Thoughts about MSFS 11

[SkippyBing]

I can just see the headlines in the NY Times the day after FSx with combat features is released.

Microsoft Builds Simulator to Train Terrorists

But as has already been pointed out you can already buy combat sims so that situation already exists. It's also arguable that a terrorist is unlikely to actually be able to get their hands on a combat aircraft, actually it'd be far easier for them to get a light piston aircraft, load it with explosives and fly that into the Presidential Palace of Ongobongoland.
Wonder where they could get a simulator to do that....
I think the main thinking that people like Mud and myself are going on (and correct me if I'm wrong) is that with FS we have a whole world to play in and add to as we wish. Occasionaly we like to blow s*** up and it'd be nice to do that in FS rather than have to learn a whole new sim. Plus if I could do a bit of guns only air-to air against a buddy down the Grand Canyon well that'd be pretty sweet too.

 

[IanP]

As long as it comes as an add-on and NOT part of the base package, I'd be more than happy to see combat available in FSXI. It must stay out of the base package though - that "3+" certification is worth far more to the sim than combat-out-of-the-box is. An add-on, the same way that Acceleration has been done, however, I'd love and definitely get myself.

Ian P.

 

[SkippyBing]

Ian,

I agree as an add-on is probably the best way all round, the base package will still have mass appeal, plus for those who want it you get the advantage of combat integrated with the sim by the developer rather than as a third party add on.

 

[srgalahad]

Sadly, the 'other side' is there (a quick search brought out 'mention of the idea' dated 9/17/2001 [Chicago Tribune] and ongoing discussions as late as 2005). Skippy, you're correct in your first paragraph -- Within the aviation security community we had similar discussions about the real and simulated possibilities pre-FS98 - it's just part of the world we live in, but those who see threats behind every tree do have a voice and I'm sure they are heard when the marketing and legal folk get involved. Remember, most of the boxed versions of the combat sims say they emulate "history" not "what if" and some people will be sensitive to the issue. Probably in response to the popularity of some of the addons for sale MS blurred the 'civil' flight sim concept themselves by adding the F-18 to Accel so we'll probably never see a coherent end-point.

OK.. I don't want to hijack this thread any further off the idea of a wish-list so I'll simply add that I agree with MM & Skippy that since the aircraft in the sim DO fire guns and drop bombs, it is easy to wish for it being included in the name of realism.

Let's get another cup of coffee and go back to discussing the technical aspects of FSFuture and on that note, I, for one, would happily pay for a seamless, easy-to-install, historically accurate "GW3" or 1950's-style addon.

Rob

 

[SkippyBing]

Rob, some sort of historical add-on would be nice although my preferred method would be to let you choose what year you're flying in and have that determine what aircraft and navaids etc. are available. For the aircraft at least you'd just need a Entered Service Year entry in the cfg and you could probably do something similar for the airfields opening at least if not the layout. Navaids may just have to be universally on from a certain date unless someone really wants to go to town creating a database!

 

[srgalahad]

Rob, some sort of historical add-on would be nice although my preferred method would be to let you choose what year you're flying in and have that determine what aircraft and navaids etc. are available.

Well we're talking MSFS/ACES here so I think it's beyond probability as part of the original boxed set for the reasons of research & 'bloat effect' vs cost.

For the aircraft at least you'd just need a Entered Service Year entry in the cfg and you could probably do something similar for the airfields opening at least if not the layout.

Dang.. if it was hard-coded that would take out all the fun of Tomcats over Pearl 12/7/411 in a recreation of The Philadelphia Experiment :}

Stand-alone ATC does need more options (selectable crossing runways, IFR visual approaches by choice, into-wind landing runway as the primary or secondary choice - even in IFR ). I know this can be done with AFCADS (to a degree) and in multiplayer (but a lot of MP setups are primarily IFR). I just hate ATC getting snotty at me for flying safely when it doesn't fit the current ATC algorithm :isadizzy:

Wonder if it would be possible to simplify the repaint process (without several addons and file type changes) along the way (a built-in engine to export/convert/import/display to say Photoshop and/or PSP to encourage people).

Along those lines, an simple, included .cfg file editor and a "universal" .cfg template (a la Crimson Skies) would simplify modifying a/c. I know how to do it but easy-DIY does encourage new people to try it. The addon aftermarket has made steps that way, but MS has often bought/borrowed from the outside to improve their product.

I'll be happy if it's just visually complex/accurate and somewhat backward compatible to preserve my costs of addons without a $2000 hardware upgrade.

Rob

 

[Pultacatt]

- Better ATC for both humans and AI
- More variation in tiles, plants (Speedtree!!!!), houses, roads, cars, etc...
- Better weather engine

- NO (real) COMBAT CAPABILITIES (like in X-Plane would be okay; if someone wants to go fully military, they should get dedicated combat sims instead of half-arsed implementations)

There are currently no Military sims that come close to the realism of flight that MSFS offers by way of weather, NAVAIDS, terrain, instrumentation, flight dynamics etc nor do they offer the scope of expansion. That is why a great deal of people wish for a combat system for MSFS and have done so for a very long time. A blanket statement "NO" is misguided stance without looking at how big the MSFS Military following is and the possibilities - I know that MSFS has and will always be a civilian flight simulator but...

I agree with those who have said (as I have) that if ACES included even just a basic form of combat or make it possible by way of damage effects etc to simulate combat in the next FS release then folk would be more than happy. It's not going to happen, we all know it isn't.

Skippy and Ian have it right on the nose: If the Combat implementation was offered via an optional upgrade or addon pack then it would be much more viable. This would get around many of the nay sayers, legals, Political Correctness issues etc as it gives the simmer the choice to include it or not, if any of the ACES team are reading this and if, if, a combat upgrade is remotely within the realm of possibility please make it fully multiplayer compatible.

"I'll be happy if it's just visually complex/accurate and somewhat backward compatible to preserve my costs of addons without a $2000 hardware upgrade."

Rob that is the best suggestion yet! Well said

 

[IanP]

One thing that I would like them to include, if a military add-on is forthcoming, is proper support for TACAN. Having them as DME only, as is the only way a civilian receiver can use them, admittedly, is a little irritating when you're flying a military jet!

I think, unfortunately, that the multiple time periods things would have to be done through add-ons rather than the base product. I'd love to be able to set the world back to the 1930s, 40s or 50s - unfortunately, as has already been said, the digital mapping data that would be required for landclass, etc, simply doesn't exist, which makes the idea next to impossible.

Most of the changes could be achieved with custom landclass and textures, but doing all the road and rail networks and drawings all the towns and cities would be a very, very, major job and you'd have to do it all by hand.

One last comment, seeing as I mentioned railways... we now have moving cars and boats, can we have moving trains in the next one, please? :d

Ian P.

 

[SkippyBing]

Trainspotter:costumes:

Dang.. if it was hard-coded that would take out all the fun of Tomcats over Pearl 12/7/411 in a recreation of The Philadelphia Experiment

Well I figure if it's in the aircraft.cfg you can always change it....

 

[Pultacatt]

One thing that I would like them to include, if a military add-on is forthcoming, is proper support for TACAN. Having them as DME only, as is the only way a civilian receiver can use them, admittedly, is a little irritating when you're flying a military jet!

I think, unfortunately, that the multiple time periods things would have to be done through add-ons rather than the base product. I'd love to be able to set the world back to the 1930s, 40s or 50s - unfortunately, as has already been said, the digital mapping data that would be required for landclass, etc, simply doesn't exist, which makes the idea next to impossible.

Most of the changes could be achieved with custom landclass and textures, but doing all the road and rail networks and drawings all the towns and cities would be a very, very, major job and you'd have to do it all by hand.

One last comment, seeing as I mentioned railways... we now have moving cars and boats, can we have moving trains in the next one, please? :d

Ian P.

Excellent idea! Moving trains please Addition of TACANs was one of the small things that has also been floated around for FS2004 and FSX in the past. I agree, can we please have TACAN

 

[robby88]

As to period support I was thinking mainly from the addon perspective and perhaps SDK and system changes to make it a bit easier to implement. For example to make it easier to create a Golden Wings type addon. Period support would also have to cover AI too. I was thinking along the lines of something like CFS3 xdp files which all simulation objects, aircraft, vehicles and non autogen buildings have. XDP files have both a starting and ending date as to when the object can exist in the sim. That would only be part of the solution as it does not cover autogen objects, or terrain textures. Anyway the more that one looks at it, it's still a massive task and will only become more complex with the trend to use higher resolution data, especially for terrain textures. As a developer who likes to create WW1 aircraft, flying over Northern France with freeways and modern vehicles below destroys the illusion somewhat.

As mentioned above I agreed with Mud as to military capabilities without actual combat in the sim and also agree with Ian's comments too. It's important to preserve FS's rating. I don't know if guns or weapons training missions would affect that rating. Basic SDK support for weapons systems is what I'd like to see so that 3rd party devs can more easily create combat addons. Commercial addons can have their own rating.

Combat is not new to FS. The first version of FS that I flew was FSII by Sub Logic on the Amiga platform, which featured a mini WW1 dogfight combat game. I'm not sure if the MS version of FS2 featured this also.

The 3 new Russian combat sims will probably partially fill the void caused by the absence of a MSCFS, but they won't include the entire world. One would have to create a new map, similar to the situation with CFS3.

BTW my comments and observations in post #27 above on the possible direction of MS sims and ESP were largely derived from media articles, BRW etc, and interviews of, and reported presentations by Shawn Firminger, head of Aces Studios, plus the occasional glance at MS Careers, and also some old blog posts by Aces members. :mixedsmi: The recent blog article by James Governor is interesting and enlightening in that respect too.

Hopefully the platform approach will encourage a flow of technology between products.

It would have been nice to see another MS produced FSX addon adding some new features and systems to FSX, given that Phil Taylor said holidays 2010 is the earliest we could see FS 11. Anyway we've got two years to enjoy FSX as it stands and I'm sure we'll see some great 3rd party add-ons.

 

[Bjoern]

The problem is most combat sims don't model the entire globe, even if they let you add aircraft. So they're far more restrictive than FS.

Strike Fighters/Wo* isn't.


Why would you need an entire globe in a combat sim (except for ICBM'ing)??

Most of the action is usually focused on a single country and the numbers of people doing a Gulf War II+III-like xyz-thousand miles-round the globe-approach just to do a two minute bomb run is negligible in my eyes.
If this was contained in an add-on, it would be okay. But as a fixed element (and possible bug lair) in a non-shooting flightsim? No, thanks.

Oh, and Mud -- buddy, FS is now and always has been a civilian flight sim, and also a civil flight sim. I like a good combat sim as much as anybody, but I think adding the ability to shoot down another plane is not part of the FS mindset.

Well put! :ernae:

I'll be happy if it's just visually complex/accurate and somewhat backward compatible to preserve my costs of addons without a $2000 hardware upgrade.

Would you ditch the backward compatibility for a better looking and more efficient rendering engine?
I know I would.
(And I hope that's the path Aces will take.)

Excellent idea! Moving trains please

Don't ask for a direct relation to your post, but this gave me an idea...

What about an indexing .ini for ground AI vehicles?

FSXI will ship with some basic, generic models for road, rail and ship traffic. Now developers can jump on the train and model some low poly vehicles, like steam engines, special cars or trains like the ICE.

Then they just copy the model folder into FSXI and add an entry to that .ini containing folder name, global region of appearance, probabilities of appearance, travelling speed and whatever else.

This way, custom ground objects could use the predefined highways, water lanes and railways without ever having to rely on a "flightplan"!

Aces would have only minimal development requirements and the possibilities of "customizing" the FS world would increase tenfold!

(Could also be expandable to trees and autogen buildings!)

 

[Lionheart]

Could also be expandable to trees and autogen buildings!

Bjoern

Now that would be brilliant. Imagine the countrysides with proper architectures...

I had wanted to do this to the FS9 platform.

Originally Posted by srgalahad
I'll be happy if it's just visually complex/accurate and somewhat backward compatible to preserve my costs of addons without a $2000 hardware upgrade.

Amen!!!!!! :ernae: :ernae:



Bill

 

[Tweek]

Why would you need an entire globe in a combat sim (except for ICBM'ing)??

Most of the action is usually focused on a single country and the numbers of people doing a Gulf War II+III-like xyz-thousand miles-round the globe-approach just to do a two minute bomb run is negligible in my eyes.

I think you're missing the point slightly. The advantage of having the entire world modelled means that you could fly wherever you want, rather than simply wanting to travel long distances for your missions. In Lock On, you're limited to a small section of Russia. In Strike Fighters, you're limited to one type of terrain, which is pretty featureless, repetetive and unrealistic. With the entire globe, you could choose to recreate the Battle of Britain over Kent, crack out a Sabre or MiG-15 over Korea, or maybe a Skyraider or Crusader over Vietnam. You wouldn't have to be limited by the constraints of the scenery, like you are in every combat sim I've ever played.

But, I also wouldn't be opposed to it being an addon. I'm still not sure why it bothers people so much, seeing as you'd hardly be forced to use it, even if it was part of the base sim, but I suppose an Acceleration style addon would be a fair compromise.

Would you ditch the backward compatibility for a better looking and more efficient rendering engine?

Yes.

I have heard that true FSX addons may well be compatible with FS11 (unconfirmed, of course), and I certainly wouldn't be against that, so long as it didn't hinder any real ground breaking progress that'll bring FS11 up to a truely new level.

 

[Bjoern]

Next idea: We have an animation system which also applies to humans. We have human models with quite few polies. Logical consequence?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_BPs6tYhBw
and
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qIJKVDUfqvM


You might catch my drift.

You wouldn't have to be limited by the constraints of the scenery, like you are in every combat sim I've ever played.

I don't know which sims you have played but from all combat flight sims I've ever had my hands on, only the IL-2 series has ever taken me to the edge of the modeled terrain.
The whole rest was clever enough to concentrate all the action more in the map centre.


Oh, and if you want true military AI, you'll also need to make them dogfight. And regarding the brainiacs the AI aircraft in FSX are, I'd say you'll be pretty disappointed once you're up against whatever you want to kill.

 

[MudMarine]

spotlope: Oh, and Mud -- buddy, FS is now and always has been a civilian flight sim, and also a civil flight sim. I like a good combat sim as much as anybody, but I think adding the ability to shoot down another plane is not part of the FS mindset. They may be developing a combat sim as well (I hope they are, in fact), but I wouldn't expect to see blazing guns in FSnext anytime soon. Not adding combat doesn't constitute ignoring you. They heard you, they just don't agree that it's a priority.

READ MY POST! Funny, I didn't ask for a combat sim!! A "civil" flight sim......I must be "un-civilize". I guess dropping a bomb means it would turn MSFS into combat sim........:isadizzy: I asked for a sim so I can do what real pilots do! Last time I checked military pilots where real pilots! I'm just glad we have those "un-cililized" pilots that protect our freedom to play our "civilized" games. And I also didn't know we were buds?!

 

[MudMarine]

I can just see the headlines in the NY Times the day after FSx with combat features is released.

Microsoft Builds Simulator to Train Terrorists

Note: With RAZBAM's A-6 add-on missions you can drop bombs. Also RealFlight may be releasing their F6F Hellcat with working guns and bombs/rockets. That is a "combat" feature. Now I don't read the NY Times but I haven't seen or heard anything about a story concerning FSX with combat features.................Terrorist are going to do what terrorist's do. FSX combat features or not.

 

[spotlope]

READ MY POST! Funny, I didn't ask for a combat sim!! A "civil" flight sim......I must be "un-civilize". I guess dropping a bomb means it would turn MSFS into combat sim........:isadizzy: I asked for a sim so I can do what real pilots do! Last time I checked military pilots where real pilots! I'm just glad we have those "un-cililized" pilots that protect our freedom to play our "civilized" games. And I also didn't know we were buds?!

Seems like you need to cool out a little, Mud. Dropping bombs sounds like combat to me... and yes, it's most uncivil. Sorry for implying that you and I were on friendly terms. My mistake.

 

[heywooood]

FSX or FSXI can remain civil even if the community can't....

There will be other sims for air combat...RRG Studios is working on a Korean sim using all or elements of the new 1c Games Storm of War engine...

neoqb is working on a WWI air combat sim...

1c's Storm of War:Battle of Brittain will be just the first installment of that developers' new WWII air combat sim

Eagle Developement has the new Black Shark modern helo / jet war sim being released to the west in short order...its already out in eastern europe...

and FighterOps is still going on...

So if M/S wants to limit the combat aspects of their FlightSim franchise to flower bombs and gun flashes without balistics or 3d damage modeling thats ok with me...

1c Storm of War will have moving traffic and trains BtW - and likely so will the RRG Studios project Galba

maybe someday this debate on M/S combat simulation will die a quiet death - its nice to have a civilian non combat flight sim and not have bullets flying at least in one corner of the world.

Maybe we can just assume that the next M/S flight sim will also be non combat and just discuss what we would like to see in it - and save the air combat possibilities for a seperate thread

 

[heywooood]

I should probably change my avatar and sig. pics for this forum

I love flying airwar sims - but I'm liking FSX for what it offers seperately, but equally