[VSKYLABS Dev-Notes] issued 21st June 2025
"Why does it take months to release an aircraft add-on when it already looks complete in previews?"
If you’ve ever followed a flight sim project, you’ve probably seen this:
“It looks done… but months go by and it’s still not released!??”
Here is a the truth, at least in VSKYLABS perspective:
Note: The following describes the general development aspects of VSKYLABS aircraft add-on for X-Plane flight simulator. However, the general idea remains the same in most, if not all flight simulator platforms such as MSFS 2020/2024, Aerofly FS and so forth.
So, in comprehensive aircraft add-on development, the early stages involve large, foundational steps of INITIAL modeling, flight dynamics foundations, systems framework...
The progress in these stages may be rapid and visible within a short period of time (short is a relative term as it can take days, weeks or months, depending on the aircraft).
However, as development advances beyond 85-90%, each remaining step becomes more detailed and nuanced, and the development 'gain' become smaller and far more time consuming. It involves multiple integrations, refinements, deep testing and so forth.
Sometimes, the 'hard to crack' and challenging components are intentionally left for this stage, and it takes time to...'crack'...
It's an exhausting phase of Exponential Effort Curve where each percent closer to completion demands exponentially more effort to complete.
To summarize:
In general, getting to ~85% takes 50% of the time. Getting the last 15%... takes the remaining 50% of the estimated time...
Depending on the aircraft and challenges, it can vary; sometimes getting to ~85% takes 20% of the time, and the last 15% takes the remaining 80%...
Huss-VSKYLABS
