X-Plane Next Generation Forestry Preview

[FS++ 708]

Definitely looking forward to it.

[mSparks 2,086]

30 minutes ago, rka said:

Sure, with regard to just XP it IS obviously revolutionary. Generally speaking, it's not so revolutionary given this is 2021 AD. They would have to put up a bit more to justify calling any of that stuff revolutionary IMHO.

Its the very recent hardware that is revolutionary.

This was always my biggest beef with MSFS and defence of XP.

Its one thing to get a forest like this in a few square miles of hand crafted map, spending $100million on a render farm to bake in the lighting (and time of day) in a game where no one cares that the simplistic physics are running at 10fps.

A whole other ballgame to get anything close on a global scale based on raw data rather than a pure random procedure, with variable time of day on hardware available in the average home with 60fps minimums for the entire simulation.

Id also say from the tests Ive done on my RTX3070 we are still barely there. JustSid is on a 3080, xbox x is roughly a 2080...

On the other hand, none of it is revolutionary, better eye candy has been available at your local airfield for a reasonable price for a hundred years or so.

Edited July 31, 2021 by mSparks

[akita 429]

31 minutes ago, rka said:

Sure, with regard to just XP it IS obviously revolutionary. Generally speaking, it's not so revolutionary given this is 2021 AD. They would have to put up a bit more to justify calling any of that stuff revolutionary IMHO.

In fact it is revolutionary, so that they can probably brag about it in GDC.

All done on the GPU via shaders, controlled seasons and foliage through WeatherFX maps, with amazing LOD (according to the shots provided) and GPU based culling (Vulkan charms), really as fast as it can get.

Definitely something to look forward and yet to see any flight simulator manage that.

[rka 916]

1 minute ago, akita said:

In fact it is revolutionary, so that they can probably brag about it in GDC.

I'm eagerly awaiting the big news from GDC, where everyone will be talking about XP.

There are posts to which I can only react with sarcasm, sorry.

[rka 916]

11 minutes ago, mSparks said:

Its the very recent hardware that is revolutionary.

This was always my biggest beef with MSFS and defence of XP.

Its one thing to get a forest like this in a few square miles of hand crafted map, spending $100million on a render farm to bake in the lighting (and time of day) in a game where no one cares that the simplistic physics are running at 10fps.

A whole other ballgame to get anything close on a global scale based on raw data rather than a pure random procedure, with variable time of day on hardware available in the average home with 60fps minimums for the entire simulation.

Id also say from the tests Ive done on my RTX3070 we are still barely there. JustSid is on a 3080, xbox x is roughly a 2080...

On the other hand, none of it is revolutionary, better eye candy has been available at your local airfield for a reasonable price for a hundred years or so.

Are you saying the stuff Asobo achieved was easy and the really big achievement is that there will be new trees (and lighting) on the XP side?

[akita 429]

 

12 minutes ago, rka said:

I'm eagerly awaiting the big news from GDC, where everyone will be talking about XP.

There are posts to which I can only react with sarcasm, sorry.

some LR staff attend GDC, interact with other developers, talk and brag about their work... is that really so unbelievable that *Game developers* attend a game developer conference?

8 minutes ago, rka said:

Are you saying the stuff Asobo achieved was easy and the really big achievement is that there will be new trees (and lighting) on the XP side?

Just for the record you are bringing MSFS in specific now...this vegetation tech is at least a generation newer than what Asobo has. 

Edited July 31, 2021 by akita

[GoranM 3,764]

54 minutes ago, rka said:

Sure, with regard to just XP it IS obviously revolutionary. Generally speaking, it's not so revolutionary given this is 2021 AD. They would have to put up a bit more to justify calling any of that stuff revolutionary IMHO.

I was going to reply, but the posts above mine have said everything and more. But yes, it’s revolutionary. And so far from a “tweaked X-Plane”, it’s hilarious. 

Edited July 31, 2021 by GoranM

[rka 916]

Just now, akita said:

some LR staff attend GDC, interact with other developers, talk... is that really so unbelievable that *Game developers* attend a game developer conference?

You did not state they would attend the conference, you did state they had something to brag about. But I guess you actually got what I intended to say.

 

2 minutes ago, akita said:

Just for the record you are bringing MSFS in specific now...this vegetation tech is at least a generation newer than what Asobo has. 

I am asking for clarification on a statement by another user - what's your problem with that? I haven't even adressed you in any way?

[mSparks 2,086]

Just now, rka said:

Are you saying the stuff Asobo achieved was easy and the really big achievement is that there will be new trees (and lighting) on the XP side?

Im saying they couldnt and havent achieved it at least nothing like was promised in the feature discovery series. 

They promised high resolution 3d trees with seasons, blowing in the storms, they delivered 2d trees with no seasons - and do they even animate?

perhaps someone with msfs could make a video similar to the op to sbs compare? There is a "surprising" lack of youtube videos with close ups on the veg for msfs.

 

 

[akita 429]

10 minutes ago, rka said:

You did not state they would attend the conference, you did state they had something to brag about. But I guess you actually got what I intended to say.

Arguing for the sake of arguing as always, you understood something, obviously wrong, then had this condescending sarcasm reply, then you still come up with:

Quote

I am asking for clarification on a statement by another user - what's your problem with that? I haven't even adressed you in any way?

I have no problem with that, I just participated in a discussion that I may like, but for some reason every comment of mine seems to slowly burn your soul.

The bringing up MSFS part is due to the unfortunate nature of these forums this days.

So I'll stop here, appreciate if you too.

Edited July 31, 2021 by akita

[rka 916]

2 minutes ago, mSparks said:

Im saying they couldnt and havent achieved it at least nothing like was promised in the feature discovery series. 

They promised high resolution 3d trees with seasons, blowing in the storms, they delivered 2d trees with no seasons - and do they even animate?

perhaps someone with msfs could make a video similar to the op to sbs compare? There is a "surprising" lack of youtube videos with close ups on the veg for msfs.

Trees could definitely be improved, as could be seasons, absolutely true.

Seeing how they are still better than every available competitor, that's not my main concern - and likely not theirs as well, which I find understandable.

[rka 916]

5 minutes ago, akita said:

So I'll stop here

That seems like the wise thing to do 😉

 

 

[mSparks 2,086]

27 minutes ago, rka said:

Trees could definitely be improved, as could be seasons, absolutely true.

Seeing how they are still better than every available competitor, that's not my main concern - and likely not theirs as well, which I find understandable.

you miss my point completely.

its not about xplane asobo laminar or msfs.

Its about the users and the hardware they have.

users with gpus remotely capable of this stuff are still a very tiny minority:

https://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey/Steam-Hardware-Software-Survey-Welcome-to-Steam

Sid has pushed the boundaries of what is possible on "next gen" hardware - and may very likely talk about it a gdc.

MS promising any kind of similar result on GA hardware wasnt quite as bad as it first seemed (x box x is a beast), but if you are one of the 95% of PC owners with a gpu less than a 2080 this preview is likely not going to look remotely similar on the hardware you currently own.

Edited July 31, 2021 by mSparks

[Bjoern 1,157]

14 hours ago, RXP said:

You are right, I'm talking about XP11 and speculating about XP12, but it used to be a paradigm to be able to run as efficiently as possible, if possible. If not directly like we can do right now with XP11 in having an OGL context we can play with, at least via proper SDK API abstractions giving access to the underlying silicon in one way or the other.

A good example of this to me is the Instancing API, which gives you near like Shader + Uniforms, but in a wrapped and efficient SDK API.

And that's why the SDK needs a Vulkan API. Having plugins run in an OpenGL context from Vulkan introduces all kinds of synchronization issues which especially AMD GPUs have massive issues with because the use case is just in too much of a niche to have driver developers implement a fix.

 

14 hours ago, RXP said:

When I compare X-Plane approach to these questions in general, with the alternative which is using a HTML layoutting engine which is inherently heavy and complex, only for displaying a dozen or so short text strings and drawing a hundred or so line segments on an EFIS, let alone JS garbage collection thrown in the mix, I can't help thinking one of the two is meant for performance and the other for GUI only (which is what it is actually marketed for first and foremost in fact, not for real time rendering of complex in game assets)*

*just to be perfectly clear here, the other APIs available through WASM are offering low level vector drawing APIs - not their GDI+ emulation but the low level path drawing API - which seems faster because aircraft with gauges using it are usually also said to be better on fps.

I never understood why MS/Asobo went with markup-based implementations for drawing and underlying code. FSX' XML implementation was awful to learn, teach and use.

[akatham 9]

33 minutes ago, Bjoern said:

FSX' XML implementation was awful to learn, teach and use.

To be fair, XML itself is awful to learn, teach and use.

Edited July 31, 2021 by akatham