish that 3rd party devs like PMDG, FSL, AeroSoft, can make/migrate more products to XP platform, so that it will become more competent, and we all know competition is always a good thing, otherwise the LM will just stick with their current P3D platform with very little improvments, cuz they dominate most of the flight sim market.

The flight sim market has been moving extremely slow compare to other genre of games, it doesn't have a large community first of all(which is a big factor for sure), but I think we can learn a thing or two from driving sim community(Im really into driving sims), It was a very small community few years ago as well (with games like GTR2 and R-Factor that has ###### graphics but decent physics, like current day P3D ), but with some excellent/revolutionary products like Assetto Corsa, Project Cars, Dirt Rally and Forza Horizon 3  poping up. Now if you look at the driving sim community, its really booming, even the hardware companies benefited from it, Logitech stated few years ago it will stop making any Driving sim related products, but now they are forced to come back(Logitech G29 racing wheel), because it is a booming industry, and it was dominating by Thrustmaster(T300RS etc). With games like Forza Horizon 7, GT Sports, GTR3, Project Cars 2, Dirt 4 and lot more to come in the future. Okay I am a bit out of topic maybe. But I just want to make my point saying, It is also 3rd party plug-in dev's responsibilities to push the Flight Sim industry forward more faster, If we just refuse to move on and stick with FSX or P3D (assume nothing big happens with P3D V4), Im confident to say that X-Plane is the future of Flight Sim. It's not hard to notice on the XP forum, there are lots of new captains getting into flight sim, I wish 3rd party products devs like PMDG can lead the industry to make that baby step towards a competitive and healthy flight sim community.

 

What do you guys think ? Do you guys think that it's time for something big on the Flight Sim world ? Or P3D/FSX works just fine for you ? It would be interesting to hear you guys opinions.

 

 

[wedgantilles 76]

I think it's okay for things to continue the way they are. First of all I really don't think the FS market is so little as you said, just right now on avsim there are more than 1000 users online, and seeing how PMDG announcements could crash the site, I'm sure there is a good number of people here.

 

But I really don't think it's possible to compare to other community, driving sim is really not at all the same challenge, first of all gravity is much easier to manage than flight dynamics, and also all the other sims are usually on closed circuit, which is in comparison to our sim where we have the whole world, very easy to tweak and to make having good performance, lots of things can be precalculated, you won't see the scenery from both a few meters, and 10km from the ground.

 

X-plane is evolving and as you I wish to get more PMDG type of products there, and it may come, just give them time, otherwise, I4m still very much amazed by what developpers can do with FSX/P3D engine, although the base code is now very old.

 

I really think there are good things ahead, and we'll have to see how DovetailGames will position themselves in this market later, which could change things or not depending on what they will be doing

[hasse29 41]

Good and bad, X-plane and P3D is two completely different platform.X-plane has been developed in one direction, and P3D in another direction. They have nothing in common, not even targeted market. Because of this you can't just create something for platform A, change a little code, and fit it to platform B.

 

I don't know all the details, but reading from Randazzo's answer in another thread, it seems like X-plane has some limitations that P3D hasn't, and P3D has some other limitations that X-plane hasn't. That leave's a company like PMDG with 3 options:

 

1. Ignore limitations as far as you can. This is the most common approach today, and it's not a very good thing in my opinion. A company might create a great production for platform A, but because of limitations in platform B, you can't implement some of those features in platform B. So they release a limited edition of their product in platform B, with a lot of disappointed customers and a lot of complaint as result. For a company like PMDG, who's business idea is to produce high level sim with quality, this is not an option. They will risk loosing too much credibility.

 

2. Develop different products for each platform, using its strength. PMDG used their long experience to produce 747 for P3D. With their experience, they know what strengths and what limitations P3D has, and can use it to create great products. They used a completely different development team (I guess) to produce a great airplane for x-plane. This cost more money, but you can release really great product for each platform, but because of different limitations, products for platform A will rarely be released for platform B, and vice versa.

 

3. Because of differences, and development cost, you ignore one of the platforms. There are few people who want to work for free, and if you want high quality products, you don't want to just grab someone from the street to do the job. ORBX choose this solution.

 

Those are the alternatives. And as a 3rd party developer, you have one more issue to take in consideration, platforms future. P3D and X-plane has a long life ahead of them as long as they don't do anything drastic. But you don't always get information about how the platform will change in the future. Let's take P3D as an example. A lot of developers created products for P3D 1.4. When LM released v2, a lot of those products failed to work. This is because sometimes you need to change in critical part of the code, like folder structures or in SDK. That means my product for 1.4 will fail to work. As a customer, you will be disappointed and complain. As a developer I can either ignore you, or I can try to see what the problem is. This can take many days to find all issues, and after you have to fix them. If it takes too long time, cost will be higher than the profit, and you will end up broke. Alternative is to resell product as a new version, with disappointed customers as a result.

 

A lot of customers now ask LM to make P3D 64-bits. which will increase VAS limit beyond any computer is enable to manage today, and it's a good step for the future. But the question some is discussing is wether they should implement DX12 also. Some people want it, some is against it. Both has advantages and disadvantages. Since no product today will work on 64-bit, I would also change to DX12. Then you will have a system that can last for many years. But LM (and Austin) need also listen to what 3rd part developer say. PMDG can give Austins team a lot of important information what X-plane needs in the future, but so can FSDreamteam also. And sometimes their wishes can conflict. How will you do then? You have your mother and father on a dinner. You serve mashed potatoes. Your mother ask for salt, you father don't want any salt. Your mother ask for black pepper, your father ask for white pepper. Who will you please? If you please one, the other will not eat. If you try to please both, they will not enjoy your food very much. Alternative is to buy more potatoes, do one for each of them with double the cost and work labor.

 

I am not involved in PMDG in any way, I haven't even met anyone of them, so I don't know anything about PMDG future plans or details about their development. I am only try to explain a developers point of view from Randazzo's earlier answer regarding this. You should look at the bright side, PMDG has shown that they are willing to develop for X-plane, and want to create great planes. Be happy about that. If there is a market, and possibilities are there, PMDG will release their products for platform x. Without having met anyone at PMDG, I am willing to bet all my savings on that Randazzo is not thinking "I don't like those xxx platform users. Lets not release this product for their platform". If there's a market, and platform allow it, PMDG will surely release what ever it is. Let's focus on giving suggestion in what we want in the future, instead of "why don't you release x fro my platform?". If demand is big, and there's a limitation in the platform, PMDG will give you a reason why they won't release it, like they did on 747.

[jfriz 27]

I installed the X-P 11, demo, and am just barley able to get  the B737 in the air after a lot of study. I notice it is very smooth, and images are really sharp.  I would do more with it if there were more add-ons, for sure.

 

I would certainly like to see PMDG, configure more of their fleet over to XP11.

 

Regards,

Jerry Friz

[sultanofswing 57]

What Made X-Plane start to gain more popularity was the release of the IXEG 737.  After that came out the amount of users flying in X-Plane doubled.

So what does this mean?  Well if we get serious developers on board with XP11 ie(PMDG)with quality addons then X-Plane will just get even more popular.

 

I fly both sims and have no issue with either.

[Raven9000 272]

I really couldn't care less for PMDG to make more products for XP as if that were *THE* thing that would make me decide to use it...

 

I have *A LOT* to learn, and there are already *MANY* add-ons that may not be PMDG level (so I hear) that already work with XP10 (and 11) but are still of exceptional quality and detail, and way more than enough to get me started and to last me for MANY, MANY years...

[alvin 0]

What Made X-Plane start to gain more popularity was the release of the IXEG 737.  After that came out the amount of users flying in X-Plane doubled.

 

Carlos, what information do you base this view on? 

Not that I would not like x-plane to gain more popularity - just wondering whether it is just impression or some official stats from Laminar Research?

 

best,

Jakub

[denthibbe 18]

Let's be honest, the only reason why P3D has been able to sort of take over a lot of FSX simmers (that includes myself) is the fact that the vast majority of addons are almost fully cross compatible (unless some developer tricks in order to block this...).

If X-Plane had only half of the FSX/P3D user base all the so called limitations/issues/shortcomings/etc... would almost magically get fixes/workarounds because only then would the profitability justify the research costs... that is the law of a developer's business model. FSX/P3D as an engine might be so old it hurts your eyes after 1 week of X-planing, as long as the user base is sitting on that side, that is where the developers will put their effort. Honestly I can't blame them for that...

 

I installed the X-plane 11 demo about 2 months ago and after 2 days I bought the license as I was literally blown away by it. In the mean time a bought a couple of tubeliners (jardesign, flightfactor,IXEG) and the Xenviro weather engine. It takes only hours to realise how far ahead this sim is when compared to P3D, but again as I said in the first part of my post, that actually doesn't really matter from a developer's business point of view.

 

Anyway, I am not investing any money in P3D (including the 747 v3) until at least the end of the X-plane 11 beta (still months out I guess) and probably not before there is more information about P3D V4. As I expect only a mere conversion to 64bit without any actual technological (graphical) innovation, I will probably fully switch to X-Plane 11 by then (even if that means losing access to addons by PMDG)

 

just the opinion of a random customer.

bye for now.

[GCBraun 2,390]

Let's be honest, the only reason why P3D has been able to sort of take over a lot of FSX simmers (that includes myself) is the fact that the vast majority of addons are almost fully cross compatible (unless some developer tricks in order to block this...).

If X-Plane had only half of the FSX/P3D user base all the so called limitations/issues/shortcomings/etc... would almost magically get fixes/workarounds because only then would the profitability justify the research costs... that is the law of a developer's business model. FSX/P3D as an engine might be so old it hurts your eyes after 1 week of X-planing, as long as the user base is sitting on that side, that is where the developers will put their effort. Honestly I can't blame them for that...

 

I installed the X-plane 11 demo about 2 months ago and after 2 days I bought the license as I was literally blown away by it. In the mean time a bought a couple of tubeliners (jardesign, flightfactor,IXEG) and the Xenviro weather engine. It takes only hours to realise how far ahead this sim is when compared to P3D, but again as I said in the first part of my post, that actually doesn't really matter from a developer's business point of view.

 

Anyway, I am not investing any money in P3D (including the 747 v3) until at least the end of the X-plane 11 beta (still months out I guess) and probably not before there is more information about P3D V4. As I expect only a mere conversion to 64bit without any actual technological (graphical) innovation, I will probably fully switch to X-Plane 11 by then (even if that means losing access to addons by PMDG)

 

just the opinion of a random customer.

bye for now.

 

I agree completely. The only reason I still have P3D installed is due to the 747, 777 and A320. Being that said, I do not have any hope that PMDG will develop again for XP in the near future. That seems already very clear for me.

[DavidP 1,408]

The question has to be: why are developers NOT flocking to XP in droves? There must be a reason. PMDG did the DC6, but there appears to not be a lot of energy towards XP, especially given the 747 has been ruled out.

[jfriz 27]

Excellent questions.

I am seriously thinking of switching over to XP-11 soon... I'll give P3D about another month.

Jerry Friz

[anthony500 27]

Even on X-plane 10 (latest version) and the demo of the 11, in general the level of smoothness and sharpness (just these two elements makes for such a better sim experience IMHO) of the sim is absolutely ridiculious compared to P3D... Certainly of the reasons im holding for the new pmdg 747-400.. We'll see what P3D 64 can bring ...

 

Anthony brichart  

[jfriz 27]

If I am understanding the Orbx forums correctly, John V, is  working with the folks at XP, and about ready to release their scenery add-ons.

Jerry Friz

[sizziano 172]

 

On 2/22/2017 at 10:07 PM, sultanofswing said:

What Made X-Plane start to gain more popularity was the release of the IXEG 737.  After that came out the amount of users flying in X-Plane doubled.

Source?

4 hours ago, jfriz said:

If I am understanding the Orbx forums correctly, John V, is  working with the folks at XP, and about ready to release their scenery add-ons.

Jerry Friz

I thought they scrapped their plans for XP. Was this reversed?

 

Felipe Vicini

[elmucki 32]

no. people just keep hoping they will change their mind. Which they may down the road. It just sad thou.