Ultimate Traffic 2

[ChrisHunt]

Downloading Ultimate Traffic 2 as I type. Tried this morning but a power outage put paid to that - decided to wait until the wind had died down before trying again. I doubt that I'll get any chance to play today but I'll post a quick critique when I get the chance (probably be end of this week).

Regards,
Chris

[ChrisHunt]

Well (as you do) I jumped straight into UT2 - problems but I did it in the end. Impressions... not too good. At first I didn't see any a/c on the ground or in the air despite traffic being set to 100% in UT2 and the sim. Registered and got access to the support forum and read about similar issues for other users. Anyway to cut a long story short it turned out that it was the anti-virus system (Kaspersky Internet Security in this case) that was preventing UT2 from talking properly with FSX. I set a couple of UT2 exes and FSX.EXE to trusted (not scanned) and all was well - could now see a/c. No diffinitive answer from UT2 support yet published on their forum (more about this later).

With commercial traffic set at 100% the amount of a/c at and movements to/from airports might best be described as sparse, e.g. 9 a/c on the ground at Stansted, 18 at Gatwick and 59 at Heathrow. One air movement at Stansted (departure) in 10 minutes and 1 in and 7 out at Heathrow in 15 minutes. Most regional airports are blessed with one or two aircraft but I didn't hang around long enough to see if anything was going to happen. Airports were visited at around midday today so there should have been plenty of commercial traffic around.

Another visit to the forum revealed a number of disgruntled customers - support (or lack of) taking too long to answer queries (or not at all in a number of cases). Talk of a service pack but no information for a number of weeks (and still not despite a request). Not a happy or particularly well looked after bunch. Shades of Horizon and FEX here I thought.

In short, the models are good but there are a number of significant flaws which need addressing pronto (and it's been out a good few months now) - this may or may not happen in the immediate future but I was sufficiently unimpressed to request a refund. Of course this is only my opinion and no doubt other views will differ but I do remember the original Ultimate Traffic for FS9 and getting p1ssed off because it took so long to get taxi clearance and then to the threshold (lots of traffic) and that was Birmingham! Had to turn the traffic sliders down to get airborne before tea.

Regards,
Chris

[Badgerman]

Hello Chris,

I've been running this for months, and I have had more than one experience of getting a bit peeved as I had to wait so long to get my turn to fly... or worse yet, always getting to my destination at the same time "every a/c in the world" showed up, all scrambling to land. I've had so much traffic at larger airfields I've had to back out of the sim, lower the traffic sliders, then re-enter the same flight - and my "monster" rig normally doesn't even hiccup. When flying out of UK destinations, I tend to stick to the smaller cities, and not being familiar with the local traffic I can't say I was unhappy. Flying out of Canadian airfields I know well - it's appeared to be rather realistic, I'm always waiting for flights I know are scheduled to get out of my way...

Sorry you're not happy... maybe I'm just easy to please!

Mark

[DaveB]

Hmm.. thanks both for that.

For at least 80% of your post Mark, I thought you were unhappy too but it's late and not making sense makes sense

I think I'll hold off a while with UT2

ATB

DaveB

[VEGAS]

Most of the points raised seem to crop up on Aerosofts Mytraffic X. Especially if I select the most modern era aircraft. The older classics don't seem to be as much a strain on the system.

Even tempted to go back to default AI and put real airline repaints on them.

[WhisperJet]

I use UT1 and am pretty disappointed with it. Many aircraft types are not featured, no russian planes at all, just absolute mainstream.
Then, the optical impression lacks quality and detail.

I'm sure that has changed with the new version, however I still don't see a reason to pay for that pack when you get top-quality models for free at World of AI. Moreover at WOAI I download only stuff for the regions I fly in. And they're beautifully done.
http://www.world-of-ai.com/

This has led to some kind of "mixed look" at my airports. I'm thinking of de-installing UT and filling the gap with WOAI now.
May be a job for a cold winter afternoon.

Cheers,

Nick.

[Fodda]

... I've had so much traffic at larger airfields I've had to back out of the sim, lower the traffic sliders, then re-enter the same flight...

You don't need to exit the flight to get to the front of the queue fast, just up the sim rate to 8x for a second as this will reset all the AI and you can taxi straight to the active (or get rid of those AI that barge in and get clearance to land before you). Not realistic really, but saves on sitting in a queue and fuel wasteage.

[WhisperJet]

Ah, Fodda, thanks very much for the hint! I didn't know that.

And besides that ATC handling AI traffic isn't too realistic either...

Cheers,

Nick

[Fodda]

Nick: No probs mate. What happens basically is that AI is present and moving on all time compression modes below 8x (1/2, normal, 2 and 4 times that is). When you select the higher time compression modes, the sim just doesn't bother with AI any more until you drop back down to the slower modes when it places all the AI again as if the sim has just started. I just hit "R" (to get into time compression mode) then "="three times followed by "-" three times very quickly. Only takes about 5 seconds to clear all the AI back to gates, parking, approach etc.

It's also very useful for those times when stupid AI pilots taxi towards each other and then just stop as they're blocking each other's access, or block a whole runway because they can't exit thanks to stopped AI on a taxiway.

[Badgerman]

Thanks for the tip Fodda!

At least your message was much easier to understand than mine was

Mark