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cleonpack93

PMDG for DTG's Flight Sim World

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Possibly true Aurelien; however, PMDG has been anticipating the migration to 64b for a long time and I assume they built the ability to target either 32b or 64b right into the structure of their code.  I do not speak for PMDG, but I am confident that their products don't need much more than recompiling for a 64b P3D as long as there are not major changes to some basic stuff like the SDK and the flight dynamics engine.  They probably have more work in the queue based on known bugs and product improvement than the switch to 64b.

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Dan Downs KCRP

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The fact that they've updated "some" navdata to 2015 is troubling.  Why not all of it? Why not incorporate a method to update it so ATC can tie into it?  I mean, I realize the navdata in FS is kinda irrelevant in some ways, but airport changes, ILS frequencies, VORs, magdecs, and other things would be nice to change.  It's gonna be 1.5 year out of date upon release.  And while I get that ILS, VORs and other things don't change too often, it would be nice to have an updated database.  It essentially reveals that they're sending out an updated FSX with 64-bit and Orbx scenery.  Maybe I'm wrong, and I'd sure like to be, but it's a little questionable.  

I wonder if ATC was even enhanced?  With the right amount of effort, updated navdata and proper ATC could be implemented and seriously change the game.  The scenery can always be a third party option, along with clouds, skies and traffic.  Same with planes really.  Nothing wrong with including decent planes but most of us don't play with them.  

It's so frustrating that ATC and other items could really be improved big time.  I have proposed methods on dealing with ATC and AI but no one listens.  The default ATC voices are much better than the third party add ons.  I don't care what anyone says.  So you have navdata, which we should be able to update at least quarterly, why not allow us to plug in a DP and STAR with our planned route and give options to enter altitudes?  Say at MARIO waypoint you need to be at 10,000 on descent.  So give us an option to enter 10,000 feet and ATC would simply say "...descend to 10,000 at MARIO (phonetically pronounced who cares)" or "...crossing MARIO at 10,000". Ect.  Then assign us an approach that truly uses the navdata that has been there since FS9 for descent. If the fix is coded for AT OR ABOVE 4000, then let us get down in time.  Instead you have to pick an approach and pray it gives you time to descend and slow down.  Usually it doesn't.  Or even give the option to descend when you need to if the simulator can't figure out the timing based on speed and current altitude.  RC had some minor implementations of what I suggested but it never really worked well imo.  I just think letting us plug in a route and alter the altitudes with some consideration to speed and altitude would work.  Throw in some unplanned turns for traffic or whatever and it would be much more immersive.  I'm sorry but with all the software out there and from what I have seen, it can be done.  If an option to choose an airspeed in knots and swept back wing was a check box to give earlier descent times, it would also help.  We need a 4:1 ratio anyhow since that's truly what most modern jets are using.  I've talked to pilots of jets with winglets and difficulty slowing, and they almost all say that it's so much more challenging and that a 4:1 ratio trumps the old 3:1 ratio for descent.  


- Chris

Gigabyte Z790 Aorus Elite AX | Intel Core i9 13900KF | Gigabyte GeForce RTX 4090 24 GB | 64GB DDR5 SDRAM | Corsair H100i Elite 240mm Liquid Cooling | 1TB & 2TB Samsung Gen 4 SSD  | 1000 Watt Gold PSU |  Windows 11 Pro | Thrustmaster Boeing Yoke | Thrustmaster TCA Captain X Airbus | Asus ROG 38" 4k IPS Monitor (PG38UQ)

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On 5/3/2017 at 5:16 PM, rjfry said:

Well if 64bit means no PMDG add-ons bad news for P3Dv4 if its 64bit.

Ray Fry.

In the future, all sims will most likely become 64 bit (in fact once FSW comes out that means all three of the major sims will be 64 bit), so this is unlikely. My question was mainly about when we can expect to hear about PMDG's plans, and if they are planning to update their current products for 64 bit or if it will be future releases only.

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14 hours ago, Orlaam said:

I wonder if ATC was even enhanced?  With the right amount of effort, updated navdata and proper ATC could be implemented and seriously change the game.  The scenery can always be a third party option, along with clouds, skies and traffic.  Same with planes really.  Nothing wrong with including decent planes but most of us don't play with them.  

It sounds like you might have, but have you tried ProATC/x recently? It offers at least some of the features you have been talking about. Their latest versions have really improved a lot. I fly with it pretty frequently.

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UPDATE: PMDG just posted the following to their Facebook page:

Quote

 

Captains,

There is an ancient curse that occasionally comes to mind: "May you live in interesting times."

As a software developer and a pilot, I am a big fan of boredom. Boredom means everything is stable. To my point of view, stable is good.

A few years ago the sim world went into panic when Microsoft killed off their flight simulation development and walked away from the market. Those of you who have been here a while will recall that I have been quite vocal in my musing that this was a good thing, as it would open the door to newer ideas and innovation and might signal a renewal of the hobby after a period of pain. I have continued to support this point of view- and I think 2017 will be the year that finally begins to see modern software and hardware architecture bringing joy to simmers.

We are coming out of a period of unprecedented platform stability. A full decade with a single platform has allowed developers to innovate and build capability without having to re-learn the process every two years as we used to do "back in the day."

With that in mind- we are starting to get quite a few folks asking questions about future platforms so I wanted to put a bit of information out to you in order to ease any concerns you might have about our plans for the future:

Prepar3D v4:

There is quite a bit of "noise" in the community, none of which has been confirmed, indicating that Lockheed Martin is working on the next iteration of Prepar3D. For our P3D customers, please know that our long-standing policy has been that we intend to support our existing products through P3D v4 "at least." This is included in the purchase you have already made and will not require further costs. It is reasonable to expect that a new version will include new features, and we expect that we will adopt those that make sense and roll them out using the micro-update process we have been developing over the past couple of years.

All of this is just a re-statement of the policy we announced in January 2015 when we launched our first products for Prepar3D- nothing has changed.

Dovetail Games' Flight Sim World:

A number of folks have been wondering what our official position is with regard to the recently announced Dovetail Games' Flight Sim World package. I wanted to summarize our thoughts in hopes that it will prevent some of the uninformed conjecture that has started up on the topic.

Summary: We are very excited to see Dovetail's work beginning to bear fruit and we look forward to learning more. At this juncture it is really not a simple task to answer the many questions being asked about whether or not PMDG will support the platform, whether our existing product line can be converted to FSW, etc etc. The bottom line is that we don't know much of anything about the platform.

For a period we were in fairly regular communication with DTG regarding their plans and progress, but that communication dried up shortly after we declined to offer our product line via the DTG controlled Steam channel for FSX-Steam Edition, and we haven't really heard much of anything from them since that time. We received a few email announcing staff changes, but we received no replies to our ongoing outreach effort, so at the moment when I look at the planning board for the next year, I see only a question mark next to the DTG platform.

We are simply waiting to hear, and remaining open minded.

With that said, I can boil the whole thing down pretty easily: Once we have a platform and an SDK and some marketing direction from DTG to work with, we will make a business decision: If the platform is capable of supporting highly complex simulations of modern airliners (we presume it will) and if we are able to market our products through our existing channels then there is a high degree of certainty that we will support it. If the market will require participation through a market controlled channel such as steam, the likelihood of our support diminishes rather significantly depending upon the costs of doing business through that channel.

As for whether our products can be ported to their new platform- it is safe to presume that they can... After all- it is just software. We do not doubt that it will require some dedicated development work and that is why we have the big question mark next to DTG on the planning board... We know work will be required, but we don't know when or how much to plan...

So stay tuned...

In the mean time, work progresses on the nearly completed PMDG DC-6 Cloudmaster for FSX and P3D, and the PMDG 747-8 Queen of the Skies II for both FSX and P3D is well on it's way to testing. We will likely have another couple of updates for the 747-400 very shortly, as we have been continuing to chip away at open items as we move the 747-8 down the assembly line.

As you can imagine, adding in all of the 747-8 functionality has created a bit of chaos in the code base, which has slowed down the update cycle for the 744, but I think we are through the worst of it now. (touch wood, hold thumbs, cross fingers and toes, etc...)

These may not be "interesting" times, but they are darned exciting!

Oh and wait until you see what else we are working on.

 

 

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3 hours ago, cleonpack93 said:

It sounds like you might have, but have you tried ProATC/x recently? It offers at least some of the features you have been talking about. Their latest versions have really improved a lot. I fly with it pretty frequently.

The voices I've heard for that negate any positive abilities the program carries with it.  :-/


- Chris

Gigabyte Z790 Aorus Elite AX | Intel Core i9 13900KF | Gigabyte GeForce RTX 4090 24 GB | 64GB DDR5 SDRAM | Corsair H100i Elite 240mm Liquid Cooling | 1TB & 2TB Samsung Gen 4 SSD  | 1000 Watt Gold PSU |  Windows 11 Pro | Thrustmaster Boeing Yoke | Thrustmaster TCA Captain X Airbus | Asus ROG 38" 4k IPS Monitor (PG38UQ)

Asus Maximus VII Hero motherboard | Intel i7 4790k CPU | MSI GTX 970 4 GB video card | Corsair DDR3 2133 32GB SDRAM | Corsair H50 water cooler | Samsung 850 EVO 250GB SSD (2) | EVGA 1000 watt PSU - Retired

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3 hours ago, cleonpack93 said:

UPDATE: PMDG just posted the following to their Facebook page:

 

Connor,

Actually, I posted it here in the forum first.  :laugh:

About a day after you started this thread...  Figured it was better to do a global reply than answer in thread since you were just one of many asking the same questions.  Hope that answered the points you were wondering about?

 


Robert S. Randazzo coolcap.gif

PLEASE NOTE THAT PMDG HAS DEPARTED AVSIM

You can find us at:  http://forum.pmdg.com

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On 5/5/2017 at 4:00 PM, rsrandazzo said:

Connor,

Actually, I posted it here in the forum first.  :laugh:

About a day after you started this thread...  Figured it was better to do a global reply than answer in thread since you were just one of many asking the same questions.  Hope that answered the points you were wondering about?

 

It certainly did. Appreciate your work and your openness! Thanks for being one of the best developers in the flight sim world.

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I feel that some of the success of failure of DTS will rely on the quality of their SDK they offer.   A bad or non-existent Source Development Kit can make entry into a new sim a bear of a challenge.

I suppose, with so many FSX based sims out there now, why we need yet another one (FSX boxed / FSX Steam, Prepar3D / ESP / and now DTS).   While I'm no X-Plane Fan (and yes, purchased it several times over the years and even downloaded the free trial version of 11), I'd love to see some company out there with experience or interest in modeling a complete "Earth-Simulator", with the ability to fly an incredibly modeled airliner through this perfection of a mathematical simulation.  It all begins with a simulation of the Earth, and the company that pulls that off will have the best Flight Simulator, hands down.  But, it's a darn tall order.

Mark Trainer

 

 

 

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Hello! Currently FSW SDK is avalable and there are no problems to sell DLCs in not-steam markets. Are any news from PMDG regarding FSW support?

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3 hours ago, AlexKz said:

Hello! Currently FSW SDK is avalable and there are no problems to sell DLCs in not-steam markets. Are any news from PMDG regarding FSW support?

The SDK doesn't yet support the creation of complex aircraft. Maybe this will improve once the bizz jet is done?

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31 minutes ago, fsxkitty said:

The SDK doesn't yet support the creation of complex aircraft. Maybe this will improve once the bizz jet is done?

when they continue developing at that speed they will make it possible when RSR retires :D


,

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9 hours ago, AlexKz said:

Hello! Currently FSW SDK is avalable and there are no problems to sell DLCs in not-steam markets. Are any news from PMDG regarding FSW support?

There is more to it than the SDK and than what we can see. Surprisingly they are referencing an  EULA which is just generatic to all DTG Games, and says nothing about third party creators. I would not say that there is no problem to sell DLC in not steam market, and the issue was more to be forced to sell them on Steam as well as on other other platforms, and not being able to change price on both.

So the real question is if there will be a market for this and what are the limitations between DTG and PMDG, which will decide on what will come. 

According to Steamspy there are only a bit less than 50 thousands owners, of which only about 2 thousands used it in the last two weeks. 

To compare Flight Simulator X Steam Edition stats shows almost 1 million owners of which about 90 thousands used it in the last two weeks.

A simple way to see clearly that it has not reached it's target, they also made in my opinion some completely dumb decisions in communication. As an example there was this issue with PMDG when robert explained why they were not going there. Instead of clarifying their position, they remained very opaque, and never addressed the issue. They also went as to say that FSUIPC was useless or something like that, which clearly see how much they care about the simulator, as FSUIPC is just a huge bit of programming that allowed so many great things for developers and users alike.

So with this data it's probably not interesting right now to invest in it, as also porbably only a very small part of owners would really be interested in learning those complex aircraft. I think a big part of those are just using it for fun, more than for simulating. But who knows things could change in the future. 

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At the moment most addons that are FSW compatible are not on steam or DTG website.   


 

Raymond Fry.

PMDG_Banner_747_Enthusiast.jpg

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There is very little addons and surely nothing big as PMDG. But for all we know there might be some agreement and that all could come later. I don't see why PMDG would not go there if it was making sense both economically, and in working with DTG. 

But nonetheless I think the platform is just not a success from the numbers of steamspy, it clearly did not catach the attention they expected, and the very bad handling of the third party issue at the early access stage might have played a role in that.

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