Today third-party developers had some interesting news to share about Microsoft Flight Simulator add-ons, on top of an airport release.
We start with Miltech Simulations, which announced a rather intriguing upcoming add-on, Supercarrier Pro. The add-on aims to bring fully functional aircraft carriers to the simulator.
It'll be released on September 14 on the developer's own store and Orbx Direct, with an official marketplace release shortly after.
Here's what the add-on will entail.
- Beautifully Modeled Ships: four ships included on initial release, Ford-Class CVN-78, Nimitz-Class CVN-76, Arleigh-Burke Destroyers and Ticonderoga Cruisers.
- Roadmap: Additional US Historical Ships and French Carrier Charles de Gaulle planned for free future updates. Other ship packs may be released as expansions.
- Moving and Static Ships: A total of 14 moving locations and 12 static (anchored) locations are included.
- Miltech Simulations Supercarrier Pro Toolbar: In-sim toolbar for full control of the carriers
- Universally-compatible Arrestor Cables and Catapults: This product was developed in n such a way that any aircraft, stock or 3rd party, can use the catapults and arrestor cables without any modification, and regardless if the aircraft has a tailhook or not.
- Full Xbox Support: All features are fully supported on Xbox. Carriers have been optimized for excellent performance on Xbox.
- FLOLS and LRLS: Functional Optical Landing Systems to safely guide your aircraft to the deck - follow “the Ball”
- Landing Signal Officer: Fully functional Landing Signal Officer, with functional audio callouts to guide the aircraft on landing and feedback scoring based on real naval operations.
- Animated Crew, Jet Blast Deflectors and Elevators
- Fully Accessible Hangar
- Exclusive Discord Community to foster group flights, events and interaction among players. Invite is available on the Toolbar
- Full Multiplayer Support: Both moving and static carriers are fully compatible over multiplayer.
Next, we get an update with new screenshots about the Pilatus PC-12 by SimWorks Studios. The studio expects to complete the aircraft next week and send it to Pilatus for approval on Friday.
On the art side, the interior textures are 99% final and next week we will put some finishing touches and close out with the addition of passengers and cargo. The exterior will get some more polish between now and the release, mainly adjusting the shading. We will also try to add some cool new things to it, but more on that if we make it.
Aircraft systems are complete with the exception of 3-4 minor items. Of those, the ITT simulation has been one of the most difficult features to implement.
The aircraft will be ITT limited after, 12000ft, meaning you will have to gradually power back to avoid exceeding 760 °C.
Residual ITT has been refined since the Kodiak and will drop faster in the air. Dry-motoring the engine with the inertial separator closed will make ITT drop faster, as all the air will now be directed into the engine, pushing the hot air out of the exhausts. Finally, the double ITT spike on startup finally seems to work.Avionics are also in their final stages. All of the functionality is now built in, and next week will be spent refining the last known bugs and correcting the EFIS coloration.
The PC-12's Avionics have kept us busy for more than 12 months as we were trying to learn the new skills, while essentially creating an entire avionics suite from scratch.On the flight model front, we want to do one final tweak to the flaps before calling it for good. We will soon be at the mercy of our test pilots for the final green light.
Finally, Mike is waiting for the above to be finished in order to put the finishing touches on the sound package. It is worth noting that the sound environment has “silently” benefitted from improvements done in the electrical system.
The remaining tasks are volume balancing and finalizing the 4-blade propeller sounds before calling it.
While waiting for the review, we will continue testing and improving the aircraft as much as we can to make it a great release.
Lastly, MFSG released a smaller Japanese airport, Asahikawa Airport (RJEC) in Hokkaido. It's available on Simmarket for $16.32. It includes the following features:
- Asahikawa Airport 2023 layout.
- Custom Asahikawa Airport ground.
- Custom Jetway.
- Compatible with AI traffic.
Microsoft Flight Simulator is available for PC (on both Steam and the Windows Store), Xbox Series X|S, and Xbox Cloud Gaming, on top of Game Pass. To stay up-to-date with the latest add-ons and developments, be sure to visit TechRaptor regularly to peruse our daily MSFS news.
Moreover, you can check out our interviews featuring Jorg Neumann from Microsoft about the Antonov An-225 "Mriya," and Ubaid Mussa, CEO of third-party developer iniBuilds.
We also offer in-depth reviews of Orbx's Stockholm Arlanda and Oslo Gardermoen Airports, iniBuilds' New York-JFK Airport, and RHDSimulations' Boeing 767-300ER.
