An idea of what ACES needs to do!!!

[sipos 0]

What I am about to say has been said countless times before and each time it is said it gets criticized really fast. So please, don

[Guest cbuchner1]

A base platform is not viable as a commercial product that is aimed atthe mass market. It is good that FSX ships with "the world", otherwise it would not sell - and therefore not even exist.I agree though that the core product should be stable. More stable than we've seen with SP2 ;-)

[Guest jshyluk]

Wow, there's a lot that can be said here. I will do my best to reply.For starters, MSFS has been around for a long time. Certainly many good folks have discussed the possibility of creating a MSFS "professional" flight sim. However, putting something together than the FAA would approve of is a very expensive proposition, both for the developer and the end consumer. Who would buy it? Microsoft used to divide their product between "Standard" and "Professional" versions, although their current "DeLuxe" tag seems more appropriate. Prefessional pilots are not allowed to use MSFS flight time as hours logged in the cockpit.If you really want to get into a professional-level flight simulator, there's some valid ways to do that: become a pilot, join the military, invent your own. Sometimes, the people that run professional-level flight sims even open them to the public, I think the going rate is around $250-$300 an hour to sit in one of those. You'd also have to limit which aircraft you would feature in your "professional" sim: most, if not all really just do one cockpit. People who just like to "kick the tires and light the fires" would no doubt feel overwhelmed by this.Finally, but not in the least, AVSIM isn't the place to be telling ACES what they "need to do!!!". Perhaps you can contact Microsoft by mail for that. You may certainly share opinions on AVSIM, but when those opinions seem like demands, then I believe you are overstepping your bounds. The only people that can tell ACES what they need to do are their bosses at Microsoft. People like us can vote with their wallets, for sure, and we can suggest things we would like to see, but you have to remember that ACES is a game-development industrial unit, they don't have the wherewithal (yet) to fabricate professional flight simulators. You dream big, and in today's world, that's a plus. But it's also good to be happy with what you got. FSX has a tremendous amount of play value (or sim value, if you are a serious hobbyist) without being the least bit professional. Do a flight around the world, write up a product review for AVSIM, volunteer with the file library, help a rookie pilot figure out the controls -- do some of that stuff, really play with FSX, use the features you haven't tried yet. Then maybe you will have some of the grounding you will need to help ACES with constructive criticism. Otherwise, can you think of any reason other than you gave EB $60 for FSX, that they should seriously listen to you? In other words, what have you done for ACES lately?What I think is that you just don't spend enough time enjoying FSX. You can either get bored with it and put it away, or you can work towards finding things in the program you enjoy -- surely, there must be something in there you like. I don't think FSX was made to suit me. I do prefer other video games over FSX. That doesn't mean that I feel the need to demand a series of time-consuming changes to the program, patch after patch, months of waiting in the forums to hear from the devs. I have found the bits and pieces in FSX that I like. I know for sure not everybody likes the stuff I like. People ask me all the time what my favourite aircraft is, expecting me to wax on about Level D or PMDG, but really, my favourite aircraft of them all is the default Piper Cub. You just take off and fly, but since it's a taildragger, there is some skill involved. When I tell people that, they just look blank or even seem insulted. When I see that you want a "professional" flight sim, what I think is that you want somebody to tell you what to do in FSX that will make you happy. You want some magic tweak, or some hyper-realistic dihedral in your wing, or something that you think will make you think that the box on your desk is a real aircraft. The truth is that in many aspects of basic flight, FSX is pretty darned good as it is. You can fly the default planes reasonably close to the numbers, especially the Cessna and the Mooney Bravo. I'm sure there's room for improvement, and I am confident that if ACES doesn't find it, some great third-party developer will. Imagine a world with no computer flight sim at all. I think back onto when I was a kid, and my dad made me an airplane cockpit out of a cardboard box that the new dishwasher came in. That was pretty special right there. The guages has a terrible refresh rate, but at least it was a 3D cockpit. The interior textures were bland, but functional. And the only way I would get a view out of the cockpit that wasn't the living room was by switching to the view my mind's eye.To be honest, I still sim-fly that way. I mean, I'm reasonably grown up, but sometimes I pretend that my Ford Focus is the cockpit of a Supermarine Spitfire, and I'm taking off to participate in the Battle of Britain. You'd be surprised how much the bumper-to-bumper traffic on the Mary Hill Bypass looks like a sky-borne fleet of He-111's in the fog of the early morning. So here's my final thought if you've read this far: if you're needing to complain to ACES after reading my post, then stop reading the forums so much, and go and fly something. Fly FSX, fly FS9, fly a real airplane or fly a carboard box. Go and re-ignite what it is you think you've lost by reading all of the Phil Taylor vs. The World threads. If you feel that folks are on your back for complaining too much, it's likely because you are complaining too much. Ease up on people, let them do their jobs, if not at ACES, then here at AVSIM. Sooner or later, the sim will be as you like it; either that, or you yourself will find a way to create the sim that you want. Bruce Artwick did it, why not you? I'm with you - there could be an awesome potential for a flight simulator that provides a base level of physics and modelling, like an Unreal or a Crysis -type game engine (by way of example, not that I am suggesting those game engines in particular). I just don't know when that's going to happen, and I really don't much worry about it, either. I have enough fun playing FSX my own way, and I feel blessed that I can have some work that allows me to enjoy one of my favorite hobbies.Jeff ShylukSenior Staff Reviewer, Avsim

[tohughes76 0]

Thank you Jeff...truer words were never spoken. A very well thought, intelligent, and pertinent post. Should be required reading for every poster in AVSIM!

[slashed2 53]

Excellent post. To add, if anyone wants to try it themselves or help in the creation of a flight simulator try out flightgear. It's open source and free and has been in development for years.

[sipos 0]

"You dream big, and in today's world, that's a plus. But it's also good to be happy with what you got. FSX has a tremendous amount of play value (or sim value, if you are a serious hobbyist) without being the least bit professional. Do a flight around the world, write up a product review for AVSIM, volunteer with the file library, help a rookie pilot figure out the controls -- do some of that stuff, really play with FSX, use the features you haven't tried yet. Then maybe you will have some of the grounding you will need to help ACES with constructive criticism. Otherwise, can you think of any reason other than you gave EB $60 for FSX, that they should seriously listen to you? In other words, what have you done for ACES lately?"Trust me, I have spent tons of time in fsx. I have even been using the SDK for about 2 years. Here is my Youtube profile: http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=joeysipos - Click on the video i made the other day - the Flight Simulator Acceleration one. It shows off the beauty of FSX Acceleration. That

[Guest sstobbe]

Jeff,AVSIM isn't the place to be telling respectful posters things like "AVSIM isn't the place to be telling ACES what they "need to do!!!".This is probably a valuable discussion, given the growing amount of posts I see here.Thanks

[Mace 1,902]

>All I am suggesting is they should spend>more time constructing a marvelous Game Engine (the base>product) with out all the distractions of scenery for the>whole world. I think things are gradually moving in that direction anyway. But it can never really move to the extreme that you propose, because Microsoft has to produce a marketable product (read = a product that many many people will buy).I feel that the Acceleration model is in the right direction, in that with Accel they had 3rd-party dev's creating parts of the content. That allowed ACES to focus on core sim features, like the movable objects, DX10, DX9, and so forth.I still believe that "the full world" should be modelled in the sim. As Jeff said, you almost have to do that if you want a marketable product. Only a few of us want "Microsoft Flight Simulator Visual Studio". :)RhettAMD 3700+ (@2585 mhz), eVGA 7800GT 256 (Guru3D 93.71), ASUS A8N-E, PC Power 510 SLI, 2gb Corsair XMS 3-3-3-8 (1T), WD 150 gig 10000rpm Raptor, WD 250gig 7200rpm SATA2, Seagate 120gb 5400 rpm external HD, CoolerMaster Praetorian

[Dewey 0]

It occurs to me that if people didn't have the freedom to bounce new ideas off one another, we wouldn't be sitting here typing messages on this forum because there wouldn't be any forums. And there wouldn't be any forums because there wouldn't be any computers. And there wouldn't be any computers because whenever someone tried to bounce related ideas off groups of people whose knowledge they respected, they would be quickly told to stop their bellyaching and just be happy playing with their Tinker Toys.You know, when you think about it, if someone comes to this forum and attempts to share a new idea, it speaks very loudly for the respect they have for the people on this forum. That person feels that these people have the knowledge and the know-how to accurately assess his idea and maybe provide some stimulating feedback that might enhance it and build it into something useful.Of course, we all know how hard it is to successfully express ourselves so that other folks really get the message we're trying to pass along. It's so common for our intentional messages to get misinterpreted, and sometimes twisted beyond recognition. And often that happens just from a choice of one or two words that mean something very different to another person. But that's a whole study by itself.What I'm saying here is that I believe we, as a community of intelligent and diverse individuals who share a common hobby, should not only accept new ideas, new slants on old ideas, or even ideas that might sound a little strange at first, but we should invite them.Who knows? It might be one of us who succeeds in solving some of the problems that we struggle with in this hobby. Then we could all say we helped, and that we read it first on Avsim.Dewey

[sipos 0]

Very wise words Dewey. Thank you. It's crazy how people take a few words from my writing and judge me off of that. Your right, I am just trying to be constructive and offer ideas, that

[Manny 1,293]

I actually concur with your product architecture idea. It would work great for us die hard simmers.But, like it has been pointed out, since that would not appeal to the retail market, it puts ACES team in an unprofitable business so I doubt that would work.For now, FSX can be very realistic if you fly at night with 3/4 mile visibility and do IFR approaches using any of the default and payware aircraft. Do it the proper way and there is tension. The only two things that would make that experience better are1. Objects like tower and Building that crash when you run into them and not go through it like ghosts.2. % probability factor in system failureFor ATC, the default ain't all that bad and if you need more Radar Contact is a good addon.Manny

[sipos 0]

[Guest Roymcm]

>>I believe ACES has to put allot more time, money and energy>into developing a solid base platform instead of spending time>creating content for the game.>Why are these mutualy exclusive? The guy making the tree isn't the guy making the tree system. >I am going to offer an idea; what if Microsoft spent the>dedicated time to develop a professional

[Mace 1,902]

No this is a good thread and that was a good point Dewey made about how we would not be posting here at the AVSIM forum if we did not respect and value other people's thoughts.I know I really like to hear others ideas on things like this.I also knew, when I read your thread title, that you didn't really mean it like, "ACES MUST DO THIS OR ELSE!!!..." :) I knew you meant "Here's something they might consider...". What are the forums if not a place to kick a wild idea around in? RhettAMD 3700+ (@2585 mhz), eVGA 7800GT 256 (Guru3D 93.71), ASUS A8N-E, PC Power 510 SLI, 2gb Corsair XMS 3-3-3-8 (1T), WD 150 gig 10000rpm Raptor, WD 250gig 7200rpm SATA2, Seagate 120gb 5400 rpm external HD, CoolerMaster Praetorian

[Guest robby88]

If one looks at the direction MS/Aces has taken in recent years, combined with comments in their blogs and jobs advertised for the Aces team at Microsoft Careers over the past 12 months, Aces are 'sort of' moving in similar directions as it stands.1.Aces appear to have a direction of developing a core simulation/3d world engine based on FSX to power other simulation products such as Train Sim, which could be used for other possible future products (eg a future CFS..hopefully).2.Aces have been advertising for marketing types, at MS Careers for a new product, code named 'montauk', aimed at the commercial simulation market. (as these positions have been openly advertised I assume it's not a secret.)3. The developers' SDK is now part of the product in FSX Deluxe. I doubt if a seperate FS development product would attract volume sales.4. Aces are committed to working with FS Developers on multiple levels from hobbyist through to pro. They have a community team including a PM in charge of developer relations. Sure there is room for improvement and at the end of the day communication is the name of the game; a two way process. A great pity I live on the other side of the Pacific and can't make Devcon this year.All this interaction between Aces & the public was almost non existent just over 2 years ago. As Aces team member Mike Singer said in his blog a while back, change is slow, one doesn't notice it as it's happening until one looks back. He likened change at Aces to pushing a barge through molasses. I'm sure we'll some interesting advances and changes in the next 2-3 years.At the end of the day, the bottom line for Aces is that they have to make money for MS. They could do lots of cool things...but sales count at the end of the day, everything has to be balanced against that. I wouldn't presume to tell Aces what to do, but certainly offer a few suggestions along the way :)