Reflections and questions about AFS2

[HiFlyer 9,358]

5 minutes ago, KBUR said:

Don't understand me wrong guys, cause I support AeroflyFS/IPACS since their first release "aerofly FS" in 2012 (even bought its downgraded Version "aerofly Flug Simulator 2013" from publisher Ikarus), and now its current version AFS 2), BUT :

For me it's about realistic expectations. Often, we seem to be hoping for Microsoft/Lockheed Martin level resources and support from a team small enough to safely hide in a closet! 😃

Instead, I look at what this tiny team has already achieved, including the recent release of the Vulkan update, and I marvel. I wonder how many people honestly grasp the complexity of the task Ipacs has set themselves, and the meagre reward our relatively smallish community are able to offer them in return.

Just the bedrock reality of survival would dictate that their first priority would be servicing the needs to the largest numbers of their users first.

Right now, Steam tracking lists about 200,000 VR users: all potential customers for Aerofly, and right now Ipacs, along with many others has prioritized VR, which may leave less resources for other niches, especially in the case of something like Trackir, where numerous users are reporting no issues.

Priorities.

As for statements on the forum.... I see that as marketing, no different than the marketing of any other company one could name. I'm a bit bemused at objections to a company and product attempting to sell itself. Even more, I don't really see anything particularly wrongheaded with them doing so, especially when they seem to confine it almost exclusively to their own forum and rarely advertise otherwise.

Missions? It would be interesting, but my impression is they have a detailed idea of what they want to do and how they intend to do it, and yes, they share those plans sparingly, likely for the same reason several flightsim companies don't announce until they are ready. Voice after voice asking about the release date until they go insane..... 😲

I want detailed reports as much as anyone. But I also know if I was them, I probably wouldn't give them either. My apparently unusual attitude about things like the upcoming helicopter is that they'll release it when they release it, and I can mess with X-plane and any number of other things while I wait. It's not that serious, simming is not the universe, and I need to do more fishing, anyway.🐟

Drop down menus? Easy to say, much harder possibly to do. Again, we are on the outside looking in, and I suspect for most of us, the only programming we do is setting the time on our various devices. Do we really know what would be involved? Really? Perhaps if you were to ask on the forums, they would actually explain why.....

 For your final point of best simulator on the market, I think that's a goal. Would we rather them say "We intend to just get by as long as we can?" 😃

Somehow I don't think that would be well received.......... Nor do I think that would be true.

[Guest]

4 hours ago, KBUR said:

For some reasons TrackIR is always linked to the aircrafts airbrakes and I couldn't get rid of this bug since I bought this sim on Steam more than one year ago. 

Never ever had this problem... Never heard if it either. I suppose you did reinstall things at one moment in time? Anyway, it must be something on your side.

4 hours ago, KBUR said:

Thereby interesting missions - or at least a mission builder - are so important for the end users not to get bored of the game/sim. 

Yet another personal opinion. I don't care at ALL about missions. I remember playing a mission once in MS Flight but I never did any missions in FSX. P3D, AFS, whatever. I stopped playing missions back in the nineties when I stopped playing fighter sims. Not important at all for this end user. 

4 hours ago, KBUR said:

Why the heck are they not developing a simple drop down menu for straight forward Aiport Selection like in other sims ?

Fully agreed! However, the reason is that (unfortunately imho!!!) IPACS isn't willing to spend time on temporary changes or fixes. We will get a new planner with the upcoming (whenever) ATC and not sooner. I do sort of understand this though... it's the same with for instance the current clouds or visibility option, which both rather sucks also. However, changing that now would take quite some time and it would possibly only be a temporary fix because whenever they start working on a weather engine (if ever) they'd probably have to do all that work all over again. It's a real shame but I do understand IPACS doesn't want to spend precious time on something twice.

4 hours ago, KBUR said:

if you read the quotes from drhotwing1

All marketing yadda yadda... Understandable but quite annoying because IPACS keeps on promising things without delivering the goods, at least not in time... 

6 hours ago, shivers9 said:

you will never win an argument here

It's not about winning. It's all about different wishes, expectations, etc. Would you 'win' the argument if I'd say 'Okay, I also think that a sim in which you can do trans-atlantic flights are the only valid sims' even if I couldn't care less? There also are simmers who do nothing else but fly VFR in a C172, following roads and rivers... AFS2 is GREAT for that but I also couldn't care less about it: THAT would get me bored within 30 minutes surely!

I agree with a lot you and Paul and KBUR and others are saying but not with everything. People often state things too black and white, forgetting all about the thousand shades of grey. There are LOTS of possibilities, expectations, wishes, preferences... people will never ever agree on everything so also not on what would be the best sim ever. It's perfectly okay to see things differently: why start saying the other is wrong because he or she doesn't accept your (perhaps very personal and objective) facts? I actually agree with some of the posted facts but not with all of them. This has nothing to do with defending or winning: we are just TALKING here. No one needs to win or lose. Can we only be friends if we agree on really everything? We are all just trying to entertain ourselves with flight simming. I certainly am not defending AFS2 here or trying to win a war: I am just talking about a hobby I love.

[Murmur 3,941]

11 hours ago, shivers9 said:

2. If you try to defend your position on anything here with facts then you will only be inciting folly from a small number of folks who will never be intimidated or influenced by truths. They never have and they never will.

Maybe you are not aware of the posting history of said individual. He only writes negative posts about a product

.) he admittedly doesn't use

.) he admittedly will not use for a few years (given the assumed mid-term roadmap of AFS2)

.) predicting and even wishing for its failure

.) rejoicing over its eventual failure (as he did with FSW)

And he did all of these even in the FSW forum. That's a far cry from legitimate criticism.

Let's be honest: if he had such a posting history in any other product forum (PMDG? Orbx? Etc.) he would have been banned many posts ago.

 

[shivers9 1,174]

7 minutes ago, Murmur said:

Let's be honest:

We can agree on that. So I have expressed my honest opinion.....your turn....LOL

[torium 207]

On 8/30/2018 at 2:52 AM, pracines said:

I will say it again:

If one can do realistic transoceanic flights in a flight sim, ....

Can you please explain specifically what features are missing in Aerofly FS2 in order for you to carry out "realistic transoceanic flights"?

[torium 207]

The reproduction on the right side has better graphics:

 

Edited August 31, 2018 by torium

[Guest]

1 hour ago, torium said:

The reproduction on the right side has better graphics:

LOL Only because they used a bad camera on the left.😉 I long for the day I will see 'graphics' like on the left in my sim on my PC! Everytime I see (low flying) real world footage I think 'Boy, we still have a looooooong way to go'. What we have now is truly awesome but still so far away from real life. We aren't even close when it comes to the detail on the ground. The overal impression when flying high is pretty nice though...

[torium 207]

On 8/30/2018 at 2:52 AM, pracines said:

I will say it again:

If one can do realistic transoceanic flights in a flight sim,

Can you please explain specifically what features are missing in Aerofly FS2 in order for you to carry out "realistic transoceanic flights"?

It guessing that it was not so easy to answer that question. 

Sérgio Costa (helisimmer.com) writes in his review, quote: - "Yes, you could potentially fly the world in it, cross the US from LA to Miami or do a trans-oceanic flight all the way to beautiful Innsbruck, but the sim simply doesn’t offer a full world scenery right now."

https://www.helisimmer.com/reviews/orbx-trueearth-netherlands-ipacs-aerofly-fs2/