Is Aerofly a sinking ship?

1st Official Post

    I am an older flitesimmer, having started my simming "career" at 15 years of age in an old, beat-up Link Trainer in our local Civil Air Patrol headquarters. My buds and I spent many happy hours in that crazy hybrid of an airplane and carnival ride. Many---many---years later, in the 1980's, I graduated to digital simulation with Microsoft Flight Simulator (versions 1 through X), and more recently, the incredible Aerofly FS2. Over those years there were many "wow" moments, but none have matched the wows that FS2 delivers every time I load it up. The lighting, shadows, fluidity, and exceptional default aircraft outshine anything I have used before, notwithstanding the absence of real weather, seasons, a very limited world, or ATC. And that's without VR! In short, IPACS should be very proud of their achievement.

    But apparently they are not. I first learned of FS2 on my favorite site, Orbx, when I clicked on one of their georgeous banners, the one announcing the mysterious "Project A," arriving in 2017. In fact, Orbx, possibly the greatest eye-candy flightsim company on earth, now has two of their five product banners devoted to Aerofly FS2. For Aerofly to be recognized by such a stellar company, and to have that company devote two of its new products to this new simulator is high praise, indeed. And yet if you load up the Aerofly site itself (and that includes IPACS/IKARUS) there is NO mention of this new Orbx collaboration or any information about any of the huge new additions that Aerofly themselves have added since the release of FS2 in 2016 (such as The DLCs for Switzerland, Utah, and New York). They do, however, send you to the Steam site that gives you minimal reason to purchase the sim, although it does mention the full current offerings (but still fails to hawk the amazing potential of the collaboration with Orbx.).

    Would I have discovered or purchased FS2 without Orbx? Probably not. If Aerofly is to succeed---and they richly deserve to do so---they need to take a few minutes or hours to at the very least update their own website with info and screenshots of what is available and forthcoming. When I see the magic they can do on the sim, it should be a mere walk in the park for them to add a few lines of text and graphics to a web page.

    Let's look at this another way. If you are shopping the Web to go on your dream cruise, do you go with the cruise line that only advertises its current ports of call and services and amenities on the web sites of its competitors? To me, that's a sure sign of a sinking cruise line---or ship. Is Aerofly a sinking ship? I really hope not...

    • Official Post

    No, it certainly is not a sinking ship. The webside it a little outdated, that obviously needs to be updated. Static information just can't keep up with the development of the sim. I'm part of the development team and from my point of view there are major new features in the making, all is going pretty well I'd say. We have published a SDK and quite a number of people have already created their own content like airports or repaints. We've also seen several guys working on their own aircraft for the Aerofly FS 2. The future is looking very well I'd say, not sinking, no.

    Regards,
    Jan

    Not a sinking ship indeed but I have to admit the communication and marketing department isn't working as it should.

    Quote from Jet-Pack

    No, it certainly is not a sinking ship. The webside it a little outdated, that obviously needs to be updated. Static information just can't keep up with the development of the sim. I'm part of the development team and from my point of view there are major new features in the making, all is going pretty well I'd say. We have published a SDK and quite a number of people have already created their own content like airports or repaints. We've also seen several guys working on their own aircraft for the Aerofly FS 2. The future is looking very well I'd say, not sinking, no.

    Regards,
    Jan

    Jan, thanks for the good response here. I appreciate your enthusiasm and applaud everything that is being worked on. However, it does reinforce my concern that IPACS is not reaching out to a prospective market in any way. Since the May 2016 FS2 release announcement the IPACS website has gone cold---and dark. No dazzling screenshots or videos of the Manhattan skyline or the Alps, no shoutouts about the Orbx collaboration. Nothing. It's as if nothing has happened in over a year, and we all know that's far from the case. I was hooked on FS2 the minute I saw the stunning Chicago screenshot on the Orbx site. IPACS needs to grab new users wherever they may be, but certainly on THEIR OWN site if commercial success is to be had. And I know that updating websites is very easily done and cannot fully understand why the developers aren't shouting out their triumphs from all the rooftops they can (photoreal or not...😉).

    Quote from J van E

    Not a sinking ship indeed but I have to admit the communication and marketing department isn't working as it should.


    I may be wrong, but as fas as I know, the marketing department consists of exactly 0 people.

    Like the two main programmers, I am a physicist myself. Most of us are quite rationale guys: It's the features which count, not empty ad blurbs. And AeroflyFS2 has indeed a number of features it can be proud of. Most notably it has that WOW factor missing in other sims.

    However, that's only half of the truth. I have been simming for 25 years now and I have seen quite a number of simulators dying. If memory serves me right, not any of them was canceled because of lacking features, bad visuals or flight models, or the like. Some of them were ahead of their time, indeed. They alle became vicitims of failing marketing and/or administration.

    I would always keep this in mind.

    Kind regards, Michael

    Intel i7-6700K 4.0 GHz / Asus MAXIMUS VIII RANGER / Kingston 32 GB DDR4 / Samsung SSD M.2 500 GB + Samsung SSD 1 TB + Intel SSD 500 GB (AeroflyFS2) + WD HD 6 TB / EVGA GTX 1080Ti 11 GB / LG 34UM95 3440 x 1440 / HP Reverb / Win 10/64

    • Official Post
    Quote from pmb

    I may be wrong, but as fas as I know, the marketing department consists of exactly 0 people.

    Like the two main programmers, I am a physicist myself. Most of us are quite rationale guys: It's the features which count, not empty ad blurbs. And AeroflyFS2 has indeed a number of features it can be proud of. Most notably it has that WOW factor missing in other sims.

    However, that's only half of the truth. I have been simming for 25 years now and I have seen quite a number of simulators dying. If memory serves me right, not any of them was canceled because of lacking features, bad visuals or flight models, or the like. Some of them were ahead of their time, indeed. They alle became vicitims of failing marketing and/or administration.

    I would always keep this in mind.

    Kind regards, Michael

    I can assure you that we are working on marketing strategy and working hard to keep everyone up to date with everything going on.
    There simply aren't enough of us to keep up with everything going on, this is why it's important for all of you to spread the word about this wonderful product.

    IPACS Development Team Member

    I'm just a cook, I don't own the restaurant.
    On behalf of Torsten, Marc, and the rest of the IPACS team, we would all like to thank you for your continued support.

    Regards,

    Jeff

    Quote from drhotwing1


    There simply aren't enough of us to keep up with everything going on, this is why it's important for all of you to spread the word about this wonderful product.


    Yes we do, notably HiFyler is very active. Anyway, good to know you are working on it.

    Kind regards, Michael

    Intel i7-6700K 4.0 GHz / Asus MAXIMUS VIII RANGER / Kingston 32 GB DDR4 / Samsung SSD M.2 500 GB + Samsung SSD 1 TB + Intel SSD 500 GB (AeroflyFS2) + WD HD 6 TB / EVGA GTX 1080Ti 11 GB / LG 34UM95 3440 x 1440 / HP Reverb / Win 10/64

    • Official Post
    Quote from pmb

    Yes we do, notably HiFyler is very active. Anyway, good to know you are working on it.

    Kind regards, Michael

    Yes, HiFlyer is one of the many that have a lot of passion for the success of Aerofly FS2, and it's very much appreciated.

    IPACS Development Team Member

    I'm just a cook, I don't own the restaurant.
    On behalf of Torsten, Marc, and the rest of the IPACS team, we would all like to thank you for your continued support.

    Regards,

    Jeff

    Aerofly is certainly not a sinking ship, as it is a Flight Simulator and we currently do not support boat physics. However the physics engine of Aerofly can easily be extended to simulate this kind of stuff.

    Anyway folks, all of you wildly speculating about Aerofly, its current state, its future and so on. Just be a little bit more patient. We are working with a team of over 10 people on Aerofly. We are not funded in any way and we have no pressure from outside investors. As some already noted, we have no real marketing team either, mainly as the two main programmers just want to do their work properly. I know some of you don't like this, but its the way we work.

    The Q400 is one example: We announced this airplane way too early. Part of the delay is due to the fact that we had to enhance our turbo engine phyiscs ( which is an insanely complicated topic ) for the Q400 to fly properly. I think we have almost tackled this problem now, as we now do the final tweaks.