Microsoft Flight Simulator

[Geisler]

DCS is a study level sim and should be judged by individual module, not as a whole. There are modules (planes) where you could spend weeks trying to learn the ins an outs of a weapons system alone, and there are others that feature weaponless planes. Same thing with the maps, sure, they're small compare to literally THE WORLD in MSFS2020, but they are focused and should be judged by context and module used (eg what use is the map of an entire continent when you're playing a specific military conflict).

 

[Burning Bridges]

Still people must be aware how incredibly small the maps are.

In X-plane small, focused mods like Orbx True Earth cover the entirety of Great Britain. In DCS you will be barely able to fly 10 minutes from the coast.

Also X-Plane mods are more detailed and much cheaper to produce, The whole hand placing approach of DCS is imo b/s when you could instead read a database of every building in entire countries.

 

[Hace El Oso]

In DCS you will be barely able to fly 10 minutes from the coast.

Also X-Plane mods are more detailed and much cheaper to produce, The whole hand placing approach of DCS is imo b/s when you could instead read a database of every building in entire countries.

Georgia and the Russian Caucasus/Kuban is a decent size for a military simulation. Perhaps small in the context of Jet aircraft, it’s certainly a good size in IL2(my favorite) .

I think everything needs to be hand-placed because Eagle Dynamics do not have access to/the money to buy map databases of sufficient accuracy. The map has to be precise enough to allow for convoys to pass unobstructed on all the roads, for example, rather than simply having traffic ‘painted on’ like in MSFS.

 

[anvi]

Microsoft spend zillions of dollars and the fancy AI and stuff, they should have thrown in a few more bucks for the DCS guys and knowhow. Imagine being able to bomb buildings and bridges and stuff in MS Flight Sim.

 

[Dexter]

 

[Quilty]

Anyone tried Air Hauler 2 for MSFS?

 

[Atrachasis]

Microsoft spend zillions of dollars and the fancy AI and stuff, they should have thrown in a few more bucks for the DCS guys and knowhow. Imagine being able to bomb buildings and bridges and stuff in MS Flight Sim.

Funnily enough, that's precisely what you could do in the very first versions of Flight Simulator, before it even became a Microsoft product:

http://josef.havlik.sweb.cz/historyenglish_combat.htm

It did get repetitive after a while.

 

[Burning Bridges]

Anyone tried Air Hauler 2 for MSFS?

The biggest problem is that there is nothing that you can fly, except a few GA planes with inop switches and the Arcadebus.

The CRJ has just been postponed too so it could be a long wait for a somewhat decent commercial plane.

 

[Quilty]

Anyone tried Air Hauler 2 for MSFS?

The biggest problem is that there is nothing that you can fly, except a few GA planes with inop switches and the Arcadebus.

The CRJ has just been postponed too so it could be a long wait for a somewhat decent commercial plane.

Are you referring to a lack of study-level planes? I'm only interested in smaller planes and bush-flying anyway, and MSFS seemed to offer enough in that area the last time I flew. Which was, oh lord, when it just came out. Life gets in the way of flying.

 

[Burning Bridges]

The planes in MSFS are not even preschool level.

All I can say is that they fly, react to inouts on control surfaces and have a few gauges (like speed, altitude). Some also have gadgets that look like computers but mostly just simulate bullshit.

Apart from a lot of missing minor switches and doors the Savage Cub is probably state of the art. That's about the level of complexity that MSFS can simulate.

Since you mentioned airline sims, for commercial jobs I use planes like the Saab 340 or Boeing 737, not STOL planes with 2 seats.

 

[Burning Bridges]

 

[Burning Bridges]

This wouldn't be so bad if the installation was the end of your troubles.

But there will be a mandatory 9GB patch every 2-3 weeks that will not download in the background like steam, but it will be in the way when you want to play. If you are allowed to continue after 15 minutes to 2 hours, it will usually just break something that was currently working (for example my payware planes would CTD) and then it takes 2-3 months until that issue is fixed.

To add insult to injury it tries to fry my graphics card even if it is in the background. My CPU and GPU run under full load even even while MSFS it is just downloading. I bet the added electricity bill has already cost me more than the fucking game. 50% of the time you will just be waiting and hoping it does not break something that causes you even more grief.

The major players in the addon field have all postponed their planes until "when it's done". Even Aerosoft have stopped talking about their arcade plane because the progress of the SDK is so fucking awful.

Right now MSFS is just a sure way to cut the lifetime of your hardware in half and the most expensive alternative to Google Earth. It is Google Earth 3d plus a cockpit with inop switches.

Unless you get an offer like we did to play it almost for free with the 1$ gamepass: dont get it!

If you still get it, get used to that screen and that music, cause you will hear it half of the time

 

[Alfgart]

You hate the game. We get it. No need to keep spamming this thread

 

[Burning Bridges]

I know, but I like it that way.

Let us know about your fantastic adventures in MSFS for a change.

 

[Burning Bridges]

for what it's worth, Just Flight are porting over their very decent PA-28 Arrow

I love the Arrow in X-Plane and the new (?) external looks amazing. The interior looks like a 1:1 port though.

maybe a next step in GA planes over Carenad. if everything works like in the original it should be lots of fun to fly

 

[Burning Bridges]

A new video for the Just flight PA-28 Arrow



They also announced a Turbo Arrow. That'S a different plane, basically a port of their X-Plane P-28s which also had 2 versions. Normally it would be better to wait for the Turbo because it has a better engine and better performance, at the cost of a worse engine sound (there is a really annoying hiss from the turbo)

Just Flight Previews PA-28R Turbo Arrow III/IV for MSFS – FSElite

 

[anvi]

I played this game for a good 40 minutes.

 

[Burning Bridges]

I have switched back to X-plane a long time ago.

Although for occasional VFR flying, especially with better planes coming like the Piper above, it can be fun.

It just is not able to simulate anything above that yet.

 

[Burning Bridges]

https://fselite.net/news/aerosoft-crj-for-msfs-release-date-confirmed-for-march-16th/

At long last, it has been confirmed that the upcoming Aerosoft CRJ 550/700 for Microsoft Flight Simulator will release on March 16th 2021. Mathijs Kok took to the forums just moments ago to announce that the “first complex and highly detailed aircraft” for Microsoft Flight Simulator will be made available through the Aerosoft Shop and the Microsoft Flight Simulator Marketplace at the same time.

Aerosoft has been previewing the Aerosoft CRJ for many months now most recently they shared the start of a brand new tutorial video series. We know that the Aerosoft CRJ for Microsoft Flight Simulator will release for €42.00 (plus any local VAT). Those who then want to buy both the 900/1000 models will be able to then buy the additional package for an extra €16.75 (plus any local VAT). If you can’t wait to learn more about the aircraft, the first volume of the manual is already available to download and read through in preparation for the release.

Some people consider that a milestone.

It does not look like it is going to be the first study level airliner for MSFS (that might never happen at all). It only looks like the first airliner for MSFS. The arcade joke they put in the official release was bullshit and does not count.

This is also indicated by the price which, if the CRJ is indeed "complex and highly detailed", would be super low.

The proof is still in the pudding but I am considering giving it a chance

 

[Burning Bridges]

The Piper Arrow by Just Flight is actually a ton of fun. The first airplane in this sim that I really like.



It's certainly still not enough if a flightsim has 1 good airplane, but it is noteworthy that I own both X-Plane and MSFS versions and I like the MSFS one more. flight model is a bit whacky, especially ground handling, but the immersion is in a class of its own.

Just Flight also has a BAE Hawk trainer in the pipeline, and will very soon release two variants of the Arrow, the fixed gear Warrior and the Turbo Arrow.

PMDG has shown the first picture of their DC-6. If I extrapolate the experience with the PA-28 and imagine real planes like eg a DC-3 or DC-6 on the same level, the future is looking very bright.

 

[downwardspiral]

I think the consensus from fly sim community is that it will take years for FS2020 to be flyable with paid study level plane and other realism modulars.
The last time I played, IFR is a joke, auto pilot is a joke, flight computer is a joke. And vatsim support was still pretty bad.
Not many of my flying sim friends switch to FS2020 yet. I can only hope it will get better 4 years later.

 

[Burning Bridges]

Yes but it's not like the other sims are perfect. And despite all it's flaws there are no other sims where you can keep flying around the world without buying a 50$ map that is due to come out in 2025 or spend a week to download the textures.

But yes, most people have installed 2 or 3 sims at the same time. I use X-Plane for airliners, DCS for combat planes and MSFS for flying GA aircraft. I think a lot of the anger towards MSFS is that people had thought their life would become easy and they could concentrate on 1 sim and now they have to cave in and juggle even more software, configs and problems.

The airliners and turboprops are shit, no question. Even the glorified FBW Airbus. But for just simulating VFR flights in light aircraft it has definitely improved, and the PA-28 demonstrates it is able to surpass the competing sims. I am not sure if/when the same can be said about planes with more complex avionics, it may never happen. Certainly the Aerosoft CRJ did not dispel the notion that this is only a glorified Bing sim and people need to wait another year to see what PMDG will manage to do.

It's of course also possible that it will forever remain the sim for simple planes. But that's what some people want to do anyway. Planes like DC-3, Twin Otter, AN-2 are coming and could be a lot of fun.

Yesterday I flew in Costa Rica and once this sim starts to come together it will be hard to ever fly anything else again.

 

[downwardspiral]

No disagreement. My setup is similar, X-plane for most civlian aircraft. DCS and BMS for military planes.
I didn't expect too much from 2020, so I am not angry they haven't got all of those stuff in one package. Actually my fly sim group has form this consensus that "it is going to sucks at beginning but the foundation looks great for future so just wait"

That map and graphics improvement is really not just for eye candy, but going to provide immersive
VFR experience. It is interesting how in RL begginners should be famaliar with VFR before they are able to fly IFR, but in flying sim it is usually reverse.
The ability to fly GA VFR by using real map and identifying map feature world-wide is great in 2020.
Too early to tell if more realism modular/planes will be there for it or not.
It will be a waste potential if it didn't make it in the future.

 

[Burning Bridges]

A lot has to do with missed expectations.

I know people who had bought the hype. They expected nothing but a study level representation of all aircraft and a sim that would include all features - payware, freeware - out of the box. It was absolutely hilarious. Their delusion was based on the alleged cooperation with Airbus which would mean Airbus would have to approve the correctness of all systems and that the complete resources of Microsoft would be behind the product.

Then the sim hit the stores and the Asobo Airbus was nothing but a pretty 3d model with the system depth of an abandoned freeware plane. Since then those people have retreated inwards, fly the Zibo 737 on X-Plane and deal with their depression.

I personally didn't expect anything from FS2020 but gradually see that it's a reöaxong pasttime and can see myself in a lot of upcoming planes and pretending that it's a flight sim.

 

[anvi]

I only played it for an hour, I flew over my home town, it just felt like I was playing google maps with a modified zoom level and some sound effects.