Game Discussions Microsoft Flight Simulator

I'd have to fly there first (my personal realism setting - I don't visit a place unless I actually fly there from my last location), and I'm not quite ready for a trans-Atlantic trip just yet.

I'm in the same mindset, but i'm not sure i'll stick with it... there's just so many cool places to see that I may not make it there otherwise. My main issue is, GA only.
 
I'd like to know how M$ can justify not having any CH Products peripherals in their FAQ list of supported ones. I mean, seriously, the CH Pro Yoke(s) are the most used (biggest selling) by flight sim enthusiasts but not even a mention of any of them:


Fair enough, I map them to my liking but that isn't the point, they surely should have default bindings. crazy

Talking of crazy, does anyone else feel that the lack of churches, tv/radio masts, chimneys etc very off-putting for VOR flying? (Doesn't Bing maps tag churches for example?)
 
Spent the past couple hours just exploring the procedural cloudscapes. Laying with a controller, losing myself, maybe the most relaxing two hours I've spent in a long time. Flying into a sunset that never seems to end. I've always enjoyed exploring procedural worlds. Flying amongst the clouds has been the most enjoyable it's ever been.

Yeah the weather in MFS is astonishing. It adds so much variety and challenge to flying now, no other sim EVER has nailed weather like this one has.

MFS is now one of my favorite exploration games, right alongside Minecraft! How crazy is that!!!!! :D
 
This sounds great to be honest, like "no fast travel" huh. Good luck!
For me this makes the game much more fun, since I love the "planning the trip" part of flying as much as flying. If I were just to teleport to all the "seven wonders of the world" for the purpose of sightseeing only, I'd probably grow bored relatively quickly. With my way there is real challenge. I'm also restricting myself to live weather and time of day.

That said, I'm roleplaying a rich guy who owns a private jet along with my Cessna, along with enough money to rent any of the other smaller planes once I arrive at my destination. And I could even see booking passage on one of the big jets, allowing the AI pilot to fly me to my destination while I ride back in first class. I'm definitely not flying a slow Cub across the world, LOL.

Oh, and because I'll be flying everywhere, I think I'm going to need a bigger cache ;)
 
Sorry for spamming pictures but just looked outside my window and spotted some beautiful low level clouds:

kF8FgHf.png
 
I'd have to fly there first (my personal realism setting - I don't visit a place unless I actually fly there from my last location), and I'm not quite ready for a trans-Atlantic trip just yet.

I fly this way too but I use FSE (Flight Sim Economy) to enforce the method! Where I land my plane is where I take off from the next time. It takes fuel to fly from place to place so I sometimes fly jobs to cover my fuel costs, repairs when the plane breaks down, maintenance costs, etc.

I've played flight sims like this for 12 years now and it's fantastic. I have to wonder if Microsoft will implement a "career mode" down the line? They've hinted at it a few times, a Euro Truck in the skies would be awesome.
 
Beautiful shots. The weather in this is insane isn't it. I don't know how they managed - adding even AI traffic for me results in some serious performance issues, but not even live weather affects performance for me even by a single frame. Try that in FSX and it turned into a slideshow.

It's probably not fair to compare them as I think FSX is not built for modern multicore CPUs, but still, I was never able to run a flightsim at a solid 60fps while looking this good. And while I came across various visual glitches, given the scope of it all I can totally forgive those.

The best views came after, I saw some interesting mushroom esq cloud pillars so I did a couple big loops to check them out and as I lost the sun and it started to slip over the horizion the entire cloud world I was absorbed in went gold red and pink at the same time. My jaw hit the floor, and I think i had a pseudo religious experience. I have a little shot I popped off but its missing the majestic pink and red cloud banks I was in and surrounded by at one point. I was between layers that were cojoined with columns. Never seen such wonderful vistas in a video game.

LANq9tz.jpg



Sorry for pic quality, was laying with controller so had to use the phone for shots. I wish I could have captured some of those things I saw.

Playing this in smooth ultra 4k / vr is my new dream.

I also have to add, I turned up cloud quality to ultra expecting my computer to go nuclear but it didn't seem to change much. The one setting I reduced from high was some resolution setting from 100 to 90 to get some head room. I get some chop when I first taxi down the runway, when sky scrappers first come into view and that's about it. I am amazed at my computers performance on high (Granted I am at 1080p). I thought it would be low city. That resolution setting made a big difference.

Also Obi there is a setting to turn ai and player planes into generic models. I turned these on maybe it will help?
 
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I just visited another small city I'm familiar with (too small to for photogrammetry, but a city nonetheless) and I was disappointed. It's weird how the autogen nails some towns and cities and totally misses other ones. I wonder if the autogen is done on the server side or client side? I'm talking about the algorithm that does, "Put a shopping mall in this space and put a housing complex in that space and put a tree in the middle of this road."

I also don't understand how water going up hill is even a thing - surely the algorithm that generates water should apply Pascal's laws. "Water seeks its own level", except in flight simulator of course.

I kinda wish I could fast-forward time about a year, when I think all these things will be fixed either in the algorithm or by scenery & content creators like myself.
 
What I was saying (should be more precise) most of the aircrafts doesnt give me (pilot that sits in his comfy room) decent feedback on whats going on. For example when I`m trying to stress the Cessna Jet it just smoothly goes in to "you crashed" screen, no pit shaking, no noise - something that DCS plane devs really master to give you feedback on whats going on with the airframe.
I hope there will be support for tactile transducers if not already. I have one in my gaming chair for iRacing. It would be great to feel the turbulence etc through the seat.
 
I've played flight sims like this for 12 years now and it's fantastic. I have to wonder if Microsoft will implement a "career mode" down the line? They've hinted at it a few times, a Euro Truck in the skies would be awesome.
I 100% agree. Completing cargo deliveries ETS2 can be so addictive and same would happen here. I remember once my wife asked me to come and watch TV with her and I just mumbled ”have to deliver the fruits from Milan to Helsinki first”. I saw her just rolling her eyes before I closed the door to my man cave.
 
For me this makes the game much more fun, since I love the "planning the trip" part of flying as much as flying. If I were just to teleport to all the "seven wonders of the world" for the purpose of sightseeing only, I'd probably grow bored relatively quickly. With my way there is real challenge. I'm also restricting myself to live weather and time of day.

That said, I'm roleplaying a rich guy who owns a private jet along with my Cessna, along with enough money to rent any of the other smaller planes once I arrive at my destination. And I could even see booking passage on one of the big jets, allowing the AI pilot to fly me to my destination while I ride back in first class. I'm definitely not flying a slow Cub across the world, LOL.

Oh, and because I'll be flying everywhere, I think I'm going to need a bigger cache ;)

That sounds like a wonderful way to experience the game. I am trying to keep it to my local area also and not skip anywhere but by the time I play its usually night. I was doing some passenger flying while experimenting with the controls and menus and not having to worry about pulling an Icarus and that's a great idea rping a passenger element. I find myself leaving the game on in the background to just glance at some vista and hear the hum of props or the Texitron Cessna's jets.

I did skip to the west coast to a huge cloud formation I saw on the world map to see some clouds, the past four days here have been cloudless where I live so didn't see any at all. It didn't disappoint especially catching them at sunset.
 

Deleted member 182079

D
The best views came after, I saw some interesting mushroom esq cloud pillars so I did a couple big loops to check them out and as I lost the sun and it started to slip over the horizion the entire cloud world I was absorbed in went gold red and pink at the same time. My jaw hit the floor, and I think i had a pseudo religious experience. I have a little shot I popped off but its missing the majestic pink and red cloud banks I was in and surrounded by at one point. I was between layers that were cojoined with columns. Never seen such wonderful vistas in a video game.

LANq9tz.jpg



Sorry for pic quality, was laying with controller so had to use the phone for shots. I wish I could have captured some of those things I saw.

Playing this in smooth ultra 4k / vr is my new dream.

I also have to add, I turned up cloud quality to ultra expecting my computer to go nuclear but it didn't seem to change much. The one setting I reduced from high was some resolution setting from 100 to 90 to get some head room. I get some chop when I first taxi down the runway, when sky scrappers first come into view and that's about it. I am amazed at my computers performance on high (Granted I am at 1080p). I thought it would be low city. That resolution setting made a big difference.

Also Obi there is a setting to turn ai and player planes into generic models. I turned these on maybe it will help?
Thanks for the AI tip, I'll try that - while I can technically live without any other traffic it does make the game feel a bit more lively. And it's not like I can see the models in detail anyways given I'm usually too far away most of the time.

I was considering the resolution scaling setting and I might just reduce it a little bit to see how it goes - to be honest though I run the game at High default settings and I get 60fps anywhere except for busy, built up areas that usually features a detailed airport, where it drops to 40-50, still stellar by sim levels (with FSX, running it at a stable 20+fps used to be a fist pumping moment in the past, and it still looked pretty fugly even by past standards).

As for the weather, I was well impressed when I checked out Donegal (one of the handcrafted airports, nice and detailed scenery in the vicinity as well) with live weather, and having lived in Ireland for many years it looked exactly what it'd be like on a regular day. Various layers of different shades of grey, with the sun sometimes breaking through at the horizon. Well impressed.

And during that aforementioned trip towards Area 51 I came across some light turbulence when traversing over a mountain ridge - the way the camera moves really makes it feel like you're flying a plane through the air. Love it.
 
Anyone else seeing this weird effect (red lines added for emphasis)?

Fuzzy Trees.jpg


It's this weird zone of "fuzzy", and it always seems to be around in this area. I was at 6000 ft ASL and had been flying for 30-40 minutes when I noticed it. It might happen at other times and altitudes. There is a "pop-in, pop-out" effect that can be seen with this as well. It's not map related. I think it might have to do with how autogen fills in trees. Next time I'm flying, I'll try some different altitudes to see what effect it has.

ps - ELEPHANT BUTT TREES! :p
 
I have no idea what tech they used to make those clouds but I have never seen such a natural soft cloud formations in any game/sim. Even when in contact with scenery they look like fog, no hard cut like line or anything.
To be honest I want to register on every DCS/Xplane/Prepar3d forum and yell - LOOK AT DAT CLOUDS!
Also, even huge cloud layers has minimal FPS effect, like... how? Oh well, back to flying but I`m feeling like a little kid in a brand new sandbox.
 
If you are wanting some free liveries the rabbit has done a yootoob of them:




Link to the livery pack is on that page but for completeness here it is direct:


(repaints for A320neo & Cessna208b)

The bonus "Aviator Club" official free livery pack seems now to have been delayed until the MSFS update due on the 27th.
 

Deleted member 182079

D
Got to say, I'm really digging the Diamond DA62 - very pleasant to fly, sleek looks, pleasant interior, and since I watched that 30 minute Youtube tutorial on the G1000 (yes, I sat through the whole thing... am I crazy?) all - well, most of those buttons and screens don't seem too intimidating anymore. Always been a fan of the Beechcraft 58 (twin props ftw) in FSX but this is my new favourite ... still need to try many of the rest though.

Did you guys start to develop any favourites already?
 
I have no idea what tech they used to make those clouds but I have never seen such a natural soft cloud formations in any game/sim. Even when in contact with scenery they look like fog, no hard cut like line or anything.
To be honest I want to register on every DCS/Xplane/Prepar3d forum and yell - LOOK AT DAT CLOUDS!
Also, even huge cloud layers has minimal FPS effect, like... how? Oh well, back to flying but I`m feeling like a little kid in a brand new sandbox.

Easily the best bit of the game, I agree.
RDR2 features similar cloud tech, but given it is a ground level game it is not that obvious.
 
So far its Daher TBM 930 and Beechcraft Bonanza, both super enjoyable props. But I`m also experimenting with the Airbus as I discover that they included very hi functionality of on board FMS.

Saved me from a bit of typing, as those are my favorite prop planes as well. I've not flown any of the jets yet.

Now if I could get my A2A P51-D to work in the game I'd probably not fly much of anything else. :)
 
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