Over on the PMDG forums, PMDG’s Robert Randazzo has given us another status update regarding their development projects. It’s a big status update with a lot to take in, especially regarding the highly anticipated Boeing 777 family line products. Robert also draws some attention to the fact that PMDG released their first ever product 23 years ago this week.
MSFS Development
First things first is a status update on the ongoing development efforts to PMDG’s 737NG3. For anyone that has been keeping up to date with the progress of this project, it will come as no surprise that the news here is rather ‘there is no real news’. Development is on-going, and as Robert has previously announced, it’s not going very fast. As the team steadily makes progress, PMDG anticipates the potential release date still over a year from now.
Boeing 777 Family
More exciting news is there for the Boeing 777 family line products. After months of being teased with updates about what the team has been working on, Robert is now reporting that the 777 update will hopefully go into beta testing later today. If all the testing goes well, it can be delivered as a product update hopefully some time in December. This update would concern the PMDG 777 200 LR/F and 777-300ER products.
Following these products, PMDG hopes to finally release one of the most requested expansions for the 777: the 777-200ER – including 3 different engine options (Pratt & Whitney, Rolls Royce and GE) with each their own performance and sounds. The release of the 777-200ER will also see the addition of an EFB to the 777 product family, something PMDG will show us more of at a later point.
Last but not least on the 777 front, Robert announced that PMDG is ‘laying the groundwork’ for the Boeing 777X. He quickly follows this up by saying that the team does not have the data needed for it yet, but that they are working on that.
Global Flight Operations
Announced back in summer 2018, PMDG finally seems about ready to release their Global Flight Operations tool. Though the release will be gradual, and will only support Prepar3D and PMDG’s own 737NGXu, 777 and 747, it’s good to see we are finally getting closer to the point of release. The API that can be used by third parties, such as Aerosoft, to integrate GFO with their planes is still being worked on.
Prepar3D v5.1
Very brief news for Prepar3D v5.1: internal testing has not shown any reason to issue compatibility updates, indicating that you should be able to update to v5.1 and use PMDG’s supported products just fine. The team will probably make some small tweaks over time related to textures and reflections, but these are not urgent and PMDG wants to make sure that changes here will not break in a future update by Lockheed Martin.
