Jordan King - Prepar3D v4 First Look

[CrownCityMisfits 58]

10 hours ago, vgbaron said:

Rain effects can easily be put in by the aircraft developer. I have them in the FSW Lear35A and some others. My guess is that LM will leave that alone and let the add on dev's handle it.

 

Vic

Well here's a direct quote from Scott at A2A...

"I think this is a question better directed at Lockheed Martin, as this is the kind of effect is easiest and best to do in the engine itself."

[RGS 1]

1 hour ago, CrownCityMisfits said:

Well here's a direct quote from Scott at A2A...

"I think this is a question better directed at Lockheed Martin, as this is the kind of effect is easiest and best to do in the engine itself."

I'd imagine LM need to write the rain effect shader first (and 3ds Max tools to go with it) - that's their job.

Once the system is in place, devs then have the tools/control required to correctly implement the effects of a per a/c basis, flagging the appropriate polygons, setting wiper masks, parameters etc.

Disappointed not to see the base effect added by LM at this stage, seems like a very odd thing to leave out when going to the trouble of re-doing the rain and snow, particularly when FSW now has the feature (and it can't be that hard to implement).

[ErichB 3,636]

13 hours ago, vgbaron said:

Rain effects can easily be put in by the aircraft developer. I have them in the FSW Lear35A and some others. My guess is that LM will leave that alone and let the add on dev's handle it.

 

Vic

 

Yeah, something for FSFX Precipitation to exploit.  Will be great.

[anden145 2,273]

Interesting... theres was a discussion (quite interesting as well) between developers on the live stream at AirDailyX last night. You can re-watch it here if you like.

Basically it cooperates what @CrownCityMisfits already said. If it were to be implemented with the current tools available in Prepar3D, it would totally kill the performance and transform the sim into a slide-show'.

[vgbaron 3,481]

10 hours ago, CrownCityMisfits said:

Well here's a direct quote from Scott at A2A...

"I think this is a question better directed at Lockheed Martin, as this is the kind of effect is easiest and best to do in the engine itself."

Of course it can be done in the engine but why add the overhead to the base product when it can be handled by the a/c developer. Personally, I'd rather LM spend their time on something important like the ATC code.

Vic

[CrownCityMisfits 58]

10 hours ago, ErichB said:

 

Yeah, something for FSFX Precipitation to exploit.  Will be great.

Yes that's what I was thinking - a new FSFX addon. It's in their wheelhouse, and their attention to detail is admirable.

[TechguyMaxC 516]

3 hours ago, vgbaron said:

Of course it can be done in the engine but why add the overhead to the base product when it can be handled by the a/c developer. Personally, I'd rather LM spend their time on something important like the ATC code.

Vic

There are numerous reasons to code effects into the sim rather than leave it up to 3rd party add-ons.  I'll list a few:

1) no need to reinvent the wheel - 3rd party add-on developers can focus on what they do best, making realistic add-ons.  Leave the effects work to the rendering engine rather than the artists!  Pre-baked effects are only approximations at best, and they require a lot of additional work.

2) consistency of the effect - knowing the effect is going to be 

a) a selectable option for *any* add-on

b) will function the same regardless of the add-on

3) reduced cost/development time for add-ons - if a 3rd party dev doesn't need to expend resources to work on a feature that's already supported, that should mean lower costs and quicker time to market!  Who's against that?

[TheFlightSimGuy 514]

3 hours ago, vgbaron said:

Personally, I'd rather LM spend their time on something important like the ATC code.

Vic

And how much time does it seem they spent on it? 

[FDX706 8]

Can a beta tester confirm if the dynamic lighting feature allows for light illumination of clouds by landing lights/strobes. Just wondering. Thanks!!

 

ROMAN78

[DrumsArt 270]

For all people who absolutely want, unfailingly, unmistakably, clearly, quickly right away have rain effects, buy just for few bucks the nice "Raindrops Simulator" for sale on Steam right now !

Sorry I can't resist, sometimes I'm a very, very naughty/bad boy...

Regards,

Richard

 

[Boomer 1,619]

Oh JC...enough about raindrops....