FSX is now on Steam, sold 5 dollars !

[Daube]

Hi all,

For information, FSX is now sold on Steam by Dovetail Games, the company who bought the Flight Simulator licence.
As you may know, this FSX is strictly identical to FSX Gold, excepted a few fixes regarding the installation, the activation and the multiplayer system (and there might be more, but I don't know).
Until the 20th of December, the price of the sim will be just 5 dollars.
After the 20th of December, it will raise to 25 dollars.

For those who are afraid of getting problems with activation, or are fed up with the install/uninstall process, or are just fed up with using these stupid DVDs, this might be a chance to get a new copy of your sim that will hopefully be trouble-free in future.

Now, as stated on the description, they tried to ensure the sim would be compatible with all the addons, but it's not guaranteed. But for 5 dollars, I'm taking the risk.
I won't reinstall FSX any time soon though, since I use Prepar3D. So don't expect any feedback from me.

Cheers.

[jcj78]

I'm in. Downloading now, will install upon reciept.

I'm interested in the multiplayer setup. that's worth $5 to me. I'll let everyone know how it goes. so far so good, fingers crossed.

[sonic]

do they still have multiplayer servers.

[jcj78]

They have new multiplayer servers. There is some disention on the forums as to whether or not you can connect to these new servers with an old existing copy of FSX:Gold thru the third party server option.

I'm downloading it now, but its a 10 gig download, and its creeping along at about 185 kbps. I should have it running by tommorrow evening with some add-ons, and I'll let y'all know how it goes.

[Fozzer]

I've always thought that it was a great shame that FSX did not contain the same simple option of connecting to Multiplayer via the drop-down, Multiplayer, in-game menu, like it does in FS 2004!
It enabled instant Multiplayer connection to FS Host, or any other available server's or private Address...with the Sim already running!
Hopefully the new FSX will contain the same Multiplayer option as FS 2004!

I regularly connect to the many Multiplayer Servers via the Chocolate Software program, "FS Host" using "FS Host Spy" and "FS Host Client"....a little bit of fiddling, but it can be done fairly quickly with the "FS Host Client" short-cut on the desktop, with no trouble...>>>
http://www.chocolatesoftware.com/

I've still got my FSX Deluxe Edition in its original Jewel case, so I'm hoping there will be no re-installation problems with it in the future!
..but the Steam version look good for new Flight Simmers!

I've already got an account with "Steam" for some of my old DOS games; "Duke Nukem", "Quake", "Dune 2000", etc, etc, (all my zillions of originals no longer work on modern PC's), so I don't know whether I will bother purchasing the new Steam "FSX" yet...but at 5 USD, its quite a bargain!

It will be interesting to get some feed-back from some of the new FSX Steam purchasers, if there are any problems, etc!

Its good to see that FSX is still up and running!

Paul.... ...!

[Daube]

Indeed it's quite a bargain, especially for a solution that lets you forget about install/uninstall/activate problems (not to mention scratched DVDs...).

Currently, there are some discussions on the forums about the fact that some complex addons (like TacPack or PMDG planes) are not compatible with the Steam edition of FSX.
This is surely due to the fact that the Steam edition uses different registry keys, I guess.
It also surely uses a different folder for the FSX.cfg and DLL.xml files.
For addon installation programs, these differences are unexpected, so the installation of some addons will fail.

However, some people have already started moving "simpler" addons (by hand) from the old FSX install to their Steam FSX install and it seems to work like a charm for all planes and sceneries

[Fozzer]

It would appear that Dovetail/Steam have possibly re-coded parts of FSX, (which to me is quite a feat, as someone more familiar with coding in Sinclair BASIC and Zilog Machine Code!), so lets hope that it doesn't generate any additional problems!

Hopefully, it will make Multiplayer simple and reliable to connect, and therefore encourage more Multiplayers to join on-line, like it used to be in the good-old FS 2002 and FS 2004 days!

....and no more registration problems!

Paul..... ...!

[garymbuska]

So every one knows I was one of the Beta Testers for this and I can tell you there were some minor problems. For starters Do not think that if you download this version it will be better than the one you currently have. It will NOT some of the issues are the out dated Navigation data base and the multiplayer problems I am not sure if they solved that one or not as I do not use it. If you currently have any version of FSX installed installing this version could present a few issues. Even though it will be in a different folder it will use your current version of the FSX cfg file. So word to the wise rename your file before installing this version.
From what I could see there was not much different between the deluxe version and the one Steam is releasing. It is basically the same game. It looks as if some of the textures were changed

[Daube]

I had been contacted by Dovetail for beta testing too, but I declined because I didn't have enough free time to perform a correct testing anymore. :/

So, if I understand correctly, that new FSX-Steam is using the same appdata\Roaming... folder structure ?
This could be probematic for your current FSX install, but on the other hand, it is LESS problematic for the installation of addons.
The only remaining thing would be the registry keys.

And for info, FSX Steam is not like FSX Deluxe. It's like FSX-Gold, which means it contains both FSX Deluxe and FSX Acceleration.

[papituwall]

Just downloaded and installed. First impressions:

Main program is installed inside Steam.

All other folder and files are installed alongside those of FSX and labelled FSX-SE

Looks like "plug and play": No need of adjusting Nvidia in my case, only set anisotropic and antialiasing on. DX10 working OK.

Installed some planes "copy-paste" method, working OK

Activated some sceneries with no problems, because I have all sceneries in a separate hard drive.

In my opinion this gives a second life to FSX, ideal for beginners, the normal price is 25€, very competitive.

[jcj78]

I do not intend to keep both installs. I will move my planes over, reference my scenery folder (which is on C:/, not in the FSX root), and try to install traffic 360, or traffic x (I have both, have been usingh 360 only). Then I'll do away with my old FSX Gold. If I don't like it, I'll uninstall Steam's version and reinstall from the DVD's.

I forgot to change my power settings, so my DL timed out. It resumed this AM when I powered up, but it'll be nine hours yet.

[Fishbed7701]

I have installed the RealAir Legacy to the Steam version and that went just fine. I do think I still have to do some tweaking since I'm getting a lot of stuttering, but overall the Steam version is much smoother than the boxed edition I've used for the past 7 years.

[Steve M]

So relying on out side party is the way now. FSX can be used offline but the steam version can't be. There is a con if I've ever seen one. But nevermind me as I bitch away. It is good that someone continues the flight sims no matter the changes.

[jcj78]

So relying on out side party is the way now. FSX can be used offline but the steam version can't be. There is a con if I've ever seen one. But nevermind me as I bitch away. It is good that someone continues the flight sims no matter the changes.

I can't imagine having a simulator pc that wasn't hooked up the the internet. Not a big deal to me at all. Also, 'relying' on an outside party that supports the game is preferential to 'relying' on the creating party, which has been derelict for five years. I'm not sure what I 'rely' on them for, anyway, once I'm installed, other than MP servers. And we relied on GameSpy for that before, so old news.

I don't see any reason not to wipe my old FSX Gold, install SE and see how it goes. Worst comes to worst, I reinstall my boxed sets.

[Fishbed7701]

I've recently added a few cfg tweaks to FSX:SE and I can say even with the RealAir Legacy, enbseries, HDE v2 clouds and overcast wx, it's still smoother than I've ever experienced in FSX. I get a steady locked 30fps and it's awesome. One of the best things about the SE is that when FSX does it's signature startup crash, you can simply "validate game files" and within 20 minutes the crash problem will be solved.