Imagine where MSFS will be in 3 years?

[Glenn Fitzpatrick 3,798]

Sadly my 128GB ram, i9 15900 and RTX 5090 with 64GB VRAM will be seen as outdated and not up to scratch for a "modern" flight sim 😄

[a321 207]

7 hours ago, abrams_tank said:

SimBrief has known problems with MSFS.  Maybe you should stop using SimBrief until the problems are fixed.  People that input their flight plans manually are able to fly fine in IFR without problems. 

Of course its always something else's fault, never MSFS

[abrams_tank 7,426]

3 hours ago, a321 said:

Of course its always something else's fault, never MSFS

Who knows who's fault it is.  It could be MSFS, it could be SimBrief. It could be both.  So file your flight plan manually and you can fly IFR without any issues.  

[akita 429]

On 4/11/2021 at 11:42 AM, abrams_tank said:

But those two platforms have major shortcomings.  The first is the graphics, that is obvious.  But the second biggest shortcoming is that MSFS can stream satellite data to give you terrain that parallels real life.

Until XPlane and P3D stream satellite data so the terrain matches real life, including real life points of views, they are many, many, steps behind MSFS.  Especially when it comes to VFR, it's just night and day comparing MSFS to XPlane & P3D.

And the truth is, the only competing company that has that satellite data is Google and I doubt Google will freely give it to XPlane and P3D, not to mention the server costs that Google would have to pay to stream that data to XPlane or P3D.

I reallyyyyy have no intention talking more about other simulators in this forum but frankly you are totally wrong.

Xplane already streams satellite data (ESRI) in it's development tools, and I'm almost sure they stream for their mobile scenery.

And even if, I really hope orthos won't be the next thing for P3D/Xplane, here is a fundamental thing to acknowledge, graphics today are drifting away from anything "baked", GPUs are capable of GI, gazillion of polygons, materials and much more as they became programmable.

orthos, are the exact opposite niche in this regard, everything is baked. patterns of grounds, fields, colors, all of that changes 24/7 every second, what orthos provide as realistic is what you think it is according to the same soruce? you see a green land in orthos, but in reality it is most of the time a dry one, it just happened that satellites caught it at a specific condition, does not mean it's always realistic.

Today's rendering is about materials, and they are not that varied; a blade of grass in africa is the same material as in russia, water, asphalt, rocks, soil etc... all come from the same materials. procedural materials are the next thing reaching towards an "infinite resolution". while ZL17/18 is considered great for orthos, procedural materials standard is about 10x higher resolution than that (10.24/5.12 px per cm, if not more).

The ground patterns that you see in orthos are merely a baked representation of an otherwise available data to dress materials on. data that P3D/Xplane already uses, it's really only about the graphics pipeline.

 

Edited April 12, 2021 by akita

[devgrp 1,233]

12 hours ago, a321 said:

I am using simbreif. I don't use the built in flight planner. But I have to load it in msfs to get it in the SIM. As with all the WT Garmin mods and PMS-gns 530 you can can get CTD's loading waypoints, and above all I should not have too. 

This issue also happens with the CRJ hence me saying it 

I have Navigraph etc in all my Sims. This is a huge issue that if fixed would also fix many other issues. 

 

Wait let me be very clear here..

For the A32NX / CJ4 / Aerosoft CRJ I use the Simbrief integration or download the plan from simbrief using the Simbrief tool for the CRJ in the native Aerosoft format, for GA  (VFR only) like you I use the planner, for the picture I posted I was using a Simbrief plan loaded into MSFS to get the plan into the Garmin with the TBM 930. If there was a way to open the plan directly in in the Garmin that would be good. But I should not have to load way points into the Garmin, I should not have my plan being changed so drastically and this has happened to me with the CRJ using an exported native CRJ flight plan. I DO NOT USE THE BUILT IN FLIGHT PLANNER TO ACTUALLY PLAN A FLIGHT.

Lets look at the A32NX.
From their GitHub page

This is not their fault!! its the sim and this kind of stuff should not be happening!

Working title:

None of this is their fault, but THEY ARE TRYING TO FIX IT!!

Lets just agree....the sim has some issues, that affect a wide range of areas of flight simming. I am not saying X-Plane or any other sim is perfect, but if you want realism these kind of things are the basics and I am sorry no matter how much people want to deny it, MSFS is just not there yet, that's all. Everything at the moment in MSFS seems like a huge compromise, and TO ME and maybe ONLY ME, it is just not good enough, hence why I dont play it so much, Yes after sim update 3 it became more of a simulator, again TO ME, but these issues are still huge and they need fixing ASAP, not more eye candy, not more whatever else, fix the core issues.  I am positive I am not the only one who feels like this. 

Of course MSFS has some majorly amazing things, but sadly what is still not working are very important things.

Like I said I don't have any of these problems because I enter everything manually unless I'm flying a GA plane with a gns or G1000. With planes like the tbm or king air I enter manually because of the touchscreen. When I do my routes I get a plan from flightaware, type it into little navmap to get an overview then enter it in the fmc or gps. I actually enjoy doing my fp. It's actually pretty easy to put all the wps in 

[mrueedi 702]

40 minutes ago, akita said:

orthos, are the exact opposite niche in this regard, everything is baked

Thats not true.

Using image processing they basically reverse engineered the whole globe. That way, the get much more information out of the image, which is used to generate correct 3D objects like trees, buildings, type of building, outline of building, color of building, roads, grass... And a lot more could be added in future releases. The effect of snow vs summer seasons, daylight conditions or weather is already nicely modeled. Looking over a city in MSFS you hardly ever see the underlying ortho. Its buried under 3D objects of correct shape and color. Therefore you easily recognize known places worldwide or you can familiarize yourself with unknown routes or airports. MSFS simulates the real world in a complete league of its own.

This is only possible in MSFS and will never be possible without truly global orthos.

56 minutes ago, akita said:

The ground patterns that you see in orthos are merely a baked representation of an otherwise available data to dress materials on. data that P3D/Xplane already uses, it's really only about the graphics pipeline.

You dont get the variations of reality that way. The data to accurately paint the landscape of rocky mountains, farmland, coastlines, urban areas is only available in one form: orthos.

[abrams_tank 7,426]

2 hours ago, akita said:

I reallyyyyy have no intention talking more about other simulators in this forum but frankly you are totally wrong.

Xplane already streams satellite data (ESRI) in it's development tools, and I'm almost sure they stream for their mobile scenery.

And even if, I really hope orthos won't be the next thing for P3D/Xplane, here is a fundamental thing to acknowledge, graphics today are drifting away from anything "baked", GPUs are capable of GI, gazillion of polygons, materials and much more as they became programmable.

orthos, are the exact opposite niche in this regard, everything is baked. patterns of grounds, fields, colors, all of that changes 24/7 every second, what orthos provide as realistic is what you think it is according to the same soruce? you see a green land in orthos, but in reality it is most of the time a dry one, it just happened that satellites caught it at a specific condition, does not mean it's always realistic.

Today's rendering is about materials, and they are not that varied; a blade of grass in africa is the same material as in russia, water, asphalt, rocks, soil etc... all come from the same materials. procedural materials are the next thing reaching towards an "infinite resolution". while ZL17/18 is considered great for orthos, procedural materials standard is about 10x higher resolution than that (10.24/5.12 px per cm, if not more).

The ground patterns that you see in orthos are merely a baked representation of an otherwise available data to dress materials on. data that P3D/Xplane already uses, it's really only about the graphics pipeline.

 

Please, give me a break.  X-Plane does not produce photogrammetry or satellite terrain nearly as good as MSFS, for the entire world, for the a price of $60 USD with no recurring subscription fees. Let's put this in plain English for you:

1. MSFS produces better photogrammetry and satellite data to generate 3D terrains

2. The photogrammetry and satellite data is for the entire world

3. MSFS does it for $60 USD with no recurring subscription fees

XPlane is ages behind MSFS for the home market in this area, period. It's not even close, it's not a contest.

You need to spend hundreds to thousands of dollars on XPlane to make it look better and it still looks worse than MSFS which you can buy for $60 USD.  And even if you spend hundreds to thousands of dollars for all those add ons, XPlane still won't cover the entire world!

Edited April 12, 2021 by abrams_tank

[Christopher Low 5,355]

Quote

Imagine where MSFS will be in 3 years?

On the scrap heap?

[abrams_tank 7,426]

4 minutes ago, Christopher Low said:

On the scrap heap?

If I were a betting man, it will be P3D first that becomes obsolete for the home market (but P3D can continue to have a commercial market).  And then X-Plane after for the home market.

If you have been following the 3rd party developers, many of them have abandoned P3D already, or at least shifted their resources away from P3D to MSFS.  From what I understand, 3rd parties are still developing for X-Plane because they are still seeing revenue behind it, but who knows how long that will be for.

Edited April 12, 2021 by abrams_tank

[akita 429]

2 hours ago, abrams_tank said:

Please, give me a break. 

Stopped reading here, go take your break.

2 hours ago, mrueedi said:

You dont get the variations of reality that way. The data to accurately paint the landscape of rocky mountains, farmland, coastlines, urban areas is only available in one form: orthos.

https://osmbuildings.org

not the only or the most complete source but you are proven wrong. As I said, dress it with procedural materials, it's all about the graphics pipeline.

Edited April 12, 2021 by akita

[abrams_tank 7,426]

7 minutes ago, akita said:

Stopped reading here, go take your break.

https://osmbuildings.org

not the only or the most complete source but you are proven wrong. As I said, dress it with procedural materials, it's all about the graphics pipeline.

Show us XPlane using satellite data to generate 3D terrain across the entire world.  You can't?  Because XPlane doesn't have that capability at the moment for the home market.  Because it costs money for those servers to stream that data to the simulator, and it also costs manpower to maintain those servers.  And I don't care about the commercial market for XPlane, I want a cost effective solutions for the home market at $60 USD, with no recurring subscription fees.  XPlane may never have that capability that can match the low cost of $60 USD with no recurring subscription fees.

And let's not even go into graphics.  XPlane graphics is a decade old and it's very obvious when you put it side by side to MSFS.  But anyways, we're not discussing graphics at the moment, we're discussing streaming satellite and photogrammetry data that covers the entire world to generate 3D terrain, for a one time fee of $60 USD.

Edited April 12, 2021 by abrams_tank

[kaosfere 3,115]

1 hour ago, akita said:

https://osmbuildings.org

I live literally two houses west of the Chicago city limit.    Here is what my neighborhood looks like with OSM data.

 

Notice that sharp cutoff west of Ozanam Ave?   That's where the city ends, and where OSM data drops off.  My house isn't there.

But there's a building in the footprint of my house in MSFS.  And my neighbor.  And their neighbor.   And the rest of the town.  Why?  Because of blackshark.ai's interpolation of satellite images of the area.

I love data.  I've played with the OSM data for fun.  I've run XPlane and used the OSM-based sceneries for it.   They're pretty good in Europe, but in large chunks of the rest of the world they range from incomplete to utter garbage.

So if you're trying to tell me you can beat MSFS's world model by wrapping procedural materials on OSM data...  all I can say is "pull the other one."

 

Edited April 12, 2021 by kaosfere

[abrams_tank 7,426]

5 minutes ago, kaosfere said:

I love data.  I've played with the OSM data for fun.  I've run XPlane and used the OSM-based sceneries for it.   They're pretty good in Europe, but in large chunks of the rest of the world they range from incomplete to utter garbage.

So if you're trying to tell me you can beat MSFS's world model by wrapping procedural materials on OSM data...  all I can say is "pull the other one."

 

Exactly!  I landed an Icon A5 in Lake Louise in Banff, Alberta, Canada (Banff is one of the most picturesque parts of the Rocky Mountains in Canada). Lake Louise isn't hand crafted at all and it's out in the middle of nowhere in the Rockies. And yet when I landed the Icon A5 at Lake Louise in MSFS, it actually gave me goosebumps because it actually resembled the Lake Louise I have seen in real life.

It's amazing that Microsoft/Asobo can do that for $60 USD.  And there isn't a subscription fee for it either!  This is something people dreamed of in past flight simulators, where they can fly around the world to whatever spot they wish, and the place they fly to may resemble what they see in real life.  No additional scenery is needed to be installed, and I don't have to spend hundreds or thousands of dollars for it.  Just $60 USD.  What a deal we got as customers of MSFS.

[akita 429]

16 minutes ago, kaosfere said:

I live literally two houses west of the Chicago city limit.    Here is what my neighborhood looks like with OSM data.

 

Notice that sharp cutoff west of Ozanam Ave?   That's where the city ends, and where OSM data drops off.  My house isn't there.

But there's a building in the footprint of my house in MSFS.  And my neighbor.  And there neighborhood.   And the rest of the town.  Why?  Because of blackshark.ai's interpolation of satellite images of the area.

I love data.  I've played with the OSM data for fun.  I've run XPlane and used the OSM-based sceneries for it.   They're pretty good in Europe, but in large chunks of the rest of the world they range from incomplete to utter garbage.

So if you're trying to tell me you can beat MSFS's world model by wrapping procedural materials on OSM data...  all I can say is "pull the other one."

 

selective qutoing ain't a great debate tactic, as I said:

Quote

not the only or the most complete source 

The data that MSFS uses is not exclusive to microsoft, or google. 

1 hour ago, abrams_tank said:

Show us XPlane using satellite data to generate 3D terrain across the entire world.  You can't?  Because XPlane doesn't have that capability at the moment for the home market.  Because it costs money for those servers to stream that data to the simulator, and it also costs manpower to maintain those servers.  And I don't care about the commercial market for XPlane, I want a cost effective solutions for the home market at $60 USD, with no recurring subscription fees.  XPlane may never have that capability that can match the low cost of $60 USD with no recurring subscription fees.

And let's not even go into graphics.  XPlane graphics is a decade old and it's very obvious when you put it side by side to MSFS.  But anyways, we're not discussing graphics at the moment, we're discussing streaming satellite and photogrammetry data that covers the entire world to generate 3D terrain, for a one time fee of $60 USD.

I'm not debating Xplane VS MSFS, that's you.

But if you still insist, 3d terrain is actually already available in Xplane. even MSFS claims that they are also using OSM. and other sources too, just like Xplane or P3D or any aiming to be global solution.

What's special about MSFS is the AZURE AI that aims to fill the gaps with auto-gen where needed (still, most of the world, photogrammetry is far from a global solution).

I'm talking about something different, about a rendering pipeline, what you actually do with this data. 

Much of the steps are part of the graphics pipeline, MSFS are using streaming to stream those low quality base materials and then walk through the pipe-line i.e tessellation, color shaders etc...

But those base materials (orthos) are not really built for that, the pipeline is there to shadow the artifacts, not to accelerate an even more impressive art assets. orthos will never look as real as:

https://quixel.com

(or any other high quality artists work)

There is a workflow to make a base-material shine with displacements, tessellation, PBR and all the fancy shaders.

AI is still not there to outperform artists (and IMO will never but that's another story), maybe in the next decade.

the eventual scenery that is created, then can be data driven, hence, follow real world patterns.

Edited April 12, 2021 by akita

[abrams_tank 7,426]

12 minutes ago, akita said:

 

But those base materials (orthos) are not really built for that, the pipeline is there to shadow the artifacts, not to accelerate an even more impressive art assets. orthos will never look as real as:

https://quixel.com

(or any other high quality artists work)

There is a workflow to make a base-material shine with displacements, tessellation, PBR and all the fancy shaders.

AI is still not there to outperform artists (and IMO will never but that's another story), maybe in the next decade.

the eventual scenery that is created, then can be data driven, hence, follow real world patterns.

Stop showing examples from other games or gaming engines, lol. Show us examples from X-Plane!

You just linked to an example using Unreal Engine with games where the area is confined.  Show us comparisons with a flight simulator, LOL.

The reason why flight simulators can't have graphics and detail in that quixel.com website you just linked is because flight simulators need to show scenery from some 50 miles or more away, whereas many games only need to show a confined scenery so those games can "tune the graphics up."

Compare flight simulator to flight simulator.  Show us the X-Plane examples.  And when you do show us X-Plane examples, please quote the cost for the add ons it took to generate that scenery.

Edited April 12, 2021 by abrams_tank