TechRaptor interview of Jorg Neumann re the future of MSFS

[jrw4 626]

https://techraptor.net/gaming/features/microsoft-flight-simulator-2024-interview
 

For what it’s worth I wasn’t able to find this posted here. Hopeful words about Microsoft’s extended commitment to the franchise…..

[Abriael 952]

I see someone found my latest interview. Hope ya'll find it interesting.

[Krakin 5,841]

5 hours ago, Abriael said:

Hope ya'll find it interesting.

Well it's off to a flying start with you bringing up what the head of P3D said lol! I love how Jorg rolled his eyes and shook his head at those comments like, "Yeah, what on earth was that guy talking about???"

 

Just wrapped it up and it was a great interview with some good questions that even threw Jorg for a loop (like the one about live fires) @Abriael The next time you get a chance to interview him or Seb, please really grill them on the improvements they are going to bring with 2024's new flight model.

Edited September 20, 2023 by Krakin

[Dominique_K 10,152]

Speaking of rolling eyes, reading this makes me shake my head 😁 (more in despair than in disbelief, mind you) .

Many have requested historical weather, but the data libraries that exist are different and are never worldwide.

history+ | Weather History & Archive - meteoblue says the contrary or so it seems

The developers are looking into it because they at least want to recreate specific events related to the Local Legends. 

Priority A1 :  the fluffy fluff

I mentioned to Neumann that many would at least like to be able to offset dynamic weather by twelve hours to be able to fly specifically during the day or night regardless of their location and the current time of the day. He responded that it's good feedback and he'll bring it to the development team. 

A "good feedback "as it was new ! The FS community has said it over and over again for the last three years, explaining what we meant by historical weather, not flying with the 1947 Honolulu weather but with a weather set  anywhere to the time of the day. Flying at noon with the noon weather.  Another illustration that the forums report team doesn't do the job or,, rather, that Neumann and/or  Asobo don't listen to whatever we say. because they don't care or can't with their engine.  

Edited September 20, 2023 by Dominique_K

[martinboehme 522]

28 minutes ago, Dominique_K said:

Many have requested historical weather, but the data libraries that exist are different and are never worldwide.

history+ | Weather History & Archive - meteoblue says the contrary or so it seems

Interesting -- hadn't seen that yet!

28 minutes ago, Dominique_K said:

A "good feedback "as it was new ! The FS community has said it over and over again for the last three years, explaining what we meant by historical weather, not flying with the 1947 Honolulu weather but with a weather set  anywhere to the time of the day.

I found this part of the interview very revealing. It seems to me that Jörg has heard of the request for historical weather but truly believed it meant weather from 1947 (for example) and, from his statement quoted above, wasn't aware that meteoblue even has data going back 80 years.

As you say, it's disappointing that this information still hasn't gotten through despite the efforts of the community, but maybe he's now finally understood that what people are asking for is really just weather going back 24 hours... which should be significantly more feasible than, say, recreating the weather conditions of Lindbergh's transatlantic flight (which is maybe what he understood). Not holding my breath... but we'll see.

[micstatic 4,340]

Hopefully we can get more information in the future about the changes/upgrades that are planned for the free flight as it was called in the article.  As of now the big focus seems to be on the missions.  Yeah I'm interested to try them.  But I'm really looking how my A-Z flight simulator experience will improve.

[pmb 5,138]

1 hour ago, Dominique_K said:

The FS community has said it over and over again for the last three years, explaining what we meant by historical weather

In any case, a very good move the interviewer pointed to the 24-hour-back weather period!

Kind regards, Michael 

[Krakin 5,841]

One career mode I hope they add is police helicopter surveillance. Not only would it be a ton of fun, but its implementation would force urban areas and traffic to look a function a lot better than it does now.

[Dominique_K 10,152]

3 hours ago, pmb said:

In any case, a very good move the interviewer pointed to the 24-hour-back weather period!

Kind regards, Michael 

Indeed, what is needed is some hammerotherapy.

[RALF9636 1,998]

8 hours ago, Dominique_K said:

Speaking of rolling eyes, reading this makes me shake my head 😁 (more in despair than in disbelief, mind you) .

Many have requested historical weather, but the data libraries that exist are different and are never worldwide.

history+ | Weather History & Archive - meteoblue says the contrary or so it seems

The developers are looking into it because they at least want to recreate specific events related to the Local Legends. 

Priority A1 :  the fluffy fluff

I mentioned to Neumann that many would at least like to be able to offset dynamic weather by twelve hours to be able to fly specifically during the day or night regardless of their location and the current time of the day. He responded that it's good feedback and he'll bring it to the development team. 

A "good feedback "as it was new ! The FS community has said it over and over again for the last three years, explaining what we meant by historical weather, not flying with the 1947 Honolulu weather but with a weather set  anywhere to the time of the day. Flying at noon with the noon weather.  Another illustration that the forums report team doesn't do the job or,, rather, that Neumann and/or  Asobo don't listen to whatever we say. because they don't care or can't with their engine.  

These were exactly my thoughts. "Good feedback. I'll bring it to the development team" Seriously? After three years of discussions and wishlist items? Where has he been?

 

7 hours ago, martinboehme said:

I found this part of the interview very revealing. It seems to me that Jörg has heard of the request for historical weather but truly believed it meant weather from 1947 (for example) and, from his statement quoted above, wasn't aware that meteoblue even has data going back 80 years.

As you say, it's disappointing that this information still hasn't gotten through despite the efforts of the community, but maybe he's now finally understood that what people are asking for is really just weather going back 24 hours... which should be significantly more feasible than, say, recreating the weather conditions of Lindbergh's transatlantic flight (which is maybe what he understood). Not holding my breath... but we'll see.

Maybe this is a semantic issue?

Being a non-native speaker I had to look up "historic" and "historical" myself. Both terms have been used equivalent in the discussions in the recent three years. But they have different meanings. The weather of Charles Lindbergh's flight in 1927 or the weather from D-day in 1944 would be "historic", also maybe a "historic" hurricane; whereas the weather from yesterday noon or from a day in July 2021 would be "historical".

And "historical" weather is what we want. Maybe he misunderstood and thought we want "historic" weather?

Only then his remarks regarding insufficient data would make sense.

Regarding the weather from yesterday or last year data shouldn't be a problem at all. Even if Meteoblue don't store all the data needed for MSFS, MS/Asobo could have done so themselves for three years now. Obviously they use the data "on the fly" to inject it into the sim. What should be the issue with storing the data? If the shear amount of data should be a problem (I don't think it is - compared to the 3D model of the world they are streaming all the time), then a snapshot every three hours should be enough for interpolation - it doesn't need to be perfectly accurate, plausible weather for the time of day and day of year would be enough.

 

Edited September 20, 2023 by RALF9636

[orchestra_nl 957]

25 minutes ago, RALF9636 said:

Regarding the weather from yesterday or last year data shouldn't be a problem at all. Even if Meteoblue don't store all the data needed for MSFS, MS/Asobo could have done so themselves for three years now.
[...]

it doesn't need to be perfectly accurate, plausible weather for the time of day and day of year would be enough.

I totally agree with that. Having no source is ridiculous, they could have stored the weather already unless they are prohibited to do so by their current contract with Meteoblue.
Just 24 hours of historical weather would make lots of people happy, not only for those who have to work during daytime but also for "realtimers" who need to pause the sim once in a while.

And 365 days of historical weather would be a great companion to the seasons we will have in MSFS!

[urthgental 181]

To be fair, even here there were/are different needs on the weather topic. Many requested to fly weather conditions from the past and not just real time weather that changes with the time of the day.

The live fire topic was interesting. It seems the want to generate dynamic activity/missions that fit to a geographical situation. I hope the implement something that feels ‚live‘ true world operations and rewarding. It could be interesting for many, even for those who are not missing something like this today…

[STK 107]

Lots of options for interesting Japanese aircraft as the upcoming LL, as they stated it's to recognize the Tokyo show. I'm assuming it's an A6M Zero produced by Aeroplane Heaven, which would be very unfortunate both from an originality perspective and quality perspective, but nonetheless a big sell. (Also unfortunate would be yet another flying boat of which there were some semi-famous ones made in Japan). Looking forward to the announcement of whatever it is within the next 16 hours or so. 

Hoping for an inibuilds-quality or higher NAMC YS-11, but we'll see

Edited September 20, 2023 by STK

[Mike777 163]

In past versions of Flight Simulator there have been addons such as Active Sky that performed very well for past weather.  I gather that the MSFS folks are not open to such addons.  Does anyone know why?

[Tuskin38 6,635]

Firefighting activities in 2024 will include real-time fires, but Microsoft is working on a system that offsets it so that people who live on the other side of the world can still do it during the daytime.

Interesting...