Wow, there is a lot of tension in this forum! I personally would have to concur with NightOne. The majority of people do not like to spend 200 dollars on a sim. This does not mean that they won’t spend 200 dollars on a sim, I am just simply stating that if a prudent person had a choice on a $100 or a $200 dollar sim that were very comparable, they would chose a $100 dollar sim.

Now to why I am at this post, I came here to find out which sim would be best to acquire, a G3 or a Reflex. The only reason that I have decide upon these two to pick from is due to the fact I was not aware of any others that are on the market. Now that I know that there are others to choose from, I am definitely going to try the cheaper one first, like the Clearview. I have downloaded the G3 demo, The Reflex demo and the Clearview demo. If the Clearview is even close to the G3 and the Reflex in handling characteristics, I will unquestionably purchase the Clearview and keep the 170 dollars I saved to put towards my Heli when needed.

One last thing, this is in retort to a remark made earlier by someone in a post. I believe their statement was along the lines of, (individuals who spend a thousand plus dollars on a RC Model would have no qualms with forking out 200 dollars for a sim). That might be true. I cannot speak for anyone else; however, I easily have over 1000 dollars in my t-rex, and still had a lot of hesitation about spending 200 dollars for a software program. I am now very pleased that I have come to this forum, I have a feeling that it will save me 170 dollars.


The Rookie

There is a good reason why you CAN fly and try models in ClearView demo and you CAN NOT fly models in RF G3 demo and Reflex demo (with Tx cable, the keyboard does not count). And, the reason is, all they fly the same and the rest is $170 dollars fluff. If you want to learn to drive a car, you learn with any car, not necessary with a Ferrari (and none of these is Ferrari either).

It is my opinion, many people, after spending $200 on a very basic program, suffer from the "Stockholm syndrome" and defend the choice they made because they will feel stupid if acknowledge they overpaid. You can read posts from a guy who spends $1300 to buy a computer to run his $200 simulator and is ecstatic what a good deal he got. If he flew fuel and parts for $1500 he would be the next Curtis. I should stop right here, because spending is good for the economy. For some people spending more money=buying into flying which is not the case by a long shot.


Stefan
http://rcflightsim.com

There is absolutely no way for a user to tell anything about a program's complexity or design, what it's base is or it's architecture.

How long a title has been around is really no indication of it's present content. Very often, the ones that've been around will be the ones with much more time invested in their design. And they're usually the ones that've had far more details enhanced and code optimised. And they often see redesign of sections that've proven to be time hogs. And they often see updates that change the title to keep up with new developments in technology. They've got programmers who're familiar with the application and have fought those functions before and know what they need to change. And those titles are often the ones that'll be around much longer, because popularity breeds profits and profits often improve the product.

In that case, you should update before you pass full judgement on G3. The new update is .448. It is far more improved of the .300 or .366. In addition to much improved flight physics, you will be able to get user created planes(update .426) Photofields also came out about the version .366.(so you'll get them if you don't already have them...)


50%

Sure there is. Anyone can look at a directory structure and see if a program uses 500 separate media files or one flat file. Not to mention disassembling. How do you think they reverse engineer things in the far east?


For an argument against your point see www.novell.com.

or would you like to use Microsoft Windows as an example?

How old is Build 366?

I find it tough to believe that after all the years of RF that the physics don't get great until the most recent version. Where can I can get the release notes? (I'll check the RF page)

You must not know much about software life cycles.

BTW NightOne what are you using for a controller? I'm looking for a sim as well but can't really try any because I don't have a controller set up. Keyboard is silly.

I'm using a JR Transmitter with a Serial PIC cable. This may not work for you as there is additional software involved in my case.

My point being is that flight physics would be the #1 important feature for a flight sim and thus would have been in there since the beginning with only tweaks throughout the years.

That would be like saying MS Word doesn't actually get good at creating documents until 2003 version.

Which JR radio are you using? Where do you have the cable plugged into? The only input/output on my radio is the 1/8" DSC jack.

MS Word wasn't very good at creating Word documents in its original format. In fact, there is a great deal of software released that, in its initial form, is not all that great at its intended purpose.

I don't know that G3 was good or bad at its release - I know little about it. I just know a great deal about software in general, and it is not unlikely that the engine in the initial release of G3 was lacking.

I mean no offense, but you seem to know very little about software.

By the way, no, that's not how software is reverse engineered, anywhere.

Well I would beg to differ. Besides going back to the Pre-DOS days and having formal training in Cobol, Fortran, Assembler, self-taught in Basic, and general knowledge of C and Pascal, I have been around software for a lot of years.

I was around when the very first version of Word for Windows was released and there is not a significant amount of difference in the basic document composition functionality. They have added a lot of features, but writing a letter is basically the same.


PLUS...

I'm not a Mississippi State Bulldogs Fan!

The cable I have is a DB9 Serial to 1/8"

It came with CockpitMaster software included with my Hangar 9 trainer.

I'm not a sports fan at all. In fact, the college football mania is really irritating, because it takes the focus away from education.



I meant no offense, and based on your experience, I'm rather surprised at your statements concerning software. I go back to MSDOS 2.0 or somewhere therabouts.

I need a USB --> 1/8". I broke the serial port on my machine some time ago. I guess I could get in there and fix the connection, but the question is, do I really want to?

G3 was PATHETIC when it was released and really hasn't come to life until recently. It should have still been in beta form. Now's the real thing.

lol yeah, for all the g3 users that bought it right at release we've been beta testing it for over a year. Only since the last 2 updates is it really finally outta "beta" lol. I really did not like the changes they made in the last update though.

lol That's about right. I'd say the last three updates though. The .426 was pretty good. I'd probably be running that if it wasn't for multiplayer.


50%

Nightone...G3 suffered originally from the same affliction that most consumer-end simulators do.

It has to look pretty to sell (good graphics) and it has to be correct physically.

An accurate physics engine eats up a ton of resources, not leaving much for graphics, and vice versa. There is a way to cheat it, and thats the same way AFPD and other sims have. Photofields. They tote them as "revolutionary" or any other number of marketing buzzwords, but its really just a cheat. Photofields use almost no graphical processessing power compared to a full 3d environment. Notice that G3s improvement in "feel" coincided with the photofields?

In that regard, my framerate dropped on 3d fields with the new updates. But I have an "upper-end" PC (laptop actually) so i have very little problem running it.

I've worked in the software/programming field most of my professional life...so I know the cycle. I know the battle of "look good" and "work fast"...especially since my current job is web-centric, so performace vs. appearance is even more of a battle.

In the end though, none of the sims feel "real"...their value is in creating/maintaing/strengthening the hand-eye coordination of certain manuevers.

At the end of the day, they are all "games" ... enjoy them as such and stop complaining about everything.

Could not have said it better. Indeed, I didn't!

Has anyone found a decent review for FS One?

I saw a writeup by someone who saw or briefly tried the software at a tradeshow.

Given it's for sale already, has anyone actually bought and used FS One that could contribute any level of user review?

-- Terry

Does any one know if you can use the G3 interlink controller with this sim??

Jeff

The sim will work with any USB game controller, and the G2/G3 controllers are USB
game controllers like any other. So the answer is yes it will work.

Michael

Michael Selig... as in Professor Selig? Did you have a hand in the creation of FSone? How "real" do you believe it to be?

Thanks

Rob.

P.S. Thank you for all of your work and inspiration over the years.