June 3rd, 2021 - Development Update

[ChaoticBeauty 6,692]

JUNE 3RD, 2021 DEVELOPMENT UPDATE

Posted by: Microsoft Flight Simulator Team

Screenshot by TastingDevotee7

 

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

• AnswerHub for the SDK will be live on June 7th, 2021! 
• We would like to welcome back our SDK team to Twitch! Our next SDK  Q&A will be June 16th, 2021 at 10:30 am PDT. You can ask questions related to the Scenery Editor here.
• This month we will be splitting our Dev Q&A into a two-part series. Dev Q&A: Part 1 – World Updates will be on June 17th, 2021 at 10:30 am PDT. Dev Q&A: Part 2 – Sim Update 5, will be on June 30th at 10:30 am PDT. Mark your calendars! Feel free to send in questions for either of those Q&As here (link coming soon)
• No Feedback snapshot or 3rd party update this week. Will resume next week.

 

NEXT FLIGHTING OPPORTUNITY

Would you like to participate in our next flighting opportunity? We have made significant updates and data changes to the sim and need a variety of PC setups to help test stability and performance. This build does not include any content changes but has significant performance updates we’d love for you to try out and provide feedback on.

Unlike the previous two flights, this flight will not be through the Xbox Insider Hub, but through a Steam branch. You do not need to own MSFS on Steam, as a code will be provided to you via email to download a specific test version of MSFS. The only requirements are that you have enough storage on your PC to handle a new (temporary) version of MSFS, and a Steam account.

For those interested, sign-ups will open to anyone who wishes to participate soon. We will post that announcement via the MSFS Website, so check back! We will cap the sign-ups at 300 participants.

Previous testers who have expressed interest via this forum post (only active for previous testers) will be automatically added to this flight and there is no need to sign up as you will be added in addition to the 300 users.

– The MSFS team

 

DEVELOPMENT ROADMAP

Click here for the web-friendly version. Most recent update:

 

SDK UPDATE

• General
  • AnswerHub Q&A platform should go live on June 7th ! Let’s meet on https://devsupport.flightsimulator.com (this link will not be active until the platform launches next week). This Friday, the 3rd party private section of the forum will be turned to read-only mode. You will still access it and view all the posts, but you won’t be able to answer anymore. We picked the latest messages and imported them on the new platform, so please double check before asking your questions again!
• Documentation
  • We documented the PackageInstaller sample.
  • We added documentation about Material Editor.
  • We made some changes to the VFX Editor’s documentation. The video tutorial will be uploaded soon to our YouTube channel.
• On the DevMode side
  • We fixed the “Show Error/warning” buttons which weren’t displayed when the object with error/warning isn’t unfolded.
  • We fixed a package mounting error. It occurred when loading Project XML file while both local and installed packages were already registered.
  • On the FX Editor, we added SmokeLanding FX edition file, which was missing from the latest SDK update. We also fixed a bad template instantiation caused by ImGui popup conflict.
  • We re-enabled the automatic loading of a previously loaded project.
• On SimConnect
  • We added Contact Point simvars.

 

MARKETPLACE

Today there are 7 new products and 7 updated products in the Marketplace.

7 NEW PRODUCTS

 

7 UPDATED PRODUCTS

 

TWITCH UPDATE

Join us tomorrow for fly-in Friday with TheFlyingFabio! All are welcome to participate. Details can be found here.

 

COMMUNITY VIDEO

Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 4K Clouds Cinematic Short from u/TheFSChannel:

 

 

SCREENSHOT CHALLENGE

This past week we challenged you to take a screenshot of “Higher Ground”. The winner is featured above. Below are our runner up choices! This week’s Screenshot Challenge: Backcountry

Last challenge’s Finalists:

Screenshot ScenicAtol3300

 

Screenshot by Nerbulus

 

Screenshot by Jannik207

 

Screenshot by BritishAvgk

 

Screenshot by Mottoth

 

Screenshot by forzakingfam

 

Screenshot by Filippo20032222

 

Screenshot by AwesomeBlack533

 

Screenshot by Netiense

 

Screenshot by z32ands30

 

NEXT DEVELOPMENT UPDATE BLOG – 6.10

Sincerely,

Microsoft Flight Simulator Team

Edited June 4, 2021 by ChaoticBeauty

[bobcat999 8,483]

'Significant performance updates' to be tested.  Nice!  

Thanks once again for posting this CB!

[ChaoticBeauty 6,692]

5 minutes ago, bobcat999 said:

'Significant performance updates' to be tested.  Nice!  

It is very exciting indeed. I'm thinking this might be an early DirectX 12 branch instead of World Update 5, since they've said that this is where all the optimisation work goes.

[scotchegg 4,186]

42 minutes ago, ChaoticBeauty said:

has significant performance updates

Please be tree LOD, please be tree LOD…

[Amon1973 1,421]

34 minutes ago, ChaoticBeauty said:

It is very exciting indeed. I'm thinking this might be an early DirectX 12 branch instead of World Update 5, since they've said that this is where all the optimisation work goes.

That's what I'm hoping for as well, hopefully they sort out the CTD's for and gpu's, I didn't have any CTD's (not sure if I should mention this?) while testing su4, but I've disabled xmp and for now the CTD's seem to have gone. Fingers crossed.

Edited June 4, 2021 by eaim

[cmpbellsjc 2,963]

[devgrp 1,233]

1 hour ago, scotchegg said:

Please be tree LOD, please be tree LOD…

Unless they are reducing it, thats the only way that would improve performance 

[Scottoest 1,561]

That last screenshot looks like it could've been the cover art for an earlier version of Flight Simulator.

Not sure why that struck me like that, but it did, haha.

[MegaRiceBall 99]

Looks like XBox launch and DX12 update align nicely with MSFS 1-year anniversary 

[Baber20 1,438]

I am pretty sure that is a DX12 version. Requires a separate install and comes with 'significant' performance updates.

[bobcat999 8,483]

3 hours ago, devgrp said:

Unless they are reducing it, thats the only way that would improve performance 

No, they say they have recently found a way of placing 4x as many trees without affecting performance.  Therefore if we just doubled the current number, that would be a gain in performance for us. 

[HighTowers 1,434]

This is a bonus to try that branch.  Separate install that doesnt touch my main folder, plus its a steam install so theres no chance of MS store screwing it up. Sign me up! Bring on DX12

[pmb 5,137]

I have rarely performance issues despite my mediocre (according to today's measures) system on the 2D screen (3440x1440). However, I could well benefit from a performance boost for VR (Reverb 1 here).  In addition, a VR display quality enhancement would be very welcome as colors a rather bleached out (contrary to AeroflyFS2 or ETS2).

Kind regards, Michael

[bobcat999 8,483]

1 hour ago, HighTowers said:

This is a bonus to try that branch.  Separate install that doesnt touch my main folder, plus its a steam install so theres no chance of MS store screwing it up. Sign me up! Bring on DX12

Yes, really encouraging and I am sure a lot of us have been waiting for an optimisation cycle.

I would love to sign up for the opportunity, but my workload has gone through the roof.  I am barley able to get on the simulator lately.

Good luck to the testers though - I hope you enjoy it!

[kiek 1,215]

18 hours ago, Beardyman said:

Just wondering why always new NVIDIA driver is so big event ?

I see absolutely zero difference between drivers, but maybe it is just me ...

+1