#FLIGHTGEAR 2.12.1 FOR MAC INSTALL#
#FLIGHTGEAR 2.12.1 FOR MAC MANUAL#
#FLIGHTGEAR 2.12.1 FOR MAC FULL#
#FLIGHTGEAR 2.12.1 FOR MAC SOFTWARE#

Lots of work has been done on the small details.

But this has now changed – a new framerate-friendly impostor technique is used to render clouds out to the horizon – wherever that may be (the system has been tested for 1000 km visibility from low Earth orbit). This allows for interesting new application, for instance merging information from Flightgear and OpenStreetMap or Mapquest, leading to a new moving map application covering the whole world is available which tracks the airplane’s position.įlightgear’s weather rendering so far has not been up to the task of showing a plausible view from high altitude.

#FLIGHTGEAR 2.12.1 FOR MAC FULL#

At full resolution of about 21000×21000 pixels per texture provided by NASA, it looks simply spectacular even from just 50 km altitude – see the Vostok capsule above entering the atmosphere.įlightgear now includes the Mongoose web server as a httpd.

#FLIGHTGEAR 2.12.1 FOR MAC INSTALL#

By default, a set of 2048×2048 textures is distributed, but Earthview is intended to allow easy access for users who want to install their own hires texture set. The textures are provided by the NASA Visible Earth project. It renders Earth as a simple, textured sphere surrounded by a cloud sphere.

Introduced to provide better visuals for the spacecraft in Flightgear, Earthview is an alternative rendering engine intended for use at high altitudes. Also, check out the selection of cars and motorbikes to explore the Flightgear world!Ĭloud shadows are notoriously difficult to render, but for Advanced Weather in combination with the Atmospheric Light Scattering rendering framework, there is now an experimental option to add them (at least close to the aircraft) to the experience. The walker subsystem now allows for more complex animated motion and adds NPCs, characters with whom a player can interact. The mission system combines with the Milestone 4 release of the walker,and thus more complex adventures can be built in which the player has to exit an aircraft and walk to a certain location.

Visual guidance symbols can be used to indicate the location of the next task.

This allows to define tasks to be completed by a player which then receives points. The Flightgear world is becoming more interesting…Ī mission subsystem is being added. *I'm one of those old-fasioned people who believe that computers are supposed to make life less complex and more enjoyable, not the other way around.Flightgear is constantly under development and as the feature freeze for the next 3.2 release approaches, it is becoming increasingly clear what the next version will have to offer to users:

#FLIGHTGEAR 2.12.1 FOR MAC SOFTWARE#

Found no other relevant documentation on the DMG, just some bible quotes, which were absolutely no use under the circumstances (praying DIDN'T help.).įrankly, if this software is actually used by anyone in the groves of academe doing serious research, I'm never flying again! For now, I'd suggest sticking with Warbirds or X-Plane they may not be open source, but they work. The other problems I can forgive as development issues, but this is just plain carelessness. Installation: 'Drag the FlightGear folder to Applications' say the (rather meagre) installation notes: this I tried, and got a permissions error.

#FLIGHTGEAR 2.12.1 FOR MAC MANUAL#

Its harder to make a comment on the flight models, since my machine (eMac 700MHz, 32MB nVidia, fine according to the limited system specs on the HTML manual pages) couldn't manage more than about 8 fps (guessing, the fps display didn't seem to work), and the poor UI design meant that changing the settings was too much of a chore*. For me, detecting collisions with ground objects is a major part of the 'simulation' aspect of any flight sim. Physics: I managed to roll through the terminal building on a take-off run, did an inverted loop (in a 707!) and flew straight through the ground, which then disappeared leaving only a black dot. Major settings like screen resolution and controller options seem to be inaccessable from inside the game. Not just the 'ported-from-UNIX-ugly-but-works' style, I mean pull-down menus that don't do anything except tell you to use an XML editor to edit the preference files (hacking is fun, but shouldn't be mandatory). Stability: takes a long time to load (about 2 minutes) and appears to be the pizza of death, but after the screen changes resolution and aspect ratio a few times it seems to work reasonably well (is the splash screen supposed to tear up like that?). Sound: Good, but then flight sims aren't the most complex soundtracks on the planet. Graphics: OK close to MSFS (pretty good for freeware, in other words). I'm not sure this should even be a beta release yet.įirst the good news.

Flightgear 2.12.1 for mac