Hello

I'm intersted in a good airline management addon. I checked the ones out there, and have narrowed it down to FSCaptain and Air Hauler 2. I tried out the demo of FSCaptain, and really liked how busy the cockpit becomes with it. The rating and promotion system is nice, but I find it a bit lacking in the management part, especially with regards to the economic mode. The developers have said they have plans for a FSCompany, but that is still after FSCaptain v2 comes out.

Air Hauler 2 seems really intersting, especially with hiring of AI pilots. Few questions about AH2 :

1. Does is allow flights to be flown in time compression ?

2. Are there other simulated airlines you can compete with ?

3.Does AH2 assign routes to you or do you have to choose routes yourself ?

4.Is there any any restrictions on destinations ? Can I fly in Europe one day and in US the next ?

5.Does it require a NavData update ?

 

Are there any other addons that I missed ? REX is working on SimAir, but that is also due Q3 2018.

Thanks 

9W

You can try FSeconomy, more oriented GA than tubeliner but it definitely worth the try considering it's free...

"Good Airline Management" there's some floating around from monarch and air berlin 

AH2 you have to set your passenger routes and seat prices once set up with AI pilots they will continue to be flown.  You can fly ADHOC passenger and cargo flights yourself at anytime.  I think you may be able to time compress your flights by a small amount but not the AI pilots their route is set.  Your pilots have an eight hour flight window then there must be another crew to take over I believe.  You do not have any restrictions to flight time, but if the plane is rated with two or more people to operate there has to be that many available for that AI flight.  You must pass a rating test to fly any plane you want to fly and the AI pilots will have planes they are rated for.  You will be able to pick your base airport and you can build other bases as money becomes available.  You can import your scenery as well as your own payware and other planes.  The game is at first a more cargo based game because you have to build your reputation up before you can hire AI pilots.  You also need money to by bigger and better planes.   You have expenditures for base lease, plane insurance, plane repair, plane checks, and others.  The game is still being improved on by Slopey the designer and is in early acess, but I think it will be released sooner rather than later.  There is a forum where you can go and Slopey monitors it faithfully.  Over all I think it is a pretty good sim if you like flying alot. Ipersonaly do not have any passenger routes set up I fly mainly GA planes with cargo and passengers around Alaska.

1. Does is allow flights to be flown in time compression ?

Yup. Fast as you like.

2. Are there other simulated airlines you can compete with ?

Online against other users, yes, but not internally with AI airlines. However, you do see your fleet in the sim parked up etc, so if you have other aircraft operating with AI pilots on cargo or scheduled passenger flights, you will see them making those flights in the sim as AI, taxying out, taking off, landing taxying in etc..

3.Does AH2 assign routes to you or do you have to choose routes yourself ?

You can set up your own scheduled passenger routes and pick all the details of them, such as seat pricing, cabin service etc, and then have AI pilots fly them or fly em yourself, or you can choose cargo or ad-hoc passenger charter jobs etc from the ones it geberates automatically. When you fly one of those, it assigns a basic GPS direct route for the flight when you crank up the sim, but you can override that and do a 'proper' route if you like.

4.Is there any any restrictions on destinations ? Can I fly in Europe one day and in US the next ?

You (and other AI pilots) are realistic entities in the world, as are your aeroplanes, so if you leave your AI pilot at Heathrow, he is there next time you fire it up, but you can have him or her travel to a new destination if you like, your AI pilots and aeroplanes would actually have to go to any new destination to operate from there, which they can do via deadheading travel, or as the crew of one of your fleet aeroplanes. You can fly from wherever you like yourself though.

5.Does it require a NavData update ?

Nope.

2 hours ago, MrDirt said:

 The game is at first a more cargo based game because you have to build your reputation up before you can hire AI pilots.  You also need money to by bigger and better planes.  

I dont have many payware aircraft. THe , PMDG 737&777 and the Dash 8 are all I have. How many hours will I have to fly before I can get to one of these ? 

 

1 hour ago, Chock said:

You (and other AI pilots) are realistic entities in the world, as are your aeroplanes, so if you leave your AI pilot at Heathrow, he is there next time you fire it up, but you can have him or her travel to a new destination if you like, your AI pilots and aeroplanes would actually have to go to any new destination to operate from there, which they can do via deadheading travel, or as the crew of one of your fleet aeroplanes. 

So, AI pilots only "work" when AH2 is running? So if the AI pilot and aircraft are at Heathrow when I shut down AH2 at 1700Z today, and have a scheduled flight from EGLL to EGCC at 2000Z, will they still be there when I fire up the software next day ? 

Your AI pilots work even when you don't have Air Hauler 2 fired up, in fact you can leave it for weeks and have them earn you revenue, it updates it all the next time you fire it up with the money you've earned for your airline whilst Air Hauler 2 wasn't actually running.

Below on the screenshot you can see that three of my Citations are currently in flight at the moment, with their AI crews operating them, and they would have been doing this even if I didn't have Air Hauler 2 running. In fact, you can see my AI crews have made a bunch of these scheduled flights earlier today, whilst I was doing my 'proper job' teaching people stuff lol, so I certainly did not have Air Hauler 2 running when that was going on, but when I fired it up, it updated the log to show they had been doing that stuff. so in other words, you don't even have to fly at all with Air Hauler, or have it running, you can just get AI pilots to do it all if you like and leave 'em to it, then crank it up once in a while to do whatever you like.

However, that would be boring not flying yourself as well, so if you had Air Hauler 2 fired up right now, you'd see my ATL-98 on the AH2 radar map flying from Liverpool to Paris with four cargo jobs on board it, with me at the controls along with 26 other pilots also flying in AH2 at the moment as well.

On this screenshot of me doing that, you can see my ATL-98 just about to depart, and if you look behind my aeroplane, there is one of my AI piloted Citation CJ4s behind the helicopters, having just landed and taxied in, it will board some passengers shortly for the next scheduled flight on that list above: