How much is the satellite streaming service in MSFS worth?

[abrams_tank 7,397]

So one of the benefits of MSFS over the competing flight simulators is that we get satellite & photogrammetry data all streamed to MSFS in real time, no matter which location you choose in the world, for free.  If you purchased the $60 USD standard version for MSFS, you haven't had to pay an extra cent for the satellite & photogrammetry data service over the last 8 months.  And of course you can get this data streamed from any place in the world because MSFS has the entire world covered for satellite data (or photogrammetry if that is available).  But of course, this satellite & photogrammetry data service costs money; Microsoft/Asobo requires servers to stream this to us and workers have to maintain those servers. And of course Microsoft had to get the satellite & photogrammetry data in the first place, which also costed money.  And there may be other costs to stream the satellite & photogrammetry data to us.

So let's say this satellite & photogrammetry data being streamed to us isn't free and it is an add on service for MSFS.  Or let's say you can also get this satellite & photogrammetry data service for P3D or X-Plane, but of course, Lockheed Martin and Laminar Research won't pay for it, so you have to pay for it as an additional service yourself.

What would you pay for this satellite & photogrammetry streaming service on a monthly basis, if it were made a separate add on service?  Perhaps $5 USD per month?  Perhaps $10 USD per month?  Perhaps more?

Edit: As David Mills has pointed out, the 2D satellite data also has to be converted into 3D buildings. Black Shark does this for MSFS. So the cost of such a streaming service would have to include the work that Black Shark does.

Edited April 28, 2021 by abrams_tank

[pmb 5,137]

As a sidenote: There is another simulator streaming satellite imagery in the core engine, It's called Flyinside FlightSimulator and just not well-known.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/862390/FlyInside_Flight_Simulator/

It's even been available before MSFS. Streaming is free but image quality can't nearly compete with MSFS for several reasons.

Kind regards, Michael

[Noel 4,494]

29 minutes ago, abrams_tank said:

What would you pay for this satellite & photogrammetry streaming service on a monthly basis, if it were made a separate add on service?  Perhaps $5 USD per month?  Perhaps $10 USD per month?  Perhaps more?

Satellite & photogrammetry streaming service are a big part of what makes MSFS different than P3D, but hardly the only parts.  One quick look at the default planes and the vast array of airports worldwide in P3D are absolute garbage compared to $60 MSFS, or in my case $119 MSFS.  We're now ~8months post release, whereas P3D whose developer is flush w/ cash from all of those defense contracts hasn't put a nickel into those two pieces, and has been around now over a decade.  So to answer your rhetorical question, today I would not support Lockheed Martin by paying for streaming service.  I already pay them thru federal income tax.  And I paid $200 per major update (I know, I'm an word not allowed, if an honest word not allowed) already.  The question needs to be revisited in a year or two when MS/Asobo has had time to bring the rest of the show up to meet or beat what P3D offers today in the areas primarily of a more robust SDK.  You and all of us know what really makes P3D shine currently as a 'cockpit simulator' is what the likes of PMDG, HiFi Simulations, FSCaptain, etc brought to the table because without those, which of course are 100% SDK-enabled, P3D is really FS2000 rewarmed over and over and over.  IMNSHO the flight models, modeling of turbulence, night lighting and atmospherics in MSFS are already superior to the flying-on-rails into level flat runways you get w/ old P3D currently.

[abrams_tank 7,397]

35 minutes ago, pmb said:

As a sidenote: There is another simulator streaming satellite imagery in the core engine, It's called Flyinside FlightSimulator and just not well-known.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/862390/FlyInside_Flight_Simulator/

It's even been available before MSFS. Streaming is free but image quality can't nearly compete with MSFS for several reasons.

Kind regards, Michael

That's pretty impressive what Flyinside accomplished for a small developer.

[Bobsk8 12,679]

19 minutes ago, Noel said:

Satellite & photogrammetry streaming service are a big part of what makes MSFS different than P3D, but hardly the only parts.  One quick look at the default planes and the vast array of airports worldwide in P3D are absolute garbage compared to $60 MSFS, or in my case $119 MSFS.  We're now ~8months post release, whereas P3D whose developer is flush w/ cash from all of those defense contracts hasn't put a nickel into those two pieces, and has been around now over a decade.  So to answer your rhetorical question, today I would not support Lockheed Martin by paying for streaming service.  I already pay them thru federal income tax.  And I paid $200 per major update (I know, I'm an word not allowed, if an honest word not allowed) already.  The question needs to be revisited in a year or two when MS/Asobo has had time to bring the rest of the show up to meet or beat what P3D offers today in the areas primarily of a more robust SDK.  You and all of us know what really makes P3D shine currently as a 'cockpit simulator' is what the likes of PMDG, HiFi Simulations, FSCaptain, etc brought to the table because without those, which of course are 100% SDK-enabled, P3D is really FS2000 rewarmed over and over and over.  IMNSHO the flight models, modeling of turbulence, night lighting and atmospherics in MSFS are already superior to the flying-on-rails into level flat runways you get w/ old P3D currently.

I was a staunch supporter of P3D for many years. It's default aircraft and scenery and weather are  a joke and still are. You have to buy hundreds and hundreds of dollars worth of add ons to hide it's faults, and even then it looks awful compared to MSFS. 

When I first got MSFS I was having CTD after CTD. I decided to purchase P3D V 5, out of frustration, and after flying with it for about 2 days, I asked LM for a refund and uninstalled it from my Hard drive. It was like going back at least 10 years in time, after seeing what MSFS was like. My MSFS finally settled down, and is running pretty well now. The only thing that makes me nervous is the upcoming updates, and what will be broken by them. Hopefully they will get some serious beta testers before releasing these updates. 

[F737MAX 5,584]

1 hour ago, abrams_tank said:

What would you pay for this satellite & photogrammetry streaming service on a monthly basis, if it were made a separate add on service?

Nothing. $0.

I maintain my belief that the streaming of Bing imagery into MSFS is a technology demonstrator for more lucrative projects for MS. These projects will earn far in excess of whatever is the current cost of streamed of imagery data.
If MS want more of my cash, they would be better off fixing the MSFS marketplace so that third party product updates are released in a more timely manner.

[abrams_tank 7,397]

6 minutes ago, F737NG said:

Nothing. $0.

I maintain my belief that the streaming of Bing imagery into MSFS is a technology demonstrator for more lucrative projects for MS. These projects will earn far in excess of whatever is the current cost of streamed of imagery data.
If MS want more of my cash, they would be better off fixing the MSFS marketplace so that third party product updates are released in a more timely manner.

So if you owned P3D or X-Plane, what would you pay for a similar satellite/photogrammetry streaming service?

The satellite/photogrammetry streaming service is worth something.  If a similar service were offered for P3D or X-Plane, some people would pay for it.  

 

[David Mills 4,753]

It's not just an issue of having satellite imagery. You'd need the technology, like Black Shark, that turns the 2D images into a 3D build that can be used within a flight simulator. If Google Earth GAVE P3D and XP complete and unlimited access to their satellite data, P3D and XP wouldn't be able to use it.

[Tuskin38 6,468]

Well, a lot of the buildings in MSFS are based off a few years old Open Street Map data and also Bing building footprints (like the ones you can see when not using the road map, not satellite)

Not all are from OSM/Bing, because there are buildings rendered in the sim that nether OSM or Bing have marked, so I assume that's where the AI comes in.

The AI is also used to generate how the buildings are procedurally generated on the patch notes for world updates.

Edited April 28, 2021 by Tuskin38

[abrams_tank 7,397]

16 minutes ago, David Mills said:

It's not just an issue of having satellite imagery. You'd need the technology, like Black Shark, that turns the 2D images into a 3D build that can be used within a flight simulator. If Google Earth GAVE P3D and XP complete and unlimited access to their satellite data, P3D and XP wouldn't be able to use it.

That's true.  So any streaming service that P3D or X-Plane provides would also have to treat the satellite data in the same way that Black Shark has treated the data.  So the extra expertise and service that Black Shark provides would also have to be factored into the cost of such hypothetical satellite/photogrammetry streaming service.

Edited April 28, 2021 by abrams_tank

[F737MAX 5,584]

27 minutes ago, abrams_tank said:

So any streaming service that P3D or X-Plane provides would also have to treat the satellite data in the same way that Black Shark has treated the data.

I feel the idea of streaming aerial data by default into P3D or XP is so hypothetical that it is not worthy of discussion.

The question in your original post is an interesting one. *If* Bing data being streamed by thousands of MSFS simmers is putting strain on servers to the detriment of other MS services, what price level per user would be acceptable to MS to offset it?
If other, vastly more popular, game titles like the next Battlefield or next COD integrate streamed data, there will be an opportunity cost to MS that may see MSFS' aerial imagery shut off in favour of more financially profitable game users. But then, I've ventured into hypothetical territory as well here.

What the vast majority of people can agree on (rare on these forums, I know) is that MSFS is groundbreaking with the use of aerial imagery. That it is stored on the Cloud and streamed, plus the fact it uses AI to interpret the data to give realistic-looking buildings, has put MSFS way, way ahead in the scenery looks department.
Even as heavy user of Ortho4XP, TrueEarth and MSE with over 2 TB of ortho and autogen saved to disk for P3D, I can admit that MSFS looks and performs better.
 

Edited April 28, 2021 by F737NG

[Dominique_K 10,138]

3 minutes ago, F737NG said:

 What the vast majority of people can agree on (rare on these forums, I know) is that MSFS is groundbreaking with the use of aerial imagery.  

Google is the real technological pioneer in streaming geo-imagery and photogrammetry to the public, not Microsoft which here, as in many sectors, was a follower. Long before here was any hint of MFS, the wonderful and free, yes free, Google Earth was with us.  Maybe one of the five greatest applications ever designed.

MFS is groundbreaking in integrating a game engine and the cloud streaming of imagery with the additional goodies of what Blackshark.ai brings to the table. 

Google Earth was a technological breakthrough. MFS is a technological prowess.

2 hours ago, abrams_tank said:

Or let's say you can also get this satellite & photogrammetry data service for P3D or X-Plane, but of course, Lockheed Martin and Laminar Research won't pay for it, so you have to pay for it as an additional service yourself.

To put in the same sentence Laminar and Lockheed Martin makes as much sense  to me as doing the same with Amazon and Simmarket because they both sell online.  

[pmb 5,137]

42 minutes ago, Tuskin38 said:

Well, a lot of the buildings in MSFS are based off a few years old Open Street Map data and also Bing building footprints (like the ones you can see when not using the road map, not satellite)

Not all are from OSM/Bing, because there are buildings rendered in the sim that nether OSM or Bing have marked, so I assume that's where the AI comes in.

The AI is also used to generate how the buildings are procedurally generated on the patch notes for world updates.

Are you sure Open Streetmap is involved in MSFS at all? I don't recall any statement from Asobo to that effect, but of course I may have simply missed them.

I just re-watched the corresponding Partnership Video (#4) from the alpha period, and I didn't find any mention of Open Streetmap, just Bing imagery + AI.

I even feel this sets MSFS apart from others sims. Many solutions for X-Plane, AeroflyFS, and others combine ground imagery with OSM objects, but they never merge to the uniqe representation MSFS achives, where all ground plus objects appear to be made all of a piece. 

Kind regards, Michael

[Bobsk8 12,679]

I believe that XP stated that they thought that streaming scenery was not the way to go, when MSFS 2020 came out. So I doubt seriously if they will walk that back, and consider doing what MSFS is doing. There loss, I'm afraid, because their sim by comparison looks really dated now. 

[Tuskin38 6,468]

29 minutes ago, pmb said:

Are you sure Open Streetmap is involved in MSFS at all?

The super tall tower that was in Melbourne at launch was because of a mistake in the OSM data, someone found the source of the error by looking at the OSM edit history of the building.

https://www.theverge.com/2020/8/21/21395084/microsoft-flight-simulator-melbourne-obelish-openstreetmap-bing-maps-data-glitch

The files that handle the autogen buildings have an OSM parameter for deciding what buildings to spawn. (the .toml files in the 'bf-pgg\PGG' folder and sub folders, can be opened with a text editor)

But as I said it's outdated OSM Data by around 2 years (that's why the tower was there even though it was already fixed in OSM at the time). it's not current OSM Data, which is probably why they're not a 'partner'.

 

Edited April 28, 2021 by Tuskin38