August 29th, 2019 [Update]

[Krakin 5,846]

3 hours ago, dave2013 said:

The question will be how much bandwidth one needs. 

Test the Google Earth flight sim.

[Paraffin 2,197]

18 minutes ago, Krakin said:

Test the Google Earth flight sim.

That may be a rough guide to what's possible on our current connection speed, but I'm not sure how many conclusions one could draw about the new MSFS from it.

In areas where there is enough data for full 3D modeling with surface textures like downtown Seattle, Google Earth keeps the frame rate smooth by showing rough polygons first, and then filling in the surface detail as you go. If you have a fast enough connection this may be invisible, happening faster than you can see it. On my 7 Mbps connection it's fairly obvious, with things filling in as I "fly" over the area at a simulated 1,000 ft.

It looks stunningly real at first, until I notice the artifacts. As an actual flight simulation it breaks immersion to see the outside world changing and "filling in" all the time with more detail. Maybe others wouldn't mind it as much? It's definitely not what we're used to seeing in a flight sim.

Google Earth is also a very flat-looking view of the world. There is no sunlight angle or color, no shadows, no weather. No dynamic elements like cars moving on the roads, trains moving on the tracks, or other aircraft in the sky. Adding the kind of lighting, vehicles and weather effects we see in the MSFS trailer may require more bandwidth than the fairly simple view of the world we see in Google Earth, depending on whether that processing is remote or on the local PC.

[chickster25 153]

I have one major concern with streamed scenery, in that when MS decide enough is enough, you will be informed by email that the service will be switched off on a particular date. At that point, you will lose all your investment into this application and will have to move on to MS2021 or whatever its called.

Call me a cynic and perhaps MS will keep this version going as "software as a service" but I dont have the money to keep paying for  a game and would not want to risk ploughing lots into add-ons with this in the back of my mind, sadly. 

[Dazkent 113]

This product could be a no go for me if is does stream the scenery. I am plagued with slow internet and still waiting for my local exchange to be converted to fibre. Who knows by the time this product come out it may be upgraded 😂

[2reds2whites 827]

I think some of you are being too simplistic in the likely approach towards streaming.

I can only assume there'll be some mixed model of downloadable assets and streaming services, with some kind of 'slider' as to how much of each you wish to use.

I imagine at the very least the basic landclass will be downloadable, with probably base textures, along with dedicated points of interest (in San Francisco, the bridge for example, or the CNN Tower in Toronto). From there I would think you can choose the amount/quality of what gets streamed, and I would think there will be an option to download whatever you want. 

Keep in mind you don't have to download the entire planet, if you like flying around North America on certain routes then you could just download that. Also note that if you're flying an airliner, the bits between point A and B will likely suffice with very basic landclass, whereas if you're a VFR flyer the areas you would have to download are reasonably small.

And whilst I do appreciate that these areas could take up lots of storage, we live in an era where a quality 1tb SSD can be bought for $120 (and always getting cheaper) and a quality 1tb HDD can be bought for $50 - and mass storage is always getting bigger and cheaper.

[Wobbie 938]

We actually cannot assume anything at this stage, based on a couple of pictures and a few clips. 

[2reds2whites 827]

Just now, Wobbie said:

We actually cannot assume anything at this stage, based on a couple of pictures and a few clips. 

I think you'll find we can assume all we like, whether it's right or wrong is what's up for debate. 

[Dominique_K 10,152]

18 minutes ago, 2reds2whites said:

 

 Landclass files are a minuscule load, they are a collection of figures calling for textures on a grid. Both could be in the basic sim.

But, and this is a big but (one t only), so far we understand that FS20 could be more imagery than LC. If confirmed, a whole new ball game. The tiny OrbX TE  Netherlands requires 200 GB to install and 76 GB of storage on disk. 

Color me simplistic but I can't wait to hear from MS how they will stream me the goods on my 4 Mbps connection.

Edited September 6, 2019 by domkle

[Paraffin 2,197]

14 minutes ago, 2reds2whites said:

Keep in mind you don't have to download the entire planet, if you like flying around North America on certain routes then you could just download that. Also note that if you're flying an airliner, the bits between point A and B will likely suffice with very basic landclass, whereas if you're a VFR flyer the areas you would have to download are reasonably small.

And whilst I do appreciate that these areas could take up lots of storage, we live in an era where a quality 1tb SSD can be bought for $120 (and always getting cheaper) and a quality 1tb HDD can be bought for $50 - and mass storage is always getting bigger and cheaper.

We're just speculating here, but personally I doubt that there will be local storage of the full, maxed-out scenery even for for frequently flown routes.

Using Orbx TE Washington State as a rough guide with 206 GB on my drive, if you wanted only the West Coast states of the USA, that would be something like 618 GB. That's a good chunk of that 1 TB SSD for just three states. And the MS scenery may be more complex than what Orbx uses.

The other reason I think it's unlikely. is that "stream scenery and erase it as you go" with a local client running the flight model, is the most robust form of copy protection. You can't pirate World of Warcraft because a good part of the content depends on the remote server. There may be more basic landclass scenery that runs completely offline, but MS can protect the full version of the sim if, like WoW, it depends on the server for the full content.

[ca_metal 2,033]

Well, we might get the answers in october, when they will kick-off their discovery series.

[dtrjones 356]

8 hours ago, Dazkent said:

This product could be a no go for me if is does stream the scenery. I am plagued with slow internet and still waiting for my local exchange to be converted to fibre. Who knows by the time this product come out it may be upgraded 😂

I wouldn't lose all hope. We've seen scenery which isn't photogrammetry or from ortho files, so it may be possible to play offline so to speak. Lets wait and see what the options are before giving up.

[vortex681 806]

19 hours ago, Paraffin said:

Using Orbx TE Washington State as a rough guide with 206 GB on my drive, if you wanted only the West Coast states of the USA, that would be something like 618 GB. That's a good chunk of that 1 TB SSD for just three states. And the MS scenery may be more complex than what Orbx uses.

Or, on the other hand, they may use a game engine which allows for much more highly optimized and compressed graphics than Orbx can produce for the existing sims.

Edited September 7, 2019 by vortex681

[Wobbie 938]

Remember that Microsoft Flight Simulator will be released for Xbox & PC!

Gamespot has revealed that it is said, so far, that there will be 2x Xbox versions, 12GB & 16GB RAM, both with a 1TB drive.

So, that seems to indicate that scenery will be streamed to the Xbox, as well as other stuff for their new games.

[vortex681 806]

25 minutes ago, Wobbie said:

Gamespot has revealed that it is said, so far, that there will be 2x Xbox versions, 12GB & 16GB RAM, both with a 1TB drive.

These are just rumours. Plus, Microsoft’s head of Xbox and gaming, Phil Spencer, has said in a recent interview that there won't be a second, fully streaming version of the new console: https://www.theverge.com/2019/8/16/20808358/microsoft-xbox-project-scarlett-no-streaming-only-console-phil-spencer-interview

[dilore 126]

Aren't the trees in the Aspen video

https://cdn.microsoftstudios.com/fsi/January Early Aspen.mp4?_=3

too tall? Or are the buildings too small?