Congrats for keeping flightsim development alive for 3rd parties! And best of luck with this new beast. As I get older, I get less tolerant of how things seem to work nowadays, and of course, nobody cares.
I would never produce a product and sell it, only to ruin some of my customer's experience with a development path. Or, if I did, I'd let the customer continue to enjoy his purchase without the added development if his system isn't good enough. But alas, this group has no such interest, and the people with good but aging vid cards are few. But I would never have ruined my experience without consideration like these guys did.
I am a big fan of the technology. My jaw dropped at the beauty of this new sim. Too bad nobody cares.
Having said that, the continued work on simulation has brought the concept a long way. Maybe that's a bit of an issue for me as well. The better the game represents reality out of the box, the less inspired I've been to decorate it. My last meaningful scenery was for fs9. Its made me think why. When I began with AFS2, we had a black grid with 2d mountains on the edge. I love it. I made up the idea of a long flight when I found out the grid would repeat if I flew away from the grid far enough. Funny huh. Then, BAO made scenery for ms3 that was green! I love it. I think that was the version I began designing for, with dos based "Airport". By then, I'd learned to fly for real, and my SEL rating was taken from an FBO at Boeing Field, KBFI. Now the sim was my practice sandbox. I could preview or postview my actual flying, which was really fun and educational. BUT...the vfr reporting points weren't there! That was my first effort with AIRPORT, adding the "reservoir", and the VA hospital.
As we all know the sim became more and more like reality, but I found the better it was out of the box, the less there was for me to do. And I'll tell you, to find fault or find stuff that should be improved in fs2020,takes more effort than before, its just that good. Finally (before going to vid card jail) I landed at one of my old projects, FisrtAir field in Monroe, Wa. Its TERRIBLE! Aha, something I can contribute, but only to find that support for my final "perpetual" license of 3dsmax is SUPPOSED to be supported, but it isn't. Such a struggle without any results.
Then the nail in the coffin, their vastly annoying policy of weekly updates that take hours to download and the user is forced to do the update.
Still, the beauty of that sim....sheesh I was putting up with all the pain. UNTIL....their 5th "update" with forced me to either spend big bucks, or live without the weather.
That was it. I'd been flying the 152 only, because it was the only plane they gave me that had the older gauges. It was slow enough to bore me. But I don't like the garmen display system, never have, and never will.
So, I think I've concluded that for me, as the sim got prettier, the motivation for adding decoration receded. I still find the business interface between this sim and its users to be absurd. I also am potentially the only one of my kind, making nobody care. But I fly as I always have, around my home territory mostly, and with gauges of old. The expensive versions provided more planes with garmen displays that won't get flown, and more scenery in places I won't go. So I only spent the minimum. The only positive is a smaller negative, who knew this company would withdraw the pleasure of their sim from those of us old timers.
Why not upgrade the vid card? I considered it, but first I took a fine flight in p3d just for kicks. Whooo Hoooo back in the cockpit of my favorite plane, the complex 182 trainer from Carendo. And flying over a less pretty world, but the operation of the aircraft was sweet and predictable. The controls were second nature, and the experience was lovely. Without buying a video card. Oh, and guess what? No hours of downloading required.
I do miss the beauty of fs2020, but I don't spend much time flying, and for my little kick of a now and then flight, less pretty but far better aircraft will suffice. I'll keep my eyes open, and if I ever upgrade the video for another reason, I'll surely try this one again. Of course, if they develop non-stop, the probability is they'll make whatever I upgrade to obsolete in the future.
Its like you signed up for perpetual spending by paying them $69. Sounds a bit like Autodesk.
I would never produce a product and sell it, only to ruin some of my customer's experience with a development path. Or, if I did, I'd let the customer continue to enjoy his purchase without the added development if his system isn't good enough. But alas, this group has no such interest, and the people with good but aging vid cards are few. But I would never have ruined my experience without consideration like these guys did.
I am a big fan of the technology. My jaw dropped at the beauty of this new sim. Too bad nobody cares.
Having said that, the continued work on simulation has brought the concept a long way. Maybe that's a bit of an issue for me as well. The better the game represents reality out of the box, the less inspired I've been to decorate it. My last meaningful scenery was for fs9. Its made me think why. When I began with AFS2, we had a black grid with 2d mountains on the edge. I love it. I made up the idea of a long flight when I found out the grid would repeat if I flew away from the grid far enough. Funny huh. Then, BAO made scenery for ms3 that was green! I love it. I think that was the version I began designing for, with dos based "Airport". By then, I'd learned to fly for real, and my SEL rating was taken from an FBO at Boeing Field, KBFI. Now the sim was my practice sandbox. I could preview or postview my actual flying, which was really fun and educational. BUT...the vfr reporting points weren't there! That was my first effort with AIRPORT, adding the "reservoir", and the VA hospital.
As we all know the sim became more and more like reality, but I found the better it was out of the box, the less there was for me to do. And I'll tell you, to find fault or find stuff that should be improved in fs2020,takes more effort than before, its just that good. Finally (before going to vid card jail) I landed at one of my old projects, FisrtAir field in Monroe, Wa. Its TERRIBLE! Aha, something I can contribute, but only to find that support for my final "perpetual" license of 3dsmax is SUPPOSED to be supported, but it isn't. Such a struggle without any results.
Then the nail in the coffin, their vastly annoying policy of weekly updates that take hours to download and the user is forced to do the update.
Still, the beauty of that sim....sheesh I was putting up with all the pain. UNTIL....their 5th "update" with forced me to either spend big bucks, or live without the weather.
That was it. I'd been flying the 152 only, because it was the only plane they gave me that had the older gauges. It was slow enough to bore me. But I don't like the garmen display system, never have, and never will.
So, I think I've concluded that for me, as the sim got prettier, the motivation for adding decoration receded. I still find the business interface between this sim and its users to be absurd. I also am potentially the only one of my kind, making nobody care. But I fly as I always have, around my home territory mostly, and with gauges of old. The expensive versions provided more planes with garmen displays that won't get flown, and more scenery in places I won't go. So I only spent the minimum. The only positive is a smaller negative, who knew this company would withdraw the pleasure of their sim from those of us old timers.
Why not upgrade the vid card? I considered it, but first I took a fine flight in p3d just for kicks. Whooo Hoooo back in the cockpit of my favorite plane, the complex 182 trainer from Carendo. And flying over a less pretty world, but the operation of the aircraft was sweet and predictable. The controls were second nature, and the experience was lovely. Without buying a video card. Oh, and guess what? No hours of downloading required.
I do miss the beauty of fs2020, but I don't spend much time flying, and for my little kick of a now and then flight, less pretty but far better aircraft will suffice. I'll keep my eyes open, and if I ever upgrade the video for another reason, I'll surely try this one again. Of course, if they develop non-stop, the probability is they'll make whatever I upgrade to obsolete in the future.
Its like you signed up for perpetual spending by paying them $69. Sounds a bit like Autodesk.
