9 minutes ago, lwt1971 said:

. MS is putting a lot of effort in loosening up their purse strings to contract out this free content to 3rd parties, ranging from entertainment add-ons like the Pelican to high fidelity realistic add-ons like the iniBuilds A310. Asobo itself stays focused on the core sim, like they should.

Man I didn't even think of that earlier lol. Makes some of the nonsense we've been seeing in this thread sound even more ridiculous.

55 minutes ago, Keto Ketchup said:

So does this latest flight sim allow modders to add their own clouds like the older versions did? For example, high altitude cirrus clouds could be added as simple 2D sprites and still look pretty amazing for those of us flying at lower altitudes.

No. The clouds in MSFS are volumetric and dynamically created based on the parameters in the weather model (or presets) for height, width, type, density etc. No pre-existing textures are used as in FSX/P3D.

The ability to use pre-made textures (in addition to the current system) might be an advantage, at least for high, thin cirrus clouds. I suspect that creating cirrus using strictly volumetric techniques is very difficult, which is why we really don’t see realistic-looking cirrus in MSFS.

Edited July 7, 20223 yr by JRBarrett

5 hours ago, SubtotalGuide said:

we are all ultra-aware that stuff you paid for regressed

Are you feeling bad you didn't get your money's worth, all $59 or $119 of it? 😂

I believe we know that the data comes in a grid/cube like pattern (or at least thats what I am led to believe from descriptions from MeteoBlue about what they do).  I have wondered what could be achieved by Asobo if they modified the shapes of some of these 'weather data cubes'?  Maybe elongate some where long stretched out cirrus or low stretched out stratus are needed?  Other 'grid-cubes'  could be adjusted in size to keep the number around the globe at that layer the same.

Isn't it true that shaders still make use of textures but just not in the way that FSX/P3D did?  Are there not small textures that describe the colors to be used for the sky for example and then other cloud sprite textures that are sampled and used to build clouds?  If someone could guess the name of these files then they might be able to make some changes but I suspect major cloud design changes wouldnt be possible.

I still remember, I was flying another Sim at the time that Asobo announced clouds with a 600 mile view distance, self shadowing and etc.

I think myself and several other people were astonished, because at the time we were using things like Skymax that we're doing the best they could, but gave a massive frame rate hit for anything even resembling what we get from Microsoft flight simulator now for a negligible cost in speed.

I remember the "old days" very vividly, and can't help but feel that we have very quickly gotten quite jaded.

Not being a pro simmer, I have no firsthand knowledge, but I wonder what sort of cloud depiction your average bajillion dollar professional simulator gives?

Yea theyre awesome. Sometimes I think they are a little grainy depending on my connection and my scenery settings, but overall my experience looks much the same as what you have posted.  Nice twin Beech by the way!  I just wish we had one that was a study level. 

4 hours ago, HiFlyer said:

I remember the "old days" very vividly, and can't help but feel that we have very quickly gotten quite jaded.

I've told myself a few times if n when I am no longer impressed w/ the scenery, lighting and atmospherics in MSFS I will reinstall P3D v4.5 so I can indeed recall vividly why it was towards the end I resorted to flying from dusk til dawn only where there were a couple of big pluses:  could put autogen & vegetation down to SPARSE, detail distance to MEDIUM, disable FTX Orbs NCA/SCA which were hard on performance, and so be able to run a smooth 30fps via vsync to a 30Hz screen and 2, NOT have to look at the scenery, limited cloud range since we flew only in the dim light.  If I ever did reinstall P3D I would just go straight default everything so we can do a proper Apples to Apples comparison.  So far, I've not tired of MSFS at all!  I would so like to get much better cloud depiction it is a very big weak spot.  Even the launched version needed work though better than today for sure, at least up close.

1 hour ago, Noel said:

I've told myself a few times if n when I am no longer impressed w/ the scenery, lighting and atmospherics in MSFS I will reinstall P3D v4.5 so I can indeed recall vividly why it was towards the end I resorted to flying from dusk til dawn only where there were a couple of big pluses:  could put autogen & vegetation down to SPARSE, detail distance to MEDIUM, disable FTX Orbs NCA/SCA which were hard on performance, and so be able to run a smooth 30fps via vsync to a 30Hz screen and 2, NOT have to look at the scenery, limited cloud range since we flew only in the dim light.  If I ever did reinstall P3D I would just go straight default everything so we can do a proper Apples to Apples comparison.  So far, I've not tired of MSFS at all!  I would so like to get much better cloud depiction it is a very big weak spot.  Even the launched version needed work though better than today for sure, at least up close.

Perhaps I remember so well because I took so many pictures, back in the day.

I vividly remember sharing this one of Skymaxx here, and many of us being gobsmacked at this "stunning" depiction of a cloudburst.

Oh how the times have changed!

4 minutes ago, HiFlyer said:

Oh how the times have changed!

I do get the idea, of course, but I think there’s enough evidence for my eyes that the clouds we have now in MSFS aren’t as good as what we had before in Live Weather. I can understand though that if you mostly use presets things might not seem so different.

27 minutes ago, scotchegg said:

I do get the idea, of course, but I think there’s enough evidence for my eyes that the clouds we have now in MSFS aren’t as good as what we had before in Live Weather. I can understand though that if you mostly use presets things might not seem so different.

My point is that....

Well, lets put it this way: When XP11 was being previewed, Austin made a video showcasing the gorgeous new clouds. They had wonderful shading, a truly volumetric feel.....

They were beautiful, and looked truly next-gen, for the time.

But when the sim came out, they were massive FPS hogs, and the community complained loudly while modders quickly came out with mod after mod reducing resolution and cloud puff size, etc until it felt like everyone and his dog was creating cloud mods!

The clouds got faster and more useable, but they were never again even close to as beautiful as in Austin's original video.

The simply couldn't be.

Over the years, traffic reduction mods and all manner of other mods became common to bring the sim into acceptable FPS territory, with the eventual outcome that the sim interface itself was changed to hide some of the features people kept insisting on turning up to the maximum... (and then complaining about FPS)

To me, there's a modern parallel in MSFS. 

An initial gob-smacking introductory set of graphics, and then, gradual reductions (optimizations) that were probably inevitable, but which we refuse to accept.

I'm much more copacetic about this than many, because I pretty much anticipated from the beginning that there would have to be compromises as Asobo / MS dialed in the balance between graphics and performance. (somebody will probably mention the Xbox, here)

People sometimes say "well I have 10 3090's so give me sliders so I can max things out while the peons suffer". but I really do wonder if its quite so easy as we seem to like to imagine.

Asobo does obligingly roll out the requested sliders occasionally, but all that happens then is we just move on to the next got-to-have-or-its-not-a-sim.

As I said before.... I would hate to be Asobo, because we often appear like we want absolutely everything; all of it pretty much perfect; due yesterday, and hopefully for never more than the $60 or so dollars that apparently gives us lifetime freebies and updates as well as unlimited bandwidth.

I mostly watch all this from the sidelines, but every once in a while I do masochistically dip a finger in....

Edited July 7, 20223 yr by HiFlyer

Now looking back we did have some pretty good looking FSX weather themes from ORBX 

Whichever particular dev created those themes was extra crafty with the cloud layering SDK.

Learjet Storm

https://youtube.com/clip/Ugkx4ZqzSxzF-WERYRtNpZHZcQf4QODhJHcG

Duke Storm

https://youtube.com/clip/UgkxZbRiN4JDwpvaL0ntox2VYbc1JaR-HsnM

 

 

Edited July 8, 20223 yr by blueshark747

7 hours ago, HiFlyer said:

People sometimes say "well I have 10 3090's so give me sliders so I can max things out while the peons suffer". but I really do wonder if its quite so easy as we seem to like to imagine.

Yes, yes it is! Sliders are the answer, why not? Turn them down or upgrade. No "peon" needs to suffer except their ego.

 

7 hours ago, HiFlyer said:

Asobo does obligingly roll out the requested sliders occasionally, but all that happens then is we just move on to the next got-to-have-or-its-not-a-sim.

Exactly! Keep us focused on the easy graphical elements they can change but won't so we don't focus on the more difficult aviation related elements which they have a hard time grasping. It would be funny if not so embarrassingly obvious.

What is even more embarrassing is the way some fall over themselves trying to stand up for big daddy MS and willing to settle for less.

Edited July 8, 20223 yr by SubtotalGuide

16 hours ago, Noel said:

Are you feeling bad you didn't get your money's worth, all $59 or $119 of it? 😂

If that's what you call having quality and features reduced since you bought the product, then yes. I know, how dare the consumer. They should be lucky they ever got the product in the first place.

  

7 hours ago, HiFlyer said:

People sometimes say "well I have 10 3090's so give me sliders so I can max things out while the peons suffer". but I really do wonder if its quite so easy as we seem to like to imagine.

Yes, yes it is! Sliders are the answer, why not? Turn them down or upgrade. No "peon" needs to suffer except their ego.

 

7 hours ago, HiFlyer said:

Asobo does obligingly roll out the requested sliders occasionally, but all that happens then is we just move on to the next got-to-have-or-its-not-a-sim.

Exactly! Keep us focused on the easy graphical elements they can change but won't so we don't focus on the more difficult aviation related elements which they have a hard time grasping. It would be funny if not so embarrassingly obvious.

What is even more embarrassing is the way some fall over themselves trying to stand up for big daddy MS and willing to settle for less.

8 minutes ago, SubtotalGuide said:

Exactly! Keep us focused on the easy graphical elements they can change but won't so we don't focus on the more difficult aviation related elements which they have a hard time grasping. It would be funny if not so embarrassingly obvious.

What is even more embarrassing is the way some fall over themselves trying to stand up for big daddy MS and willing to settle for less.

Bilge and poppycock. They’ve clearly been putting a lot of work over the last few updates into core flight dynamics and have been open about the progress and limitations of the current CFD model. They haven’t done any significant graphical stuff with the sky for ages.

And as you may also know those haven't turned out stellar either. I know, they will keep working on it.

And yes they haven't done much to return the sky to its former glory for ages since SU5 and 7. Which is why it's one of the top issues being complained about currently.

I'm hoping the SUX beta will prove me wrong.

Edited July 8, 20223 yr by SubtotalGuide