I think it makes sense for LM to break-free from the shackles of ESP. Some interim releases using the old engine might still be doable, but the long-term vision should target something revolutionary like incorporating Unreal Engine 5.

Edited November 29, 20223 yr by GCBraun

I hope my slightly oldish computer will be able to run a P3D v6.

2 hours ago, Benbo said:

I wonder if the devs who abandoned us and P3D will crawl back out of the woodwork,well if they do,me for sure wont be purchasing anything off them again.

They will be crawling out of the woodwork with a new influx of revenue they would have never seen had they not made that move giving them more freedom to come back to V6 opposed to making no revenue for the past 2 1/2 years and no longer existing...  That abandonment of P3D and migration to MSFS provided massive revenue influxes for a lot of these developers who otherwise may not have been able to sustain...  

12 minutes ago, Joseph29 said:

I hope my slightly oldish computer will be able to run a P3D v6.

System Requirements for Running and Developing with Unreal Engine 5

Unreal Engine 5 is highly anticipated by game developers like yourself, but is your current PC setup compatible with the latest Unreal Engine system requirements?

Unreal Engine renders graphics at high quality, so it is best to run the program on mid-range to premium computers or laptops.

Recommended Hardware

Minimum Requirements	Windows	Mac OS X	Linux
Operating System	Windows 10 64-bit	Latest MacOS Monterey	Ubuntu 20.04
Processor (CPU)	Quad-core Intel or AMD, 2.5 GHz or faster	Quad-core Intel, 2.5 GHz or faster	Quad-core Intel or AMD, 2.5 GHz or faster
Memory	8 GB RAM	8 GB RAM	32 GB RAM
Graphics/Video Card (GPU)	DirectX 11 or 12 Compatible Graphics Card	Metal 1.2. Compatible Graphics Card	NVIDIA GeForce 960 GTX or Higher with the latest NVIDIA drivers
Video RAM	-	-	8 GB or more
RHI Version	· DirectX 11: Latest drivers · DirectX 12: Latest drivers · Vulkan: AMD (21.11.3+) and NVIDIA (496.76+)	-	· DirectX 11: Latest drivers · Vulkan: AMD (21.11.3+) and NVIDIA (496.76)

Unreal Engine 5 consumes a certain percentage of memory, so ensure that you have enough storage (we recommend SSD - solid state drive type ) before proceeding to install the engine. It’s also worth noting that certain rendering functions have more demanding requirements than the recommended specs.

Unreal Engine 5 Feature Requirements

Unreal Engine 5 Feature	System Requirements (Windows only)
Lumen Global Illumination and Reflections	Hardware Ray Tracing: · Windows 10 with DirectX 12 support · NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 series video card or higher, AMD Radeon RX-6000 series or higher Software Ray Tracing: · DirectX 11 video card, support for Shader Model 5
Nanite Virtualized Geometry	· Windows 10 with support for DirectX 12 Agility SDK · DirectX 12 or Vulkan
Virtual Shadow Maps	· Windows 10 with support for DirectX 12 Agility SDK · DirectX 12 or Vulkan · Latest Graphics Drivers
Temporal Super Resolution	Runs on any video card with Shader Model 5 support, however, performance may be constrained

Don’t know where to download Unreal editor and UE5? Visit the official Unreal Engine download page and follow the instructions to set up your game development journey with Unreal Engine.

Basically you need a gfx card that supports DirectX 12 to get the good stuff like Nanite and Lumen.

RTX20xx ->

26 minutes ago, espent said:

System Requirements for Running and Developing with Unreal Engine 5

Unreal Engine 5 is highly anticipated by game developers like yourself, but is your current PC setup compatible with the latest Unreal Engine system requirements?

Unreal Engine renders graphics at high quality, so it is best to run the program on mid-range to premium computers or laptops.

Recommended Hardware

Minimum Requirements	Windows	Mac OS X	Linux
Operating System	Windows 10 64-bit	Latest MacOS Monterey	Ubuntu 20.04
Processor (CPU)	Quad-core Intel or AMD, 2.5 GHz or faster	Quad-core Intel, 2.5 GHz or faster	Quad-core Intel or AMD, 2.5 GHz or faster
Memory	8 GB RAM	8 GB RAM	32 GB RAM
Graphics/Video Card (GPU)	DirectX 11 or 12 Compatible Graphics Card	Metal 1.2. Compatible Graphics Card	NVIDIA GeForce 960 GTX or Higher with the latest NVIDIA drivers
Video RAM	-	-	8 GB or more
RHI Version	· DirectX 11: Latest drivers · DirectX 12: Latest drivers · Vulkan: AMD (21.11.3+) and NVIDIA (496.76+)	-	· DirectX 11: Latest drivers · Vulkan: AMD (21.11.3+) and NVIDIA (496.76)

Unreal Engine 5 consumes a certain percentage of memory, so ensure that you have enough storage (we recommend SSD - solid state drive type ) before proceeding to install the engine. It’s also worth noting that certain rendering functions have more demanding requirements than the recommended specs.

Unreal Engine 5 Feature Requirements

Unreal Engine 5 Feature	System Requirements (Windows only)
Lumen Global Illumination and Reflections	Hardware Ray Tracing: · Windows 10 with DirectX 12 support · NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 series video card or higher, AMD Radeon RX-6000 series or higher Software Ray Tracing: · DirectX 11 video card, support for Shader Model 5
Nanite Virtualized Geometry	· Windows 10 with support for DirectX 12 Agility SDK · DirectX 12 or Vulkan
Virtual Shadow Maps	· Windows 10 with support for DirectX 12 Agility SDK · DirectX 12 or Vulkan · Latest Graphics Drivers
Temporal Super Resolution	Runs on any video card with Shader Model 5 support, however, performance may be constrained

Don’t know where to download Unreal editor and UE5? Visit the official Unreal Engine download page and follow the instructions to set up your game development journey with Unreal Engine.

Well, it looks like my computer would be able to run a P3D v6 sim, but I think it will soon be time to upgrade my computer anyway. Right now I have GTX 1080 graphic card and my i7-7700K CPU is old and does not support Win11. Plus, I think I need a bigger SSD (the one I have now is 63% full).

21 minutes ago, Joseph29 said:

Well, it looks like my computer would be able to run a P3D v6 sim, but I think it will soon be time to upgrade my computer anyway. Right now I have GTX 1080 graphic card and my i7-7700K CPU is old and does not support Win11. Plus, I think I need a bigger SSD (the one I have now is 63% full).

You probably have some time because we don’t even know if this is actually P3D V6

57 minutes ago, Joseph29 said:

Well, it looks like my computer would be able to run a P3D v6 sim, but I think it will soon be time to upgrade my computer anyway. Right now I have GTX 1080 graphic card and my i7-7700K CPU is old and does not support Win11. Plus, I think I need a bigger SSD (the one I have now is 63% full).

I was surprised to discover that Windows 11 only supports 8th generation or higher Intel CPUs. The question is......why do I get offers now and again to upgrade to Windows 11 on my home PC when I have an i5 7600k?

One has to wonder about backwards compatibility and that means this might be (a la MSFS) waiting a long time before having the necessary tools (activesky, AI traffic models, decent airport scenery, etc) to make the switch. 

The other thing I really hope is improved is TrueSky. The fact that it's a static representation of weather is still a huge dealbreaker for some of us. 

Exciting times ahead but lots of questions to be answered. 

 

11 minutes ago, DChockey08 said:

One has to wonder about backwards compatibility and that means this might be (a la MSFS) waiting a long time before having the necessary tools (activesky, AI traffic models, decent airport scenery, etc) to make the switch.

 

This will be me probably. Flying with default airports, no live weather (Activesky), and no AI traffic? No thank you!

2 minutes ago, Joseph29 said:

This will be me probably. Flying with default airports, no live weather (Activesky), and no AI traffic? No thank you!

Ultimately if this is a completely new sim, with no backwards compatibility, I can't see this as a great development. If developers are going to have to make significant changes to products, and most people are using MSFS and not P3Dv6, then we have a problem. 

Ultimately, we have to hope that this change miraculously requires only minor updates to add-ons to be used and that the core of the sim stays the same because what keeps most of us using P3D isn't really the sim, it's all the stuff that can be added to it that isn't possible with MSFS, and sadly looks like it will never be possible. 

One things to remember: everyone predicted the move to P3Dv4 and 64 bit would break every single add-on and everything would need to be rebuilt from scratch, when in reality it proved to be a lot more painless than originally thought. 

I prefer to think it of it as an amazing opportunity for new and established developers to take their products places we haven't previously seen.  If backward compatibility were a priority for LM and its government and commercial base, I doubt Unreal/LM would have made this splashy announcement.  And the fact that announcement is coming on the heals of CAE announcing that they are using Unreal too makes me think the commercial market place wants this.  

Also, I'm going to self-congratulate for a moment because I wrote the quote below back on June 9, and was mostly naysaid by the forum:

"Isn't it also possible that LM's core market of DOD types might actually want hyper-realistic graphics and world environments for its training tools at some point. If we make the assumption that the Air Force, for example, is training young pilots and other staff for combat simulations, etc., and if those trainees have grown-up on modern video game/simulator engines, CGI-filled movies, Google Earth, etc., it seems likely that those trainees may expect the best quality environment and that the DOD entities would want to make it as realistic as possible. Those requirements could ultimately drive LM to make a true next-gen P3D.  Of course, the question would then become: would they even release it publicly?"

Guess I should go buy a lottery ticket now.  😛

 

 

Edited November 29, 20223 yr by Iadbound

I think this new direction for Prepar3d has been on the table and in the works for quite some time now. It sounds like the info in the linked announcement makes it pretty clear that this new direction is expected to make it possible to keep the good stuff we have in P3D and continue into the future. Kind of a "best of two worlds deal".

I also will not be surprised to find out the some of the better developers like A2A and maybe even ORBX  and many others have been working in the background with LM. We will just have to wait and see. It is way to early to start down the "oh my god, you are going to break my add-ons" rabbit hole. 

There isn't really an indication this is what P3D will become - As it's not mentioned in the article is it? It could be a different product altogether. Time will tell though. 

37 minutes ago, Zangoose said:

There isn't really an indication this is what P3D will become - As it's not mentioned in the article is it? It could be a different product altogether. Time will tell though. 

Yes, this can be a completely new product. Nothing in the article mentions that this is P3Dv6.  I don't even know why people in this thread assume it's P3Dv6.  And if it does turn out to be a completely new product, the likelihood that it will be backwards compatible with P3Dv5 add-ons is probably slim to none.

Edited November 29, 20223 yr by abrams_tank