It’s been a little while since we’ve had a consequential dev blog update from X-Plane developers Laminar Research but the one that came out yesterday gives us one of the best overviews of what they are planning for the sim than we’ve had in a while. Most of its exciting news with new features already here in recently released 12.0.7 while more are planned for 12.0.8 and 12.1. The pricing on X-Plane 12, like so many other things, is also going up. Let’s have a look!
Now available in 12.0.7
The good news from Laninar Research is that the long in development and testing 12.0.7 is now out and available on both the X-Plane installer as well as on Steam.
The new version comes with OpenXR VR support, new cloud rendering, reduced VRAM usage, among a long list of other improvements.
The VRAM usage reduction should be good news to everyone but especially to people running systems and GPUs with lower amounts of memory. X-Plane’s solution to reduce texture quality when memory limits are hit tended to become very disruptive and seemed to be a frequent occurrence for some. Good news to see this get improved!
In the pipeline and beyond
Laminar are also talking about 12.0.8 and even 12.1. Entering the beta testing phase soon, 12.0.8 is expected to bring forward some flight model improvements. Those include engine model improvements, landing gear physics updates, and a new fuel temperature model.
There have also been improvements in the works for multi monitor networking scenarios and projector warping/blending. This last feature is intended for professional license holders only.
Then looking further afield we have some discussion on what 12.1 will bring. A lot is visual with better bloom lighting, cloud shadows on water, better water opacity, softer shadows, MSAA improvements, something called RCAS (or Robust Contrast Adaptative Sharpening), and improved CPU performance. We can also expect improved rain and fog effects, better particles, light level tuning and fixes to overly dark cockpits.
They also mention real time weather model improvements with no more “Minecraft” cloud formations in the future referenced as an improvement. Good stuff all around.
They say other things are in the works. Absent from mention is any scenery improvements but I hold out eternal hope for improvements there. Meanwhile the rest of the changes look to be providing both efficiency and visual updates and all of this is extremely encouraging for X-Plane fans.
Pricing is changing
Everything is getting more expensive these days and it seems that X-Plane is too. It’s price will be increasing to $79.99 USD. They say the price change will help them improve the product and expand their team. Of course the price difference has little impact on current owners of X-Plane 12 but it will increase the price of admission of those coming into the sim.
The price change has not yet taken effect but they also make it sound like the increase will come very soon.
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