IPACS Design Direction

crispy136 · July 26, 2018 at 4:07 AM

I find that Aerofly FS2 flight simulator gives me the most realistic experience even though it lacks some features available in other flightsims. This is mainly due to the photo realistic scenery included as standard and available for purchase, and the stellar performance on more modest computers like mine. In additional to Aerofly I also have use both FSX and Prpar3d. I like the performance improvement of P3d over FSX, but I have so much content for FSX that P3d isn't even installed any more. But every time I go back to FS2 from FSX, the syrupy smooth frame rates and large areas of photo realistic scenery are like a flight sim junkies dream. This is surely the future of flightsim!

Work is underway to allow users to create high quality content themselves using AeroScenery and share it (thanks Bing maps) with other users. Utilities like Fscloudport are available now to allow users to create runways, airport and surrounding buildings and static aircraft. Developers of this type of enhancement are my hero's. AeroScenery will greatly reduce the complexity of photo realistic scenery that the more skilled users can already create. Fscloudport has a good selection of basic buildings, and with a little creativity users are able to create complex structures, like the curved multi arm Domestic terminal in Brisbane Australia. While the result is not as good as custom designed scenery available for purchase in this and other sims, from the air still manages to looks realistic enough. I never sit at the gate looking at the great details of the buildings in front of me. I am more interested in the aircraft itself, getting it up in the air, how the airport area looks from the air as I depart and then approach for landing, and how that detail impacts my system performance.

While the just released Florida scenery is a visually impressive feast, there are a vast number of happy simmers out there available to use AeroScenery and Fscloudport tools to also create scenery worthy of Aerofly FS2. All without IPACS lifting a finger.

Being freed from scenery design would allow IPACS to concentrate on adding features that bring more realism to FS2. Things like live weather, AI aircraft, ATC etc, all of which are delivered standard in a flightsim coming up to 12 years old. And FSX is pretty ancient by computer software standards.

This slight change in focus to enhancement rather than scenery could make Aerofly more popular (selling more copies to balance the lack of scenery sales). Providing enhancements that flow through to Fscoudport, like more static aircraft types and more region specific paint jobs, creates even better free scenery content, enticing even more users to Aerofly. Even with the maximum detail wacked into Fscloudport, there is no performance penalty in Aerofly. A credit to both Aerofly and Fscloudport.

Lastly all users love free stuff that enhances the flightsim experience. The more free stuff (like scenery created by other users), the more people will want to migrate to Aerofly. Simmers love flying over their home turf so projects like scenery being created for Australia and various other parts of the world not covered by existing scenery, might also entice users of other simmers to make the transition to Aerofly. The more people who migrate to Aerofly the better for IPACS. Sales of FSX enhancements also prove simmers are willing to pay for enhancements. I'd definitely cough up a modest fee for an ATC, AI aircraft or live weather enhancement for Aerofly. Florida is on the other side of the world, in a country I have never visited. ATC, moving aircraft and weather are all around everyone everywhere.

This is not a criticism of IPACS, anything you have developed to date or your plans for the future. I love Aerofly and thanks for developing it and providing additional aircraft and plenty of scenery free to existing users. But a slight change in focus could attract more simmers, and make the Aerofly experience better for everyone, not just frequent travellers to Florida.

"It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent; it is the one most adaptable to change." Charles Darwin

drhotwing1 (IPACS) · July 26, 2018 at 5:08 AM Official Post

Hi Chris,

first off we are glad that you are enjoying Aerofly and this is not taken as a criticism at all. The one thing that you need to understand is how IPACS is structured, as you probably already know, we are a very small team. We will always do three things simultaneously; build scenery as we have two internal modelers that their sole job is to do just this, improve and design new and existing aircraft; we have two team members that only do this, and two core coders that pretty much do all of the 'core features' that you see. The problem here is that at times we need to stall a project that's being worked on to assist somewhere else that he is needed more as a priority. This is why ATC is taking so long (aside from how complex it is). Then there is marketing, multiple platforms, support, maintaining forums and websites, strategic planning, and overall management of the business. All of us on the IPACS team serves different roles at different times but we all have core tasks that have to be done.

Every one of us on the team wants to see every single feature in Aerofly but we also know that isn't realistic. We have a roadmap and a goal for Aerofly but we also know that this isn't going to happen overnight. Once we get the R22 released we can resume with a more clear head as we try to get more actual features released.

As most individuals on this forum already knows, our wishlist is as big as everyone else's.

All I can say at this time, as an IPACS team member, this is going to be a long road but we will get there. We are all very passionate about Aerofly and we are all working hard to make Aerofly the best flight simulator out there today.

crispy136 · July 26, 2018 at 6:53 AM

Thanks for reading and responding to my comments. It is great to know how IPACS works.

drhotwing1 (IPACS) September 28, 2018 at 5:48 PM