I don't believe this video has been posted before, I thought it is a good video showing off the top players in the sim market today.  While some might argue the order of the number one and two spots, I feel the video does a good job of presenting all the sims discussed.

John

 

Interesting video! Who would have thought only a few years ago when Microsoft ditched FS development, that we would now have so many different platforms to choose from? I personally haven't yet made a final decision on what platform I will run with next (although it is likely to be P3Dv4) but I am waiting to see which ones end up with the best selection of addons from the viewpoint of what I want. It will also be interesting to see if all the new platforms can survive in what must be a limited (albeit large) market.

Bill

15 minutes ago, scianoir said:

Interesting video! Who would have thought only a few years ago when Microsoft ditched FS development, that we would now have so many different platforms to choose from? I personally haven't yet made a final decision on what platform I will run with next (although it is likely to be P3Dv4) but I am waiting to see which ones end up with the best selection of addons from the viewpoint of what I want. It will also be interesting to see if all the new platforms can survive in what must be a limited (albeit large) market.

Bill

Yes, I remember when MS announced the disbanding of the ACES team and that there would be no further development of their flight sim line.  There was much wailing and gnashing of teeth as X-Plane seemed to be the only possible alternative and the future seemed bleak.  X-Plane has now come a long way and Prepar3D has taken the FSX code to where the ACES team probably would have taken it.  Couple that with the still in development Aerofly FS 2 and Flightsim World and the future of flight sims looks pretty bright.

Boy, Shane is cranking out the videos lately...

I haven't flown XPlane in many years as, at the time as a new pilot, I wasn't convinced by their flight model.  (I wasn't convinced about FSX either but, thought it was sufficient.)  From things I've heard, not much has changed.  I do think XPlane has the lighting and reflection advantage as well as some visual effects. 

BTW, one of the things I think is going to give a big advantage to one of these platforms is the ability for ordinary folks to make addons.  FSX had several tools for scenery that you could work with directly in the sim to create scenery (Instant Scenery and Instant Object Studio from Flight 1).  IOS wasn't great but it was good and the only game in town for making custom objects in sim...though, anything complex was sure to create a flashing mess.  They tried to have Instant Scenery in P3D but LM kept changing things and breaking it so it died or, at least, has seriously lagged getting updates.  LM would be wise to help the dev get it back up.  Making stuff in the sim, by itself (like you can in Cities Skylines), is a hoot and so much could be done with countless ultra-crappy looking smaller airports that have zero chance of being created by a professional dev.