45 minutes ago, Oliver Ooi said:

Really speechless. Several months ago, they said they will have bigger update in coming months and this is what we get? We have Microsoft failed us several years ago and now DTG. I wonder which company would like to continue the project? Ubisoft?

A big gaming company could come into the market and trounce everyone. If they don't, it's because they don't see the money in it. 

So what we get is a niche company of people that actually want to use the products they make, Laminar, who take eons to catch up to what ten-year-old software can still do. That or we just get LM propping up the FSX code base with minor improvements like 64 bits, which DTG was also able to do. 

Alas, that's where we are. Laminar seems to be the slow and steady tortoise that's winning the race at this point.

You obviously haven't flown p3d...the improvements by LM are significant, and 64 bit even more so. 

And until Austin acknowledges there are many who fly high fidelity heavies with AI traffic, XP is not there and remains a GA flight sim.

Edited April 24, 20188 yr by Boomer

Even though the ESP engine is older, P3D really has climbed out of many of the limitations of that box. LM have rebuilt it into something that can rise far above those humbler origins.

 

Edited April 24, 20188 yr by SpiritFlyer

3 minutes ago, SpiritFlyer said:

Even though the ESP engine is older, P3D really has climbed out of many of the limitations of that box. LM have rebuilt it into something that can rise far above those humbler origins.

 

And DTG Greedy arrogant business model tried to drag it backwards.

A nice and fairly sober video.

 

6 hours ago, Oliver Ooi said:

I wonder which company would like to continue the project?

None. You'd have to be totally crazy to try that.

6 hours ago, carbonbasedlifeform said:

So what we get is a niche company of people that actually want to use the products they make, Laminar, who take eons to catch up to what ten-year-old software can still do. That or we just get LM propping up the FSX code base with minor improvements like 64 bits, which DTG was also able to do. 

Alas, that's where we are. Laminar seems to be the slow and steady tortoise that's winning the race at this point.

You are forgetting about Aerofly FS 2 which still could become a serious contender. But well, development of that is sim extremely slow, the (core) developers don't really communicate with their customers and apart from Orbx no 3rd party developers seem to be getting on board so well... the future will tell. It does have a lot of potential. I do hope they will make wiser decisions than DTG though: I couldn't care less about the ending of FSW but I seriously would regret it if Aerofly won't make it. Although I am having more and more doubt if they will ever make it. 

 

 

 

6 hours ago, carbonbasedlifeform said:

Yeah, but the thing about P3D is the goal seems to be to just drag an outdated engine into the future with little changes aside from 64 bit.

This is plainly wrong. I've been an active Prepar3d user since 2012 (1.2). While versions 1.X were indeed a mere debugging of the ESP code, the core engine has been quite basically worked on since versions 2.X. This means shifting code processing from the CPU to the GPU, transition from DX9 to DX11, shadow management, volumetric fog, tesselation, better multi-core usage (still not optimum but better) etc. etc. Version 4.x did not only bring 64 bits but better Anti-Aliazing, markably better performance, and more.

I am far from finding Prepar3d4 optimum and I see enough work to be done (an updatable navaids/runway database, better photo scenery handling etc. come to my mind immediately). However, you may have noticed, all attempts to get a new flight sim engine built from scratch to commercialization failed, which certainly isn't a coincidence. X-Plane's base engine is as old as the MSFS engine and even AeroflyFS2 being ths "yougest" among competition is based on the AeroflyFS1 (2012) engine which is based on the engine of the IPACS (decades old) RC sims.

Kind regards, Michael

6 hours ago, Boomer said:

You obviously haven't flown p3d...the improvements by LM are significant, and 64 bit even more so. 

And until Austin acknowledges there are many who fly high fidelity heavies with AI traffic, XP is not there and remains a GA flight sim.

I personally don't see any significant difference between P3D and FSX apart from some lighting improvements and 64-bit. DTG actually achieved a lot in the short time they had, including porting the engine to 64-bit, adding TrueSky, FTX Global, a new UI, etc and the changes were very visible and really cheap. For the amount of years P3D has been out, its improvements are really nothing to shout home about. I'd expect a lot more for the $200 price tag for each version. The default sim is pretty bad and for a professional sim, having things like navdata from 2006 is just unacceptable. Would anyone really use this sim if it wasn't for the former FSX addons that now run on it? FSW was at least usable and enjoyable its default state.

Regarding X-Plane, just like P3D, it's up to the addon developers to create this functionality. The sim itself is more than capable and there are several high quality airliner simulations available to already prove this. X-Plane does have many problems, no doubt about it, but it has a growing userbase making it an attractive platform, and many developers are now making products for it (ORBX, FlyTampa, etc).

 

 

 

Well, if they changed things too much and too fast/often, ppl would moan about it breaking their planes and add-ons.  And it would be a huge pain for everybody.  So I like to enjoy the super nice stuff we have now instead of dreaming of some utopia where everything is "just right".

24 minutes ago, J van E said:

I couldn't care less about the ending of FSW but I seriously would regret it if Aerofly won't make it. Although I am having more and more doubt if they will ever make it. 

Define "make it" :). You are never going to be able to please everyone, and I'd guess the majority of AF2's core users are pretty happy with it. It does what it says on the tin, it's a fast flight simulator you can fire up in a few seconds, with top-notch VR support. If we're talking about a "professional" simulator, whatever that is, then yes it's missing certain things. But perhaps, the typical simmer here isn't their target audience, just like it wasn't for DTG either.

 

So, here go my money and hopes flushed through the toilet. I learn from mistakes the hard way. I don't begrudge the people who allegedly knew from the start and their tad of schadenfreude. But I still can't be "sad" about FSW's demise, I am more angry. They outlined a greater future and then bang! How could I have been so naive with all the bad omen?

Why do they even bother selling it until May 24th? They should end it right here.

1 minute ago, paulopp said:

So, here go my money and hopes flushed through the toilet. I learn from mistakes the hard way

I'm sorry, I don't understand this remark. The sim was really cheap for what it was and you'll still have it and can use it once it is removed from sale. My guess is most of your addons you have in other sims cost more than FSW alone :). 

It's pretty sad that any hope of an improved consumer-based ESP sim has now gone, but also maybe it's a good thing that the ESP engine is left to retire so we can get an improved engine in the future.

 

 

1 minute ago, tonywob said:

I'm sorry, I don't understand this remark. The sim was really cheap for what it was and you'll still have it and can use it once it is removed from sale. My guess is most of your addons you have in other sims cost more than FSW alone :).

 

 

You're right, Tony. Got FSW very cheap, but I also bought literally ALL addons which sums up to a price I would have probably spent better on P3D/XP11. Never again, early-access DLC.

20 minutes ago, pmb said:

This is plainly wrong. I've been an active Prepar3d user since 2012 (1.2). While versions 1.X were indeed a mere debugging of the ESP code, the core engine has been quite basically worked on since versions 2.X. This means shifting code processing from the CPU to the GPU, transition from DX9 to DX11, shadow management, volumetric fog, tesselation, better multi-core usage (still not optimum but better) etc. etc. Version 4.x did not only bring 64 bits but better Anti-Aliazing, markably better performance, and more.

 

I don't meant to knock P3D and given that LM lives on a healthy diet of my U.S. tax dollars I might even buy it some day, but everything you just listed is basically optimization and eye candy. The core technology consisting of flight dynamics, terrain engine, weather, ATC, AI, gauge system, simconnect and so on, are pretty much the same technology as FSX. This is apparent by comparing the respective SDK's. LM has added a few nice things such as LUA and a few new programming interfaces but all the basics look the same to me. I even still find some gMax screenshots in the P3Dv4 docs, LOL. I think this is why many of us don't see much that's ground breaking in P3D. Still I don't doubt that it's a much better implementation than FSX.

Guys, no discussions or debates on the EULA of P3D please.

www.avsim.com/forums/topic/487638-no-discussions-of-prepar3d-academic-or-professional-licenses-allowed/