Game Discussions Microsoft Flight Simulator
- Thread starter Jenner
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Camera pulls back from city skyline with KhhhAAAAAANNN! echoing in background
I don't mind
To be fair with your friend, he's probably right that X-Plane and P3D with Orbx addons are better, because, well, they are handcrafted addons. I'm confident that future handcrafted Orbx addons for FS will be better as well.
But as you imply, the fact that photogrammetry and AI allow FS in its most basic form to already come up with views like the one above, it's what makes it "next-gen" to me.
I'm also appreciating Blackshark's AI as well, I expected autogen to simply throw a bunch of bricks at any given place marked as "here be town", I was pleasantly surprised to find out instead it tries to give a resemblance of estimation to what's supposed to be on the ground. Of course it spectacularly misses on every building that isn't somewhat bricky in appearance, but it's still good enough that I can VFR above my city (Turin) with major towers, factories, buildings and streets easily recognizable, especially from a distance. Really the only things it misses are churches and monuments.
He's even more of a miserable sod than I am, so I'd take what he says with a pinch of salt.
However, here is my home town of Arbroath. It's not perfect, because all the historical buildings are either missing or converted into hotels / blocks of flats, but it's still recognisable to me. So much so, that I posted it in a FB group for Arbroath pics for a giggle, and it took quite some time for people to figure out it wasn't a legit drone photograph. I think considering it's all built using AI and satellite photos that counts as a win.
"I will leave you as you left me... buried alive in a photogrammetry hotel... buried alive..."
A friend of mine who is an ardent simmer is very disparaging of MFS - claims that X-Plane11 and Prepar3D with Orbx addons is "better", because apparently "you can't VFR using MFS because cathedrals are missing".
Personally, I think he's just upset that he's spent hundreds of £££ on add-ons for a superseded flight sim.
Hope you don't mind, but I've sent him this picture.
It is certainly true that MSFS is bereft of many VRPs - steeples, chimneys etc - so only those that are visible in satellite images are to hand - rail, road and river features for example.
So you can fly VFR - just "carefully".
P.S. I am still flying X-plane 11 for preference at the moment - I don't think one can say that it has been superseded yet, no doubt MSFS 2020 will take top spot eventually - how long depends on their updates, fine-tuning of features and addons.
P.P.S. - Can I have a smokie please?
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Also I think many will/may still prefer X-Plane for the flight model...now I'm far from being even remotely competent about it, I just take off, take in the views and (hopefully) land, and my real life experience with planes amounts to "I touched the wing of a parked Cessna at a fair, once", but for some reason there's something about the flight model here that somehow still doesn't feel "right" to me....also, no actual experience as I said, but I'm not sure that flying above just about any hill should be equal to crossing a minor hurricane of updraft winds 
.
(My last experience with X-Plane goes back to version 7, some time in the past between the fall of the Byzantine Empire and the rise of the Ottomans...but I still liked that more than FS flight model)
.(My last experience with X-Plane goes back to version 7, some time in the past between the fall of the Byzantine Empire and the rise of the Ottomans...but I still liked that more than FS flight model)
![[VR] optimal_909](https://forums-cdn.zaonce.net/data/avatars/m/109/109067.jpg?1553781733){kind=avatar}
Also I think many will/may still prefer X-Plane for the flight model...now I'm far from being even remotely competent about it, I just take off, take in the views and (hopefully) land, and my real life experience with planes amounts to "I touched the wing of a parked Cessna at a fair, once", but for some reason there's something about the flight model here that somehow still doesn't feel "right" to me....also, no actual experience as I said, but I'm not sure that flying above just about any hill should be equal to crossing a minor hurricane of updraft winds
(My last experience with X-Plane goes back to version 7, some time in the past between the fall of the Byzantine Empire and the rise of the Ottomans...but I still liked that more than FS flight model)
One of the 3rd party plane developer said that the modelling in MFS is leaps and bounds beyond existing platforms, once it matures it will be much better.
I think your comment a few pages back was spot on. MSFS2020 is, in practice, a kind of "open beta". The list of current bugs is huge, if you drop by the MSFS2020 forum you'll realize the actual extent of it. So people who compare the current MSFS2020 with X-Plane 11 purely as flight sims will get the impression that XP11 is still the better product. From a purely flight sim perspective, they're probably right for now, as in XP11 stuff just works as intended and everything just "feels" right, and it already had all the cockpit bells and whistles like full 3D interactive cockpits etc. It was a huge step forward from FSX and others.
But I think the potential of MSFS2020 is just enormous, and if MS starts fixing the many bugs and improving the game regularly, it will surely reign supreme, most likely for a very, very long time. And this is before we take scenery into account, because in that case, even though there are areas where the scenery in MSFS2020 is disappointing, there's just no possible way that XP11, even with a ton of addons, can compete with this. I already think that MSFS2020 is an instant classic, so when things are fixed and stable it will probably achieve legendary status.
In the end, I don't want to get into any kind of MSFS2020 vs XP11 fight. I loved X-Plane, it was a true pioneering game when released, fantastic for it's time, and most importantly it was a single beacon of light in a very long time of total darkness where the civilian flight sim genre was pretty much abandoned. IMO MSFS2020 will now take over the throne, XP11 will step back but that's just product lifecycle. Will likely never play XP11 again, but like other legendary titles in the past it may be gone, but never forgotten.
I'm just glad that finally the genre is picking up again with some truly amazing, fantastic titles. After X-Plane 11, IL-2 Sturmovik, Rise of Flight and DCS, now MSFS2020. What a time for virtual aviators to be alive!
Funny how my experience with Frontier has tainted my hopefulness when it comes to other developers. I want to believe Microsoft / Asobo will put in the time and effort to improve this game and fix all the bugs and finish cooking the half-baked stuff, but ED has all but snuffed out the once shining light of hope that used to burn bright in my heart
Please Microsoft / Asobo, don't be another Frontier!
Fun extra plane to fly for free - a not-really-accurate-but-fun F/A-18 fighter jet.
Read the description before downloading.
Read the description before downloading.
He's even more of a miserable sod than I am, so I'd take what he says with a pinch of salt.
However, here is my home town of Arbroath. It's not perfect, because all the historical buildings are either missing or converted into hotels / blocks of flats, but it's still recognisable to me. So much so, that I posted it in a FB group for Arbroath pics for a giggle, and it took quite some time for people to figure out it wasn't a legit drone photograph. I think considering it's all built using AI and satellite photos that counts as a win.
View attachment 186083
I had the same experience. I honestly feel many gamers would be way happier in general if they took a broader perspective. You show a picture of a computer game to the general public and many will legit believe it is an actual photo until someone asks them to take a closer look. That is a monumental accomplishment! But then you have gamers go:"Yeah, well, they added a new supermarket to my tiny backwards village two years ago and it isn't in game, Bing Maps are so terrible and stupid!".
Dude. I swear, if we actually build a colony on Mars in real life these are the kind of people who, upon leaving the spaceship and walking on an alien planet for the first time, complain that the Food Replicator only had four types of tomato soup available, the pillows weren't comfy enough and the artificial gravity module didn't create nice waves in the swimming pool.
Meanwhile I am flying from Grenada to Cuba via all the fun little carribean islands. I just finished a shift (I rarely work saturdays but today was an exception :/) so figured I might enjoy a glass of rhum and put on some local music. As I hop from island to island I browse wiki to read-up on the places I am visiting. One mentions a largely rhum-based economy, and I think:"hang on a minute, where is the rhum I am currently drinking made?". Turns out it is Habitation Saint-Etienne, Martinique. So of I go, and before you know it I am right next to the distillery while enjoying their work in real-life.
This is awesome!
Truth.
Bing Maps is only "terrible and stupid" because Google Maps exists, and they have more data. That's entirely down to investment. Even so, Bing is still pretty incredible by any metric that I grew up with. So now there is an added incentive and reason for Microsoft to do that investment & feed that into the flight sim. I don't know how widely used the Maps tool on Windows 10 is, but it wouldn't ever be my first thought when I want to find somewhere.
So I suspect it's getting used more than it ever has - although I worked on a vehicle tracking system a few years ago, and we used Bing Maps simply because the API access was cheaper so I dunno.
Meanwhile I am flying from Grenada to Cuba via all the fun little carribean islands. I just finished a shift (I rarely work saturdays but today was an exception :/) so figured I might enjoy a glass of rhum and put on some local music. As I hop from island to island I browse wiki to read-up on the places I am visiting. One mentions a largely rhum-based economy, and I think:"hang on a minute, where is the rhum I am currently drinking made?". Turns out it is Habitation Saint-Etienne, Martinique. So of I go, and before you know it I am right next to the distillery while enjoying their work in real-life.
This is awesome!
It is indeed. More of a gin lover myself (surprised?
). Nice setup though! Jenner
I wish I was English like my hero Tj.
No, I have to use the ribbon too. It's a 'gamey' sacrifice I'm all too willing to make. Lol.
Here is a good video I found on ILS and IFR. He's got a good sense of humor, too.
Well, you can check the layout on the maps and follow it, that's what serious simmers do.
Also in relation it was said that it was infuriating to see people reporting planes flying "unrealistically" when they were exactly spot on - possibly because they expect them to fly like in XP11, because that's so real.