Is iniBuilds going all in on MSFS?

[jcomm 5,938]

2 minutes ago, keithb77 said:

Optimistic ... they said on their forum "There is no comments we have on XP12. You are buying an addon for XP11. "

https://forum.inibuilds.com/topic/4658-x-plane-12-upgrade-path/

you're being bad !  🙂

17 minutes ago, abrams_tank said:

Hey jcomm, it's about where the money is for 3rd party developers.  Since this topic is about iniBuilds, I would like to circle back to iniBuilds.  iniBuilds is forecasting that they can make a lot of money in MSFS, so that's why it looks like iniBuilds is increasingly prioritizing MSFS.

I'm sure FSLabs is a very serious developer too. And it didn't look like FSLabs really wanted to jump onto the MSFS bandwagon. But FSLabs had their hands forced, by the market.  These companies, they got to pay their staff, their rent, their bills, food, etc. So they go where the money is.  

iniBuilds is playing it smart.  FSLabs, not so much.

Fully agree !

[abrams_tank 7,419]

11 minutes ago, keithb77 said:

Optimistic ... they said on their forum "There is no comments we have on XP12. You are buying an addon for XP11. "

https://forum.inibuilds.com/topic/4658-x-plane-12-upgrade-path/

If it's relatively easy and fast for iniBuilds to port their products to XP 12, I'm pretty sure they will do it.

I think iniBuilds is saying this as a disclaimer, in case porting to XP 12 is a nightmare and costs them a lot of time.  But if porting their add-ons over is a relatively easy and fast process, I don’t see why they wouldn’t do it.

Edited June 5, 2022 by abrams_tank

[Krakin 5,766]

There seems to be an assumption that Asobo is not working overtime trying to give MSFS the best flight model available.

[keithb77 308]

Quote

If it's relatively easy and fast for iniBuilds to port their products to XP 12, I'm pretty sure they will do it.

Hope they do, I bought the Beluga and the 300 too 😐
Reading Austin's XP12 Flight model article "we’ve overhauled… everything" ... so I'll get the demo and see what works...

Edited June 5, 2022 by keithb77

[jcomm 5,938]

7 minutes ago, Krakin said:

There seems to be an assumption that Asobo is not working overtime trying to give MSFS the best flight model available.

Wrong assumption in as far as I am concerned.

I do believe that ASOBO is not only making a remarkable effort to develop their initial design for a new flight dynamics model for MFS, and in good part they managed to update it a few times already, making it better.

The same applies to Weather modelling. I have posted about how positive the experience with their new thermal radiation model introduced with SU9, and I look fwd for SU10 for some additional features already mentioned in their Q&A sessions.

At the same time though I guess some aspects of the modelling of various types of aircraft, including aircraft with "non-standard" geometries, or propulsion systems, have escaped so far from their base / core FM engine. This doesn't mean that they can't bring it to MFS in the future, just as they intend to do with rotary wings, but so far it's still not easy / realistic to model, for instance, such "basic" stuff as an aircraft with multiple tails, a bi-plane or a tri-plane, or even to properly model the effects of swept back wings like those that are used on most airliners with enough detail. 

In such cases they revert back to the FSX-like aircraft.cfg type parameters, and then we have a mix of that new model that calculates the forces over a matrix of points and of the legacy parametric / table based model that, IMO, is more difficult for developers to deal with.

[MrBitstFlyer 3,875]

1 hour ago, lzamm said:

You, me, and how many others - that's the question.  XP was a niche player in the heyday of FSX and only experienced its current explosion in numbers (and developers) when MS abandoned flight simulation.  While I firmly believe that X-plane is technically a superior product to anything MS has produced to date, I don't think it has the mass appeal that is driving developers to the numbers (and $$$) of MSFS. 

I agree XP12 is not going to have the sales of MSFS, but the XP12 updates so far demonstrated (spectacular to my eyes) should enable some niche study level aircraft to do well.  I would imagine aircraft like the Hotstart will be made compatible quickly.

[himmelhorse 1,276]

3 hours ago, sgreen91 said:

Hotstart has no desire to go to MSFS thank goodness.

Mate,

Without being critical, I have no idea why you would say this, with emphasis on "thank goodness" unless you are thinking that working with more than one platform would somehow degrade what they already deliver.  I look at this from the point, that the more developers who are developing for two or more platforms, are actually good for flightsim consumers and for flight simulation in general.

I am aware that there are politics and economics at play here, and I am a multi platform player (I assume that many of us are) I would love Hotstart and Aerobask to come to MSFS with their quality products for example. The only downside to this for consumers is the inevitable damage to our wallets. 

Long live the great developers regardless of what platforms they support exclusively.

Regards

Tony

[mtaxp 666]

Aside from inibuilds, no other x-plane aircraft developers worth to mention moved to MSFS. In fact most of them already issued statements about x-plane 12. So it seems despite all the speculations, 3rd parties are rather happy, there are about 200 of them in a slack channel with LR testing and working on updates currently.

A crucial thing to note about long term income; It took Hotstart, 2 awesome developers, but only 2, to build from scratch the current benchamrk for home simulation, 3 years.

It took PMDG & Fenix, both rather large teams, almost 2 years to *port* an already well developed for YEARS systems and code.

Take this info and infer what you want.

Edited June 5, 2022 by mtaxp

[Fiorentoni 4,226]

8 minutes ago, mtaxp said:

Aside from inibuilds, no other x-plane aircraft developers worth to mention moved to MSFS. In fact most of them already issued statements about x-plane 12. So it seems despite all the speculations, 3rd parties are rather happy, there are about 200 of them in a slack channel with LR testing and working on updates currently.

A crucial thing to note about long term income; It took Hotstart, 2 awesome developers, but only 2, to build from scratch the current benchamrk for home simulation, 3 years.

It took PMDG & Fenix, both rather large teams, almost 2 years to *port* an already well developed for YEARS systems and code.

Take this info and infer what you want.

I love what Hotstart did, but you are comparing an airliner to a business jet, that's not the same thing, no matter the level of detail. Also Fenix did not really "port" anything, it's not like you can just add a model to ProSim and it's good. Both were hindered by the MSFS development, so it's not attributable to the devs themselves entirely, especially Fenix seem to have the same mindset as the Hotstart devs.

[lwt1971 7,416]

Agreed @abrams_tank, given their recent fire sales on XP products and what they've been saying on their discord, looks like a shift is coming not just in their scenery products but aircrafts as well.  Some of their A310 discord posts I captured in this thread https://www.avsim.com/forums/topic/618710-inibuilds-a310-interesting-tidbit/. The most interesting bit was how they said "Just to be fully clear, our flight model in MSFS is on par to XP, So those still wanting to negate MSFS as a viable sim solution based on those reasons, don't speak too soon", which goes counter to the usual talking points and narratives.. and I think already settled given the barrage of stellar aircrafts released in May for MSFS that show what the platform is capable of in terms of flight models and dynamics above & beyond the default aircrafts.

And about their future commitment to XP, hard to say I guess, but perhaps some clues in this exchange ("MJ" is their lead dev):

MJ — 02/05/2022
Profile mod is how it is int eh aircraft
a lot of the xp stuff that was not done, has been implemented in msfs
We will be making statements on our future plans soon though

NevadaRocks75 — 08/05/2022
So with this statement and the one below that there are no news about XP12 and compatibility the A310/A300 for XP is becoming kind of an abandonware now or how can one understand this?? Just curious

MJ — 08/05/2022
To be fully clear, you bought a product for XP11
XP12 was not on the market whatsoever
We have never sold a product saying XP 12 comparability is to be expected
Just to be fully clear, our flight model in MSFS is on par to XP
So those still wanting to negate MSFS as a viable sim solution based on those reasons - don’t speak too soon.

 

 

[lwt1971 7,416]

3 hours ago, jcomm said:

BUT! when it comes to detailed flight dynamics and ease of systems simulation I think XP12 will still be the preferred platform for any serious developer.

I'll beg to differ on this one... No amount of hand waving and "look at me how I did this so great" statements from Austin is going to convince me that XP 12 is going to be the be-all and end-all when it comes to flight dynamics :).  Asobo is speeding ahead in this area, and currently has some capabilities that's not in XP.  And I don't see them standing still at all. And despite the shills (not you jcomm btw!) who always love to use the MSFS default aircrafts to denigrate the sim's flight dynamics, like I always say it's all about the core aerodynamics and physics engine and how it *enables* aircraft implementations to realistically re-create the flight dynamics.. the "flight model" and flight dynamics ultimately comes down to the aircraft implementation.  And here MSFS is now thriving with various capable and serious devs just getting started in putting out their products for MSFS. That momentum is not going to change and is only going to keep snowballing.

Couple that with a world and weather rendering+simulation environment in MSFS that is miles ahead (and that's still my opinion after having read/seen what XP12 has to offer), then the *overall* experience is very hard to beat.  Of course given my past experience with the likes of XP and P3D, I'll definitely give them a fair look when they come out with their next incarnations, but what I'm seeing so far is not impressing me enough... and I say that as a simmer who only cares to have one flight sim to build around, of course there are many who will continue to use multiple sims.

Edited June 5, 2022 by lwt1971

[DD_Arthur 1,050]

1 hour ago, mtaxp said:

A crucial thing to note about long term income; It took Hotstart, 2 awesome developers, but only 2, to build from scratch the current benchamrk for home simulation, 3 years.

It took PMDG & Fenix, both rather large teams, almost 2 years to *port* an already well developed for YEARS systems and code.

Take this info and infer what you want.

Er....I infer from that info;  two guys just spent three years working their backsides off to make not nearly as much money as they could have building for another sim.

Plus, these two guys are now lumbered with support for their product for an indefinite amount of time whilst sales income tapers off sharply.

Perhaps if they’d made initial development decisions three or four months later - in the light of industry announcements - they could be enjoying sales in the tens of thousands rather than merely thousands.

Such is life.....

[Bobsk8 12,730]

2 hours ago, keithb77 said:

Hope they do, I bought the Beluga and the 300 too 😐
Reading Austin's XP12 Flight model article "we’ve overhauled… everything" ... so I'll get the demo and see what works...

Don't they say that for pretty much every new version of XP that drops?

[BobFS88 635]

1 hour ago, lwt1971 said:

  Asobo is speeding ahead in this area, and currently has some capabilities that's not in XP. 

Are you one of those who are lucky enough to be under a NDA for X Plane in order to know this for a fact? 

And if there are some capabilities that Asobo will have, how do you know if they are needed in X Plane for it to be able to shine based on what we do know. It seems to me that it would be a wait and see. There are still more things that have not been revealed to make such earlier conclusion. And IMO thinks Asobo has already shown its best hand.

[Bobsk8 12,730]

5 minutes ago, BobFS88 said:

Are you one of those who are lucky enough to be under a NDA for X Plane in order to know this for a fact? 

And if there are some capabilities that Asobo will have, how do you know if they are needed in X Plane for it to be able to shine based on what we do know. It seems to me that it would be a wait and see. There are still more things that have not been revealed to make such earlier conclusion. And IMO thinks Asobo has already shown its best hand.

Sorry , but if you look at XP whatever version and then MSFS, it takes about a millisecond to realize where the future is at.