What the heck was going on in Alpha/Beta?

[HiFlyer 9,360]

2 hours ago, Dominique_K said:

Playing the old wise man contemplating the foolish world below him, hey ? So easy and also so self-gratifying... 

But there is so much to contemplate! 😲

Considering our apparent age demographic, all this running in circles, impugning the testers, taking the habitual swipes at the knuckle dragging and surely undeserving gamers, not to mention the people at MS/Asobo who have put in so much work and stunning amounts of cash, not to mention years of their lives for this effort, only to have people howling to the skies within the first day, before they can even get to the promised and inevitable patches (much less anything else) seems absolutely foolish, most especially when people could have the sim to test for about a dollar from game-pass and then calmly enumerate the issues and discuss, instead of what we seem to do

Every

Single

Time.

Wise old man? I don't know about all that, but nobody needs to be all that wise to do better than this.

Edited August 19, 2020 by HiFlyer

[OzWhitey 3,353]

6 hours ago, Mark_A said:

Im sure nobody will be going back to P3D or X-Plane which says it all.

Yes, I’m 100% sure nobody wants to fly in VR, or with airliners that work, or go to Stuttgart, or fly military planes, or use a GTN750, or get more than 30 FPS, or use a proper 3-screen setup, or even fly a GA plane that has no wish to kill them when the autopilot is switched on...

Edited August 19, 2020 by OzWhitey

[virtualstuff 758]

4 hours ago, G-RFRY said:

As an Alpha like a lot of other was amazed when the release date was announced and we could still see issues. 

Yes that was a fun surprise 🙃

[flycln 435]

2 hours ago, F737NG said:

The hype was at levels where the RTM version could only disappoint a large number of people and yet even when subtly trying to tell non-testers that there were significant problems still unresolved at a late stage, testers were slapped down by overexcited fans and even by a number of vocal testers telling us, even 'guaranteeing' that the release candidate would be better - well, it isn't.

This drove me nuts. 😛

Countless times I’ve tried to tell those testers that there will be NO miracle patch on release day. There was never some secret build that had all those old bugs fixed. That is just not how software development and testing works. It was perfectly clear that the state the alpha/beta was in would be very close to the eventual release version. 

But of course you kept seeing those insane “OMG shut up, it’s a beta, don’t you know what that means? Stop complaining about bugs!” people. 
 

When those of us who have done testing or even developing before knew exactly that there would be no miracle patch. 
 

Guess what, if they’d fixed all those bugs behind the scenes, the would have pushed them live for us to test them... 

 

And oh man, the forum hype here on avsim, driven by people who had seen the promotional videos and images... there was just no telling them that the default airliners won’t be super advanced. Or heck, that even the systems they do have... simply don’t work reliably. 
 

The PR machine worked perfectly, also driven by streamers who stood to gain financially from being very close to Asobo which made sure they got to exclusively show stuff early and gain subs and donations. 
 

But in the end, as you said, it was impossible for the release version to live up to those standards. And I feel like a little less hype would have actually helped avoid the disappointment and backlash.  
 

I really want MSFS to succeed because there’s so much potential. But I laughed whenever I saw somebody say they’re ready to uninstall P3D or XP11 the moment this gets released. 
 

I love flying around in a GA plane in areas those other sims had terrible scenery for but I simply can’t drop the other sims until more advanced planes are out for MSFS. And we can expect those in 2021. 

Edited August 19, 2020 by flycln

[ryanbatc 12,857]

5 hours ago, Der Zeitgeist said:

 

Apart from that, me and many other testers said it for weeks:

• Realistic expectations

THIS!  All everyone knew for the last decade was PAYWARE addons (or a rarity of incredible freeware addons).  So naturally when a brand new sim comes out they expected the DEFAULT aircraft to function on a payware level.  I truly believe many users (even here with experience!) expected functional FMS, loading of procedures etc, perfect flight dynamics....

We couldn't tell you people about the bugs but even though we were super excited we tried to remind people about the "default" state of aircraft.  A lot of the default aircraft are still really nice!  Try the Savage Cub!  Try the Longitude!  It's probably the best GA/mini airliner type there is.  I flew the Savage cub before release all over Idaho and northern California on multiplayer....it is was incredible.  I will NEVER go back to P3D....  I am using XP11 however, but even that will diminish.  Give this sim a chance!  Remember FSX on release day anyone?  Hardware DISASTER....tons of bugs!  It didn't get great until SP2/Acceleration, AND a multitude of 3rd party devs.

Yes there are bugs in this sim...some pretty annoying ones too.  But it is what it is.  I believe many will be squished soon!

[Adrian123 1,015]

Like the US response to a pandemic by MS. "It is what it is"

[MattNischan 3,778]

19 minutes ago, Dominique_K said:

MS started in June of 2019 a never seen before PR campaign  culminating on Youtube, which raised expectations to a white hot level and it is normal that we, the users, take them to their word.  They actually did deliver a lot on August, 18th but certainly not up to what was expected through their campaign. 

I think a lot of people read way, way into the words that were said. If you look at each Feature Series video, aside from talking about wanting to make aircraft study level, they've basically hit every single thing they claimed to hit. I've been simming since FS 4. I love X-Plane. The sims that are out there are wonderful works of engineering and ingenuity. But the expectations for this I think just hit a level where everyone filled in their own personal pet wants in between what Asobo was actually saying.

"You'll be able to fly over your house." Yeah but my specific house in a rural area with no photogrammetry is too tall and doesn't show my pool, so VFR is unusable.

"All the clouds are real volumes that you can fly through." Yeah but they're not extra sharp when I'm right next to them so they're completely unrealistic and ActiveSky is better.

"The flight model is completely reworked." Yeah but I need 3% more power on this default aircraft at one specific flight envelope than I would in a very specific real aircraft, so the flight model is clearly created by amateurs.

"We have 36K airports." Yeah but my pet airport should have a new FBO and still has the old one in the sim, the building AI is terrible.

Let me tell you a story from alpha testing. This is probably technically against NDA but there's nothing really about the test process experience in here.

I had been hopping around the US, doing various short 1 hour-ish GA flights with POH in hand using different aircraft, checking perf numbers as I went. Almost all the GA stuff, especially the piston singles, are within low single digits of published perf numbers, but occasionally I'd find some off stuff, usually with engine numbers as I think that's where the models are still pretty much the ESP models. But, I'm hopping, hopping, made it all the way from Chicago, hopped my way to Atlanta, then down to Pensacola, over to New Orleans, up the Gulf coast then into San Antonio, where my wife lived for many years.

They're at work, and I'm tooling around on my lunch, and my wife asks if the high school they went to is in the sim. I say, I'm not sure, it's possible, where is it and I'll take a look? So, I found it on Maps and said to myself, OK, well, I'm going to be taking off from Stinson, so I'll fly north, pickup the highway, look for the Tower of the Americas, follow the highway as it curves, look for the diagonal street that starts at a golf course, and then follow that street about halfway and see if I can spot the school.

So, I load up the DA40 and decide to do a little POH testing while I sightsee. Power up and start works perfectly via the POH checklist, switches in the right spots, even the "Glow On" indicator comes on in the PFD for a couple seconds while the glow plugs light up (the NG is a diesel), just like the book said it would. Try the automated ECU engine test, that's INOP. OK, no biggie, I kinda expected that, that's a super complex test system. But I'll toss in a Zendesk report nonetheless. I taxi out (taxi power looks pretty reasonable, maybe a touch high) and take off, flaps to T/O. Need rudder to counteract torque, that's good. Check the book for takeoff speeds, nose starts to get light around 10 knots before, really neat. Liftoff within a couple knots of published, pitch up to 72kts, trim, check vertical speed. Just a tiny bit under the book, very cool.

At around 900 ft above, pull up the flaps, pitch to 88kts for best climb, check the vertical speed again, should go up about 100-150 per the book. Yep, almost right on the money. Could maybe use a touch more power, I think. I start my turn north towards San Antonio proper and begin my search for the dome and the Tower of the Americas. I get oriented, level off, trim, power at 92% per the book, check speeds as I cruise towards downtown. Very close, but also it's word not allowed hot out. Get some buffets as I start to hit more buildings underneath instead of just desert. I pick up the highway, follow it north and then west around the bend, spot the freaking golf course, see the diagonal road, then follow it up until I spot the high school, plain as day. I swing one wing low to point at the high school as a ground reference, do a turn or two around the school as I snap a couple shots for my wife. I was hooked.

Never in my simming days have I gotten the same sense of childlike wonderment that I've had actually flying for real as I did on that alpha test flight. The whole feel of that flight was by far the most complete flight-like experience of my simming "career". I get that simmers are, by and large, computer people. They like systems, they like complexity. And that's totally valid. But holy hell, sometimes just flying a darn plane, no DME arc IFR ILS approaches, just getting into the skies and doing some honest to goodness flying, is just out of this world. And that's a first for me, in the sim world. And, it's clear that was Asobo's focus first: how does flying feel? How can we recreate that feeling of wonder from being up in the air?

Underbaked, probably a little. Amazing, absolutely.

[OzWhitey 3,353]

Flight model can be pretty weird, though. It’s not some “3% in specific circumstances” thing. Someone with 3000 hours in the Grand Caravan posted the real versus sim numbers yesterday, it was not remotely close, way worse than any other sim.

I’ve had multiple episodes in GA aircraft where the plane struggled to remain airborne, even with full power and optimum configuration.

I have an open mind on this, but the flight model in the release version seems pretty dubious, not withstanding the fact that it’s more fluid than FSX.

[Dominique_K 10,149]

20 minutes ago, MattNischan said:

 

Never in my simming days have I gotten the same sense of childlike wonderment that I've had actually flying for real as I did on that alpha test flight.

Underbaked, probably a little. Amazing, absolutely.

Thanks for your post, Matt. Loved your sense of awe. We need more of them instead of those demeaning fellow avsimers.
 

Edited August 19, 2020 by Dominique_K

[aleex 551]

7 hours ago, Mark_A said:

Just fly the sim - it’s great.

Im sure nobody will be going back to P3D or X-Plane which says it all.

I really doubt that. 

[MattNischan 3,778]

9 minutes ago, OzWhitey said:

I have an open mind on this, but the flight model in the release version seems pretty dubious, not withstanding the fact that it’s more fluid than FSX.

The flight model itself is pretty fantastic. Each individual plane is hit or miss based on the input parameters to the model in the aircraft files.

I haven't tried every single one. Some aren't as good, certainly, as my one DA40 experience. But some are really that good. The Robin, the DA62, the 152 and 172, those are all pretty close to the books for sure. King Air, Caravan, not quite as good. The TBM is close to the books in some areas, and not very close in other areas (the turbine model is clearly not changed from ESP at all). It all really depends. But the flight model itself is going to give 3rd parties a lot of great flight dynamics to work with.

[G-RFRY 1,712]

Well it`s out now time will tell how they fix the issues, to me it`s a VFR sim more akin to XPlane.

[OzWhitey 3,353]

1 minute ago, MattNischan said:

The flight model itself is pretty fantastic. Each individual plane is hit or miss based on the input parameters to the model in the aircraft files.

I haven't tried every single one. Some aren't as good, certainly, as my one DA40 experience. But some are really that good. The Robin, the DA62, the 152 and 172, those are all pretty close to the books for sure. King Air, Caravan, not quite as good. The TBM is close to the books in some areas, and not very close in other areas (the turbine model is clearly not changed from ESP at all). It all really depends. But the flight model itself is going to give 3rd parties a lot of great flight dynamics to work with.

Maybe it will, maybe it won’t, The flight model has been marketed well - “1400 surfaces etc ect” - be we have no idea what 3rd party aircraft will be like. 
 

As for the default planes, the more feedback we have from pilots with experience on type, the better.

[Lenny777 299]

11 hours ago, norman_99 said:

I understand, but the issues I raised are not bugs/glitches. They are completely illogical design decisions, and completely inaccurate simulation physics. Not a bug like a switch working backwards, of some scenery item flickering. This is the core of the software, and it’s simply not up to scratch.

Then switch to the old flight physics as you are aware that option is actually given to you? In the meantime report your findings but stop making ridiculous hyperbolic statements like in your original statement about the Alpha/Beta testing which is an insult to many experienced people who had participated. Your original post might have had an ounce of credibility if you had stayed aware from this ridiculous hyperbole.

[MattNischan 3,778]

Just now, OzWhitey said:

Maybe it will, maybe it won’t, The flight model has been marketed well - “1400 surfaces etc ect” - be we have no idea what 3rd party aircraft will be like. 
 

As for the default planes, the more feedback we have from pilots with experience on type, the better.

Well, I say that having looked pretty extensively over the past 24 hours at the SDK and flight dynamics editing process. It's as advertised.

Agreed that we need more feedback with pilots who have type experience. Plenty in the testing process with experience on the smaller GA types (I expect that's why they're closer to the books), not as many with experience on the expensive stuff. It's hard to find pilots who have those planes and the time on a good day and we're in the middle of a pandemic with GA way way down, to boot, so I imagine it's been a challenge.