How Much Would You Pay For Sloped Runways

[ukplane1 37]

Hello, i've made progressive talks with scenery developers albeit smaller ones - nevertheless it's a start. The general notion was about adding sloped runways to  airport sceneries. Just over half had the technology to implement this feature into their airport projects and of that half some even had the technology to allow a/i traffic to still use the runway. Most of the developers were of the opinion that atleast 75% of their customers used online networks such as IVAO,Pilot edge and VATSIM which would result in the likeliness of no a/i traffic being used. Sloped runways compatible with a/i traffic was deemed as obsolete considering most of their customers used online networks. The overall consensus was sloped runways would be considered more seriously in current and future projects.

The subject of sloped taxiways was dismissed after a cost benefit analysis

 

Of Course not all runways have sloped runways or are pronounced enough to be considered in an airport scenery

 

Sloped runways would be able to be toggled on and off via control panel i believe.

 

Thank you for participating in the poll and perhaps there could be some interesting airports with sloped runways coming to P3D V4 before (23 x 2 divided by 5.4 )   Month.

[Japo32 52]

Good this iniciative. Would be good to see sloped runways at last in P3D. I hoped to see that feature in all airports in P3Dv4 finally, but still nothing. 

Don't want to introduce the debate into which is better or not. I think both are complementary, but Xplane do have sloped runaways since long time, and all the airports inside are with sloped runways. You just have to define the width, long and direction, and it will adapt to the shape of the landscape where it is the runway. That way in can be the same runway up and down several times (waves).

For that reason I wouldn't pay anything for that feature, because I think is on Lockeed part, to implement that feature in future v4.x. But I think they won't because I cannot imagine the mess it can produce to all airport developers to modify everything of their airports. The dirty textures, or any texture goes as planar decals on top of the runways... so I cannot imagine what they would need in time to redo everything.

But good iniciative anyway.

[Sethos 4,335]

Not sure I'd pay extra for it but I would love the feature, with the stipulation that it's an optional feature via whatever configuration utility they use, so it can still be flattened and used with AI traffic. 

[MatthewS 761]

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Sloped runways are nice idea, but in XP10 I noticed that with the generic airports the runways are not very smoothly sloped and rather bumpy, presumably because the mesh under the runway is not high enough in resolution.  It would be nice if XP applied better smoothing to the runway, to accommodate the low mesh resolution. 

I guess though if an airport is being custom built the devs would use a much higher mesh resolution under the runway and airport and better smooth the runway.

But still, it would be nice if P3D had the option to enable sloped runways for generic airports.

Oh how I wish P3D v4 had night lighting like XP, those XP11 airports really seem stand out!  Who knows maybe with the new lighting in P3D v4 we will start to something similar?

<incoherentWaffleMode=0>

 

[Skywolf 992]

Make some interesting ones as normal priced and then get users addicted to it and then you can charge it nicely for other airports etc

Similar strategies are used in other industries like "the Gillette model" or insert other unique biz models.

[Litmoose 90]

If its now possible to create slopped run ways accurately i don't think any extra charge should be expected. Its just making use of the tools available. Does that mean they should start charging extra for adding dynamic lighting etc? We already pay a lot for sceneries to be honest 

[signmanbob 592]

If someone made a utility that put accurately slopping runways on existing airports, I would buy that right away.

[qqwertz 781]

Depends on how this is done. For instance, I don't like the way ORBX implemented sloped runways since it interferes with a lot of my addon programs (AI, ATC, taxi to gate, ..). I usually disable ORBX sloped runways. If done properly, that would definitely make me more interested in an airport as long as the sloping is significant.

Peter

[pracines 823]

I think we are going to have to wait for an "all new" version of P3D for this to be successful. The AI is a factor first off, and if the sim is going to have slopped runways it may as well have correct and smooth elevation throughout. Along with the smooth correct elevation, we sure could use an atmosphere that acts like an atmosphere.

To have just airports with slopped runways is too much of a "Band-Aid" approach especially when we already pay for world wide terrain, and then "flatten" the airports just to make the terrain products functional in our current situation. Just take out the flattening.

I would hate to end up with a slip shod outcome like many airports in XP11 ( just test out KCRW to see what I mean). 

 

[Jiri Kocman 20]

If developer wants, it make it. I do not care about that feature, especially when I have to pay extra.

[Manny 1,293]

The Aerosoft's LA City with Catalina sloped runway is awesome (Catalina is available as freeware).. I love Courchevel  and Lukla.. All three are my fav airports on the account of sloped runways. And how could I forget Aerosofts another freeware (gosh Wusserkupe in Germany). I'd pay extra for sloped runway for sure.

[fluffyflops 1,858]

The developers always seem to rehash the same airports anyways.  If Barcelona had a sloped runway you'd be onto a winner.  Alas not much money to be made by making Teesside international 4 times over

[Nemo 1,305]

I would pay nothing as long as ai aircraft is not able to use them.Though, I know this is by design (FSX&P3D)

[Wobbie 938]

We already have it in FS2004! Sloping runways as well as ramps on aircraft carriers & on the ground! Quite fun driving down a ramp.! 

All for free!

Not available for P3D? Seriously?

[ErichB 3,642]

1 hour ago, Nemo said:

I would pay nothing as long as ai aircraft is not able to use them.Though, I know this is by design (FSX&P3D)

It's not just AI aircraft which are the problem.  If you are flying on VATSIM and your fellow aviators don't have the same sloped runway airport, their aircraft altitude data points will be different, so their aircraft will be either floating above or sinking into the runway.   This would have to be a holistic approach for an effective implementation.  Sloped runways would be cool and all 'wowwee' until the novelty wears off and you become frustrated with VATSIM aircraft all at different elevation points.  What would be cool is if the sim was able to identify the user's installed airport elevation points and correct the VATSIM AI traffic accordingly

So my question is, what has Xplane done differently to ensure AI are able to use sloped runways?