I’ve been waiting for this baby for a long time - so excited to see it finally arrive! Share your thoughts here!
I tried it on my “first impressions” stream last night with a quick flight around NYC, with landings in the Hudson and elsewhere. She handles beautifully and I’m already in love.
Loves: the interior and exterior model. Think the panel textures could be a tad better. I need to figure out how to walk around the cabin and get into the nose bubble (solved!). Love the splash effects (could use a bit more spray from the area just under the wings - probably only so much the sim will do right now).
Wants: please make the bow hatch operable (solved - it is!). A “touring” interior would be awesome. A dinghy to get to shore.
Bugs: the wheels kept spinning while retracted and on the water. My prop controls were mapped to the mixture levers by default (likely a sim thing).
Can’t find: the parking brake release (solved - it’s down to the right of the pilot’s seat!).
Funny: exiting the aircraft allowed me to walk on water. Don’t tell my wife!
@CharlieFox00 Thank you for the very kind words and review of the Albatross, much appreciated! I’m glad you’re enjoying it.
To address your questions/concerns:
The bow hatch should be operable. If you slide down from the pilots seat into the tunnel, and open the nose compartment door, you’ll see a handle for the hatch you can use. You can also use the checklist board (left of the pilots seat) to operate all the doors and some other items.
I am working on some interior options and upgrades (not sure when those will be ready yet though)
The wheels spinning while in the water (and retracted no less, hehe) is a sim bug and regression. It was fixed awhile ago, but popped up again at release. Happens sometimes. Hopefully that will be fixed soon.
Not sure about the prop/mixture controls being cross-mapped. I haven’t encountered that.
Parking brake: The handle is under the right side of the pilot’s seat, right next to the tunnel. That will toggle your parking brake by default, but it has several other functions, mostly for emergencies.
Not sure what to do about the divine water walking ability if it persists, but I’m not going to do anything to prevent it for now. Asobo might change it, or give it uses, like exiting onto docks, or as you mentioned into boats. I have no idea. Hope so though.
Mike, The Albatross is really great. So many of the new aircraft are a mess…but this one is polished! Also a personal favorite aircraft. Huge grin when I found this view last night:
I was super excited to fly this in 2024 and it did not disappoint! Cant wait for community liveries later on down the road. Exterior sounds are the weakest point IMO but not terrible compared to some other radial aircraft released prior. Really great addition to the sim and super glad to have it!
Hi Mike, thanks for the reply! I did figure out how to open the bow hatch during tonight’s stream, but couldn’t figure out how to close it. Love the checklist - haven’t seen that yet, but will look soon. Sounds like everything I need is there.
Not sure about the mixture mapping, either - it could be some weird default thing from the sim itself. Still getting used to things.
Love the zen window!
But this plane is an instant favorite - very well done. Looking forward to many hours spent in it!
I have just finished watching both of your streams with the HU-16, and they are exceptionally informative and helpful. Been taking a lot of notes tonight for minor fixes and improvements (ex: you should be able to stand up in the nose hatch etc).
There is a manual on the flightsimulator website for it, but the file is quite out of date unfortunately. It may be useful in the short term though while MS updates it to the latest version.
You’re welcome, glad you enjoyed the streams - there will be a lot more where that came from! I’m so looking forward to diving in further. Most of my issues right now (affecting this and every other plane) revolve around control mapping changes and getting used to the new sim. In time, we’ll master this as well!
Oh, was also going to ask - any possibility of celestial navigation? Maybe it’s already there or in the works; forgive me for so many questions - just super enthused about this.
@CharlieFox00 I have no idea if there’s any native celestial nav functionality coming to the sim, but I think I remember seeing some 3rd party tools for that awhile back? It’s a bit out of my wheelhouse, so not sure.
Yes the control mapping is a bit challenging sometimes right now. I’m sure it’ll smooth it out over time.
First of all thank you for your work on this beautiful plane - it is my favourite in a new sim. Looks more polished than others.
I have found one issue so far:
There is something like CFD visualisation visible when landing on water. It looks like green vector cubes. I have checked my CFD settings and they are off. Also tried other plane but there was not visible these boxes. I am on XBOX Series X.
The other issue I have found is missing passengers in interior. I have set up passengers via EFB. (set it to four) but plane is empty inside. Maybe it is not implemented and Ive got wrong impression from official developer videos that passengers are implemented on a sim level itself.
What I like:
Handling on water,
Handling in Air,
3D Model, textures
Interior especially view from bedroom round window
What I would like to see in future:
Also this camping interior variant
And visible passengers.
Thanks again for great plane, take care and have a nice day sir.
Jaro
Screenshot of these green vectors (west of Bella Coola)
Personally, I love it. Easily my favorite in the sim right now. It was the reason I sprang for the upgrade and I’m glad I did. I’m actually completely happy with the interiors, and having the modern avionics available is a huge bonus.
I’ve been having troubles with the autopilot that I’m hoping are launch related, though.
Someday I’d love to see an option with that little FLIR screen that the Optica has, so I can really get into the coast guard vibes.
@Jaro5416 Thank you very much, I’m happy you’re enjoying it.
The picture you showed with the water problem is one of the wake effects missing. When the sim can’t find an effect it just draws the outlines of the particles, little greenish squares. Unfortunately this is probably due to a streaming error. I have seen several cases in videos of missing effects on other aircraft, and in a different video of the same plane they’re fine. I hope this gets sorted out soon.
I am working on the missing passengers issue. They were all showing up fine when the final plane build was submitted, but no developers had access to the final sim build before release, so there are some little issues like this across the board.
@PaulWarlocc Thank you again! I am investigating the autopilot but haven’t been able to trip it up yet. I will keep trying. One item I wanted to mention on the HU-16, is that the autopilot takes its barometer reading for altitude holds from the Garmin G5’s (central panel area) pressure setting. The plane has two analogue altimeters you have to manually set barometers for as well.
Anything I can do, let me know.
Like I said in my other thread though, it may be something else and not the aircraft causing it. I also experienced the exact same issue in the little Dornier Seastar, but couldn’t replicate it in the default Cessna or the Optica.
I have not yet loaded 2024, but the Albatross is one element that I am REALLY excited about. I actually flew on the actual US Navy variant that has been shown on the 2024 previews, back between 1969 and 1972. At CGAS / NAS Kodiak, at Kodiak Alaska the Coast Guard had 3 Goats and the Navy had 1. The Navy bird was used as a shuttle off the island when ever the main shuttle, an old USAF C-54 was not available. Of course, the interior was a bit different than the one here, but I am fine with that. Really looking forward to loading her up and doing a quick Kodiak to Afognak hop :0)
Observing as an MS2024 outsider right now but in the images of this aircraft, why did the developer choose to reverse the US flag on the right side so it’s backwards?
Normally, the flag is depicted as if the nose of the aircraft is the “pole” so any momentum would put the flag into the wind - so…blue field leads.
Was this inspired by a real livery with the flag looking this way?
The Albatross is fantastic, totally loving both! My favorite is the G-111.
Question: For the G111 it seems to be missing a button to make the GPS the NAV source (the plane does respond to the command if I bind it to a key but where is the switch? In the other variant it is there).
The textures, sound and flight model are a work of art!
@Cutlass172 You are correct, it’s currently backwards on the starboard side. Thanks for the heads up. I will correct that for the first update.
@LuisArgerich Thank you very much! Glad you like them.
On the G-111 you should be able to change the nav source by using the CDI button on the bottom middle of the G1000, but for some strange reason that’s not working now. Another of those things that worked in the Dev Alpha sim build but not in the release one. This bug is near the top of my list of things to address in the first update.
Just in case somebody else asks if you bind the command to set the GPS as nav source then it works perfectly.
The G1000 is kind of broken at this moment, aircraft appears as a white dot instead of the aircraft symbol, etc.
I suspect this is a Working Title issue and perhaps not the aircraft, because I’ve seen similar problems in a couple of the Primus-equipped aircraft as well, but just to put it out there…
The displays in the G111 do not all dim the same. This screenshot is with PFD & MFD set to 0.00% Manual brightness. There’s no dimmer on the G5 standby instrument. The audio panel key brightness is also intense.
