Flight Sim Mega thread: You had me at "longest shaft in the market"

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Flight Sim Mega thread: You had me at "longest shaft in the market"

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That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Just an FYI you can get the Xbox game pass for PC for like $1 for 3 months right now and it includes free downloads of their catalog including Microsoft flight simulator

# ¿ Jan 5, 2022 15:35

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# ¿ May 10, 2024 14:48

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

I am wanting to get some suggestions / input on hotas hardware. I am looking to budget out an update over my current setup and buy between now and sometime this summer depending on final cost.

I use VR and will continue to do so. I have a Thrustmaster T16000M with the pedals and it works great / I could just stick with this. I don't fly civilian sims much at all / don't really want any hardware oriented towards that. I primarily play DCS and Il2, leaning much towards DCS these days. I just bought the F16 module and while having a full replica 16 setup is nice I don't want to unknowingly pigeonhole myself into a hardware setup that doesn't play nice with dual engine jets etc in the future.

I don't have a simpit set up but will probably build my own in the future. I strongly prefer having the joystick on the right and not a center mount, throttle on the left so I know that affects choices somewhat. Budget isn't fixed but would prefer closer to the $600 range than the $1000+ range. From googling around so far I see 4 options right away that I would use with my existing rudder pedals:

1. People seem to love/hate the Thrustmaster Warthog ($560 new from what I can see).

2. Comparatively is the VKB Gladiator NXT 'space combat edition' and the NXT 'Omni' throttle, together selling for $310. Are the VKB that much worse than the warthog / are they just less capable etc?

3. Also around are the Winwings Orion hotas F16-EX ($549) or (3A) Orion hotas F-18 ($399) which are their desktop versions. These seem attractive based on reviews etc but idk why the F18 one costs so much less. If I did get the F18 would it be lovely to use with an F16 etc?

I don't care too much about having full matching fidelity for individual planes vs having something that covers a lot of bases and isn't a turd or requires a ton of fiddly software and/or physical repair work etc.

Any thoughts / suggestions?

Oh yeah also definitely buying a pair of the Cougar MFD panels.

# ¿ Feb 3, 2022 14:18

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

As a newer DCS player, I've been enjoying the poo poo out of the A4 Skyhawk mod. Bonus, it's free.

It's full fidelity with a lot of stuff modeled so it's very much a "clicky" cockpit and a really nice midpoint between the free Su25T and something like the F16 (not free) full fidelity module. I bought the F16 mod and while enjoying it, was quite overwhelmed with the massive array of sensors, weapons systems etc. The A4 is vastly simpler and pretty intuitive, especially if you've flown sims before or only in WW2 era stuff.

The DCS base game is free and so is the A4 mod, definitely give it a try.

https://github.com/heclak/community-a4e-c/releases/

# ¿ Mar 6, 2022 21:57

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

I'm assuming a mountain given that each one has a 4 digit number right next to it (height in meters?)

# ¿ May 12, 2022 00:17

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

I just bought MSFS a few days back and did my first real flight in real time. It's pretty loving rad in VR to descend into Long Island during sunset.

Bonus was watching a ton of people in the distance going suborbital in Pelicans.

# ¿ Jun 13, 2022 01:39

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Sapozhnik posted:

If we're going to have science fiction planes then it would be good to have a straight-up big bubble canopy UFO that can hover in place and move sideways and accelerate to Mach 10 or whatever. Basically a flyable drone cam for people who don't want to bother with all that nerdy trimming and minimum air speed nonsense, I think that it would appeal to a lot of casual people on Game Pass.

Then they glance at the flight training tutorials out of curiosity and start puttering around in a 152 and before they know it they're flying IFR flight plans on VATSIM

*Registers for VATSIM*

Wait why are you frowning

# ¿ Jun 13, 2022 18:48

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Sapozhnik posted:

I hope you used your real, legal name to do so on this public internet service operated by god-knows-what bunch of boomers or you are a very bad (wo)man

Lt.Col Deez Nuts USMC ret. is ready to sim.

# ¿ Jun 13, 2022 18:59

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

side note for the G2, be super aggressive with RMA / warranty return for that poo poo. Mine was always fussy and turns out it shipped with an older cable version that has known difficulty with AMD motherboards. I didn't use it a ton during the 1st year and thought that this was just the current state of VR (being a bit unstable). Now my warranty is expired and I recently updated computers and the issues are even worse.

After spending $90 for a newer version of cable from Hp and $30 for a separate PCI-E card to supply USB-C power, its still very unstable. My current experience to use VR for MSFS, IL2, DCS etc is to start up the comp, start up windows MRP, watch the G2 power up and hear it, but see no picture (yet the screens are powered on). Then some combination of restarting MRP, cycling the power on the G2 etc usually from 2-4x gets it working. About 1 in 5 times it will work but flicker madly, I go into MRP and switch back and forth the Hz for the G2 until this stops. Occasionally this causes a crash and I have to restart the entire process.

I'd say about 1 in 4 times I start up the G2 I can go right into a game and play without doing another 5-15 minutes of restarting the software / cycling the power on the hardware.

# ¿ Jun 21, 2022 15:21

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Vahakyla posted:

If that would work natively in MSFS with little animated loading and what not, and simple voice lines and ledgers and tycoon tools, I would play that so hard I�d ban Dandy from air goons.

Let's get a crowdfunding solution started.

# ¿ Jun 24, 2022 00:07

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Refurbished G2's are on ebay for like $300.

# ¿ Jul 27, 2022 18:29

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Close air "support"

https://i.imgur.com/y0MNi15.mp4

# ¿ Oct 26, 2022 13:00

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Yooper posted:

Breaky, thirty seconds before says on comms, "It's so cinematic with CAS flying above."

I saw Breaky go past, thought I was clear, and didn't realize he swung around again to offload. Felt bad, but man, it's pretty funny to see it now.

It was perfect comedic timing. I had just flown over some tanks advancing while in a Huey and my door gunner was pasting some target and an Su25 flew over my head and it was a really cool immersive moment and I was all "ok this mission setup rules". I orbit the LZ once to see if my door gunner can catch anything then come around to drop off my troops and get just pasted from above. The troops got out and capped the point tho.

# ¿ Oct 26, 2022 13:51

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Rot posted:

Hi, it's me, one of the midi guys you speak of. I made a big post about how I've set up my Behringer X-Touch Mini using an app called Axis And Ohs. Since then I've refined things quite a bit but the basics are still entirely applicable.

IMO a cheap midi controller is the way to go over this kickstarter project.

Pros:
- far more versatile (more buttons, more knobs)
- ability to have per-plane controller profiles and automatically switch profiles
- cheaper
- actually exists

Cons:
- a not insignificant learning curve, especially if you don't have any programming experience
- requires another app that needs to be running while you're simming
- not as professional looking (nicely printed overlays help a lot)

This is the most recent pic of my setup:

The X-Touch Mini is on top of the Alpha. In the 152, just the knobs work, but in the 172 it will control the GNS 530/430. In something with a G1000 it will operate the PFD and MFD. I make the overlays in Photoshop and then get them printed on thick cardstock at a local printing place.

I have something to say about this too!

A while back I built this:

Two dual encoders with push button from PropWash, and a spare Arduino Micro I had kicking around. You can see it in the first picture between the Alpha and the Bravo. These I've programmed to handle VOR and/or ADF tuning.

I was curious about using the X-Touch Mini and went through your posts itt etc, nice work. I had a couple questions.

I am primarily playing DCS and have a full Virpil HOTAS setup but its got a lack of rotary dials. I was considering just building a rotary dial button box at some point to learn / tinker with. However the X-touch controls seem pretty drat close to what I would have built.

It seems someone has made some attempt to integrate this with DCS already https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/files/3320133/

Any idea how good of a solution that might be? I know you are in MSFS but I am starting from square 1 and had never even heard of this type of controller until I read your latest post.

Also you mentioned programming being a substantial learning curve, what type of programming? I have very limited experience but willing to use it as an exercise to learn if need be.

Sorry this is kind of tangential to your project but hopefully you or others might have some insight.

# ¿ Dec 9, 2022 16:08

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Scruff McGruff posted:

IIRC I tried that specific plugin but could never get it to work properly and ended up using a different MIDI-2-vJoy app so that the X-Touch shows up in DCS as another joystick and I can bind the buttons there.

I never actually managed to get the dials working the way they should. All the buttons were fine, but I could only ever get the dials to register as additional buttons (so a right twist was, say, button23, and left twist was button24) instead of as axis like they were supposed to. This sort of worked as long as the desired action had both an axis option and a hotkey up/down option but the keystroke detection could be hit or miss and not nearly fast enough to really feel good. Then I started having issues where the vJoy stuff would just drop out so DCS wouldn't see the device at all.

I ended up giving up on it and haven't gotten around to re-visiting it since, ended up just using my touchscreen monitor and Helios to adjust stuff like HUD/MFD brightness and radio/lock tone volume. I only use the X-Split for MSFS now because A&O worked no problem.

I will say that I am a pretty bad programmer so my issues could easily just be a bad config or missing some instruction somewhere.

Thank you this is really good to know. It also outlines a lot of problems that I don�t even really think I want to tackle.

I might just go back to building a rotary dial button box instead .

# ¿ Dec 9, 2022 21:00

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Seconding Virpil hardware is wonderful but also very expensive. I justified it when I realized I had been playing flight sims consistently for almost 30 years.

# ¿ Dec 19, 2022 13:07

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

I like Long Island up the New England coast. Lots of dynamic weather, islands and you can get from empty wooded areas to open ocean to heavy urban areas all within 30 mins or less

# ¿ Dec 28, 2022 14:48

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Apologize for the Reddit link but this combo works really well for effectively. No cost if you have a WebCam.

https://www.reddit.com/r/StarWarsSquadrons/comments/kbpq2s/use_opentrack_aitrack_to_get_headtracking_with/

# ¿ Jan 10, 2023 02:37

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Chubby Henparty posted:

Type of camera I'm guessing? I was perfectly happy with the �5 ps3eye (rip my delantrack) until I couldn't get it to webcam any more and bought a new one for work.

The opentrack guys seem to be pretty good, credit for their staunch refusal to accept any donations. I wish they'd accepted a big pile of money to build webcam on their own ps3eye drivers though.

I am using a ~8+ yr old logitech 1080 webcam for it. I found opentrack alone was OK but had definite faults and inconsistent use. Pairing it to AITrack made it work almost all the time. It only seems to struggle with looking down beyond a certain point where it loses face recognition and gets really erratic. I found changing the curves for the axis for looking down could fix this most of the way. It's still in that respect a little worse than Track IR5, but for 0$ vs 100+$ well, no contest.

# ¿ Jan 10, 2023 17:17

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

I play mostly only DCS, BMS and IL2 and I don't think I'd ever go from VR (with a G2) back to trackIR and I've got a nice 1440p ultrawide that performed well with that. It's just so nicely immersive I quite enjoy it.

It is not without frustration though, especially as mentioned above when you are learning a new module for the 1st time or setting keybinds etc. Dialing something in with VR on is a hassle but after that is over it's wonderful.

# ¿ Mar 9, 2023 21:18

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

I found that this solution worked pretty drat well for head tracking for free if you have a regular webcam.

https://www.reddit.com/r/StarWarsSquadrons/comments/kbpq2s/use_opentrack_aitrack_to_get_headtracking_with/

Opentrack + AITrack.

# ¿ Mar 9, 2023 21:36

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

DCS seems like it�s actually getting hyper threading today.

:confuoot:

# ¿ Mar 10, 2023 16:18

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

JayKay posted:

Anyone try this out yet? I'm currently updating and contemplating if I want to really hook all my gear up.

5-7 fps increase in VR for me, shorter load times and less fluctuations in fps overall. I had a well performing system before the update. People with more marginal systems are saying its a huge improvement. Rare big win for DCS imo

# ¿ Mar 12, 2023 23:29

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

I have a G2 and play DCS, BMS and IL2 and very rarely MSFS. Highly recommend it especially given the sale price it hits often at $300.

It can be fussy with cables and the older firmware and such was much more unstable but now it�s been great for the last 9 month or so without any issues. WMR largely seems to exist just to pass off the interface to another program so I�m less concerned about that myself given i don�t use the program for anything.

# ¿ Mar 14, 2023 13:15

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

If you dont have Syria get Syria for sure. Widest used map besides Caucasus

# ¿ Mar 18, 2023 18:27

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Probably a good time to mention that the lead coder (Yink) of ECW is some kind of Nazi fan. When Enigma was pressed on the issue he even defended the fact that Yink was likely a Nazi and doubled down that he did not care because Yink did not talk about it on the server or discord and that he would "hire Bin Laden if he wrote good code and kept things to himself".

Ill still fly on ECW on occasion but no way I'm giving the youtube any traffic nor any patreon support for the server etc.

Apologies for the offsite drama but I think most goons would rather know vs not given the already high ratio of chuds in general in the milsim communities.

# ¿ Mar 23, 2023 13:57

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Yeah that's basically the summary. Sorry for bringing in drama but it seemed relevant and contextual enough to mention.

ECW - Enigma's Cold War server is typically the most popular multiplayer server in DCS, especially for US primetime and Enigma themself are a popular youtuber (for DCS content). It's a good server, always updated and a lot of fun but uh yeah the people who run it are not great.

# ¿ Mar 23, 2023 17:01

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Idk I was running Quake 3 at 345 fps :smug:

# ¿ Apr 20, 2023 16:25

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Anime Store Adventure posted:

Speaking of bad installers: I�ve had DCS installed because I still desperately want to make the time to sit down and learn it. It�s spent a day on steam downloading a sliver and revalidating 200gb, lol.

Make sure youre getting the open beta version.

No one uses stable.

# ¿ May 8, 2023 16:24

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Squiggle posted:

I hope you can custom start anywhere over water but it still spawns you in at altitude

Flying dutchman mod when

# ¿ May 16, 2023 01:13

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

I used plywood, 2x4 ripped down, some drawer slides and a Poang chair. Works well.

# ¿ Jul 7, 2023 02:48

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Qubee posted:

Does anyone have some good joystick recommendations? I remember coming across an American shop that had some really high quality gear, one joystick in particular looked great and you clamped it to the desk.

I've always used the cheap(ish) sticks and wanted to try something a bit better.

You know how hard it is to not make a dick joke here right

# ¿ Jul 19, 2023 23:36

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Lord Stimperor posted:

i saw a truck driving up what appeared to be a waterfall

spawning season :unsmith:

# ¿ Jul 28, 2023 00:37

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Negostrike posted:

I've been playing the open test version and it's really fun. Nice balance between arcade and sim

I just signed up for it, do you know if it will be multiplayer in the future or if it has / will have VR support?

e: cool the vid says will have multiplayer, steam lists it as SP right now so I was confused.

# ¿ Jul 28, 2023 11:42

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Lord Stimperor posted:

Sorry for spamming but what's the gold standard for good but affordable mfd control right now? Cougar MFDs still a community favorite?

I'm trying to get back into DCS

Yes. Cougar still solid and auto detects / assigns in DCS

# ¿ Sep 1, 2023 12:05

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

StarBegotten posted:

I just say this interview from Enigma about about a new WW2 flight sim called Combat Pilot from a veteran of the genre, Jason Williams (IL2 Great Battles and Rise of Flight)

It sounds like super early days, but may be worth keeping an eye on.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCvYVzooi5U

Just a heads up Enigma is an unapologetic Nazi sympathizer.

# ¿ Sep 30, 2023 18:33

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Wicaeed posted:

Source your quotes?

Its come up in the thread before.

Check post history itt and its mentioned there and confirmed by others in the airgoons sever after he got banned from it.

# ¿ Sep 30, 2023 23:52

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Spaced God posted:

Jesus Christ lmao

this

# ¿ Oct 1, 2023 16:48

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

StarBegotten posted:

I meant at least he doesnt agree with the guys views (so technically not a sympathiser)

Cannot agree with that part.

He defends keeping them around knowing what they are, defends their work and skill, gives shoutouts and praise to them (Yink) in his vids and other media while benefiting from their work. He's openly acknowledged that they are a Nazi and supports them being there as part of the community that he has made.

It's like the saying if you have 9 people at dinner and a known nazi sits down and joins them and everyone has a pleasant meal, you have 10 nazis at dinner.

e: given that its the flightsim thread not gonna reply further, PM if you really want to discuss further (I do not).

# ¿ Oct 2, 2023 11:29

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Enigma89 posted:

(USER WAS PERMABANNED FOR THIS POST)

lol

# ¿ Oct 4, 2023 19:13

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# ¿ May 10, 2024 14:48

That Works: Jul 22, 2006; Every revolution evaporates and leaves behind only the slime of a new bureaucracy

Phat Phingers posted:

I loving love these forums man. "Noooo guys i'm definitely NOT a crypto fascist I just pal around with them I swear!!!"

Its great.

"if you guys are getting mad at me for being a friend with a nazi you should see what my friends get mad at me about for talking to gays" The Michael Jordan of being tone deaf folks.

# ¿ Oct 4, 2023 19:17

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Flight Sim Mega thread: You had me at "longest shaft in the market"

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