X-Plane 11 VS Aerofly FS 2

*** Please note that the video does not have talking. It is merely a video showing the two sims running in VR. For the comparison information keep reading.

I just got Aerofly FS 2 and wanted to do a comparison video for you. The two simulators are great. I really wanted to try Aerofly FS 2, as I have read that it is a great choice for flying with VR. I’ll go over the good and bad of both.

In the first part of the video, you will see me flying X-Plane and the latter part will have me flying Aerofly FS 2. I have both sims start on the runway at the San Francisco International Airport. I do a quick loop and land on the runway. Please don’t judge my flying, as I am just experimenting with the two, to get a feel for the flight model.

The Comparison

Graphics

I have set both graphics very high. Aerofly FS 2 is set to Ultra, which is the highest setting and X-Plane 11 is adjusted to a high setting. X-Plane 11 does have higher settings, however my computer can’t handle the top settings in VR. Take a look at my settings and my computer.

I like the graphics on both. I find that Aeroplane has great overall scenery. The scenery appears incredible, and photo realistic. The only big downside to this, is that if you fly lower than a couple hundred feet from the ground, away from an airport, you will really notice that it is an actual photograph of scenery. The scenery becomes distorted, like when you zoom too close to a digital photograph. It’s definitely not a deal breaker, as it is not often you are doing a landing in a field (unless you are practising emergency landings). As long as you aren’t landing on random fields or on a city street, you won’t notice this. Around the airports is high resolution, making for a better experience. If you are flying at a good height, then the scenery is amazing.

The one thing you will notice, is that nothing moves in the scenery. The cars have been halted and all is still. It gives it a bit of a zombie apocalypse feel. The Cockpit looks great, as well as the plane itself.

X-Plane has amazing graphics. As I don’t have mine cranked up to the max it is hard to do a 100% comparison, however I can tell you that I have cranked them up on my monitor, without VR and can tell you that they are amazing. It almost makes it hard to distinguish between the sim and real life.

One of X-Plane’s downfalls, is that it requires a big CPU and GPU. It is worth it to run it on a very high end computer when using VR. I would recommend at least my computer or better.  The real big benefit to X-Plane 11, is that everything is moving. It really brings the world to life. Trains, birds, cars, planes and much more is cruising around as you fly. If you need some VR equipment like a computer that can handle VR, take a look at this post, Top 5 Things You Need for VR Flight.

The feeling of Flight

As I am a student pilot, the feeling of flight is one that I want to be great. I have read lots about Aerofly FS 2. Most people comment on the flight model and say it is more of a game. For most of the flying I have done in Aeroplane, it has felt realistic. It pulls to the left as you accelerate off the runway and pulls to the left when you climb into the sky. Without rudder correction, it will start to veer to the left (which is what it should do on take off). It appears to have a slight amount of adverse yaw when you turn.

Now, I don’t have to say much about X-Plane 11’s feel. It is known for its flight model characteristics and realism. I can confirm that flying a Cessna 172 is very realistic in X-Plane 11 as I have flown the Cessna 172 in real life. It feels like you are flying. In my opinion, X-Plane 11 has it beat in the flight model department.

The Stall (As seen in the video)

There is one portion of my flight, where I bring the plane into a stall. It was more of a test for the flight model. X-Plane 11 gives a very sloppy (realistic) feeling in the controls, whereas I found that Aerofly FS 2 is very stable when approaching a stall. In fact, I found that I couldn’t get much of a stall from Aerofly FS 2. If I held the stall in X-Plane, it actually threw me into a spin (which is what it should do, if you don’t manage the yaw correctly with your rudder pedals).

Please note, that I fly mostly with the Cessna 172 in the sim and have only flown a Cessna 172 in real life. I can’t comment on how realistic it is with a commercial jet or fighter jet, as I have never flown these in real life.

Is the Sim Missing Anything?

X-Plane 11 has everything you could want in a flight simulator. Again, not much to say about X-Plane 11, as it is a well known complete sim. You can fly anywhere in the world and can control every option in your plane.

Aerofly FS 2 on the other hand is missing quite a few elements of a good sim. First off, I found that it was strange that I couldn’t set up my mixture control to work on the sim. It appears that the mixture doesn’t move and can’t be controlled. You can only fly in specific locations in the world. The sim appears to be missing a lot of functionality that X-Plane has.

For me, I count this as a win for X-Plane 11.

VR Experience

X-Plane 11 has currently implemented VR into their simulator. You can now use X-Plane 11 with native VR. I plan to do another review of the two in VR, so stay tuned for that.

 

I found that the cockpit in Aerofly FS 2 did feel abit more “3d”, however I don’t know if it was better… just different from the cockpit in X-Plane 11.

Now that X-Plane 11 offers it’s own VR support, I would say this is a tie, however I have heard that Aerofly FS 2 has went through some recent updates. I will have to revisit the VR experience in the near future.

To Conclude

I enjoyed flying both sims. There are definite differences between the two. I believe if you have a beefy CPU and GPU, then X-Plane 11 probably is a great choice, however if you do most of your flying above a few hundred feet and don’t mind that nothing moves around the city, then Aerofly is a great choice. For me, I was able to get a much higher frame rate from Aerofly FS 2. I was able to run Aerofly FS 2 on Ultra settings and get over 90 fps. With X-Plane 11, I am on a high setting and only manage to get 50 fps (Oculus headset at 90fps due to timewarp).

For me… I will fly both. Hope you found this useful. I have included the system requirements for both flight sims below. If you want to know more about what it takes to run X-Plane 11 in VR, check out my other post What system do I use for VR Flight in X-Plane 11.

 

If your interested in using the
Oculus Rift , please check out my link. I want to be 100% transparent, and let you know that I do get an affiliate commission from the link. I plan to put out lots of great content in the future and would appreciate it a lot if you used my link.

Also, here is the Yoke and Rudder Pedals I use in case you were interested in that as well.

 

System Requirements

X-Plane 11 (System Requirements)

MINIMUM:

• CPU: Intel Core i3, i5, or i7 CPU with 2 or more cores, or AMD equivalent.
• Memory: 8 GB RAM
• Video Card: a DirectX 11-capable video card from NVIDIA, AMD or Intel with at least 1 GB VRAM

RECOMMENDED:

• CPU: Intel Core i5 6600K at 3.5 ghz or faster
• Memory: 16-24 GB RAM or more
• Video Card: a DirectX 12-capable video card from NVIDIA, AMD or Intel with at least 4 GB VRAM (GeForce GTX 1070 or better or similar from AMD)

Aerofly 2 (System Requirements)