2 hours ago, Manny said:

It would be good if they add "Unable" as a response option when ATC in MSFS does that. I usually ignore such directive and may even cancel IFR. 

Shure that`s what i am doeing the same way - ignore the ATC, what else can you do for this ? 😏

Glad i am not allone..

 

cheers 😉

1 hour ago, Noel said:

The term, "eyecandy" in my mind is oft used as a denegration of sorts, as if the entire package was only visuals and that visuals are really just 'fluff'.  The immersion that comes from flying thru atmosphere and scenery that mimics the real world, versus landclass-based stuff we have in FSX/P3D is huge for me.  The only downside with MSFS as it stands today for me is something I mentioned very early on:  there isn't quite enough stuff to do, and that's really the heart of it versus something like P3D.  If I had to fly P3D w/ a simple default airliner, without GSX, without FSCaptain, I'd have quit a long time ago.  But that is not the case w/ MSFS, despite no GSX, no FSCaptain, and no PMDG airliners.  IOW, that 'eye candy' plays a giant role in the draw and staying power of MSFS.  It helps that the default airplanes are really as good as they are relative to the default garbage in P3D.

Eyecandy is imho a great compliment. Lots of things to see. For P3D I had to buy or scenery and spent a lot of money on that.Custom AG I either had to buy or make it myself. Now it’s all there .

Unfortunately I am a home cockpit “pilot” and Simconnect/SDK are far from what I need. 
Two out of three flights end in CTD with Simconnect getting overloaded which crashes the sim.

Back on topic : hopefully a good third party developer comes around that makes is a more realistic ATC.

 

Hello my friends!

I have enjoyed reading this thread and I can't disagree with most any of the comments here, in fact there was only one comment that I'd like to address and it really takes us to the heart of the matter.

Before I go any further I want to ensure that the following is my PERSONAL opinion and it does not represent the opinion or position of any company.

I don't believe that Asobo has ignored ATC development in MSFS. They are simply working on what is most important to the masses, and even though most people in this thread won't want to hear it (and I can't blame them) ATC is simply not what is most important to the masses. If you give me a chance I'll try and explain that, and explain why that is not necessarily a bad thing for existing and experienced flight simmers.

Prior to the release of MSFS (aka MSFS 2020 or MFS 2020) there were approximately 250,000 active flight simmers around the world. For purposes of this thread I am defining "Active Flight Simmers" as someone who makes a flight two to three times in a 3 month period, and the number 250,000 is a number which I alone deduced using data from various sources. MSFS was released in August 2020, though sales of MSFS DVD packages pre-dated the release date so we have about one year of weighted sales data. Existing flight simmers purchased roughly 200,000 to 250,000 copies of MSFS (likely the lower range of that number) which more or less validates my number above and that leaves us with the public purchasing the range of 700,000 to 750,000 copies of MSFS.

While more people buy the product every month, I estimate that 50% or more new flight simmers use the software several times and stop (give up) thus fall outside of my definition "Active Flight Simmers" and at least half of that number have been lost to our community for reasons I've been tracking but go far beyond the scope of this post.

Now, if you want to know when or if ATC development is going to be important to Asobo then you first need to understand where the money comes from (aka "the Market that feeds MSFS development beyond the initial investment") and then understand how Program Managers think and what moves them to act.  In this case its boils down to Program Manager's question of "where do I expend my funding for the greatest benefit to my program".  If we answer this question honestly then it's easy to see that Air Traffic Control is not even close to the top of the list. 

Looking at this from a slightly different angle we know that most experienced flight simmers (the ones that care about realistic ATC) have already purchased MSFS, and those who are not experienced flight simmers wouldn't know the difference between realistic or non-realistic ATC.  This provides us with an understanding of the landscape on which we will battle (get ATC upgraded).  

Now I can't read the Asobo or Microsoft PM's mind and I'm not privy to their future plans or decisions. But based on what I see, it seems clear to me the best hope is still third party development.  I hope I'm proven wrong, I really do, but I wouldn't bet on it. 

The other thing I’d like us to consider is the age of the market base. Those who are 40 years of age and younger grew up with interactive gaming while those like me who are older grew up in the gaming world predominately (here it comes) playing with ourselves - oh man, I’m actually laughing so hard it’s difficult to breathe!  My point is this… the younger to 40 gang is accustomed to online, interactive game experience so I fully expect to see them flock to online flight simulation (VATSIM, IVAO, POSCON) and if those venues are proactive about simplifying the learning curve then that will be another nail in the coffin of AI ATC development.  I know that POSCON is making every effort to collapse the learning curve for their new users.

Thank you so very much for giving this old flight simmer an opportunity to share my thoughts with you. I’m sorry if what I shared wasn’t want you wanted to hear and I’m not arguing against what you want. Just sharing some information and calling it like I see it, nothing more or less.

 

Best wishes for Happy Flights my friends!

Edited February 2, 20215 yr by DaveCT2003

17 hours ago, sd_flyer said:

Sure it needs to improve badly. Yet if you compare in with on in XP11 you wont complain at all LOL In fact, back in my days in XP11 I have never use stock ATC.

This is my first complete foray back into the world of MSFS in almost 18 years (installed 2020 version in September).  Back at the turn of the century a number of us started using Terminal Reality's Fly! and found it (at that time) to have more realistic flight dynamics (especially if the aircraft had been adjusted by Rob Young 🙂), amazing instrument panels and realistic systems (again, for that time). PMDG built their first airliners for the Fly! world and that was an eye-opening experience.  I have installed other versions of FS over the years but still found them wanting (better scenery and more airports but still lacking in cockpit realism and appropriate flight dynamics).  I installed FSX a few years ago and found that the MSFS world had finally updated to a point that I enjoyed, though I still spent a lot of time in Fly!

I have found FS2020 to be wonderful and immersive in many ways and some of the aircraft are approaching realistic handling - I believe this bodes well for the future.  The ironic thing is that the in-sim ATC is so poor.  Back when the first version of Fly! came out it included a basic ATC - it was OK but not much better than what is in FS2020 now.  Unlike FS2020, however, the Terminal Reality SDK was well-developed and a number of amateur developers produced some great plugins and tools.  A controller out of the southeast USA by the name of Marc Schrier developed an ATC script for Fly!II called Cleared 4 Takeoff.  This wonderful plugin worked extremely well and included the following features:

+ Clearance Delivery, Ground, Tower, Departure, Center, and Approach Controls implemented
+ Runway assignments based on wind direction
+ Accurate ILS approach vectors
+ Visual approach support
+ Real-World ATC phraseology (per FAAH 7110.65)
+ Automatically determines correct altitude for direction of flight
+ Missed approaches
+ Speed restrictions
+ Spoken wind and altimeter settings
+ Lower/Higher altitude requests
+ Intelligent control instructions based on aircraft performance
+ "Say Again" routine with custom pilot readbacks
+ Altitude, speed, and heading deviation monitor
+ Frequency changes based on the FLY! II ATC database
+ All airports in the FLY! II database supported
+ Uses the FLY! II Flight Planner (no 3rd party planners required)
+ Terrain monitoring (but don't expect miracles)
+ Departure Control checks for correct transponder codes.
+ Unicom/Multicom pattern leg calls

I spent a lot of time communicating with Marc as he developed this (I was one of the controller voices).  And this was in May of 2001... 🙂

1 minute ago, RandallR said:

This is my first complete foray back into the world of MSFS in almost 18 years (installed 2020 version in September).  Back at the turn of the century a number of us started using Terminal Reality's Fly! and found it (at that time) to have more realistic flight dynamics (especially if the aircraft had been adjusted by Rob Young 🙂), amazing instrument panels and realistic systems (again, for that time). PMDG built their first airliners for the Fly! world and that was an eye-opening experience.  I have installed other versions of FS over the years but still found them wanting (better scenery and more airports but still lacking in cockpit realism and appropriate flight dynamics).  I installed FSX a few years ago and found that the MSFS world had finally updated to a point that I enjoyed, though I still spent a lot of time in Fly!

I have found FS2020 to be wonderful and immersive in many ways and some of the aircraft are approaching realistic handling - I believe this bodes well for the future.  The ironic thing is that the in-sim ATC is so poor.  Back when the first version of Fly! came out it included a basic ATC - it was OK but not much better than what is in FS2020 now.  Unlike FS2020, however, the Terminal Reality SDK was well-developed and a number of amateur developers produced some great plugins and tools.  A controller out of the southeast USA by the name of Marc Schrier developed an ATC script for Fly!II called Cleared 4 Takeoff.  This wonderful plugin worked extremely well and included the following features:

+ Clearance Delivery, Ground, Tower, Departure, Center, and Approach Controls implemented
+ Runway assignments based on wind direction
+ Accurate ILS approach vectors
+ Visual approach support
+ Real-World ATC phraseology (per FAAH 7110.65)
+ Automatically determines correct altitude for direction of flight
+ Missed approaches
+ Speed restrictions
+ Spoken wind and altimeter settings
+ Lower/Higher altitude requests
+ Intelligent control instructions based on aircraft performance
+ "Say Again" routine with custom pilot readbacks
+ Altitude, speed, and heading deviation monitor
+ Frequency changes based on the FLY! II ATC database
+ All airports in the FLY! II database supported
+ Uses the FLY! II Flight Planner (no 3rd party planners required)
+ Terrain monitoring (but don't expect miracles)
+ Departure Control checks for correct transponder codes.
+ Unicom/Multicom pattern leg calls

I spent a lot of time communicating with Marc as he developed this (I was one of the controller voices).  And this was in May of 2001... 🙂

More voices for sure. Correct phraseology depending on part of the world for example:"radar contact" in US, and "identified" in Europe. Biggest problem with ATC right now is incorrecassignmentnt of runway vs wind direction. Unless I preprogap my landing ATC 96% assign runway with tail wind LOL

7 minutes ago, RandallR said:

Terminal Reality's Fly!

I had this. Great fun back in the day. Didn't the poor chap die young (the creator)?

Strongly recommending Pilot2ATC. Ability to actually TALK to ATC, like in real world is a game changer and immersion builder for me, even more in VR.

17 hours ago, fppilot said:

100%² agreement.  And ATIS/AWOS is in need of comprehensive revision as well.

1,000% Agreed!

47 minutes ago, Steku said:

Strongly recommending Pilot2ATC. Ability to actually TALK to ATC, like in real world is a game changer and immersion builder for me, even more in VR.

You must live alone... LOL!

 

I tried this once and it drove everyone else in my house crazy!!!

5 minutes ago, Kilo60 said:

You must live alone... LOL!

 

I tried this once and it drove everyone else in my house crazy!!!

haha that is why I use the drop down menus for it on a separate monitor. 

14 hours ago, GSalden said:

Eyecandy is the main feature of MSFS. Then the rest.

Keep in mind that MSFS wil also be for the X Box. Those players like to fly around in general and are probably less interested in correct ATC or even study level ac.

So there will be a place for 3rd party developers to bring more realism....

The problem is 3rd Party development for ATC based on FSX and P3D has been abysmal and none of the big 3rd party develpoers have never bother trying because it's so hard to add in properly...!

 

The reason is if you aren't a developer changing in the sim itself and improving it it becomes a mixed bag for a 3rd party to implement!

 

You either have it not corresponding to the sims weather via correct runway assignments, poor robotic voices, no implementation of AI traffic, etc...

 

It's the reason after trying several of the recommended "not deserted" ATC add-ons, for FSX and P3D, I eventually just settled for EVP...!

19 hours ago, WestAir said:

Just let me bypass the "climb 12,000 expect FL240" entirely until you come up with a fleshed out ATC update.

THIS. I dont understand why we arent just cleared to our planned cruise altitude instead of these step climbs that keep causing us to level off. 

 

3 hours ago, Ianrivaldosmith said:

This is why I use Pilot2ATC. Cost almost as much as MSFS basic in itself. ( And no, you don't need a mic to use it!) 

I used the trial and I only had 1 issue with it when it prevented me from contacting clearance delivery once and kept changing the frequency back to ground even with the CO Pilot handle coms box unchecked. Other than that its better than default for sure but I will say as someone who cant use the voice feature because of roommates, It was a hassle clicking around for things and 2 monitors are a must if you wont use voice otherwise its not to pleasant of an experience. 

I personally didnt think it was better than PRO ATC-X when I used P3D so im kinda holding out hope that ever gets developed. 

My biggest gripe about the built-in ATC is the occasional: "Climb and maintain 16,000 feet" then before you can respond it's "Climb and maintain 18,000 feet" "Descend and maintain 12000 feet" "Climb and maintain 12,500 feet" "Descend and maintain 4,000 feet" and on and on and on.

 

Or how about the one where you are flying at 12,000 above mountainous terrain and they tell you to descend to 6,000 feet. More than once they've flown me right into the side of a mountain in bad weather.

 

Yeah. ATC needs work.

3 hours ago, Ianrivaldosmith said:

I had this. Great fun back in the day. Didn't the poor chap die young (the creator)?

Yep - Richard Harvey.  Passed away young of cancer, I believe.

21 hours ago, WestAir said:

Man I miss RC4.

Me too, it was the most phonetically accurate product out there hands down. Wish JD took it all the way to version 5. 
Back in September/October timeframe Jorg mentioned Microsoft China working on something new which is supposed to improve ATC, but he didn't say much more than it.