2024: A Year of Milestones
10 Things That Defined 2024
Can you believe it? We're already at the end of 2024! For me, that not only means that I am traveling across Europe to visit my family, but it also means that it's time to look back at what we've achieved at X-Crafts, and what we can look forward to in 2025.
1: Ten Years of X-Crafts
First of all, 2024 marked a really important milestone for X-Crafts: 10 years since the first release of my first E195! Looking back, it's incredible how much has changed, not only in the Flightsim world! Ten years ago I was only 21, just starting University as a mechanical engineer, I lived in Czech Republic and X-Plane 10 just came out.
Since then, I spent a year in Croatia, followed by studying Visual Effects for Films (CGI) in the south of England. I worked for a year in a VFX Studio, but I soon realized that I never got the passion and satisfaction that I felt when making airplanes for X-Plane. At the end of 2019 I took a month off between jobs, and I traveled to Nepal for a month with my best friend, which was truly amazing. We did the Everest Base Camp Trek, starting by flying into one of the world's most famous airports: Lukla, where only a handful of pilots are certified to land at a steep uphill airstrip, with many fatal accidents over the years.
And of course, taking off happens on the same runway, only downhill! Here's my photo:
We were honestly terrified, and let me tell you that it is a very weird thing to pick which socks to put on the day you think you might die! I made a short film about that whole Nepal adventure and you can watch it here.
Soon after I came back, the Pandemic hit, and the filmmaking industry came to a halt, which worked great for me, because it meant I had more time to work on the ERJ Family! After a few months in lockdown, I decided that I absolutely loved doing this every minute of every day, and that if I let go of my VFX career and did this full-time, I could really take X-Crafts to the next level and create products that I could be proud of.
And here I am, a decade later, living in London with my incredible wife, who not only accepts but supports my weird passion for virtual airplanes. We've got our first baby on the way, which is definitely going to impact my work-life balance, but I'm here committed to continuously improving everyone's flight sim experiences in all possible ways.
2: We released Free E-Jets for X-Plane 12
To celebrate the first decade of X-Crafts, our Free E175 & E195 have been updated, enhanced, and fully optimized for X-Plane 12. They were released on the 1st of May 2024 and our Free E-Jets have been downloaded by over 22,000 users already!
3: One Year of Free Real-World Flight Plans
Not only are we celebrating 10 years of X-Crafts, we're also celebrating one year of our Free Weekly Real-World Community Flights! In one year, our subscribers flew over 7,485,120NM, which is the equivalent of flying to the moon and back 18 times, or flying around the globe 342 times🌍!
These weekly flight plans are hand-picked by Ben who is also part of the customer support team here at X-Crafts and he puts a lot of effort into picking real and fun E-Jet routes from all around the world, although we do aim for at least half of them being in the US. Our subscribers then get an email with all the important info needed for the flight, removing the hassle of picking your flights.
This is a free service by X-Crafts, so you should definitely join!
4: E-Jets Family is Now Better than Ever
By far the biggest release of the year was the E-Jets Family 1.1.0. This was a big deal for me, because I really wanted to raise the bar with the authenticity of the E-Jets, and the E-Jets Family now finally brings the "automatic essence" of the real E-Jets.
You can now enjoy FMS Speed, ILS Autotune, Steep Approach (E170 & 190 only) and over 160 other new features, enhancements, and fixes. These updates automate many of the tasks you previously had to manage manually, reducing the pilot’s workload, and maximizing the immersion.
5. Lineage 1000 Nearly Done
I spent the last few months working on the Lineage 1000 and I'm finishing up the 3D model. There are still other things missing, mainly some systems and animations, but we're really getting there. 2025 is going to be an exciting year and the Lineage 1000 will be the first major release for us.
The cabin night lighting has been taking up a lot of my time. I should probably write a whole separate Not-A-Newsletter on the complexities of getting the night lighting right because X-Plane really doesn't make it easy to make things look good at night. But I wanted to share with you the progress I've made so far, so here's an exclusive in-sim walk-through video with commentary.
6. ERJ Family Comeback!
I recently published a development update on the ERJ Family v2 and I was really happy to get a lot of positive feedback and support from the community! It's clear that the ERJs are very popular regional jets, and they are making a great Comeback in 2025, so stay tuned!
7: We Gave Away $650 in Store Credit
Along with our weekly flight plans, I also started a monthly screenshot contest where users get a chance to win $50 of store credit by simply submitting their screenshot!
Since this is the 12th month of our promotion, we will be selecting two winners this time! Each winner will receive $50 in store credit, and if they do not already own it, they will also win the full E-Jets Family package. This means you have double the chances of winning! Be sure to submit your screenshot by the end of the month, which is just two days away. Find out more here.
8. The X-Plane Index
In my effort to unify the X-Plane Community, I created the X-Plane Index—one comprehensive list of active add-ons for X-Plane, no matter the source or developer, to help everyone get the most out of X-Plane. This is a real community effort, unifying developers and marketplaces alike. You can explore hundreds of freeware and payware airliners, sceneries, plugins, or other add-ons, categorized for easy browsing.
9. X-Craft's Continued Support of MSF
For years now I've been supporting Doctors Without Borders, who provide independent, impartial medical humanitarian assistance to the people who need it most, all around the world. And I'm very happy that this year X-Crafts donated $3,005 to this great organization.
10. Not Just Sunshine
After reading all the above, you might think that this all just sounds too good to be true. But I started the Not-A-Newsletter to give everyone a transparent behind-the-scenes look at flight sim development, and this year has actually been quite tough for me. The truth is that there are many challenges when it comes to running a business in this industry, and it is not easy to make a profit. I think that it is important to talk about the hard things as it is talking about the good things, but I want to address this properly so I'll keep it for a future Not-A-Newlsetter.
Happy New Year!