Active Sky coming to MSFS

[Franz007 559]

1 hour ago, Fiorentoni said:

 Yes, however - in the best of all cases - you don‘t notice that. I mean you wouldn‘t know or care what weather is beyond your line of sight, until you are actually in visible range to it. If AS can create those distance weather fronts at the right moment, it would be perfect.

I very much doubt it will be like that. You will see for example clear skies all around and then by approaching an airport (that was looking like clear sky from further away) it will then be covered by clouds. And looking back where you just flew through clear skies will also be cloudy (as example) because the actual closest weather will be applied everywhere around you. That’s a huge immersion-killer since you won’t see any fronts anymore (if it’s the way I am understanding it). No local weather anymore, only global. A big step back.

[VHOJT 181]

There does seem to be a bit of an over-emphasis on approaching fronts, as if it is perfect weather one side, and then terrible on the other.  It's not always that cut and dry.

The good thing is if you value this feature of MSFS, you can still use ASFS to give you better air/turbulence/thunderstorm effects that default MSFS simply does not have, or implements poorly.

Edited April 16 by VHOJT

[MarcG 3,031]

11 minutes ago, VHOJT said:

The other evening - WMKP Penang had a thunderstorm on top of it according to the METAR.  Default MSFS weather - nothing - just some fluffy fair-weather cumulus cotton balls as far as the eye could see.  A pleasant, mostly sunny afternoon.  Nothing at all like the actual conditions reported there.  ASFS, however, correctly depicted the thunderstorm and crappy weather around the airport.  Even the MSFS METAR said TS but it was not presenting anything even remotely like it. Just a nice afternoon.

This is something Asobo ruined with SU7 and here we still are today, having to rely on METAR reports that turn off to be nothing like what we see in Live Weather.

I don't think they want to accept they made a mistake when they bowed to the vatsim vote harvesting for METAR to be included, that in itself is the main reason we are where we are today having to rely on a 3rd party apps to yet again fix what Asobo broke. It's a sad state of affairs but they seem oblivious to Live Weather issues, Seb seems confused when the same questions get asked in Q&As, but there's a reason they're continually getting asked.

[DModjo 122]

32 minutes ago, Franz007 said:

I very much doubt it will be like that. You will see for example clear skies all around and then by approaching an airport (that was looking like clear sky from further away) it will then be covered by clouds. And looking back where you just flew through clear skies will also be cloudy (as example) because the actual closest weather will be applied everywhere around you. That’s a huge immersion-killer since you won’t see any fronts anymore (if it’s the way I am understanding it). No local weather anymore, only global. A big step back.

Surely it would be a pretty hard sell if it was that bad? 

[RALF9636 1,998]

5 hours ago, tup61 said:

So... AS will give you ONE type of weather applied all over the world and then transition into another type of weather along the way (if needed)?

 

4 hours ago, Fiorentoni said:

 Yes, however - in the best of all cases - you don‘t notice that. I mean you wouldn‘t know or care what weather is beyond your line of sight, until you are actually in visible range to it. If AS can create those distance weather fronts at the right moment, it would be perfect.

 

4 hours ago, fsiscool said:

This is what only default live weather can do but no other weather tool: show the correct weather along a weather front!

 

 You can read about what it does here: https://hifisimtech.com/asfs/

I try to give a TLDR:

ASFS can be used in two different modes.

1. In "Passive Mode" you get the default MSFS live weather with all its features like regional weather with fronts (but also with all clouds being cumulus and weather sometimes not accurate according to the METAR). The default live weather is enhanced with atmospheric effects like microbursts and improved thunderstorm effects. Also you can use all the planning tools of ASFS like the weather lookup, map or briefing.

2. In "Active Sky Preset Control" you can also use all the planning tools and it is ASFS that injects the weather - accurately according to the METARs. So you have for example the cloud variability (including stratus and cirrus), humidity and visibility effects, snow coverage and thunderstorm depiction by ASFS which at least can subjectively be considered preferable to the MSFS default live weather and its shortcomings.

Also in this mode you are not limited to live weather but you can also get the weather of a date and time in the past (=historical weather), optionally automatically synced to the date and time you have set in the sim; so other than with the default live weather your weather will always be appropriate for the date and time you are flying in the sim.

This mode is based on presets (due to the limitations imposed by MS/Asobo) so the weather is set globally, i.e. you don't get weather fronts. But it is not like you are flying in clear skies to the horizon and then all of a sudden you are in overcast to the horizon. ASFS takes into consideration the weather of neighboring stations and - if you loaded a flightplan - your whole route to produce smart and smooth transitions all the time to maintain an immersive experience. 

 

Edited April 16 by RALF9636

[Franz007 559]

1 hour ago, DModjo said:

Surely it would be a pretty hard sell if it was that bad? 

Not necessarely. Because it also has some advantages like perfect depicted metars, history-weather etc.

[DD_Arthur 1,091]

1 hour ago, DModjo said:

Surely it would be a pretty hard sell if it was that bad? 

I rather think without direct access to a weather api it’s going to be a pretty hard sell anyway.

Rex and Enviro have been out for a while now and this doesn’t really look like it’ll be doing anything fundamentally different just….better?

It will no doubt sell to many of those people who used it in FSX/P3D but for the great many who already enjoy live weather?

No sales on Xbox either?

Hmm…

[F737MAX 5,738]

12 minutes ago, RALF9636 said:

I try to give a TLDR

Appreciate you and other beta testers describing your experiences. It sounds like ASFS appears to work better than current weather add-ons and some of the commentary on here would suggest.

However, only a more detailed video demonstrating the program's ability to interpret and display weather in MSFS is going to convince many people to dip into their wallets.

This type of real world view has been seen in MSFS, so there is real reticence to give it up while paying to do so...

[Cognita 1,113]

29 minutes ago, RALF9636 said:

I try to give a TLDR:

ASFS can be used in two different modes

This is a helpful and clear summary. I think the approach of having the two modes was thoughtful. I have no interest in the preset mode at all: l never once have flown or had a desire to fly in the past and  I do not mind the current cloud depiction (yes, it was and could be better, but it is what it is and I am ok with it, I am not interested in the trade off of mono weather that a preset delivers.) But the enhancements in the passive mode to turbulence and thunderstorm effects have some value to me -- although, honestly, all of us who flew pre SU7/5 know that the simulator can do these well so I am hoping 2024 brings these features back. 

 

14 minutes ago, DD_Arthur said:

It will no doubt sell to many of those people who used it in FSX/P3D but for the great many who already enjoy live weather?

I agree that this may be a bit of a hard sell outside of the small number of people who remember Active Sky from P3D and if it will not work on x-box that further reduces the audience -- even someone like me who plans to eventually migrate to an x-box when we downsize. 

Edited April 16 by Cognita

[sdirand 247]

20 minutes ago, DD_Arthur said:

I rather think without direct access to a weather api it’s going to be a pretty hard sell anyway.

Rex and Enviro have been out for a while now and this doesn’t really look like it’ll be doing anything fundamentally different just….better?

It will no doubt sell to many of those people who used it in FSX/P3D but for the great many who already enjoy live weather?

No sales on Xbox either?

Hmm…

The name only, Active Sky, will generate lots of sales because people will automatically think they will get the AS they knew in the past in FSX/P3D. Now, it remains to be seen if it is going to be the same AS we knew.

And anyway, HiFi have no choice. If they get stuck in P3D or XP, they are going to die soon or later. XP is going better but is still a niche simulator. and new users on P3d must be really rare while all the simmers that still use P3D already have AS for a long time. So Hifi has to come with something on msfs. Let's just hope we won't be disapointed.

Edited April 16 by sdirand

[Cognita 1,113]

7 minutes ago, F737MAX said:

This type of real world view has been seen in MSFS, so there is real reticence to give it up while paying to do so...

I think the price-point is going to be critical for this product. This is not P3D where prices for addons were generally higher but, more importantly, this is not P3D that has no weather, only presents. In those dark days of simulation the only way to get live weather was through a weather engine, period. So, Active Sky or its REX competitor Sky Force was pretty much a necessity. That is just not the case now. A low price point may help.

[kiek 1,235]

Finally we can have historical weather together with PSXT and RealTraffic in time shift mode!

[Franz007 559]

4 hours ago, MarcG said:

I don't think they want to accept they made a mistake when they bowed to the vatsim vote harvesting for METAR to be included,

I don‘t think we can call that an error because integrating metars was the only way of having more or less acurate local weather, that was often completely inacurate (in every aspect) before.Forecast general weather and local metars are both important and is by the way also how AS worked. Blending both sources together is is a big challenge and will never be perfect. But I don‘t really see any other solution when talking about „real weather“. Otherwise it would just be „fantasy weather“ that looks nice.

[vgbaron 3,715]

4 hours ago, Franz007 said:

I very much doubt it will be like that. You will see for example clear skies all around and then by approaching an airport (that was looking like clear sky from further away) it will then be covered by clouds. And looking back where you just flew through clear skies will also be cloudy (as example) because the actual closest weather will be applied everywhere around you. That’s a huge immersion-killer since you won’t see any fronts anymore (if it’s the way I am understanding it). No local weather anymore, only global. A big step back.

And, exactly how many flights have you flown with ASFS to make this determination as to what will be seen? You have a good point, too bad it's not true.  In the flights I have taken (easily 100+) I have not seen this. ASFS behaves as I would expect when flying from clear weather into a front.

[Maxis 1,886]

As someone posted earlier ...a video demonstrating the transition in preset mode would be probably best. I know what my personal preferences are so there is no point in pointing them out any further. looking forward to some actual demonstrations of the program at work