Happy/sad

[andy1252 3,784]

Well, I've had one of those happy/sad moments this week. I happened to notice that LM had released P3D 5.2 this week, and I've been thinking for a while now about all the aircraft I miss from P3D and how I'd try and get round to setting up a clean system to use for my old hangar, so I went and did so with 5.2. Absolutely clean install - I renamed my old 5.1 system folders so that I had everything if I did decide to bring anything over, and because I wanted to keep all the gauges, sounds, effects etc for the aircraft - but the 5.2 system went in absolutely clean. I then re-installed Orbx global stuff, also completely fresh, and a couple of True Earth areas, and then tried it out.

To be honest, I was quite impressed at first. LM have obviously done some work on the engine - I was getting a fairly consistent 30 fps (my target rate) over TE London without any of the stutters and pauses I was getting with 5.0 and 5.1, and that was with everything maxed out and the EA and volumetric clouds also full on. Pretty impressive.

But after a very short space of time I realised that I just couldn't stand the look of the environment any more. The atmospherics aren't bad, with EA on, and I dare say that once the various shader manipulation addons are upgraded for 5.2 the overall visuals will improve even more, but that still left me with two major issues.

First is (and I don't know if Filou is still around here at the moment, I'd be interested on his take on this) what I suspect is a LOD issue. It feels like they may have done an Asobo and fixed the stuttering and some of the performance issues by crippling the LOD distance. I was very aware of what felt like a vastly reduced detail horizon, maybe half what it used to be.

Second, and more final, is that I realise I just can't take landclass tiles seriously any more. TE mitigates that to some degree, but even within that it seems to be an issue. I took off from KSFO within TE Nor-Cal and noticed a tile of buildings rising up the side of a hill and then just stopping dead, including the good old half-a-building cut through on the edge of the tile. I know P3D does this, but having been using MSFS almost exclusively since it came out I realise I just can't do that any more. I tried a bit of photoscenery and that looked pretty poor as well,

So it all just confirmed for me exactly how wonderful I feel MSFS is. Maybe not for everyone, I know the tubeliner/serious button pusher folk are still missing some tricks bit for me it really is a done deal. But I'm also sad, because I realise that I'm really unlikely to ever get any use out of my huge hangar of P3D aircraft - probably 500-600 strong. I won't actually delete them all - I've got Tb of spare HDD sitting on the sim pc so it doesn't cost me to keep them there, and maybe P3D v6 or even v7 will be a version that I can live with, but for now, P3D has become a relic. Oddly enough, I might actually straighten out my old FSX system to use some of the old hangar as at least on FSX I don't have any great expectations, visually - it's a sim and can't possibly pretend to look real in my eyes so I accept if for what it is.

But with MSFS I can really almost convince myself I'm there.

The price of progress, I guess.

[Jeff Nielsen 1,385]

Quote

 

Give it 2 or 3 more months and I think we'll have a lot of FMC type issues (flight plan manager) sorted out and have a proper (or close to it), LNAV/VNAV.  WX should be pretty close by then also, then it's just a matter of loading up on the gravy.

That's the thing with the new sim, you can't un-see the graphics.  No terrain tiles makes all the difference in the world along with the environmentals.

[Bobsk8 12,584]

28 minutes ago, Jeff Nielsen said:

Give it 2 or 3 more months and I think we'll have a lot of FMC type issues (flight plan manager) sorted out and have a proper (or close to it), LNAV/VNAV.  WX should be pretty close by then also, then it's just a matter of loading up on the gravy.

That's the thing with the new sim, you can't un-see the graphics.  No terrain tiles makes all the difference in the world along with the environmentals.

I was forced two weeks ago to return to P3D while my new PC is on an RMA ( coming back to me early this coming week).  P3D looks horrible after flying MSFS for a couple of months. There is no way I will fly it anymore, as soon as my PC returns. 

[jimcarrel 688]

I've found myself flying both for now, MSFS is absolutely has the wow moments, but at the same time, I still love flying the Majestic Dash and my A2A planes. For now I'm not ditching "one for the other". Got to much tied up in both. Really, the way I see it, they are just "different". Not unhappy or sad.

[bean_sprout 1,201]

That's why I left simming years ago - I could no longer fly my awesome aircraft in a cartoon world.  Immersion = -10 no matter how good the planes were.

Regards

bs