Classic British Flight Sim

I was going though the latest FSX propaganda from M$ and saw in there flash demo a list of 20 aircraft that are included. They say that the standard version will have 21 AC and the deluxe version will have 24. But here is the list.

Airbus A31
Air Creation SL450 Ultra Light
Bell 206B jet Ranger
Boeing 737-800
Boeing 747-400
Bombardier CRJ-700
Bombardier Learjet 45
Cessna 208B Grand Caravan
Cessna 172 Skyhawk SP
deHavilland DHC-2 Beaver Float Plane
DG 808S 18 Meter Sailplane
Douglas DC-3
Extra 300S
Grumman G-21A goose
Maule M7-260 Super Rocket
Mooney Bravo
Piper J3 Cub
Raytheon Baron 58
Raytheon King Air 350
Robinson R22 Beta 2

I am glad to see the DC-3 and the Cub made the cut, but I will miss the Comet and the Vega.

Nice to see a less 'American' slant on things Joe

That said.. perhaps a scratch or so away from the surface will reveal improvements that we can all incorporate into our freeware offerings

ATB

DaveB :tab:

I am glad to see the DC-3 and the Cub made the cut, but I will miss the Comet and the Vega.

Since planes are backward compatible (or so they say), you could import the default FS2004 Comet, Vega, Vimy, Wright Flyer, etc.

I've looked at the Comet and it is translucent

Indications are the aircraft are not fully backwards compatible.

Garry

I've noticed that all aircraft with the "translucent" problem are ones that use the Alpha Channel in FS9 for shine instead of transparency. FSX apparently uses the Alpha Channel for transparency only. Thus, it should be fairly easy to fix the problem by simply eliminating the alpha channel in the textures.

Hi Chris

Just eliminating the alpha channel will not help as that will mean the colours for the natural metals and golds will be will be wrong

Also there are translucent problems with paints that have no alpha

The Alpha is causing transparent, not translucent.

Garry

The translucent problem I've seen has been related to aircraft that don't have the "_T" textures and/or Alpha textures that are used for shine. I'm sure there's a new way to do shine with FSX, we just have to see the SDK first.

It might be worth seeing how the default textures have been done?

i have just downloaded the Demo, so i am going to have a good look at the textures setup

The textures are saved in DDS format.

I realise there will be new ways to make the shine but all I am saying is the backwards compatability is not as good as they say.

I don't see the pint in trying anything ubtil we are sure this is the final way the models display.

Garry