North American Airports

[mike stout]

I am a recent convert to Orbx scenery and am glad I did. I think they did an outstanding job with FTX North America. Sure would like to see them Start making major airports.

[Geezer]

They have already made hundreds of airports for north America.  They're free.  Just look in that section.  There are also a few very nice payware ones.  Orbx tends not to make major ones at all.  The idea is more tuned to low and slow VFR and bush flying.

[Matt McGee]

9 hours ago, mike stout said:

Sure would like to see them Start making major airports.

There have been many discussions about this topic over the years.  

The replies from the staff have generally indicated a business model based on small to midsize GA airports, with the occasional regional airport.

If I remember correctly, a couple of their considerations were:

- The increased time (= cost) required to make larger airports versus the target airport price point.

- Larger airports have increased demand on the sim/computer (more details and objects to render) which result in lower FPS on the average user's PC.

 

IMHO, the recent YMML v3 release is an indicator of the challenge of airport size versus detail with a good FPS.  

I think YMML is the largest airport that Orbx has made and one of the earlier ones.  It was an OOM generator for many people, even with airport details turned down/off.  Version 3 is the result of Orbx's efforts to make YMML FPS friendly, while bringing its graphics up to the current level.  

I think they succeeded (with 3D grass turned off), but I'm guessing that the amount of work it took reinforced their original view.

[Nick Cooper]

My personal view, not necessarily that of FTX, is that there are already numerous developers of large airports.

In the case of very large airports, there is often already a choice of developer.

As Matt says, I personally (again) cannot see a credible return for developing large but niche airports.

Mind you, ESSA is an example of what FTX developers can do and will stand comparison with any other developer's

large airport.

 

[goodperson36]

Mike you also have to be careful with other third party airports sometimes the scenery does not mesh well with orbx FTX global. if those issues arise just ask orbx for support they will help you at most you might have to change some BGL files to make it work or to blend in. Hope this helps. Hopefully other developers well catch on to orbx beautiful FTX global and make it compatible so that we do not have to keep changing files lol.

[mike stout]

I was flying FSX with the entire western half of the US in photo real. I fly with South West Virtual and It looked very good from FL360. I added the tree line scenery for every state and some pay ware airports. I was pretty happy with it until my computer took its last breath. I ordered a "Jet Line System", and the guys there told me to dump the photo scenery and get the Orbx, that I would be VERY happy with it. So I bought Global Base, Vector and Southern California. I liked it but thought Global Base was not quite there for the US. Then here comes FTX North America, Active sky 16 and Cloud Art and suddenly I was blown away but what I was seeing from the cockpit! So now I thought that if these guys could make some airports I fly to then I am a customer for sure.  By the way, my pay-ware airports work great with this scenery.