Stock X-Plane 10 quality question :D

[Sigmoid]

Well to be honest, I've never been part of the FSX world, and this level of extensibility and ecosystem is quite surprising to me at this point, and it feels a bit like wandering into a department store in China as a westerner. (...I think you might only get that one if you've ever wandered into a department store in China as a westerner, but... XD)

 

So I'm wondering what exactly is the state and quality of the STOCK stuff in X-Plane 10, all the bagful of DVDs of it. What I've seen of the stock scenery on youtube seemed kind of awesome compared to anything else I've seen on the market or in Free Software. Still most discussion is about, and most show-off vids on youtube are chock full of payware and freeware add-ons.

So I wonder how the stock scenery compares in a world of payware scenery, free OSM-based scenery generators, super-high-quality scenery improvers, etc.

 

Also, what about the stock aircraft? I heard that in XPlane 9, the stock Cessna was so bad it hurt. Do they live up to any standard, or does one usually start by buying or downloading "proper" aircraft models?

[Mario Donick]

In many parts the default scenery is very good.

 

The height mesh (i.e. the basic landscape) is very good, compared to FSX and XP9. (I don't know about P3D). You certainly won't need stuff like "Ultimate Terrain" which is almost necessary in FSX.

 

Then, you have OSM, i.e. accurate roads and railroads in many parts of the world. This is something I can't live without when I fire up FSX from time to time. These streets are a real benefit for every VFR pilot.

 

The ground textures have become better and better over time. Certain places of the world look absolutely stunning. Yesterday, for example, I was flying around Sarajevo and Mostar in Bosnia Herzegovina, with the new freeware sceneries, and it was really beautiful.

 

 

On the downside, we currently have autogen, which has also improved over time, but is still U.S. style all over the world, and still lacks night textures. You can, however, easily install OSM buildings for free.

 

We don't have seasons currently; but at least winter is possible since some months with a tiny freeware addon. John Spahn is working on WinterMAXX to improve the winter experience.

 

The clouds are also not quite there yet. But there are already many replacement textures available, also for sky colors.

 

And of course, airports are empty if you don't install freeware or payware addons for the airports. There are many websites and lists about this. I have made one, too, only focusing on airports which are worth the download in my subjective opinion: http://goo.gl/maps/hVjCO

 

 

So, all in all, XP default scenery is certainly much better than FSX default scenery.

 

 

Default aircraft ... is okay, but as in FSX, I'd surely go for decent payware. There is also some quite nice freeware around.

Edited April 3, 2013 by mariodonick

[Sigmoid]

Then, you have OSM, i.e. accurate roads and railroads in many parts of the world. This is something I can't live without when I fire up FSX from time to time. These streets are a real benefit for every VFR pilot.

So the stock terrain is based on OSM? BTW, how does autogen work, is it pre-generated, or on-demand in runtime, placing building models as needed by the map?

(Eg. if someone were to come up with an Africa autogen algorithm and models, then is it just "plugged into" the X-Plane autogenerator, or is it a replacement for the actual pregenerated scenery?)

 

On the downside, we currently have autogen, which has also improved over time, but is still U.S. style all over the world, and still lacks night textures. You can, however, easily install OSM buildings for free.

 

What do you mean night textures? Like skyscrapers with windows lit etc.?

Edited April 3, 2013 by Sigmoid

[Mario Donick]

So the stock terrain is based on OSM? BTW, how does autogen work, is it pre-generated, or on-demand in runtime, placing building models as needed by the map?

(Eg. if someone were to come up with an Africa autogen algorithm and models, then is it just "plugged into" the X-Plane autogenerator, or is it a replacement for the actual pregenerated scenery?)

 

Yes, both the terrain and the streets, railroads, lakes, forests, positions and types of autogen are based on OSM. From time to time, in XP updates also the OSM data will be updated.

 

If you want to know how autogen works internally, I suggest reading this extremly informative article: http://xsimreviews.com/2011/12/10/developer-interview-andras-fabian-mr-x-terrain/

 

With night textures I mean the lightning of the buildings at night.

Edited April 3, 2013 by mariodonick

[Sigmoid]

That was a quite interesting read, thanks! Though I'm more interested in the 3d structures (ie. roads and buildings), which weren't discussed too much.

 

I've had a look around the downloadables and payware stuff, and my "chinese department store" feeling didn't abate much. A lot of it seems not only not worth the price, but actually inferior to the stock scenery. I wonder if there are any packages of autogen assets (road models, buildings, town blocks, trees, etc.) for various non-US localities, like African villages and Chinese slums. I didn't see any of those.

 

What I did see a lot of was re-texturing the default green grass into, well, either actual satellite imagery, or random satellite imagery tiles, basically making the whole thing uglier than FlightGear (and that's pretty ugly). It goes pretty much against the very idea of how the XP10 scenery system was designed, doesn't it now?  When I first saw the clean "model railroad diorama" look of XPlane 10, I thought "oh my god, this is definitely the future". Sure, it may look like a diorama instead of an actual city, but at least it doesn't look like something created by an insane patchwork artist, which pretty much all other flightsims look like. Paying money to go "back to the past" seems rather silly.

Edited April 4, 2013 by Sigmoid