Author’s note: We briefly covered Black Square’s upcoming Starship release in our Editorial piece, Next Month Promises to be an Exciting One for Flight Simulation, but there is much more to the developer’s update we wanted to cover separately.
In an article posted on JustFlight.com, Black Square’s lead developer, Nick Cyganski, details the Starship’s development progress, reveals a release date, and shows off several other updates coming to the Black Square product line for Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 and 2024.
Starship Update
Black Square announced the development of the iconic twin turboprop nearly three years ago, and progress has been steady with several updates provided during that time, all as the one-man team has been busy with other releases including the Steam Gauge-Series Baron, Bonanza, Caravan, and King Air, as well as the TBM 850, and Piston and Turbine Duke for Microsoft Flight Simulator (MSFS). Safe to say, Nick has been very busy and only recently able to turn his full attention to the Starship.
That commitment seems to be paying off, and in the latest update, we get the best picture yet of the upcoming twin-pusher turboprop aircraft. According to Nick, the Starship’s release will be before this year’s Flight Sim Expo in Providence, Rhode Island, which runs June 27-29. We also learned that Nick has recently had the opportunity to spend two days hands-on with the actual aircraft. As he says in the article, “It was my pleasure to spend two days recording high-quality audio from the aircraft, taking reference photos, and ‘button pushing’ in the cockpit with its owner. Although the current owners had sent me thousands of pages of documents, there is no replacement for being able to operate the avionics yourself at your own pace.”
Black Square and JustFlight have also made the user manual for the Starship available via JustFlight’s website. The nearly 200-page document provides comprehensive details about the aircraft’s systems, avionics, failure modeling, and other details. The manual also provides a complete overview of the Starship’s Collins AMS-850 “14-tube” (CRT) avionics suite that Black Square has custom-developed for MSFS. The aircraft will include improved turboprop dynamics, a fully-simulated electrical system with 170+ circuit breakers and failures, damage and failure modeling, as well as Black Square’s tablet interface. You can see the full feature list below or read the user manual yourself, here.
Pricing for the Starship hasn’t been revealed, but according to JustFlight’s Starship product page, buyers will receive 180 JustFlight reward points – which, if accurate for the Starship, would put pricing around $55.99 US.
Starship Features:
- Tablet Interface for configuring options, payload settings, failure management, and real-time visualizers for engines, electrical schematics, and environmental systems.
- One-of-a-kind Collins AMS-850 “14-tube” (CRT) avionics suite and associated line-replaceable-unit failure logic, quirks, eccentricities, and never-seen-again features of the first all-glass panel cockpit and flight management system in a business aircraft.
- Very Low Frequency (VLF) & Omega radionavigation systems from the pre-GPS era.
- Configure the aircraft to tune stations on the other side of the globe, and manage six DME receivers to maintain accurate position information in a time before GPS.
- Avionics & instrument panel temperature simulation requires you to properly manage the equipment cooling systems on the aircraft, or else be faced with electronics and display failures that will necessitate reversionary modes and hardware redundancy.
- 230+ Random, scheduled, or performance-triggered failures, settable via the tablet interface, including engine damage, compatible with 3rd party UI’s and instructor stations.
- Fully simulated environmental control and pressurization system for heating, air conditioning, ventilation, and ram air cooling. Cool things off by opening a door, or watch the airplane heat up in the sun. Monitor via the new tablet interface.
- NEW terrain & weather radar technology creates a functioning terrain radar without the use of WASM modules or external desktop software applications. Aircraft pitch, antenna position, transceiver gain, precipitation rate, and altitude all influence the radar depiction.
- Completely simulated electrical system, with 170+ circuit breakers and failures.
- Functional windshield wipers clear rain with realistic visuals.
- Improved turboprop dynamics, including (ITT, TRQ, Ng, FF, FP), hot starts, residual heat, and exhaust back pressure, P2.5 HP & LP valve simulation, and fuel-oil heat exchanger.
- Turbine engine failures, such as compressor stall and surging, fuel control failure, fuel filter clogs, propeller governors, and fire suppression systems.
- FOD damage based on surface type. Use the inertial separators to avoid engine damage.
- Tablet interface displays the type and intensity of FOD.
- NEW physics-driven propeller governor and feathering simulation and beta range from the Black Square Duke
- Floppy disk reader for updating navigation databases and reading other data files.
- Gyroscope physics simulation for electric and pneumatic gyroscopes with precession and partial failures, based on a coupled quadrature oscillator.
- Voltage-based light dimming, an immediately recognizable effect to nighttime pilots.
- Strobe light system causes realistic distracting flashes in clouds.
- St. Elmo’s Fire & static discharge on static wicks and windshields in severe weather.
- Mathematically accurate VOR & ADF signal attenuation and noise degradation.
- Physics-based instrument needles bounce and respond to aerodynamic forces.
- Functional exterior elements (Interactive in MSFS2024): chocks, pitot covers, engine
- covers, gear downlock pins, and ground power generator. Pitot cover flags blow in the wind.
- Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) simulation & warmup based on instrument panel temperature.
- Improper engine management will slowly damage engines to failure.
- Carbon Monoxide leaks are possible and can be detected with the CO detector.
- State saving for fuel, radio selection, radio frequency memory, cabin aesthetics, etc.
- Crew/Passenger oxygen depletes according to pressure altitude, passenger occupancy.
- Ultra-custom dynamic registration number system for livery creators
MSFS 2024 Aircraft Updates:
Also in the article, Nick discusses the challenges of updating Black Square’s ten-aircraft lineup for MSFS 2024, particularly due to the constant flux of major simulator components. He notes that the stability of the base simulation after SU2 is a huge improvement, but unfortunately, none of the blocking issues have been resolved. These issues include Black Square’s highly customizable dynamic registration system, and another that makes canard aircraft incompatible with the new default EFB payload interface, as well as what Nick calls an “overly aggressive” LOD system that results in the models’ visibility “popping” at various distances.
On a positive note, Nick states that Black Square plans to incorporate walkaround and collision features in the MSFS 2024 updates for their aircraft, allowing interactions that were not possible in MSFS 2020. This method doesn’t rely on the default MSFS 2024 walkaround module, but instead will use a “far more complex behavior regarding doors, engine covers, pitot covers, etc, than the native MSFS 2024 system allows.” The article concludes the MSFS 2024 aircraft update by stating, “Regardless of the present blocking issues that persist in MSFS 2024, Starship will be the first to debut in MSFS 2024, acting as a catalyst for the others, which will be updated after Flight Sim Expo.”
Real Taxiways Update:
Lastly, Nick details his ongoing work to make Black Square’s Real Taxiways product compatible with MSFS 2024, which will include an update for select airports in MSFS 2020. Real Taxiways provides a solution to MSFS improperly placing and sizing taxiway signs in the sim, as well as incorrectly naming taxiways at certain airports. The product will be reintroduced and updated in the coming months. The update, which includes highly improved airport layouts and taxiway names, will be available in both MSFS 2020 and MSFS 2024 Marketplaces, as well as on the JustFlight Store. Additionally, Real Taxiways will include custom taxiways sign models with new textures, emissive materials, and high-detail decals for both versions of the sim. These models are optimized for the MSFS 2024 LOD system, making them visible from a distance with less popping than the default models in both simulators, and signs will be easier to read at night.
