Microsoft Flight Simulator - USA Update Before and After

[AnkH 2,282]

1 hour ago, icewater5 said:

Whales

😆

[Dylanear 26]

They really messed up the David Monthan boneyard in my estimation. It used to have decent, but not super duper detailed photogrametry of what is actually there. It looked great until you got really down low. If you landed on between rows of planes and were right by them the would look word darn rough. 

But now they just modeled 5 or 6 kinds of aircraft (F-16,C-130,C-5,k/C-135, E-2,P-3, B-52 off the top of my head.) and placed them all over. And it seems like a much smaller area with aircraft I think? There's a much more interesting mix of stuff and interesting odd gems randomly around. That's the charm of the place, the actual history, the variety of things there.  It's just not even close to accurate anymore by my estimations. 

Maybe the Air Force/DOD called them up and wanted it less accurate?? Probably not a big conspiracy, but I need to try to find a way to get back the old photogrammetry or I'll loose interest in using that airport anymore. I visited Davis Monthan and the Boneyard in the early 90s, so maybe I'm just more a stickler about this than most. 

If I do a personal add on project for MSFS it would be one or both of two things.  Realistically plausible set of aircraft to see around Edwards. The stuff you can see on google maps is pretty cool. The crowning touch would be an accurate representation of the Pancho's Happy Bottom Riding Club site nearby the base. There's auto gen houses there now and that's just sad. Have some respect for the guys that used to have their pictures on the wall there! 

And a really, really detailed, accurate photogramertry of the actual contents of the Boneyard at Davis Monthan. And maybe add some cool stuff on the AFB, A-10s, KC-135, C-130, Blackhawks. Etc. 

 

Edited December 3, 2020 by Dylanear

[Tuskin38 6,635]

4 hours ago, Dylanear said:

There's auto gen houses there now and that's just sad. Have some respect for the guys that used to have their pictures on the wall there! 

Ok? There’s thousands of buildings all over the planet like that. How do the decide which ones they should make?

America isn’t the centre of the universe.

[Tuskin38 6,635]

On 11/25/2020 at 7:43 PM, HiFlyer said:

The sim turned the planes into houses

I haven’t looked, but I assume it’s because open street map had them labeled as such.

[HiFlyer 9,374]

28 minutes ago, Tuskin38 said:

I haven’t looked, but I assume it’s because open street map had them labeled as such.

I think that the system they used identified the planes from above as structures of some type and simply extruded them as buildings. 

Those have now been replaced by individual planes.

[Tuskin38 6,635]

2 hours ago, HiFlyer said:

I think that the system they used identified the planes from above as structures of some type and simply extruded them as buildings. 

Those have now been replaced by individual planes.

Well there is a museum in Russia that has the same thing, the planes are showing up as a buildings, and if you went to Open Street Map, indeed the airplanes used to be labelled as buildings. Someone fixed it at some point, but MSFS uses old OSM data.

That unrealistically tall building that was in Melbourne was tracked back a typo in the OSM data.

Also before this update the airplane graveyard was covered by photogrammetry. That's why they were 3D, it had nothing to do with any system detecting them as planes.

Edited December 3, 2020 by Tuskin38

[HiFlyer 9,374]

3 hours ago, Tuskin38 said:

That's why they were 3D, it had nothing to do with any system detecting them as planes.

That's why I said they were detected as structures of some type and simply extruded to the ground. 

Actually, during testing, there were several entire airports, complete with similarly extruded planes that were handled in the same way, and they were all ugly as sin.

Fortunately, as far as I know, they were later all cleaned up.

[Dylanear 26]

 

14 hours ago, Tuskin38 said:

18 hours ago, Dylanear said:

There's auto gen houses there now and that's just sad. Have some respect for the guys that used to have their pictures on the wall there! 

Ok? There’s thousands of buildings all over the planet like that. How do the decide which ones they should make?

America isn’t the centre of the universe.

Lol, this isn't an America vs the rest of the world thing. The whole area around Edwards AFB is all auto gen. You clearly don't know the thing I'm referencing (Only geeks who know the history of Edwards AFB or have read The Right Stuff or seen the 80's movie from that book would.) The recent The Right Stuff mini series doesn't cover the pre Mercury program stuff the old movie did (Chuck Yeager and Edwards, then Muroc I believe). 

The place I'm referring to is now just rubble. You can see the left overs in satellite maps.  But at one time it was the go to hang out for the test pilots at Edwards and famous in the lore of that time there. 

I'd be SHOCKED if this was given any attention at all by Asobo. They haven't given any attention to Edwards AFB, it's just an autogen airport, has none of the actual features of the base. My point was, if someone spent the time making an accurate Edwards AFB add on, putting in proper photgrametry of the ruins of the Happy Bottom Riding Club would be an amazing detail for those interested in the history of aviation and the part Edwards played in that. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Happy_Bottom_Riding_Club

https://www.google.com/maps/uv?pb=!1s0x80c24b10907f5395:0x5b96184e06fc66bf!3m1!7e115!4shttps://lh5.googleusercontent.com/p/AF1QipOsC4nMj8CReQvtWQ7RNxPPQDUtbPNGfiaH8X3k%3Dw213-h160-k-no!5spancho's+happy+bottom+riding+club+-+Google+Search!15zQ2dJZ0FRPT0&imagekey=!1e10!2sAF1QipOsC4nMj8CReQvtWQ7RNxPPQDUtbPNGfiaH8X3k&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjko-TmwrPtAhVGHzQIHQIJANMQoiowFnoECB4QAw

Edited December 4, 2020 by Dylanear