On 5/28/2025 at 11:41 PM, Krakin said:

XP12 has made some big strides with clouds but I can't abide the low resolution and angular shapes that pop up.

One of the reasons I have installed XP12 to run alongside MSFS2024 are the clouds.

44 minutes ago, MrBitstFlyer said:

One of the reasons I have installed XP12 to run alongside MSFS2024 are the clouds.

Yup the shapes look very convincing but even in your screenshots I can tell how very blurry they are and that kills the immersion for me, big time. At first glance they do wow me, don't get me wrong but once my eyes settle on them, I see the issues. If LR can find a way to crank up the rez and deal with the anomalies that pop up, they'll have the best clouds in the business.

On 5/28/2025 at 5:41 PM, Krakin said:

 

I too find it strange that he said 24 has a yellow tinge. If anything, it have more of a blue shift. 2024 clouds don't look great on the horizon for sure but mid to close range they can't be beat, especially when it comes to resolution. Some clouds do tend to be too transparent sometimes but it is FAR worse in 2020. XP12 has made some big strides with clouds but I can't abide the low resolution and angular shapes that pop up.

The clouds up close are still really low detail and I find it immersion breaking at times but the further away they are the better they look.  And at medium to long ranges they look a lot better than 20 and 24 IMO.  Additionally a recent beta patch addressed the likelihood of those funky Minecraft clouds from appearing.  They're still there occasionally but much less frequently display.  And the dev team is having anyone who sees those clouds send them a log file.  So Laminar is listening and improving with each update.

2024 has made some good strides too but if you specifically want aeronautical things to be correct, XP 12 is a good sim to look at.  And if you do make sure you really allocate some time aside to get it setup.  When I first seriously looked at xp10 I was ready to give up on the first hour - XP is so different than Fsx or MSFS - I wasn't prepared for the changes.  I'd recommend at a MINIMUM considering XP Map Enhancement (the same dev who made it for MSFS) and you'll need about 30 GB of hard drive space for North America tiles - but then you'll get streaming Ortho (aerial imagery) for North America.  The resolution is generally lower than MSFS but increases dramatically once you get near an airport.  Also the resolution stays pretty sharp at altitude unlike MSFS which uses LOD to drastically reduce aerial/satellite resolution the higher you get.

If you do look at it and like it you can PM me for any further help on setup and or recommendations for addons 🙂

I'm currently flying addons for both XP12 and MSFS and it's not cheap LOL

Edited May 30, 20251 yr by ryanbatc

"2024 clouds don't look great on the horizon for sure but mid to close range they can't be beat, especially when it comes to resolution."

Big LOL!

 

I'm still looking for the beautiful clouds from FS2024. Where exactly are they? In which simulator? Which screenchot forum? Which YouTube video? On which social media page?

I'm also looking for the FS2024 modern lighting engine. Day and night? and cirrus clouds also.

To finish I'm looking for a nice cloud layer that doesn't dazzle you. Is that possible?

FS2024 is just a total imbalance even with its beautiful clouds up close range.That's not going to save his life."Sky is not the limit"

 

 

 

1 hour ago, Krakin said:

Yup the shapes look very convincing but even in your screenshots I can tell how very blurry they are and that kills the immersion for me, big time. At first glance they do wow me, don't get me wrong but once my eyes settle on them, I see the issues. If LR can find a way to crank up the rez and deal with the anomalies that pop up, they'll have the best clouds in the business.

Me too. The blurry clouds are a huge issue with XP 12 and also kills the immersion for me. MSFS 2024 needs to add more variety of clouds, and improve the cloud shapes for live weather, but I like that the clouds are sharp enough that I can see enough definition, and they are not blurry.  The clouds in MSFS 2020 are also sharp enough that I can see enough definition.

Edited May 30, 20251 yr by abrams_tank

3 hours ago, abrams_tank said:

Me too. The blurry clouds are a huge issue with XP 12 and also kills the immersion for me. MSFS 2024 needs to add more variety of clouds, and improve the cloud shapes for live weather, but I like that the clouds are sharp enough that I can see enough definition, and they are not blurry.  The clouds in MSFS 2020 are also sharp enough that I can see enough definition.

Slightly less blurry would be good in XP12, but over the past week I have really appreciated the varied cloud types and just how realistic they can be.  XP12 clouds with the sharpness of 2024 would be perfect ☺️

That haze though in the second screenshot over the desert... 😍 

I agree the resolution of the clouds looks pretty low close-up, but it as @ryanbatc said, they seem to be knocking it out of the park with each new beta update, trying to dial in these clouds.
In my case, I've just reverted to 2020, with Atmos and the decent clouds (as well as RealTurb for in-cloud turbulence). Flying through clouds isn't quite as satisfying in 2020 as it is in 2024, and the effect of wind gusts etc on the flight model isn't nearly as refined, but for me personally, those downsides are outweighed by the beauty of the sky colours and cloud detail/definition all the way out to the cloud draw limit in 2020.