Tom_L

I went for a more general question, although I put in one for better CB depiction as well: "Large threads on the forums discuss Live Weather issues for years. Would you finally consider to acknowledge the discussion and elaborate on your goals and probable obstacles?"

I assume that - both here and on the official forum - there are dedicated simmers who want the best possible simulator. Naturally, matters of style are always open to debate. However, the argument often leans toward the idea that we should simply be grateful for progress in other areas whenever criticism is raised regarding MS's communication on the stagnation of live weather features. That is certainly the case in this thread as well. I have enjoyed MSFS - and the series in general, ever since FS4 - and I still do. Yet, I also notice that MS has always pursued its own agenda. Community involvement is frequently cited when it aligns with their own goals, whereas - as in the case of the weather - legitimate criticism and passionate discussions are ignored for years. Any improvements adopted from the community stem from the input of a tiny fraction of the user base; therefore, arguments dismissing criticism because it supposedly represents a minority view are misleading. I would hope that - setting aside matters of style - threads like this one would lead to a greater push for improvements, rather than repeatedly being shut down in the manner described.

How should that happen, if the argument is that there is room for improvement, but out of "respect for ASOBO" one shouldn't insist, and everything else is much better than it used to be anyway?

The entire system—including the wishlist—has really become a farce by now. For starters, participation in their forum is nowhere near what it was in the early days; consequently, many topics garner fewer votes. But even when Msobo deems action justified—which, in my view, often boils down to whether they simply want to do it or not—the outcome doesn't always align with the intent of the thread, where many valid points had been gathered during the discussion. Take the weather radar as an example: according to the last "Feedback Snapshot" I could find (the weekly updates are, well... let's just say...), it was listed as "Partially Done" as of April 2026. With the recently introduced tilt feature, they would likely consider it "Done." The result is—well... Then there is the "Dangerous Weather" mentioned in the interview, listed as "In Progress: SU05 + SU06" - a clear indication that they aren't actually familiar with the content of the corresponding thread.

This text accompanied the image: We know what you’re thinking. Nope. And nope.

I had a similar incident, and from what I gathered from the Windows EVENT VIEWER some update might have happend while flying, and it seemed to be related to some AMD core components. I have since disabled automatic installation in the AMD Install Manager. No further incident since, but that may be coincidence. But seeing you having an AMD Motherboard, it may be worth checking.

Here's a Discord channel : https://discord.gg/dAucySpqy . Quality differs, Fenix packs for Lufthansa and Eurowings were recorded by a real purser, while others contain original recordings of differing quality. EZY for the Fenix is decent imho, EJU is a bit weaker. Give it a try.

IIrc, I copied my airbus profile and then simply used the calibration page of their EFB.

The maddening aspect is that they work with third parties in every aspect of the sim - except for Live Weather. Unfortunately they missed hiring said someone (who went by "Biology2394" in the Forums), who is now working magic on XPlane's atmosphere and weather depiction as far as I am aware, which is imho - although flawed in many instances too - far superior to the oftentimes comic-style and cumulus ridden MSFS Live Weather (and yes, i have stunning expierences as well, but all in all it lacks far more than it delivers). And there is development, whereas larger efforts beyond the occasional tweaking here and there are missing in MSFS entirely since SU7(2020). There are evidently circumstances that do not even allow the topic to be addressed openly. It is sad that a modern flight simulator settles for such a mediocre implementation, especially after such a promising start. The primary argument against opening up the weather engine for third party developers was that it constituted a core component of the product. I was going along with that decision, because there was so much potential. Yet, this core component has seen no further development for five years now, whereas all other areas have. That argument has therefore lost all validity. But the truth is also that many weather related threads in the Forums didn't gain much traction, like a Wishlist-thread asking for a dedicated Atmosphere and Weather related SimUpdate back in 2020 days. So it’s fair to assume that most gamers are satisfied with what they get. They are not to blame, because most don't even know what they are missing. For me, as a PPL holder, a whole dimension of flying - the go/no-go decision or any serious planning for adverse weather, dodging storms.... - is missing, and the way I feel is that it is not what was promised before the release of 2020.

The video was prepared though, so there has been some preparation going into answering that particular question. Therefore, I believe that your accusation that I am disingineous stems from an unrealistic assessment.

Since SU7 they are evasive of any question regarding Live Weather, the standard answer being "we'll have to talk to Meteoblue", so I was curious how they would circumvent the issue this time, as one question (0:35:10) was: "With night lighting being adressed by the team in SU4 beta, are there any improvements we can expect in terms of the atmosphere and clouds next?" Seb then asks to play a video showcasing the improvements they made for the night lighting. I guess it's their way to make clear that weather, clouds and atmosphere remain a sideshow in their flight simulator.

This thread—which actually started with the weather radar and now revolves around the visual aspects of weather rendering, which can be highly subjective and certainly depends on the specific situation (such as a spectacular sunset)— misses the point once again. The standard aircraft were mediocre at best initially, and MS responded by bringing in third-party developers. The avionics were mediocre, and MS responded by bringing in the Working Title team. The autogen scenery was basically okay, yet MS is striving for improvements with the move away from Blackshark. The scenery received a significant boost with the improved 3D terrain features. The walk-around feature as an introduction to first-person view suggests further development plans. I could list many more examples, but the text is getting already too long... What about Live Weather? It was a key feature at the launch of MSFS 2020, and Jorg Neumann couldn't promise enough fantastic developments in this area. That changed radically with SU7. No more visions in this direction, just tweaks. Yes, it looks spectacular at times, but it still carries many known shortcomings, not least the unfulfilled promise of being able to render all types of clouds. A thread like this would be an opportunity to address an imbalance in development effort, but instead, mediocrity is being celebrated. TL;DR: A first step in the right direction would be to acknowledge that weather and atmosphere should be a core focus in a flight simulator, and that this has no longer been the case in MSFS since SU7. Everything else would probably follow from that.

I think it says more about the community. Although the weather representation has been tweaked for years (some say there is development—but that's wishful thinking), there is still a lack of credible implementation of cloud formations in different atmospheric conditions. This may even be advantageous, as some flights would otherwise have to be canceled due to the lack of a convincing weather radar - but let's not open that can of worms. But that can't be the standard for a modern flight simulator, in which many areas (aircraft, avionics, scenery) see active development while the atmosphere will have to make do with tweaks to an apparently inadequate engine from the early days. And yet, weather related Bug reports or Wishlist threads seldom reach more than 250 votes. And I cannot but notice that many discussions about deficiencies in weather simulation are often stifled early on with mere subjective impressions ("looks good enough for me") instead of supporting efforts to improve the sim. The reasons for this behavior are a mystery to me, but it is striking that there is also resistance from the user base to improvements in weather and atmosphere simulation.

It is quite obvious what happened here: you are absolutely right, at some point they really improved the night lighting in MSFS 2020 reacting to a HUGE and longstanding thread in their forums and a catastrophic first attempt to calm the community which made the sim look more like TRON at night. That must have been the time when they decided to fork the code in order to develop MSFS 2024, and that's why the "new" one has so many flaws that have been ironed out in the "old" one. The sepia mask is another hint, as it was dialled down at some point in MSFS 2020. They are aware of the sepia issue as it played a major role in the above mentioned HUGE thread for MSFS 2020 already, and Seb has hinted at a solution in a recent Q&A. But why they weren't able to implement all the updates for MSFS2020 in the forked code in the first place will remain their secret.

And there are some misaligned textures at parking positions as well. I reported it via their own Zendesk reporting tool - if I remember correctly - and got a fairly quick response with an acknowledgement. Fixes never materialized though. Thankfully their gorgeous LIRQ doesn't have such massive issues. Their customer support is a shame, and although I love their work I probably would only purchase another Gaya product after I have seen a thorough review that proves there are no major issues. In general, I think it is not so much an issue of the communication method but the willingness of developers to invest time and money into an already paid product. My impression is also that the expectations of us customers play a major role. No manufacturer of aircraft add-ons can afford to ignore customers in the long run, regardless of the price tag. Scenery developers, on the other hand, generally seem unwilling to release more than one service package – if at all. I don't even want to start talking about adjustments to the current development status, which is very annoying for airports where construction is essentially constant. And they seem to be getting away with it, perhaps because the development time for a scenery is shorter than that for an aircraft, and they can therefore generate fresh cash more quickly and are therefore less dependant on customeer satisfaction.