No, not a question about birds :-) I just did a search on clouds and was disappointed to find no reference to this subject. I remember when Fly! was first released the clouds would seem to envelop the aircraft as they flew through them - a nice piece of basic realism if you like. All the FS series have given us so far is a kind of 'pin the tail on the donkey' effect, where aircraft are merely 'popped on' or superimposed over the environment. Granted you need to be outside the aircraft to see (or not see) this effect but when I *don't* see it, in say external view or replay mode, I feel like I am playing with a toy plane pivoting about its axes but somehow detached from the world in which it is supposed to be immersed. It certainly *isn't* immersed and to that extent nor can I be. Do we have any reason to wish/hope that FSX will be different in this aspect? Please excuse and disregard if this has been covered and I missed it. On the other hand the way FS is coded may well preclude such an effect. Sigh. Because that could well necessitate a complete rewrite and a consigning to history of FS's daring machine code core components - and I fear that would never see the light of day (as in not get past the bean-counters department.) I will of course buy the next incarnation of this absolutely unique piece of organic dream-ware as soon as it arrives - as will most of us I suspect - and be extremely thankful to be able to do so. As a frequent visitor but infrequent contributor may I use this opportunity to say 'Thank You Avsim' for your fansatic contribution to this hobby.

>in say external view or replay mode, I feel like I am>playing with a toy plane pivoting about its axes but somehow>detached from the world in which it is supposed to be>immersed. Many flight simulators suffer from the same problem: in spot view it looks as if the plane is pinned to the screen. That's because the computer-controlled camera always points precisely at the geometric centre of the plane. IL-2 was particularly bad in this respect and FS isn't much better. A while ago I made some suggestions about this, for example to ensure that the camera doesn't point precisely at the centre and also to make the view move around a bit as it would in real life (e.g. due to turbulence). tdragger replied, saying that I wouldn't be disappointed! I think it's well established that the view system in FSX is completely new and is hopefully far more realistic and flexible. Unfortunately there's no evidence (as far as I know) that the clouds will be improved. I certainly hope they will be improved because in my opinion clouds in FS are a major weakness. They're okay in the distance but very poor when you actually fly through them. It's amazing that in some areas FS still hasn't caught up with Flight Unlimited 2! Best regards, Chris

I have exactly the same memory of Fly! except from the cockpit. You were really emerging from the cloud. Sure hope to see that again...