X-Plane devs ask “Are we there yet?” with Vulkan update

July 18, 2020

1–2 minutes

The wait for Vulkan on X-Plane has been a long one with Laminar Research, developers of X-Plane, having spent much of the last few years perfecting a whole new rendering engine for their sim and the new API. The initial results from beta testers have been great and with version 11.50 beta 15 now out – they (and the rest of us) are asking “Are we there yet?” It sure seems like it!

When to stop adding features and fixes and release?

Early betas had impressive performance but also some serious issues both with compatibility and multiple plug-ins as well as numerous debugging considerations that were needed. The beta process with X-Plane is generally good and while most remain on stable, 11.50 beta tests were open and available to anyone with interest.

With people reporting significant jumps in framerates and far smoother flying overall thanks to Vulkan API, the latest changes are going to make a big difference for all X-Plane fans. Those of us not already on the beta anyways.

Most plug-ins and third party developers have now had a chance to test, resolve problems, and fix bugs and so it seems like they are slowing making their way towards an end point. At some point you do have to whittle the bug list down and release. It sounds like we’re almost at that point.

According to Ben Supnik, a software engineer with X-Plane, we’re in the final stages of resolving problems.

We are reaching the end of X-Plane 11.50 – at this point the number of remaining bugs to be fixed in this beta is small enough that they aren’t that hard to keep track of. To get to a release candidate though, we’ll need to stop introducing major changes.
Ben Supnik, X-Plane Dev Blog

Sounds good. Although the current beta still has a few glitches in play, it sounds like many of them are now close to being worked out and that one of the biggest fundamental updates for X-Plane in a long time is nearly ready to launch.

Read the full dev blog here.

2 responses to “X-Plane devs ask “Are we there yet?” with Vulkan update”

Fernando

July 18, 2020 at 7:49 pm

Cant wait to fly my Avro Vulcan in Vulkan 🙂

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Mischiew Rithe

July 19, 2020 at 5:05 am

They must feel some pressure, with MSFS 2020 coming in beta soon and pre-orders starting at the same price as X-Plane.

X-Plane has an advantage with their current customer base, people who have invested a bit and may not be willing to change soon. At least it was usually the case in the past, themselves had the same problem with P3D/FSX after all.

But is the situation comparable?

If we believe the trailers, it looks like MSFS 2020 leaps well ahead of competition in a number of departments: weather, which is the most critical for realism, visuals, scenery – though that is less clear regarding the airports since their last blog update. The one that may not look better is availability of “study-level” aircraft, we actually don’t know how it will be until well-known 3rd parties start releasing products. But many people are usually happy with included models, so it’s probably not a big hindrance to MS.

Then, isn’t there is the hidden promise that, with the development capacity of MS and Asobo, the product will be fixed and upgraded more easily than X-Plane, which is more an evolving project and the baby of Austin Meyer?

Until the MSFS product is released and “normal people” can actually test it and see what was true and what was hype, nothing is sure, except X-Plane must probably not linger, and certainly not introduce major changes at this stage indeed.

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