C-130 Hercules? Anyone know of one in development?

Hi, I used to love flying everywhere around the world in a freeware C-130H in FS2004, and wondered if anyone knows if there is a C-130 planned by... well, anyone?

 

I know way back in the day, CaptainSim had what appeared to be a very nice package of Hercules variants older and newer, for FS2004 and FSX. I tried to contact them to ask about FS2020 plans and whether they'd consider the Hercules for the new sim, but I haven't heard anything, and am starting to wonder if they are developing anything these days?

 

 

I know in the real world, the modern glass cockpits and HUD's offer real advantages for situational awareness safety, but I really hope that developers for FS both freeware and payware, don't ignore the older traditional "six pack" and "steam gauge" cockpits! Meaning, while I wouldn't mind a C-130J, what I really want is a C-130H or earlier!

 

Sooo... anyone know of a Hercules project?

Anyone heard of anything? Payware? Freeware?

I wouldn't be surprised if Captain Sim actually updates their C-130 to MSFS. I just hope that when (and if) they do, they actually update it so that the J has the glass flight deck and not still use the analog flight deck. But, I still enjoy the analog flight deck anyways when I fly her

I prefer the earlier H version because it's been so widely exported, used for just about all missions (well except maybe Interceptor!), and was used for sooo many decades... the history makes it easy to imagine so many scenarios for flights.

 

I personally had a ride in a brand new C-130J-30 belonging to the Canadian Air Force in May 2016, because I was among thousands of people who had to be evacuated because of this:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_Fort_McMurray_wildfire

 

 

Just FYI, If you have a certain other sim that involves planes shooting at planes... there's now a really good C-130J Super Hercules free mod that's quite good. It has a full glass cockpit, working autopilot, working HUD, a loadmaster station to handle the ramps and doors, can deploy paratroops, air drop vehicles out the back ramp and so on. I think it has working JATO rockets too! If you don't yet have it, should be free to get the sim and the Hercules mod... PM me and I'll send you a couple links. Now... it's not detailed in systems complexity like say an Aerosoft or PMDG, but for freeware it's darn good!

Edited April 14, 2021 by Herc79

.

I wouldn't be surprised if Captain Sim actually updates their C-130 to MSFS.

 

 

I would love for that to be the case... but I'm sceptical. I'm not even sure they are even in business anymore, at least in terms of doing more than selling old products. Has anyone heard of them doing anything for sims newer than FSX ?

 

 

 

It's too bad, because they also had other cool aircraft, like the B-52G, B-707, B-727 and 737-200, and L-1011 with some newer tubeliners. But they didn't even make the C-130 available for P3D at all, odd considering it's Lockheed's baby... but maybe Lockheed told them "no!"...

 

Anyway I hope they do bring their products to MSFS2020, all their products, as I'd enjoy them, and I think this sim has a lot of potential in the long term.

 

I tried contacting CaptainSim to ask about a possible Hercules for FS2020, through customer support, and got no response. It would be nice even if they just ported over the older Herc... but I wonder if they're out of the flightsim development game?

 

 

Edit:

 

ok I just visited the site now, and noticed a tiny icon that brings me to their forum... didn't notice they had a forum the previous visit! I'm gonna check into this further...

Ok so from what I gather from the Captain Sim forums, it seems that the developers there are very uncertain about MSFS2020 aircraft development, because the SDK is very far from complete. They mentioned that the current SDK they have seen, is maybe good enough for a tiny single engine Cessna GA plane... but is very much lacking for more complex planes.

 

This matches what I've heard from the guys at Aerosoft recently, who said that it was really quite difficult to make the CRJ for this reason, and had to rely on their personal contacts at Microsoft and Asobo for questions, answers and possible solutions, and helped to add to the effort to improve the SDK.

 

This also maybe explains why a few default aircraft aren't flying all that well on autopilot... some behaviors of aircraft have not yet been figured out fully, need to be fixed, and then those lessons learned need to be described into the future SDK versions to be distributed in future.

 

Soooo... as frustrating as this is, now knowing it's likely to be quite some time before some really nice older payware can be "ported over" for this new sim, at least we know it's now an eventual possibility!

 

Maybe.

 

Then again:

...but everyone is sitting on the sidelines with MS2020 due to the useless SDK and changes to the sim core engine and the sheer amount of redesign and rebuilding work required to do it.

.

Edited April 20, 2021 by Herc79

Just gonna leave this here. Yes it's for FS2004 and FSX, but I'm hoping to generate enthusiasm for an MSFS2020 upgrade, so people go bug them about doing so when able!