PMDG delays P3D updates

[DrumsArt 270]

42 minutes ago, Rob_Ainscough said:

No, not like UE5 both from end user perspective and developer perspective. 

But agree UE5 probably wasn't the reason to rush to market ... in fact, I still don't understand MS reason to rush to market?  Do you?  Release wasn't close to Holiday season and SDK wasn't ready and many of us in the first Beta program had reported a long list of bugs that didn't get addressed before release ... not like Microsoft needed the money.

Cheers, Rob.

One reason could be the covid-related containment/lockdown/confinement? I always thought it was the perfect time...

Richard.

Edited December 19, 2021 by DrumsArt

[Dreamflight767 312]

I'm not a computer expert by any means.  So, as a consumer, I find this whole thing very confusing. 

On one hand you have some developers who are saying P3D is old tech. w/ limitations, it's better/easier to develop for MSFS, and sales are dead for P3D so they are moving onto MSFS.  OK.  Fine.  Great.

But then you read from other developers that say MSFS can't support what they need/want so their products aren't going to come online anytime soon.

Then theirs PMDG who can't seem to get their word not allowed together at all says they aren't doing anything for P3D but MSFS is a pain in the @$$ and has lots of bugs.  So I have no idea what to think of them.

So, which IS IT!?

Regardless, why I don't expect a new airplane in P3D from PMDG, I would like to see the 777 get some attention.  Especially since it's fairly new to P3D and the inside is dated.  Slowly, they are reminding me of Aerosoft (CRJ and A330)  and CS (757/767) with empty promises, unable to commit.

Lastly, even if the NGXu is released for MSFS, I'm not sure I'll transition.  Why buy a new sim for airplanes that are just aging out of service?  I'd like to see some NEO Airbuses, the MAX, A350, A220, 777X, and biz jets.  That's what needs to start rolling out for MSFS - especially since it's been on the market for over a year.

Edited December 19, 2021 by Dreamflight767

[Christopher Low 5,332]

I keep seeing these comments about the 777 VC looking "dated". Maybe it's because I run P3D @ 1080p resolution rather than 4K, but the 2048 VC textures in the 777 looked perfectly fine to me when I had the plane installed six months ago.

Edited December 19, 2021 by Christopher Low

[d.tsakiris 417]

6 hours ago, Dreamflight767 said:

On one hand you have some developers who are saying P3D is old tech. w/ limitations, it's better/easier to develop for MSFS, and sales are dead for P3D so they are moving onto MSFS.  OK.  Fine.  Great.

But then you read from other developers that say MSFS can't support what they need/want so their products aren't going to come online anytime soon.

It seems to strongly depend on WHAT they are developing. Is it scenery? Here MSFS seems to be easier to develop for. Airplanes and other add-ons? Not so much. But I'm not a developer, it's just my impression from what I read.

[Fiorentoni 4,137]

5 minutes ago, d.tsakiris said:

It seems to strongly depend on WHAT they are developing. Is it scenery? Here MSFS seems to be easier to develop for. Airplanes and other add-ons? Not so much. But I'm not a developer, it's just my impression from what I read.

Yes scenery creation is much easier on MSFS and the default stuff already looks great, even if you don't know what you are doing. For complex aircraft it's the complete opposite.
You can clearly see where Asobo's priority was and is: Visuals.

[abrams_tank 7,393]

7 hours ago, Dreamflight767 said:

I'm not a computer expert by any means.  So, as a consumer, I find this whole thing very confusing. 

On one hand you have some developers who are saying P3D is old tech. w/ limitations, it's better/easier to develop for MSFS, and sales are dead for P3D so they are moving onto MSFS.  OK.  Fine.  Great.

But then you read from other developers that say MSFS can't support what they need/want so their products aren't going to come online anytime soon.

Then theirs PMDG who can't seem to get their word not allowed together at all says they aren't doing anything for P3D but MSFS is a pain in the @$$ and has lots of bugs.  So I have no idea what to think of them.

So, which IS IT!?

I think you need to get your information from outside this forum for MSFS. Maybe go to the MSFS forum here in Avsim and ask your questions, or ask them at the official MSFS forums.  No offense, but some of the information about MSFS in this P3D forum is not always accurate (but then again, it's a forum for mostly P3D users so this is not surprising).

So for anything involving the systems, if the developer is willing to emulate the systems in an external process outside the MSFS SDK, they can do almost anything regarding the systems.  This is what the Fenix team is doing, by running ProSim in an external process for their Fenix A320.  Compared to the PMDG 737, the Fenix A320 relies much less on the MSFS SDK. Because Fenix does it this way, when SU5 came out, Fenix reported that SU5 had little impact on the Fenix A320, while SU5 broke many planes for other 3rd party devs that were more tightly integrated to the MSFS SDK.  Similarly for the SU7 release, once again, Fenix is reporting SU7 didn't impact them much and their productivity is still high working on the Fenix A320 (I believe SU7 did impact PMDG though and caused problems for them).  Mind you, Fenix still uses the MSFS SDK, but they are not as tightly coupled to it compared to say, PMDG and other 3rd party devs.

So what's the catch if a 3rd party dev uses Fenix's architecture?  Because Fenix is running ProSim in an external process, they cannot release the Fenix A320 for X-Box. I assume this is because of X-Box's sandbox, or other restrictions on the X-Box. PMDG and other 3rd party devs do want to release their planes on X-Box for the extra revenue (yes, the DC6 ran into some "show stopping" problems on its X-Box release, but in the long run, when these problems are resolved for the X-Box, the X-Box provides extra revenue for 3rd party plane developers).

PMDG on the other hand, are more tightly coupled and rely on the MSFS SDK more than Fenix, because PMDG do want to release their planes on X-Box.  So the MSFS SDK will have to become more advanced to support all the features that PMDG wants, but because PMDG is a first class partner for Microsoft/Asobo, it's likely that PMDG will get what they want but it will just take time. 

One thing that the MSFS SDK is missing at this moment for the C++ level is enough functionality for the weather radar.  I believe that if developers opt to go the Javascript/HTML route with the MSFS SDK, they can implement a weather radar but this isn't possible if they go the C++ route with the MSFS SDK.  For the terrain radar, Aamir from Fenix said "we will have a Terrain on ND functionality - using the correct terrain DB method." 

TLDR: Don't get your MSFS information here in the P3D forum, it's sometimes inaccurate.  Almost anything can be done with the systems emulation in MSFS if run from an external process like Fenix, with the drawback that such an architecture will only work on PC and not X-Box.

Edited December 19, 2021 by abrams_tank

[micstatic 4,314]

This is a good explanation @abrams_tank

i want to share your optimism.  But It’s been over two years since I was notified I was accepted as an alpha tester. Yet I still can’t fly high quality airliners in the sim. I guess I’m just more pessimistic at this point than you are. 

[kevinfirth 1,392]

7 minutes ago, micstatic said:

This is a good explanation @abrams_tank

i want to share your optimism.  But It’s been over two years since I was notified I was accepted as an alpha tester. Yet I still can’t fly high quality airliners in the sim. I guess I’m just more pessimistic at this point than you are. 

I’m sure it will happen, just not quite as fast as some would like.  It may even come in stages, but for me, until the whole package (GSX, full systems etc) are available reliably, the visuals alone don’t persuade me personally to drop P3D.

[psolk 3,037]

10 minutes ago, micstatic said:

This is a good explanation @abrams_tank

i want to share your optimism.  But It’s been over two years since I was notified I was accepted as an alpha tester. Yet I still can’t fly high quality airliners in the sim. I guess I’m just more pessimistic at this point than you are. 

And it has been GA for what 16 months, how many high quality airliner add-ons did you have in P3D 16 months after V1 was released?  Perhaps your pessimism is in your expectations...  

[micstatic 4,314]

3 minutes ago, psolk said:

And it has been GA for what 16 months, how many high quality airliner add-ons did you have in P3D 16 months after V1 was released?  Perhaps your pessimism is in your expectations...  

I wasn’t an early adopter of p3d. But yes I don’t think msfs walks on water like many around here do. Atleast for the kind of flying I’m into to 

[F737MAX 5,542]

An aspect that isn't discussed much is (IMO) how reliant PMDG is on being the first developer to get a popular airliner out to market first. If Fenix releases their A320 ahead of PMDG's 737, that takes a chunk out of the payware airliner add-on market. If another developer releases a quality Boeing ahead of them (unlikely), then PMDG would be in real trouble.

I don't think the add-on market for MSFS is anywhere near as wide as P3D. Again IMO, just two or three airliners are going to sell extremely well, the rest will be bought by the usual small niche of hard-core simmers and a few casually interested types.

The FBW A320 project is to MSFS what Zibo 737 is to XP, there will have to be a compelling reason for the masses to splash the cash on what they'll see as an 'expensive' expansion/mod over what they already can get for free.

[psolk 3,037]

28 minutes ago, micstatic said:

I wasn’t an early adopter of p3d. But yes I don’t think msfs walks on water like many around here do. Atleast for the kind of flying I’m into to 

Well at 16 months into P3D you wouldn't have been flying your FSL, PMDG's, QW's either so it's not so much thinking "it walks on water" as not being overtly negative due to improper expectations.  

 

[d.tsakiris 417]

The time frame is the point. What a lot of people seem to be forgetting when they say "study level airplanes will come to MSFS" is a) how long that might take and b) the development that goes into P3D in that same time frame. MSFS & add-ons are progressing, but so is P3D.

So, either you compare both products in their current states, or what they - both of them - will be like one or two years in the future. But not MSFS in a year with PMDG aircraft and P3D at it's current state. A lot of people seem to be doing that.

[G-YMML1 582]

2 hours ago, psolk said:

Well at 16 months into P3D you wouldn't have been flying your FSL, PMDG's, QW's either so it's not so much thinking "it walks on water" as not being overtly negative due to improper expectations.  

 

 Very true. The 1st edition was issued in 2010 and it took 5 (five) years to make more or less stable version 3.X....Hence, see you all in 2025 in MSFS!

[micstatic 4,314]

i truly appreciate that the asobo team approached this simulator with a fresh perspective.  That's a good thing not a bad thing.  But sometimes I wonder if any of them were actually hardcore flight sim people.  The things that appear to not be thought of or just bypassed I can't see somebody who has been in this hobby for a long time doing.  But I give them the benefit of the doubt.  I'm sure they had their reasons.