I think this could be a proving ground for the US Military. Fly over a surveillance area and map it to a Military Simulator. VFR, IFR Drone Flights using real time ,  Commercial developers could use it. Construction, Farming. The possibilities are endless.

How bout recording real time Satellite transmitted live for time studies on traffic, boating and Airport use . MFS is a showpiece for future development. I cant even begin to comprehend the possibilities.

With unlimited bandwidth and computing power comes unlimited possibilities. 

Edited August 28, 20205 yr by Denwagg

Even if they pulled the plug on streaming (they won't because Bing is not going anywhere), the sim's offline mode still exists as a base for add-ons, whether it's Orbx regions or an Ortho4XP type app for MSFS. The future is bright no matter what.

I think it could be a mistake trying to match P3D as a hard-core simulator platform:  they're already doing it, most hard-core simmers already use it, and familiarity helps (God help me learning how to program the cameras in MSFS!).  LM continues to retain the hard-core platform, and is adding other attributes that will not impinge on that whatsoever.

I can see MSFS being the go-to VFR simulator, and it already beats P3D in this sole domain, IMO of course.  Port VFR type aircraft to it.   Add-on higher quality airports, expecially smaller muni airports, and a few terminals.  Add seasons to some degree if possible.  I find the night lighting awful myself (what in God's name are all of those clusters of red lights?), in MSFS, but to me it looks like a tweakable area.  ATC seems slightly improved over the old one, though the old voices to me sounded more realistic in some ways.  Weather is promising, but needs a greater variety of cloud types and haze which is far superior in P3D IMO (with, of course, ASN4/REX SF/Etc)

This business model (i.e., not really competing for the hard-core market) it would seem to me is totally compatible w/ MSFS, especially w/ Xbox aspirations.  Out of the box it would be far easier to learn than P3D is w/ all of its myriad addons to make scenery acceptable.  You know exactly what I mean:  only members of the asylum are willing to spend the better part of a day installing everything required to make P3D what it is.

It's an adjustment for me, just flying.  But again, it's really quite remarkable for site seeing, and the Modern FM seems pretty real to me, but I only imagine that as I am not a RW pilot.  The planet is a great big playground, and already, MSFS is kind of good enough in that role.  

Edited August 28, 20205 yr by Noel

Just wait for pmdg to drop their aircraft into FS2020 and 6 months to a year from now,  all the hardcore fan boys will be here. This  737 NG3  is going to be very nice , I hope

Edited August 28, 20205 yr by SirDan

Given the massive amount of extremely positive mainstream coverage the new sim got showing MS as a fun company which uses technology for cool entertainment, but also one leveraging new technology and probably making Google panic a bit as a better-leveraged technology goes mainstream for gamers, I think we're good.

If MS pulled it, it would be a huge PR blunder, and that would be suicide for the board of directors. Given their funds and their comment about it being a long term project, it's obvious they'll stick with it because they know it has done what the old FS used to do for them; make them look like a company which pushes technology that people are into.

Just look at all the negative PR they've had in the past from half-@rsed stabs at mobile phones etc; but this is one where PR-wise, it was straight in the back of the net. A great score for them. They'd be insane to backtrack on this one.

Edited August 28, 20205 yr by Chock

Any worries about long term viability of the platform? After nine days? Nope. Might be worth asking the same in six months though to see where we are at.

Honestly, I see the platform as a possible platform for a lot of other simulators.  Train, sailing, truck.  It could get verrry interesting.

Doesn't Microsoft get a cut of whatever add-on is sold through their storefront? I would assume they do but I haven't seen it confirmed.

If they do, then that's the missing piece of the pie that shut down ACES and led to the failed "we'll do it all ourselves" experiment with MS Flight. If Microsoft gets continuing revenue for development with a small piece of every add-on sold through their store, they'll have an incentive to keep going. 

The other consideration is that Microsoft didn't build a network infrastructure and mapping database from scratch for this sim. It's leaning on infrastructure that's already heavily built out and used for other purposes. We don't have to worry about Microsoft killing off the flight sim because the bandwidth and server cost is too expensive. We're just a tiny part of that operation.

Between those two factors, I'm not worried about long-term viability on the Microsoft side, at least.

My worries are in other areas, like whether Asobo is capable of extending and improving the flight and systems modeling without just handing it all off to 3rd parties, which will slow the development of payware aircraft. And also whether Asobo can get a handle on some of the legacy FSX issues like pop-in that I'm seeing.

It's still way to early to know any of this though. On the Microsoft side, I'm not worried about them killing it off for financial reasons. They seem to have that side covered, this time around.

Judging from the time they needed to produce that joke of a patch... I'm not hopeful 

I'm willing to put money on betting Asobo have already shifted their attention to other projects. 

 

Even if Microsoft decided to pull the plug on streaming Bing data at some point in the future (though I think it unlikely, at least soon), I don't think that it would be impossible for them to create an archive of the data as of shutdown and then turn it over to some organization such as the Internet Archive so they could then provide streaming services to users. Even though the data is about 2 petabytes, as of 2016 the Internet Archive was already storing about 30 petabytes and adding 13-15 terabytes of data per day (so 1 petabyte every 2-3 months). If anything, this has only accelerated.

Even with offline scenery it is better than the alternatives. I’m sure it will be fine at worst.

23 minutes ago, maniamcool said:

Judging from the time they needed to produce that joke of a patch... I'm not hopeful 

I'm willing to put money on betting Asobo have already shifted their attention to other projects.

Are you privy to both the inner workings of Asobo and the code for everything being worked on? Genuine question.

58 minutes ago, Chock said:

Given the massive amount of extremely positive mainstream coverage the new sim got showing MS as a fun company which uses technology for cool entertainment, but also one leveraging new technology and probably making Google panic a bit as a better-leveraged technology goes mainstream for gamers, I think we're good.

If MS pulled it, it would be a huge PR blunder, and that would be suicide for the board of directors. Given their funds and their comment about it being a long term project, it's obvious they'll stick with it because they know it has done what the old FS used to do for them; make them look like a company which pushes technology that people are into.

Just look at all the negative PR they've had in the past from half-@rsed stabs at mobile phones etc; but this is one where PR-wise, it was straight in the back of the net. A great score for them. They'd be insane to backtrack on this one.

It's Microsoft. Like Google, if it starts losing money and it's going to affect dividends - done. Not saying it will happen but in the next few years if it does, MS will have no problem pulling the plug. Same for P3D for that matter and Lockheed. Its business, money and shareholders at the end of the day.

Enjoy the game today. There's no guarantee itll be around in the future, just like there's no guarantee I'll be alive tomorrow. 

16 minutes ago, B777ER said:

It's Microsoft. Like Google, if it starts losing money and it's going to affect dividends - done. Not saying it will happen but in the next few years if it does, MS will have no problem pulling the plug. Same for P3D for that matter and Lockheed. Its business, money and shareholders at the end of the day.

Oh yeah. Not saying MS would never consider pulling the plug, but not everything is about the shareholders and the bottom line this year, but what it will continue to be thanks to some far-sightedness.

Sometimes people not so great at that make it look like it is on the annual reports in the short term, but occasionally it is about personal agendas and the consequent bad management decisions which follow in spite of all that. We saw that with former MS supremo Steve Balmer, who, whilst on paper initially bumped the profits of MS to make it look like he'd done a fab job of taking the reins, but in the long term, his stupidity and word not allowed-poor company care skills diminished the market dominance of Microsoft in several major sectors and made it a PR joke. His short-sight in this regard is something the incumbent MS people are well aware of. Balmer  made a lot of money for himself, but he word not allowed-near destroyed the company in doing so.

Balmer's not unique in that at all either. You only have to look at what 'producer' Kathleen Kennedy has done to the golden goose that was Star Wars, and the massive problems she caused for Lucasfilm and Disney going forward courtesy of her ridiculous PC agenda, to know that someone in a high up position, which in her case she didn't truly attain through merit or skill, can turn anything into a train wreck. 🤣