I saw and had a chance to demo the Reflex XTR at Toledo today. First let me say regarding the graphics WOW.

A lot of people (including yours truly) thought these were videos of real R/C airplanes at first. I was impressed with the realism of the background; trees, grass, clouds looked like a photograph.

Now I have to put the preceding under a disclaimer because I don’t own a sim and have nothing to compare to. I’ve been wanting to purchase a sim and pretty much decided on AFP. After seeing the G2, which was in the very next booth, and AFP today, I’m very confused what to get now because the Reflex XTR looked good.

Can anybody with plenty of experience with G2 or AFP that gave the new Reflex XTR a test drive at Toledo provide comparison comments?

Just my opinion but beyond the graphics looking better The planes didnt seem to 3d any better (or as good ) than AFP . But there was a kid about 10 making it look awful good

i saw the reflex too. and yeah WOW. it looked unbelievable. i cant say how real it flies because i did not try it myself but it looked amazing. i have owned FMS, G2 and now i use AFP. AFP is much better than FMS and somewhat better than G2. The graphics are better and in my limited experience i can say it flies more realistic.

I must second that the graphic engine on the sim is awesome.

Serge

Smallfly, when you say: “The planes didn’t seem to 3-D any better (or as good) than AFP� do you mean it was, not as easy? Or not as realistic as AFP? Even though the graphics were outstanding the overriding factor for me will be the closest assimilation to realistic flight.

I spent quite a bit of time in the booth listening to Wolfgang talk about his product to others. One interesting thing he said (major paraphrasing here) is: As the designer it is not his job to entertain but rather improve the users skills. In other words he’s is not going to ease the tough parts of reality to make it more enjoyable to play.

I dont want to comment further, 2 minutes at most on a flight sim with only 1 plane to try doesnt make a good comparison. Like I said the kid next to me made it 3d like a champ, but to a buddy of mine and me that particular extra we flew did not appear to fly realisticly, but Then again many planes in AFP don't fly realisticly either. At least in 3d mode, but you can learn a lot in the ones that do in a short amount of time. You need planes that torque roll easy (as an example) to learn how to get the basic reversing rythym down, but then you need touchy planes to improve those skills, AFP has those available, and reflex may as well, I just didnt get a chance to see it, too many people in line, not enough time

When bringing a product to a market, you have to decide upon a product strategy. That's what we did 12 years ago. Besides some specialities, a major target of our simulation is to make things hard enough to produce the training effect. A SIMULATION in nothing to "please" you but to make things just that little harder than reality in order to produce the training effect. Remember, on the field you will face some other influences we can't simulate like pure fear for the invested money ...

Another aspect of our product strategy is the use of your own radio INCLUDING your own stick sensivity, switch allignment and expo/dual rate setting. Showing a sim on an show is thrilling but it can give you just an idea of what will happen using your own radio with your own preferences. We had some customers claiming the sim was too aggressive, lo sensitive but more people were loving the REFLEX because they finally got something "demanding", something that needs just as much concentration as on the field if not more. "Mr.-10-year-old" was quite some fun but you should have seen the 8-year-old! What a talent - I hope his father explores that talent very carefully. So if you are looking for a fast "sucess", the REFLEX may not be the most ideal product. 3D hovering and torques are nothing that is the next step after showing some flying ability with your first trainer 40. It needs skills and experience to fly like that and skills and experience is built by training and learning.

Cheers - wolfgang

I agree that Reflex had great graphics. But thats the only good thing i can say about it. I own Realflight G2 and FMS. The realism and physics of the flying was very poor. It didn't impress me and im gonna stick with G2

Well, what was very poor? Tell me please. Wolfgang

... maybe I'm wrong but I think he's talking about G2...

Wolfgang, Thanks for answering my naïve questions at Toledo.

I’ve prtty much decided to spend my money on a Reflex. So please let us know as soon as the XTR is available in the states.

MRC will have them the second week of may.

I just bought the Reflex sim about a week ago, and all I can say is, this sim ROCKS. Defiantly the way to go in my opinion. I can't believe the way the helis fly compared to the real thing. I can't wait to get the XTR upgrade. Way to go Wolfgang

Iloveflyn,

I think you need to inhale less nitro fumes bud. G2 is by FAR the worst sim I have wasted any money on . . . ever. It did not handle wind well, stall speeds were wacky, aircraft on the expansion do not handle like the reallife counterparts (i happen to own some of those planes), all the customization features do more harm than good because they are needlessly complex. All that and you pay more for it than any other sim on the market currently, and if you need G3 you can count on it shelling out more money than any other competitors upgrades. I personally use AFP . .. sold G2 and got AFP. I am really happy with the sim i got and it's not perfect but much less expensive and better than G2 by a fair margin, and I can;t imagine that WSN bothered to bring oujt software that is worse especially since they have been doing sim development for 12 years.

If reflex is seriously worse than G2 please by all means enlighten us as to where, heck I am sure WSN wants to improve his software. What part of flight did you find unrealistic?

I saw the simulator just on the video of the Toledo trade show, and it looked nice. Now I have a couple questions. Wolfgang, you say that you can use your own control, will the sim be compatible also with the Futaba 9CAP and if so will the interface be USB or Serial? Will the interface be sold separately or will it be included in the sim? I am interested in all this since I have a computer with no serial adapter and I can use only USB. Oh and another thing, what will be the systems requirements to run the simulator smooth, I am not taking about the minimum you need, because as always if you have to run it at that level you want all the graphics at your max.
Thanks

For my two cents and for what it’s worthy i think the Reflex Sim is truly under rated
I ve been using this sim for around about a year now so I kinda got a handle on it now.
I have also used some ( not all )of the other sims on the market, and for me I find that they all have good and bad points.
And in whole I find that some of the better ones are a bit gamie !, for me reflex tends to be a straight Down the line no fuss RC Simulation.

There that must have scored me some brownie points with Wolf Gang
And can we get the XTL upgrade, is it in the UK yet ? I cant wait to see it !!

Macs

Reflex XTR will be available with a 9c square connector. It comes with a USB connector which is the copy protection so it is not available fpr seperate sales. The minimum is a P4 1200 with a 32 MB video card. Minimum in our spelling means all options on but lowest resolution and a minimum display rate of 30 FPS. The optimum is comming from the motherboard and the video card. A fast front side bus and AGP4x or 8x already improves a lot. A 128 MB video card like a Radeon 9700 pro or a Geforce 5900 ultra is the best you can get. That's driving the FPS at max resolution to abt. 250 FPS. Cheers - wolfgang

Wolfgang

Know you may be busy but I am after some information on an order placed with you and have had now reply from your web site email my order number is 20970. I would like to know when I would receive this Please as it has been on order since the 02/04/04
Cheers
Neil

Without coloured carton: tomorrow. With coloured carton: 10 days.

Cheers - wolfgang

Hi
Does not matter to me on the packaging as long as it get to me in good order.