Data streaming and offline mode confirmed

[ca_metal 2,021]

46 minutes ago, Paraffin said:

Sounds neat, but there had better be a way to turn it off, or turn it down, when you really need to complete a flight and you're in something lightweight that can't handle the weather. If the sim is successful enough to be integrated into FSEconomy, you need to actually complete every flight. It's one reason I don't use the xEnviro plugin that only injects real weather without enough user control. We get Fall/Winter storms up here in the coastal PNW that would ground many GA planes and non-SAR helicopters.

 I'm also wondering about that last part -- "get too comfortable running a commuter flight, and Azure might throw up sudden shifts in the weather, turning a sunny flight into a battle to keep aloft as storm conditions roll in."

I'm not sure how I feel about the sim (Azure) deciding things aren't exciting enough and turning the flight into a "battle" to keep me on my toes. Really? That's something we've never seen in a serous flight sim, and sounds a bit game-y. As long as there are other options for how the weather is generated, I guess it doesn't matter.

When he says "Azure might throw" I understand that azure will control the the weather transitions, which doesn't mean random weather. Azure can be feed with real-time weather data and can change the weather accordingly. 

Not saying it will have for sure real-time weather data, but it's possible. 

About the the FSEconomy issue, I'm sure you won't need to use the Azure weather data all the time, as he stated the sim would work offline.

[Mengy 814]

The offline mode intrigues me, as I am worried that my farm town USA crappy internet speeds won't be enough for the new FS2020.

It would be FANTASTIC if MS allows us to select and download regions of the satellite data to our drives.  Say I was only expecting to fly around the PNW, if I was able to download that imagery while I slept overnight that would be great.  Stream the world when needed but still allow us to have SSD speeds for data in regions of our choice.  I'd love that.

[cappy42 37]

I think one thing in this article people have not alluded to is that it seems that a lot of the processing is going to be done in the cloud then sent to your PC, therefore not requiring the most ultrafast PC available (just a fast internet connection) to be able to run this game.  If that is true, and if this can be accomplished seamlessly, I think that's good news for everyone.

[Sticky 267]

11 minutes ago, cappy42 said:

I think one thing in this article people have not alluded to is that it seems that a lot of the processing is going to be done in the cloud then sent to your PC, therefore not requiring the most ultrafast PC available (just a fast internet connection) to be able to run this game.  If that is true, and if this can be accomplished seamlessly, I think that's good news for everyone.

Also means to me *possibly* no more scenery or weather add-ons.  Or the way these add-ons will work will be a fundamental change.

[Woozie 732]

1 hour ago, Arasaka said:

We have 8 core processors, slowly becoming a default standard in a "gaming" rig, I'm not even talking about Threadrippers and its Intel analogs. Is this not enough to calculate everything offline?

For visual glory its definitely sufficient, but not for high fidelity simulation of weather, aerodynamics and a "living world" with dynamic elements

 

[B777ER 2,486]

I see companies like HiFi, REX and Orbx and their business models possibly losing a lot. If MS AI handles real-time weather and the way it already looks with the clouds and the sky and the AI scenery being loaded in real time as you fly there's no need for any of their products..

[Paraffin 2,197]

50 minutes ago, cappy42 said:

I think one thing in this article people have not alluded to is that it seems that a lot of the processing is going to be done in the cloud then sent to your PC, therefore not requiring the most ultrafast PC available (just a fast internet connection) to be able to run this game.  If that is true, and if this can be accomplished seamlessly, I think that's good news for everyone.

Maybe, but as someone who is emphasizing the "cautious" part of cautious optimism in regard to the new MFS, I wouldn't get my hopes up too far. 

Some of the CPU tasks might be offloaded to a remote server like the AI flight models and pathing, programmed ATC, and pre-assembling scenery to be streamed and and then buffered locally. The weather could be assembled on the server with the end result streamed to the client. 

OTOH, I'm not sure the user's flight model could be run remotely. Think about the need to update the FM for every frame at 30-40 fps or higher, completely smooth and with no hiccups. That's not something like scenery or weather injection that could be buffered ahead of time. I know some games are starting to work this way with no local processing, I'm just not sure about something as complex as a flight model and all the associated systems modeling in one of the more complex aircraft.

And you'll probably still need a hefty GPU to push those generated pixels to the screen, especially if your'e at 4k resolution. Possibly also a very fast SSD drive, depending on the buffering requirements for streamed scenery.

[aleex 551]

17 minutes ago, B777ER said:

I see companies like HiFi, REX and Orbx and their business models possibly losing a lot. If MS AI handles real-time weather and the way it already looks with the clouds and the sky and the AI scenery being loaded in real time as you fly there's no need for any of their products..

I'm more worried about how that internet connection will work (if any. I don't going to believe anything until it's confirmed by MS officially... Already got lied in the past) than about third party devs, honestly 😕

[Woozie 732]

40 minutes ago, Paraffin said:

Maybe, but as someone who is emphasizing the "cautious" part of cautious optimism in regard to the new MFS, I wouldn't get my hopes up too far. 

Some of the CPU tasks might be offloaded to a remote server like the AI flight models and pathing, programmed ATC, and pre-assembling scenery to be streamed and and then buffered locally. The weather could be assembled on the server with the end result streamed to the client. 

OTOH, I'm not sure the user's flight model could be run remotely. Think about the need to update the FM for every frame at 30-40 fps or higher, completely smooth and with no hiccups. That's not something like scenery or weather injection that could be buffered ahead of time. I know some games are starting to work this way with no local processing, I'm just not sure about something as complex as a flight model and all the associated systems modeling in one of the more complex aircraft.

And you'll probably still need a hefty GPU to push those generated pixels to the screen, especially if your'e at 4k resolution. Possibly also a very fast SSD drive, depending on the buffering requirements for streamed scenery.

Thats the million dollar question! If they go full cloud computed, you could run it on a shoebox in full details, but there will be input lag that may become unbearable if you got a rather wonky internet connection. However, as it seems it will have an offline mode, we can safely assume that it wont be cloud computed streaming

I guess it will rather be a cloud assisted title, as Microsoft seems to be aiming for hybrid cloud gaming for their new "xCloud" platform. Stuff that can be pre-calculated and buffered will be cloud computed, everything else still happens on your PC. Another application of cloud assistance is task outsorcing (or splitting). A simple example would be calculating an animation in the cloud, send the raw animation data to the local PC and use locally installed models and textures to actually build and display the animation.

Cloud assistance/Hybrid woud still be helpful for those who own a low/medium spec PC, as it free's up local processing power

However, depending on how much hybrid this is going to be, we may get much less customization in MSFS than what we are used to. If ground textures are being streamed, you cant just simply replace them with 3rd party addons

Edited July 24, 2019 by Woozie

[Woozie 732]

40 minutes ago, aleex said:

I'm more worried about how that internet connection will work (if any. I don't going to believe anything until it's confirmed by MS officially... Already got lied in the past) than about third party devs, honestly 😕

Microsoft already confirmed they are going to use Azure AI and there will be some sort of streaming, so some features will definitely require a permanent internet connection.

Edited July 24, 2019 by Woozie

[Woozie 732]

2 minutes ago, Rob_Ainscough said:

Sure you can, if you look at the demo video, that's exactly what's happening ... not 3rd party but default terrain LC per comment "severely truncated" ... no reason it couldn't be 3rd party as offline would pull from local source for textures.  Also "how much capability I need at any point" would indicate sources would be local AND streamed ... this is good for lower connection speeds but it does sound like visual fidelity will vary based on how good one's internet connection performs.

As i mentioned, it depends on how much hybrid this is going to be. If all textures are still local, 3rd party stuff will likely still be possible. If textures are being streamed its a different story. And i'm not sure if the offline mode isnt just some kind of "emergency mode", allowing you to fly if internet insn't available for whatever reason

[aleex 551]

21 minutes ago, Woozie said:

Microsoft already confirmed they are going to use Azure AI and there will be some sort of streaming, so some features will definitely require a permanent internet connection.

I know, but the article mentions the streaming, and that's much more that just weather download... we will see...

[Paraffin 2,197]

13 minutes ago, Rob_Ainscough said:

All other rendering (PBR, reflections, shadows, etc.) would still be handled by the CPU/GPU.  This is all good as it free's up the CPU some which is the objective since XBOX CPUs (AMD Jaguar) are no where near as capable as desktop CPUs ... hopefully we get some optimization features specific to PCs that will leverage PC hardware.

The new Xbox Scarlett will have a much stronger CPU than the current one:

"Using custom-designed processor from AMD making use of Zen 2 and Navi architecture, Xbox Project Scarlett will be 4x more powerful than the Xbox One X." (techradar report)

I imagine that will be the target for CPU usage, with support for the current XBox One requiring much lower settings. 

Ideally, MFS would design for even higher future CPU/GPU capability than either the new Xbox or current PCs, to allow for advancement in PC hardware over the life cycle of the first version while the Xbox remains fixed. But that can have marketing issues with users who complain about not being able to run at full settings. 

[Superdelphinus 718]

4 hours ago, Arasaka said:

We have 8 core processors, slowly becoming a default standard in a "gaming" rig, I'm not even talking about Threadrippers and its Intel analogs. Is this not enough to calculate everything offline?

I don’t know, but the percentage of people who have top of the range P.C. gear is vanishingly small. 

[chass32 138]

4 hours ago, Paraffin said:

I'm also wondering about that last part -- "get too comfortable running a commuter flight, and Azure might throw up sudden shifts in the weather, turning a sunny flight into a battle to keep aloft as storm conditions roll in."

I'm not sure how I feel about the sim (Azure) deciding things aren't exciting enough and turning the flight into a "battle" to keep me on my toes. Really? That's something we've never seen in a serous flight sim, and sounds a bit game-y. As long as there are other options for how the weather is generated, I guess it doesn't matter.

I´m pretty sure that the journalist is not a flight/flightsim expert, and sometimes writing an article means you can "foresee" (or you think you can) about what will happen just to make it more appealing to the reader. It´s fair to do so  but in the end it just "appeals" to those easily influenced.

We´ll have user-defined weather, random-defined weather (as probably the journalist was told) and real weather. 

Cheers

Carlos