In MS2020, I helped develop the G36 Improvement Project, which had around 40k downloads and still has an active community around it on Discord.
My mod improved the default Bonanaza, changing the handling, electrical system, adding improved fuel burn and engine performance and more to get the aircraft as close as we could to the POH.
We did this by reverse engineering the current Asobo aircraft to understand how to write in RPN and what was set in the CFG files and moved on to writing our behaviour def files.
We can now view part of the aircraft via the VFS Projector, but I can’t see how we can make these community mods from the SDK documentation.
Is there any chance you could help with the basic workflow of being able to modify a stock aircraft like the G36?
(note quote for below as I put something similar in the encrypted post but that is getting fragmented so thought it better to start my own thread)
Still trying to figure it out myself, I love modifying aircraft lights so all I need access to is the systems.cfg and effects folders, the VFS projection thing is crap and I have not learned away around it with this whole streaming nonsense.
3rd party aircraft I don’t have any problems with because everything is there that I need. Default aircraft in 2024 as of now is not happening unfortunately.
I’ve been able to get there and start modifying, although the workflow is pretty slow, as I have to restart the sim every time I make a change!
Steps to start modifying
Open VFS Projector, start and open the file explorer
Navigate to C:\Users\yourname\AppData\Local\Packages\Microsoft.Limitless_8wekyb3d8bbwe\LocalState\VFSProjection\simobjects\airplanes
This gives you access to the standard aircraft; if you look in common/config, you can get to the systems.cfg. The effects files are in the root of the VFS folder C:\Users\yourname\AppData\Local\Packages\Microsoft.Limitless_8wekyb3d8bbwe\LocalState\VFSProjection\effects
Create a folder for the mod in your community folder; I have the following structure, and it is loading in sim:
Create the folder structure:
layout.json
manifest.json
ContentInfo
Bonanza_Imporvement_Project
Thumbnail.jpg
simobjects
airplanes
asobo_bonanza_g36
presets
asobo
bonanza_captmatto
config
.cfgs (system, engines etc)
thumbnail
copied images from VFS
That’s as far as I’ve got - it is loading in the sim - I’m currently working on the systems cfg to model the electrical system correctly. I had a lot of model behaviour files in 2020 to correctly model things like spark fouling, state-saving, bus tie logic etc and not found the best way to make this work yet.
Woah! Thanks so much for this breakdown! I just usually do aircraft lighting mods, specifically external lights. The only files I need access too are the effects folder, and aicraft’s system cfg.
A typical mod would look something like this:
Folder name starting with a “z” to be read first in the community folder
z-mets747-Aircraft-LightsMod
layout.json
manifest.json
Effects
FX files
Texture Folder
SimObjects
airplanes
aircraft name
systems.cfg
I tried doing these exact steps with files I copied out of the VFS projection folder for the A330 in 2024 and it wasn’t saving any of my changes or even being read in the community folder.
How are your manifest and layout files looking? There are some changes between old/new, and I believe the VFS system needs correct file sizes for the layout.json.
It took me a while to get it in game with much trial and error. Otherwise, I think your structure looks ok, I think?
If you fancy modding the lights on the Bonanza, we could try to figure it out together.
I have no idea how to create those tbh so I copy and pasted from another 2024 and modified the manifest with proper info and ran the layout on my layout generator.exe, other than that, I don’t know how to create them otherwise.
One thing I have found when modifying the default aircraft is that it inherits information from the main aircraft config files.
I’m working on updating the electrical system and have created a new systems.cfg, however, the aircraft is still pulling through entries made in the default systems.cfg.
I can see my changes, but it then “fills in the blanks” for the rest.
Not sure this is a bug or something that I’ve setup incorrectly.
EDIT: Thanks to some help from the FS2 Discord I now know this is related to the modular nature of the aircraft. I need to overwrite the common cfg’s rather than create my own preset which uses the common files and any additional cfg’s add to this rather than overwrite in the entirity.
Can you explain this a little more deeply? It sounds like it’s working the way it’s supposed to, but I don’t understand from your comments what your intent was. It sounds like you didn’t want it to fill in the information you didn’t put in the file (which seems weird to me)? What were you expecting? Was it overwriting your information? Where did your package sit (Community I assume?)? I assume you didn’t copy the original to the community directory, and it was “filling in the blanks” from the streamed copy? Why was it a problem that it filled in the information you didn’t put in (I’m assuming you didn’t want this behavior because you said you thought it was a bug. That’s what the VFS is supposed to do, and always has (although the difference may have been in the past it did it on a file basis, and now it does it on a line by line basis?)?
Thanks for sharing your progress. I expect I’ll spend some time to learn how to use the VFS Projector soon.
Do you understand how modular simobject merging works? Everything in a given preset gets merged together, which might be what you’re seeing if you are using one of the default presets and only overriding some of the attachments. Modular SimObjects
Totally a PICNIC issue (Problem In Chair Not In Computer)! I hadn’t understood how the modular simobject system works. I’ve moved my systems.cfg to the common folder now, and it is working as expected. Although I assume this overwrites all the G36s now, not just my presets.
I need to troubleshoot my electrical setup now, as I’ve made many changes to bring it in line with the real aircraft, but it’s not quite there yet. I have some issues with the lines and connections, etc.
