During last week’s Virtual International Air Show, Eagle Dynamics CEO Nick Grey met up with the hosts and answered some questions about DCS World and about Eagle Dynamics. Its a fascinating look into the history and the business behind the sim. I’ve got some point form notes from the interview that you may want to read through and of course I encourage you to watch the interview in full.
The interview
The hosts of VIAF from Virtual Air Festivals sat down with Nick Grey, Eagle Dynamics CEO. Nick is of course the deep voice narrating some of the DCS World videos and he is one of the visions behind a series of flight sims that has resulted in DCS World.
The TL;DR can be summarized into three key points:
- A DCS: Afghanistan map was confirmed by him in the interview and says that its part of three maps that will fill out the region. The next map is located “nearby” and suggests that it will be revealed in the 2024 and Beyond video.
- Nick also reconfirms that Eagle Dynamics are working on an F6F Hellcat. This was teased in the 2023 and Beyond video.
- Multi-threading servers and Vulcan API are coming in 2024 and will offer some performance improvements but also suggested that they won’t be big improvements.
For the rest, read my notes below:
- DCS started by pure chance. Met three engineers who had a sim with a basic Sukhoi Su-27. One of those engineers was Igor Tishin who ended up being a co-leader. The Fighter Collection in the UK financed everything with some staff in the UK. When Igor died, Nick became CEO and much more involved on a daily basis.
- Want to develop a more immersive world and to bring aviation simulation to an even higher level of realism and precision. Only 190 people on the team. Nick says the marketplace is small but it is growing.
- Nick’s favourites are the Spitfire, Mustang, and Mosquito. For fun, the F/A-18 or F-16 is superb as well says Nick. He says he’s having trouble answering that question and intones that he really does love all of them.
- Started working on a spherical earth with a small team. Four person team working on all of the technology. The biggest issue is creating something, inexpensively, that feels realistic and looks good. The current maps are very manual and hands on. Developing something with automation. Praises MSFS’ geography. World map not just for the consumer market but also for professional market.
- The next products will be revealed in the 2024 and beyond video. Afghanistan confirmed (coordinates from previous video). Also doing another map… “nearby.” It will be in three parts and develop the region.
- Looking for new people in aerodynamics. Developing a flight model is quite complex. Had six and Nick says they need more.
- Upcoming module excitement. Really excited about the F-4 Phantom. Keen about the Hellcat. Calls the C-47 really cool and “funky.”
- Multi-threading for servers coming next year. Vulcan coming next year. Both will add performance but it won’t be a huge step.
- Typhoon (Heatblur), slowed down for a number of reasons. Nothing Nick can say today but it is a project that will definitely happen.
- Nick says that DCS is not considering a subscription model. Says its great for content like Netflix and content based business. Owning a module is, mentally, more of a commitment and their commitment to the customer to continue to update it. Nick says that Eagle Dynamics is more of a tech company and not an entertainment company. Might try financing in the future so people can do monthly payment terms.
- Wants to improve the loyalty program to make for better terms and make things more exciting for long term fans.
- Dynamic campaign has been on their mind for a long time. The problem faced was technically very large and connected to machine learning. Being able to use AI as a means to an end. Says that AI has come a long way and has helped them accelerate it. Four people are working seriously on the feature and they have very big ambitions for the dynamic campaign. Its not a feature they are going to walk away from but its a very complex thing that they are doing.
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