>>Holy Smoke! The engineer waves at you! :)>He's not just waving, but is actually letting you know the tunnel is approaching! You can see it off in the distance when the user turns the camera back out the front window. Pretty nifty!

hmmmm...todays hardware, 2.5 years from now for a new product with a new feature set...hmmmm.given the feature set for FS11 isnt decided, its a bit premature to make many claims in that regard.on the GPU side - we have already moved to Shader Model 3.0, so if you dont have a GPU capable of that, no.on the CPU/mobo/memory side - there is a wide range of "todays hardware". todays low end hardware - will run like low-end hardware. todays high-end hardware - that doesn't run FSX flat out today so it likely wont run FS11 flat out. will it run the FSX features plus the new FS11 features with approximately the same performance tomorrow on todays hardware that you get with FSX today - that is a good question. we certainly are working to make the engine more performant, but I am making no promises until the current dev work is much farther along.

good to see you posting here at avsim Phil, keep up the good work !!! Looking forward to FS11RegardsJohn

>Waving people we need.I imagine waving people are generally more appropriate in a train sim than a flight sim, but I could certainly use some animated guys waving red sticks to help me park those big airliners. :)Colin

I look forward to seeing my passenger look for and use the brown paper bag after some aeros in FS11 . ;-)

Those of you who are scoffing at the concept of animated people being ridiculous in a flight simulator probably need to visit an airport and take a good look around.There are lots of people who work at airports who perform vital functions that require that their arms be moving.There are lots of things I'd like to see in Flight Simulator that aren't in FSX. There are lots of things I'd like to see probably before characters that move convincingly even.But to suggest that there's no place in Flight Simulator for animated characters is to not really understand what Flight Simulator is all about. Adding convincing characters would vastly increase the immersion factor.It's my opinion that the lack of quality airport personnel characters significantly inhibits the sense of realism that I have when using Flight Simulator and am happy to see this finally being addressed.So ... go ACES! Give us all the waving characters you can fit onto the DVD!PS: And to the Train Sim guys who animated that brakeman. That's just awesome looking! Keep up the good work!

I went to the Train show in Anaheim and saw TS2. I didn't spend much time on it but I did see some scenes that looked like the frame rates were below 20. The guy working the booth said it was running on a quad but wouldn't say which model. I would expect Microsoft would show up with some powerful computers, so I wonder how well TS2 will run on an average machine.If we do get animated people in FX11, I hope we can turn them off. I have enough trouble on the ground at busy airports without having to draw animated people.

>If we do get animated people in FX11, I hope we can turn them>off. I have enough trouble on the ground at busy airports>without having to draw animated people.>I'd be very surprised if you didn't have that capability ... since that's similar to what we have now with things like the animated jetways (which require that your Scenery Complexity be set very high to see them.)I certainly don't speak for ACES, but I'm sure you'll be able to turn them off if you want extra performance.Cheers,

Well i sure hope FS11 is NOT backward compatable with fsx or fs9 start fresh....

Thats the key. OPTIONSAces can have waving people,intoxicated passengers and superman hanging on the wing but make it a OPTION.A screen full of options with check boxes.Not a slider with 4 or so levels that globally effect everything.That way you can set the sim up exactly to your personal preference and machine capability.I do not need the programmers to decide for me what my machine can or cannot handle via a prog that detects perfomance.Also, having such control over the individual options will keep the tweekers happy, the detail nutts and those who could care less about eyecandy and turn em all off.I like the UTX menus. Everything it offers is shown,a description of what it is,what it does and its performance hit.So pile it on Aces but let US control it.

There are already animated people in FSX - the "Russian Villian", who looks straight out of a James Bond movie, comes to mind and she can be placed anywhere you wish using any object placer program.http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/190817.jpgRegards, Kendall#1: [email protected]/Coolermaster HyperTX2 Gigabyte P35-DS3L 4GB Ballistix Tracers PC6400 EVGA 8800GT - 174.74 beta Seagate 250GB 7200.11 CH Yoke/Pedals/Saitek Throttle Dual Monitor: Dell 2405/1905 #2: Dell 8400 3.2 H.T. 3GB PC4200 - X800XT Diamond Xtreme/Logitech X-530's

I like the idea of animated people.I hope we can also get animated flight crew members and pax, too (with of course an option to disable them as some people won't like that kind of thing).Bryan

>I like the idea of animated people.>>I hope we can also get animated flight crew members and pax,>too (with of course an option to disable them as some people>won't like that kind of thing).>>Bryan>Hi Bryan,This is not directed to you at all, but since it was the last post, I replied (globally I guess)If you ask 10 people what they want for the next FS, you will get a minimum of 50 requests, all unique, most self serving and many similar.I have watched this thread with great interest before posting.I think the bigger point that was made earlier ... is that you can have anything you want, but don't decide to have it in place of things that are core, and on the larger scale of what a "flight" simulator should be. FSX is a perfect example of trying to stuff too much candy and goo goo in place of what many really wanted (including team members) and what was core to a real flight simulation experience... which is "relative" to each user. It is what I refer to as perceived reality. Because that is exactly what it is. It is perceived by each user exactly as they expect it to be regardless of their experience real world or virtual.Before you go left on me, I have owned my own aircraft for over 12 years, and I hold current commercial, multi-engine, instrument ratings and have flown quite a few impressive aircraft and I have been producing commercial FS 3rd party aircraft for since 1995. Please do not assume that is an arrogant statement. It is not meant to be.What is all this rambling about?On a personal note, I could care less if a marshaler waves me in, I know where to park. I could care less if I see flocks of birds, I avoid them like the plague when I fly my airplane and it is the last dang thing I want to see in front of my windscreen. I could care less if the hot mama in the right seat gestures me from the VC, my wife would have my head on a platter.What I care about is what is most important to me and most professional pilots when we fly, realistic weather, terrain and up to date and state of the art navigation. the rest is entertainment fluff and if I hear the word "immersion" used one more time, I am likely to barf. It is overused, mis-understood and "perceived"Regards,Jim RhoadsFlight1Tech

>I like the idea of animated people.Gee I can

>Before you go left on me, I have owned my own aircraft for>over 12 years, and I hold current commercial, multi-engine,>instrument ratings and have flown quite a few impressive>aircraft and I have been producing commercial FS 3rd party>aircraft for since 1995. Please do not assume that is an>arrogant statement. It is not meant to be.>>What is all this rambling about?>On a personal note, I could care less if a marshaler waves me>in, I know where to park. I could care less if I see flocks of>birds, I avoid them like the plague when I fly my airplane and>it is the last dang thing I want to see in front of my>windscreen. I could care less if the hot mama in the right>seat gestures me from the VC, my wife would have my head on a>platter.>>What I care about is what is most important to me and most>professional pilots when we fly, realistic weather, terrain>and up to date and state of the art navigation. the rest is>entertainment fluff and if I hear the word "immersion" used>one more time, I am likely to barf. It is overused,>mis-understood and "perceived">The vast majority of people using FSX don't have pilot licenses and even fewer own their own plane. I understand why you don't care about immersion since you are fully immersed every time you take out real plane out.For me FSX is about entertainment and some degree of simulation (eg LDS767, Coolsky MD80). IMHO the more immersion the better the entertainment value. Plus animated pilots, ground crew, marshallers and passengers are a "cool" new feature that will help sell more boxes! :)