FSXI?

[toprob]

QUOTE (SUBS17 @ Aug 13 2008, 01:04 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I wonder why they don't make Train simulator and Ship simulator with FS for MP compatible? It could add another aspect to MP flying over ships and trains that are actually MP controlled.

Since TS and FS will share the same 'world', I assume that this is where they are heading -- although maybe not in the next version. Certainly within a decade I'd like to see a sim where I can fly a commercial jet into NZAA, or a Cessna into Ardmore, take the bus or train to Pukekohe, in time to race a V8:)

Someone else could 'film' the race from a copter, and stream to spectators -- including watching on TV while travelling the Tranzscenic...

[FlyingKiwi]

Wouldn't be surprised if there are "virtual worlds" like that within the next ten years; just look at how far videogames have come in the last ten.

[Anthony]

Microsoft makes a train simulator?
That's interesting... I guess it's like FS but for train geeks.
Subs has a good idea too, multiplayer with some other stuff would be better than a bit of AI I think.
Be interesting to see that happen.

[Yak52aholic]

QUOTE (Timmo @ Aug 13 2008, 12:48 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I know this is probably weird for a flight simmer to say (the pot calling the kettle black?) but I just dont GET Train Sim? Maybe I just dont know enough about the process of train driving but....it just seems like it would be kinda boring?

As I say, a lot of people would probably say that about flight sim too.....us simmers are an odd bunch

Hehe that's exactly what I say to people that play World Of Warcraft for hours on end...........

I have MSTS1 (it was made by Kuju, who made their own Rail Simulator) and Trainz installed so I am hooked on train driving I suppose.

[deaneb]

QUOTE (toprob @ Aug 13 2008, 01:26 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Since TS and FS will share the same 'world', I assume that this is where they are heading -- although maybe not in the next version. Certainly within a decade I'd like to see a sim where I can fly a commercial jet into NZAA, or a Cessna into Ardmore, take the bus or train to Pukekohe, in time to race a V8:)

Someone else could 'film' the race from a copter, and stream to spectators -- including watching on TV while travelling the Tranzscenic...

I said a few years back, that my prediction is eventually we won't have the core scenery on our hard discs. I foresee a time when a virtual sim earth/world exists online and when we choose to fly, race cars or drive trains then its this world we will interact in, choosing who else to share it with. Imagine war games with ground based players, Flight simmers, tank drivers and ship capains all coming together in battle !!. I can see no limit to achieving this in the future, perhaps within 10 years.

Deane

[SUBS17]

Its possible but unlikely since players of other types of games don't like the idea of being in such enviroments with other sim types or they might prefer to only fly with a select group. One thing that has been discussed though is the possibility of adding a political and strategic aspect to future jet combat flight sims. This would be on a global map like FSX where players choose a country and Air Force and then participate online. If the players squadron has an exercise in Europe and they are based in the US then they would fly there. Same with conflict they might have to fly there or use an AI player to fly their jet to the forward base. The political aspect might involve trade, spying, war and allies. In order to spy on an enemy it might involve actually flying the spy player to the country and parachuting them in. For FSX they could do something similar it'll be interesting to see what they do with the next version of FS.

[Timmo]

haha Best case scenario: Total immersion with lots of other traffic on the sea, air, road rail and foot.

Worst case scenario: Some idiot in his F15 decides it would be funny to fire an AMRAAM at that lumbering ol 747 on finals (after you have just spent 12 hours on a trans-Pacific flight to LAX)

[SUBS17]

Theres a very simple way to fix that though is to have a requirement to pass flight trainning and be qualified before you could go on the main server. This would be quite in depth requiring UPT and IFF qualifications.(which is what FighterOps will have) that then he would be unlikely to shoot down a 747. Even if tommorrow someone made Falcon merged into FSX I doubt any F4 pilots would shoot down a 747 the level of experience is usually quite high unless it was a noob. On the other hand I could imagine a FSX player shooting a 747 down if they had the ability to because its normally people just flying around not a simmer whose main goal is to fly a mission tasked out for a campaign. The biggest number of online players are the FPS crowd and merging them with other sims could be chaos from a flight simmers perspective but if they had similar trainning missions it would work out pretty much the same and that being said most Arma players work well with flight simmers since its a long walk to the front line if you shoot your ride down. Although on occassions where I have seen guys do that they normally just kick them off the server.(and Black Shark you can get out and walk around your helicopter so FPS might be added to DCS series later)

[Yak52aholic]

You can always dream fellas Lets just hope Microsoft is reading this.....

[Anthony]

QUOTE (Yak52aholic @ Aug 15 2008, 03:06 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

You can always dream fellas Lets just hope Microsoft is reading this.....

Why not actually tell them about it?
Wasn't there some email address where you could send suggestions or comments about FS and stuff to Microsoft?
Or it may have been one of the developer's blogs, I will see if I can find it.

[beaufighterguy]

QUOTE (Anthony @ Aug 15 2008, 04:08 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Why not actually tell them about it?
Wasn't there some email address where you could send suggestions or comments about FS and stuff to Microsoft?
Or it may have been one of the developer's blogs, I will see if I can find it.

Hey good point Anthony,no harm in trying eh?

[deaneb]

QUOTE (SUBS17 @ Aug 14 2008, 11:17 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Its possible but unlikely since players of other types of games don't like the idea of being in such enviroments with other sim types or they might prefer to only fly with a select group.

As I said we would choose who we interact with. I didn't mean a global free for all. I might want to fly alone,or join a group of simmers to fly with in the same way as is done now. The only difference is we'd all be sharing the same scenery base.

Deane

[happytraveller]

Read this piece about the new MS train simulator and animated people, so wonder if this feature will make it into FS11?

http://tsinsider.com/Articles/AboutTS2/Characters.aspx

smooth landings.

[Ian Warren]

Yip .. FSX..whoops 11 .. I hickcupped .. FSE it is .... the new name FSE .. next generation Microsoft Flight sim has been named

[FlyerMike]

QUOTE (happytraveller @ Sep 3 2008, 02:16 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Read this piece about the new MS train simulator and animated people, so wonder if this feature will make it into FS11?

http://tsinsider.com/Articles/AboutTS2/Characters.aspx

smooth landings.

This looks great!
The one thing that I miss in FSX is enough people especially since the "cardboard cutout" people from FS9 do not rotate to viewer anymore.
Incidentally does anyone know of any successful libraries of people for FSX? (preferebly 3D)
Anywat hope to see people in FSXl (or FSE)
Cheers
Mike

[deaneb]

Those people do look good. As well as people at airports etc, the one thing that I think is lacking in FS is dtailed co-pilots and other crew in virtual cockpits. Seems weird to have a super detailed interior cockpit in say a 737, but there is no co pilot sitting there with you.

Deane

[toprob]

QUOTE (FlyerMike @ Aug 30 2008, 07:18 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

This looks great!
The one thing that I miss in FSX is enough people especially since the "cardboard cutout" people from FS9 do not rotate to viewer anymore.
Incidentally does anyone know of any successful libraries of people for FSX? (preferebly 3D)
Anywat hope to see people in FSXl (or FSE)
Cheers
Mike

QUOTE (deaneb @ Aug 31 2008, 11:04 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Those people do look good. As well as people at airports etc, the one thing that I think is lacking in FS is dtailed co-pilots and other crew in virtual cockpits. Seems weird to have a super detailed interior cockpit in say a 737, but there is no co pilot sitting there with you.

Deane

It would be a good assumption that if MS are doing all this work for TS, then it'll end up in FSE. I would guess that we'll see a lot of high quality ramp rats etc, with some low-poly ambient passenger folk.
And I bet that someone somewhere is building a library of 3D people for FSX. Lately I've been looking at this area, as I needed to make one character for a mission. Here are some things I've learnt from the experience:)

1. There is a huge online community dedicated to what I call 'dress-up dolls'. There are some basic 3D characters available with tools such as Poser, and people design/share/buy/sell clothing and accessories for them. I would think (and hope) that most do this to flesh-out their 3D scenes with realistic people, but I suspect that there are a lot of virtual dress-up girlfriends out there... Here's a Wikipedia article, but I could have just as easily linked to an online store selling tongue morphs. (Don't ask.)

2. The MS article makes some really good points -- I wish I'd read it before I began, as I needed to figure out a lot of things myself. 3D people need to be animated, otherwise they look like statues, and it isn't as easy as you'd think to make a life-like animation --they mention using motion capture, but I've had to do it the hard way -- not really too successfully.

3. Getting a model out of something like Poser into GMAX is easy enough once you know how, but getting to that stage took me a few weeks. Then you need to get to grips with the concept of bones to animate -- basically you build a skeleton, link vertices from your 3D person to the appropriate bone, then animate the bones. Ideally your model will move with the bones in a life-like manner:~

4. A SDK tool that turns 3D people into animated FSE characters would be nice:)

Deane's comment is spot-on, it is quite creepy -- and unnecessarily low-tech -- to do a mission with an invisible co-pilot or passenger. People used to other modern 3D games would think there's something wrong with their sim when they come across this for the first time.

[FlyerMike]

QUOTE (toprob @ Sep 5 2008, 12:55 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

It would be a good assumption that if MS are doing all this work for TS, then it'll end up in FSE. I would guess that we'll see a lot of high quality ramp rats etc, with some low-poly ambient passenger folk.
And I bet that someone somewhere is building a library of 3D people for FSX. Lately I've been looking at this area, as I needed to make one character for a mission. Here are some things I've learnt from the experience:)

1. There is a huge online community dedicated to what I call 'dress-up dolls'. There are some basic 3D characters available with tools such as Poser, and people design/share/buy/sell clothing and accessories for them. I would think (and hope) that most do this to flesh-out their 3D scenes with realistic people, but I suspect that there are a lot of virtual dress-up girlfriends out there... Here's a Wikipedia article, but I could have just as easily linked to an online store selling tongue morphs. (Don't ask.)

2. The MS article makes some really good points -- I wish I'd read it before I began, as I needed to figure out a lot of things myself. 3D people need to be animated, otherwise they look like statues, and it isn't as easy as you'd think to make a life-like animation --they mention using motion capture, but I've had to do it the hard way -- not really too successfully.

3. Getting a model out of something like Poser into GMAX is easy enough once you know how, but getting to that stage took me a few weeks. Then you need to get to grips with the concept of bones to animate -- basically you build a skeleton, link vertices from your 3D person to the appropriate bone, then animate the bones. Ideally your model will move with the bones in a life-like manner:~

4. A SDK tool that turns 3D people into animated FSE characters would be nice:)

Deane's comment is spot-on, it is quite creepy -- and unnecessarily low-tech -- to do a mission with an invisible co-pilot or passenger. People used to other modern 3D games would think there's something wrong with their sim when they come across this for the first time.

Having followed the wikipedia link I am amazed at the number and variety of the products being advertised for Poser figures etc.
It seems strange that no-one has seen an opportunity to populate the FS World with such figures (whether animated or not). Afterall we made do with "cardboard cutouts" as sort of placeholders for something more realistic.
It is the "Mary (Marie) Celeste" effect at some of the superb Airfields being produced these days that really irritates.
I am glad that you think Microsoft will include more people next time around Robin but if anyone can produce any sort of figures in the meantime it would be much appreciated.
I assume that Poser is a purely commercial product? (and difficult as well?)
Cheers
Mike

[toprob]

QUOTE (FlyerMike @ Aug 31 2008, 12:53 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I assume that Poser is a purely commercial product? (and difficult as well?)

Poser was simply one way to source a 3D figure -- I've never actually seen it in action, I have a friend who does 3D for a living, so I just had him email me a variety of figures and poses until we could decide on something which worked ok in FSX. When I say a 'friend', I really mean someone who still finds it riotously funny that last year he earned just about exactly 10 times what I earned...

All the work is just done in GMAX -- the figure we settled on was a very low-poly version, which is simplified even more in GMAX until I ended up with less than 1000 vertices. Texturing and animation is all done in GMAX. Still, in answer to your question, it ain't easy...

Rather than have someone produce a whole bunch of 3D people, I'd rather someone build a few simple GMAX models with the bone structure attached. That way they could be textured in the same way that an aircraft repaint is done (altering an existing texture sheet, I mean) and animated to suit.

[FlyerMike]

QUOTE (toprob @ Sep 5 2008, 03:05 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Poser was simply one way to source a 3D figure -- I've never actually seen it in action, I have a friend who does 3D for a living, so I just had him email me a variety of figures and poses until we could decide on something which worked ok in FSX. When I say a 'friend', I really mean someone who still finds it riotously funny that last year he earned just about exactly 10 times what I earned...

All the work is just done in GMAX -- the figure we settled on was a very low-poly version, which is simplified even more in GMAX until I ended up with less than 1000 vertices. Texturing and animation is all done in GMAX. Still, in answer to your question, it ain't easy...

Rather than have someone produce a whole bunch of 3D people, I'd rather someone build a few simple GMAX models with the bone structure attached. That way they could be textured in the same way that an aircraft repaint is done (altering an existing texture sheet, I mean) and animated to suit.

It sounds really interesting (& difficult!)
Each time I vow to get stuck into some designing I pick up on another layer of difficulty that sort of makes me prevaricate even more!
BUT - I must apply myself and face the challenge of Gmax. At least the small foray with Instant Object Maker showed me that it can be fun and the feeling I had when that first model appeared in FSX was like when I caught my first fish!
I live in hope that the people appear in the near future!
Cheers
Mike