Well for me, it was an easy decision to jump into VR, however there are benefits and drawbacks to using VR.
I am going to show you some of the reasons that I love VR and some of the reasons I would hesitate in buying VR. It really comes down to what you want from your sim.
Let’s break it down.
When you fly a flight sim, you are probably looking to have the most realistic experience possible. It is important for the pilot to feel immersed in the flight. With VR, the biggest benefit is definitely immersion. You can’t get much more immersed… unless you have a full motion simulator (but not many of us can afford to put one of these in our house).
You can look anywhere you want VR and move as if you were sitting in your plane. It is absolutely incredible to have the freedom of movement that comes with VR.
The only thing that can take away from the immersion is the fact that you are not able to grab the physical controls without either having muscle memory to where they are, or blindly looking around your desk for the throttle quadrant or trim wheel. I will get into this later in the post.
If you want to learn more about integrating your physical controls into X-Plane 11 with VR, take a look at the post below.
How to Integrate VR Controls into X-Plane 11
Immersion for a monitor Flight set up will vary. I would have to say that it would vary from a single monitor setup all the way to the person who has an actual cockpit in their house.
Obviously the person with the flight cockpit in there house will have significant immersion, as it will feel like they are in an actual plane. On the other hand, a person with the single monitor setup will have a hard time feeling like they are in an actual plane. Saying this, there is nothing wrong with getting started with the single monitor setup. I have run flight sims for many years with the single monitor and have enjoyed every minute of it.
VR does provide a benefit that you can’t and you won’t get with a cockpit setup. You get to see everything in 3D with VR. This gives you that needed depth perception for landings and take offs. Makes you feel like you could reach out and touch everything in the sim.
No matter what you do with monitors, you will still be looking at a 2D screen (even if you have a full motion cockpit).
The other problem with the monitor setup, is that you don’t have any freedom of movement. You can program different view setups on shortcut keys, however it is not going to be as smooth or immersive as VR. The other solution that is available that will help, is getting an IR tracking system. This isn’t all that cheap but can be a good idea if you are going to go the monitor route.
So, this is where the cost of VR Flight will increase beyond the cost of the “average” flight sim. Now, an average flight sim setup needs a decent computer, however in VR you have to lean towards the higher end computers in order to get a great experience. Now, I don’t say you need the absolute best computer, however you need something that is fairly powerful.
For me, I am not running the highest end computer out there. I run X-Plane 11.20 with VR on a i5-7600k (slightly overclocked) with a GTX 1060 with 6GB of Ram. This computer runs X-Plane 11.20 at 45 frames per second.
Now, I am always tweaking my graphics settings in the game to get the most out of my game. This is not a requirement but I do it because I enjoy it and really want to get the most out of my system.
If you want to see what it looks like when I am flying, please take a look at some of my YouTube videos that I have online. I have included two of these videos below to give you an idea what it looks like with my system. Keep in mind that what you see in my videos is what I see… however it is not a lens view from the Oculus Rift. This is because when I fly, I can’t put a camera inside my Oculus Rift headset. I record from my monitor, which is displaying a copy of what I see in my headset. Later I will include a video where I actually show you the lens view, recorded with a GoPro camera.
If I were to give you a recommendation on how fast of a computer you would want, get the fastest CPU with the best GPU that you can buy with the most RAM. It will be worth it. Especially if you want a lot of eye candy.
My computer setup will run X-Plane 11.20 without VR at a very high frame rate, which means I could easily crank up my graphic settings on a monitor, however I have fallen in love with VR Flight and can’t go back. The reason, I can run X-Plane at a higher setting on a monitor, is the program is only creating one image, where in my Oculus Rift, it has to render the game twice from two perspectives in order to create a 3D effect.
Here is a link to a post where I get into some of the finer details about selecting a computer.
5 Top Things You Should Understand When Buying a Computer
The post below will give you some recommended computers, whereas the post above will get into some technical aspects of computer selection.
Top 5 Things You Need for VR Flight
I am not going to get into exact prices here because things are constantly changing and this would be out of date before I got it posted. We will talk in general terms to compare the price.
So in order to get a computer for X-Plane 11.20 you are looking at spending anywhere from $500 to $1000 (USD) in order to get a decent computer to run it. As I will say now and again, more is always better when it comes to flight sim. The more money you can spend on your PC, the better your system will handle X-Plane 11.
Now, when you buy a PC for a monitor setup or two monitor setup, you will probably want two monitors, however a single large monitor would work as well. Now monitors are not cheap. You could probably pick up a decent monitor for $250 (USD).
In order to get more freedom of movement, you would probably want to add an IR Tracker, which will cost approximately $150 (USD). IR Trackers will essentially track your head movement. It will allow you to move your view by making small head movements. This allows you to look around without using a control on your joystick or keyboard.
Now we have a very basic setup with no controls. Controls will obviously add some more cost. You can actually pick up a nice set of rudder pedals and yoke for a pretty reasonable price. Take a look at the links below if you are interested.
Logitech G PRO Flight Rudder Pedals
Logitech G Saitek Pro Flight Yoke with Throttle Quadrant
Both of these links are Amazon.com affiliate links. This just means that if you use my link, I get a small commision if you purchase something from Amazon. It does not affect your purchase or price in anyway. If you use my link I really appreciate it, as it helps to keep me building great content.
So, in order to run VR, as I mentioned above, you need to look at a higher end computer. A computer that can run VR will start somewhere in the range of $1200 (USD). It can be less or more depending on what you are happy with. If you were to spend approximately $2000 (USD) on a higher end computer, you would have a serious flight sim computer.
Once you add the computer to the setup, you need to get yourself a VR headset. The VR headsets on the market start at around $400.
For me, I use the Oculus Rift, which I love. (Amazon affiliate link)
So, below I have added up a VR and Non-VR setup. Note that I did not add any controls into the math.
So here is the initial breakdown. Please note that these are rough estimates.
$1150 – $1650
$1600 – $2400
So it is more expensive to fly VR, however the experience is worth the cost.
There is also one cost that you can save up front when flying in VR. When you fly in VR, you will get a set of controllers with your headset. These controllers are held in your hands and can operate anything in your VR Cockpit. So instantly you have full control of the cockpit. You can control the yoke, throttle, mixture and every button, or switch in the cockpit. You instantly have full control of the cockpit without buying any hardware. This can be a great way to start flying in VR.
This is the one area that I will admit… A monitor will beat the VR for visual quality. I believe that the visuals and graphics are still great, but not quite as clear as the monitor.
Instead of me trying to explain what it looks like, I took a video for you and have included it below.
Below is the Oculus Rift Lens view when running X-Plane 11 in VR.
I briefly touched on this topic, but it’s now time to dive into the controls.
The VR setup, such as the Oculus Rift, comes with Touch controllers, which essentially can become an extension of your arm. You can now operate everything in your cockpit by reaching out and grabbing it with the Touch Controllers… or by using the laser pointer (an extension of the Oculus Touch Controllers in X-Plane 11). The laser pointer comes in handy for mixing physical controls with VR. When you use the laser pointer, you essentially can use it like it is an extension on your arm. You point at something and grab it. Once you grab it, you operate that item as if you reached out with your hand.
Physical controls can add an element of challenge to VR. This can be overcome by keeping your physical controls in an easily accessible and logical location that you know. This way you build muscle memory and it becomes very natural to find your control without looking at it. Probably not a bad habit to get into when flying a real plane. Don’t want to be staring down at your hands when flying VFR.
Now for the rare people that have a full cockpit in their basement, VR flight sim may not be a great choice, as the VR headset will essentially be a complete replacement for that whole setup and it could be difficult to operate all the switches in the cockpit without seeing them.
With VR, you instantly get that full cockpit experience without remortgaging your house. My favorite way to fly is to have rudder pedals, yoke, throttle and trim wheel as physical controls. I then keep my touch controller on a chair where I can easily reach it. When I need to manipulate other items in the cockpit, I can easily pick up my touch controller and flip switches or operate other equipment in the aircraft. For me this is the absolute best way to fly.
If you want to find out more about my control setup, take a look at these two posts.
How to Integrate VR Controls into X-Plane 11
5 Top Reasons Your Flight Sim needs Rudder Pedals
So, I think it is obvious that I prefer VR, however there is nothing wrong with flying with a monitor. Personally I can’t go back to flight without VR, but that is just me.
If you fly to be fully immersed in flight, then VR flight is for you. It is an experience to fly in VR and I think any serious flight sim pilot, student pilot or real pilot will want to fly VR. You can’t beat it for realism.
If you enjoyed my post and want to get into VR Flight, I will include my links to all of the flight hardware that I use with my sim below. Again these are Amazon Affiliate links that give me a small advertising fee if you make any purchase from Amazon after using my link. It will help to keep this website running and won’t affect your price or purchase in any way.
X-Plane 11 Official Version – Global Flight Simulator (PC, MAC and LINUX)
Oculus Rift + Touch Virtual Reality System
Logitech G PRO Flight Rudder Pedals
Logitech G Saitek PRO Flight Yoke System
Thanks for reading,
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View Comments
Dan - great review! Having just given up on VR, a bit more should be said about the lack of clarity of the VR system. I tried everything I could come up with to attain better clarity with the Oculus system, including a special prescription glass holder which fits inside the headset. Bottom line is the VR image will not clear up enough to read the gages in the cockpit. The other problem with blurriness is that it brings on motion sickness, which became unbearable (it should be noted that I have spent 50+ years ocean sailing with never a problem). I was told by an optician that the brain would eventually adapt, but after weeks of immersion, motion sickness just got worse. To be fair about it, I am flying helicopters and can't tolerate progressive lenses.
I would recommend trying out a VR system in a store before popping the $$ for it; you will either love it or hate it! The technology is amazing, and I would hope that the optics will improve over time.