April 29th, 2021 - Development Update

[ChaoticBeauty 6,692]

APRIL 29TH, 2021 DEVELOPMENT UPDATE

Posted by: Microsoft Flight Simulator Team

Screenshot by zerch00

 

The Top Rudder 103 ultralight plane developed by Asobo Studio came out yesterday and is available for $9.99 in the Marketplace! We hope you enjoy it, and feel free to leave any feedback here. Check out the trailer here:

An updated Development Roadmap is now available as well. Have a great week! 

– The MSFS team

 

 

DEVELOPMENT ROADMAP

Click here for the web-friendly version.

 

FEEDBACK SNAPSHOT

Click here for the web-friendly version.

KEY:

SU = Sim Update (3, 4, etc.)

WU = World Update

ASAP = As Soon as Possible

TBD = To Be Determined

Several Releases = Fixes will come over a series of updates

Ongoing Fixes = An item we will continually be working on

Planned = Scheduled to be worked on

Under Investigation = The team is currently looking into the issue

Not Planned = We will likely not work on this

Started = Work as started on this item

 

THIRD PARTY UPDATE

• As of 04/24, we have now approved 159 (+10) third parties to sell content in the in-sim marketplace and so far 81 (+2) have released 334 products (+16).
• In total, 870 products (+25) have already been released in 3rd party stores and the in-sim marketplace. Beyond that, another 317 products (+5) from 3rd party developers are in production (190 announced, 127 unannounced). In total, over 1,187 3rd party products (+24) are either released or are in development.
• Airports:
  • 749 airports (+9) are either released or are in various stages of development.
    • 550 airports (+8) have been released on the platform so far in various stores.
    • 278 airports (+15) have been released in the in-sim marketplace.
    • 94 airports (+3) beyond the released airports have been announced.
    • 105 airports (-2) are not announced, but the dev let us know that an airport is in production.
• Aircraft:
  • 135 aircraft (+6) are either released or are in various stages of development.
    • 34 aircraft (+3) have been released on the platform so far in various stores.
    • 24 aircraft (+0) have been released in the in-sim marketplace.
    • 79 aircraft (+3) beyond the released aircraft have been announced.
    • 22 aircraft (+0) are not announced, but the dev let us know that an aircraft is in production.
• Scenery:
  • 276 sceneries (+15) are either released or are in various stages of development.
    • 259 sceneries (+14) have been released on the platform so far in various stores.
    • 22 sceneries (+2) have been released in the in-sim marketplace.
    • 17 sceneries (+1) beyond the released scenery have been announced.
• Mission Packs:
  • 27 mission packs (+0) are either released or are in various stages of development.
    • 27 mission packs (+0) have been released on the platform so far in various stores.
    • 3 mission packs (+0) have been released in the in-sim marketplace.
    • 0 mission packs (+0) beyond the released missions have been announced.

 

SDK UPDATE

• Documentation:
  • We made some changes on the Flight Model section, created a Flights & Missions section, added a page about ice on aircraft models, and updated flightmodel.cfg with new parameters. More to come!
• Dev Mode:
  • We fixed the “add custom asset group” window which wouldn’t close when creating a new non-templated asset group.
  • We fixed the font displayed in the release notes window.
  • The Audio team fixed a shared convolution IR which didn’t load in Wwise remote and added Built-in Emitter & Listener cone game-parameters.
  • In the Scenery Editor, we fixed the windsocks with the wrong orientation, and we fixed ‘`’ char being filtered in taxiway sign content text entry.
• SimConnect:
  • We added the GEAR_SKIDDING_FACTOR SimVar.

 

MARKETPLACE

There are 21 new products and 8 updated products in the Marketplace today.

Released Wednesday, 4/28:

 

Releasing Thursday, 4/29:

21 NEW PRODUCTS

 

8 UPDATED PRODUCTS

 

 

TWITCH UPDATE

Tomorrow, join community manager Jayne and Twitch streamer ForderLearntoFly for the next C152 flying lesson: Forward Slip and Flapless Landings! 2pm PST.

 

COMMUNITY VIDEO

Check out this stunning aerial tour of France/Benelux. Enjoy!

 

SCREENSHOT CHALLENGE

This past week we challenged you to take a screenshot of “Peace and Quiet”. The winner is featured above. Below are our 10 runner up choices! This week’s Screenshot Challenge: Best Kept Secret 

Last challenge’s Finalists:

Screenshot by HolmesCZ6127

 

Screenshot by Steeler2340

 

Screenshot by Renoi71

 

Screenshot by ebbsy2

 

Screenshot by MarinerHally

 

Screenshot by SnagglePss68

 

Screenshot by Schnemat

 

Screenshot by Jannik207

 

Screenshot by HeKa48

 

Screenshot by VFilippo20032222

 

NEXT DEVELOPMENT UPDATE BLOG – 5.06

Sincerely,

Microsoft Flight Simulator Team

Edited April 29, 2021 by ChaoticBeauty

[bendead 1,085]

As usual thanks for the update 😉.

I am seeing it wrong or are we going to see a sim update this month, wasn't it supposed to be delayed to June and shipped with world update?

[omarsmak30 4,067]

I thought they will release SU4 with WU5 as they mentioned in the last Q&A? Anyway, if it is going to be SU4 in May, I am looking forward to it and in the same time, having stomachache 😅

[KERNEL32 499]

Seasons - was 2021 recently changed to "2022" 😞

Edited April 29, 2021 by KERNEL32

[Flic1 976]

Why is #1 on the Wishlist the FBW 320??  Not quite sure what the wish is for....we have access to it now.  What am I missing here??

[ChaoticBeauty 6,692]

1 minute ago, bendead said:

As usual thanks for the update 😉.

I am seeing it wrong or are we going to see a sim update this month, wasn't it supposed to be delayed to June and shipped with world update?

1 minute ago, omarsmak30 said:

I thought they will release SU4 with WU5 as they mentioned in the last Q&A? Anyway, if it is going to be SU4 in May, I am looking forward to it and in the same time, having stomachache 😅

Indeed it was. I don't think they would for any reason decide to split the branches again, so it probably is a mistake on the roadmap (wouldn't be the first time). Hopefully this will be clarified soon.

1 minute ago, KERNEL32 said:

Seasons - was Summer 2021 now "2022" 😞

Before it was just 2021, so it might have only been delayed from late 2021 to early 2022 or something. It was certainly not coming in the summer alongside the major DirectX 12 update and Xbox launch.

2 minutes ago, Flic1 said:

Why is #1 on the Wishlist the FBW 320??  Not quite sure what the wish is for....we have access to it now.  What am I missing here??

I'm thinking that this wish will be fulfilled when it's released on the Marketplace.

[Baber20 1,438]

I guess we will see Xbox release in June with DX12U update for pc coming in July with Sim Update 5.

[pmb 5,137]

49 minutes ago, KERNEL32 said:

Seasons - was 2021 recently changed to "2022" 😞

Seasons might have turned out to be more difficult than they thought initially. Asobo certainly made some stabs into that field but may have ran into obstacles.

None of the present competitors has shader-based seasons in the core sim. I am not that well-informed, but are there any addons for the other sims successfully having implemented shader-based seasons (contrary to pure texture-based ones)?

Meanwhile, Bijan is doing a great job with the trees which I really enjoy, but as we all know that's only part of the game. I hope, Asobo doesn't consider it a relieve.

Kind regards, Michael

[KERNEL32 499]

9 minutes ago, pmb said:

 Asobo certainly made some stabs into that field but may have ran into obstacles.

Kind regards, Michael

Speaking of "obstacles" I noticed those (powerlines/obstacles) also quietly went from 2021 to 2022 😞 

I know there are more pressing "issues", but those are issues and not wishes. Oh well, good things come to those who wait!

Edited April 30, 2021 by KERNEL32

[marsman2020 1,310]

12 minutes ago, KERNEL32 said:

I know there are more pressing "issues", but those are issues and not wishes. Oh well, good things come to those who wait!

They aren't really making any progress on the issues either.  I'm honestly not sure what 200 people are supposedly doing at this point.  Certainly not any work that is customer-facing. 

Where's the darn particle effects system they have been faffing on about since literally the week the sim came out?

Hopefully they are re-writing the Alpha that Microsoft forced them to ship into something workable....hopefully....

Edited April 30, 2021 by marsman2020

[Glenn Fitzpatrick 3,798]

4 minutes ago, marsman2020 said:

 

Where's the darn particle effects system they have been faffing on about since literally the week the sim came out?

 

 

Given that particle effects without ray tracing are guaranteed to hammer performance and how many people (not me thankfully) have performance issues even with the current feature set, it is not surprising this one is delayed.

[espent 1,390]

A big part of the top50 wish list have now been set to be released in 2021. I find that pretty awesome.  If they release on time and with quality this will be very good. 

[marsman2020 1,310]

7 minutes ago, espent said:

A big part of the top50 wish list have now been set to be released in 2021. I find that pretty awesome.  If they release on time and with quality this will be very good. 

🤣

[Gilandred 690]

1 hour ago, pmb said:

Seasons might have turned out to be more difficult than they thought initially. Asobo certainly made some stabs into that field but may have ran into obstacles.

None of the present competitors has shader-based seasons in the core sim. I am not that well-informed, but are there any addons for the other sims successfully having implemented shader-based seasons (contrary to pure texture-based ones)?

Xenviro for X Plane does winter with shaders.

Edited April 30, 2021 by Gilandred

[Scottoest 1,561]

1 hour ago, pmb said:

Seasons might have turned out to be more difficult than they thought initially. Asobo certainly made some stabs into that field but may have ran into obstacles.

None of the present competitors has shader-based seasons in the core sim. I am not that well-informed, but are there any addons for the other sims successfully having implemented shader-based seasons (contrary to pure texture-based ones)?

Meanwhile, Bijan is doing a great job with the trees which I really enjoy, but as we all know that's only part of the game. I hope, Asobo doesn't consider it a relieve.

Kind regards, Michael

My guess is that seasons simply got backburnered in favour of more pressing stuff they want to get in or fix first, in response to feedback.