ANSWERED FTX Global "lclookup.bgl" causing issues

[Just Fly]

Hi there!

 

Not sure if I'm posting this in the right forum. I found this issue using the Iceland OFF Demo, but I guess people using FTX Global could also be affected by this.

The issue is the following: when flying outside FTX regions, I used to select "Default" in FTX Central and everything was OK. I installed the Iceland OFF Demo (I still don't have FTX Global) back in October 2013 and haven't flown outside FTX regions since. Recently though, I decided to check some long forgotten addons and set FTX Central to "Global". I found out that this setting caused landclass issues with some regional addons I was using (not fom ORBX). When I manually replaced the "Global" lclookup.bgl file with the FSX defaut one, those issues disappeared. "Hybrid" mode caused similar issues.

 

Here's a GIF I made showing the difference between "Global", "Hybrid" and FSX default lclookup.bgl. The addon is African Airstrip Adventures by Aerosoft.

 

 

While I understand that you may need those different lclookup.bgl files in order for FTX Global to work properly, it would be really helpful if you could add the Default button back in FTX Central.

 

Thanks in anticipation,

Just Fly

[Just Fly]

Bump

[Holger Sandmann]

Hi there,

 

looks like that add-on uses its own set of custom textures meaning it's not just a "pure" landclass file. The non-hybird version of the Global lclookup file doesn't have any major "hacks" but it unlocks seasonal variants, lightmaps, and blendmasks for several classes. Judging by the squared-off textures and odd block repetition it looks like missing blendmasks and/or seasonal variants.

 

We don't make those changes just because we can but because it significantly enhances the display of landclass textures. For example, ACES never got around to make custom blendmasks for their own urban and agricultural ground texture sets; instead they recycled the FS9 versions. Not only does that not make any sense (because the FS9 versions use 5-m pixel resolution and their content has nothing to do with the content of the new FSX textures) but there are also fewer variants per texture set in FS9 and ACES locked those into place via lclookup.bgl. Thus, there are many classes in FSX that have 15 or 16 unique variants but only 7 will ever properly blend, even if you make custom blendmasks for all of them. 

 

Unfortunately, bringing back the Default option for FTX Central isn't really feasible because it's much more than just switching lclookup; it would essentially require uninstalling FTX Global Base, which would take several minutes each time. In fact, you can already do this yourself via the available Global uninstaller. 

 

In theory it's possible to adjust the African add-on to work with FTX Global by adding "dummy" duplicates of the missing files via a batch file. In fact, it would make it look better due to the enhanced blending masks and other features. However, it would take some work to determine which files are missing by comparing file set names in the add-ons texture folder with those in \Scenery\World\texture. 

 

In short, while FTX Global Base is fully compatible with third-party landclass add-ons that utilize the landclass textures in \Scenery\World\texture it's not compatible with those that include their own texture sets unless those add-ons also use the extended sets unlocked in lclookup. If manually replacing just lclookup.bgl appears to allow you to use that add-on without "breaking" anything else then that's probably the best and fastest work-around.  

 

Cheers, Holger

[Just Fly]

Thanks a lot for taking the time to type such a comprehensive answer, Holger! I now understand the mechanism behind all this much better.

I absolutely forgot that there were in fact many more files that would need to be switched on/off, hence the now senseless suggestion to bring back the Default option in FTX Central. I'll simply go ahead and continue switching those files manually when using that particular addon.

 

Once again, thank you very much for taking the time to explain all this!

 

Cheers,

Just Fly