It has been a long time coming, but we have our first glimpse at Orbx’s long-awaited openLC Asia for Prepar3D and FSX. Ed Correia took to the Orbx forums earlier this week to share a small update and some brand new previews of the scenery product. He detailed that there are some positive changes to how the first area will be released.
First, however, Ed said that development is “taking longer than anticipated” as the Prepar3D v4 version needs more work for the exclusion of secondary and tertiary roads. He said that without that work, there would be a “mass of minor roads cutting through our landscape textures which does not do it any justice.”
Furthermore, Ed also said that they are working hard to ensure that openLC Asia will work with and without Orbx Vector being present. Whilst there have been challenges, developer Eugene is working “practically on this 7 days a week” to get this out to customers.
The good news, however, is that the first area for release has increased slightly in size and includes a good portion of Tibet and the surrounding area. This is to make more efficient use of the landclass texturing already considered for the first area. In addition, several new previews for the product have been shared.
As a reminder, the plan is to release openLC Asia in multiple areas throughout 2021. Area 1 of openLC Asia would cover areas such as India, Iran and Afganistan. Area 2 focuses primarily on Russia. Finally, Area 3 would cover countries such as Japan, Indonesia and China. The reason the development of this huge area is being split into three is due to the diversity in landclass data and textures, along with the need for developing new autogen models. In particular, Area 3 poses the biggest challenge of them all and thus releasing last.
It’s unclear at this stage if Orbx is still on track to release openLC Asia Area 1 in the first quarter of 2021, but they did say last time they can’t be too specific about timeframes due to the complexities involved with the product.
You can read a bit more about the roadmap and release areas in our original post. We’ll be sure to keep you updated on any additional news regarding Orbx openLC as and when we get it.
