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A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Discuss anything here...nothing political or controversial please.
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Firebird
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Re: A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Post by Firebird »

Oh good grief!
If they had spent the time working on the AI system I would have been more impressed.
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Re: A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Post by MIKE JG »

SeanG wrote: 21 Nov 2022, 22:02 SU11 may have broken stuff, but it has drastically improved performance in my ‘potato’ PC :)

Sean
Just the opposite here. FPS are way down..... :cry:
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Re: A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Post by MIKE JG »

Firebird wrote: 22 Nov 2022, 08:33 Oh good grief!
If they had spent the time working on the AI system I would have been more impressed.
Same here. Obviously not a priority for them right now.
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Re: A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Post by TimC340 »

I've just responded to this in John's Selfridge ANGB thread, but I'm afraid I've totally given up with MSFS until Asobo do something about AI. For those who like to fly aircraft, there are better simulations available in FSX/P3D. After 45 years of doing it for a living, I'm not that interested in recreating my job (would you sit in a computer-simulated office, for example?) but I do like to recreate the world of aviation and watch it moving and interacting, and that is simply not possible in MSFS. It's pretty - if you don't look too closely at the photogrammetry - but it's sterile. I can get the visual experience in Google Earth, for free (yes, it has a flight simulator mode). I'll stick with P3D until Asobo tackle the AI issues.
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Re: A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Post by Manschy »

TimC340 wrote: 01 Dec 2022, 11:33 I've just responded to this in John's Selfridge ANGB thread, but I'm afraid I've totally given up with MSFS until Asobo do something about AI. For those who like to fly aircraft, there are better simulations available in FSX/P3D. After 45 years of doing it for a living, I'm not that interested in recreating my job (would you sit in a computer-simulated office, for example?) but I do like to recreate the world of aviation and watch it moving and interacting, and that is simply not possible in MSFS. It's pretty - if you don't look too closely at the photogrammetry - but it's sterile. I can get the visual experience in Google Earth, for free (yes, it has a flight simulator mode). I'll stick with P3D until Asobo tackle the AI issues.
That's the reason why I didn't make a change so far.
But in my opinion, the sterile impression only may be the case for military activities by now. Regarding civil aircraft, there is a lot of fine stuff in the pipeline (like FS Live Traffic for example). But currently unfortunately there are no GA or aircraft like two seater... So you only have movements at the bigger airports....
Regards, Manfred.
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Re: A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Post by PB68 »

…without being rude chaps, I think we really do need to evaluate exactly what is in the pipeline here at MAIW regarding the future. Can anyone shed any light on Scenery Packages or Aircraft Packages, that are currently being developed or that are imminently scheduled for release and on what Simulator version ?

Unless I am mistaken, it’s practically nothing.
Whilst I understand your concerns with MSFS, if we all take your viewpoint regarding MSFS and say that it’s not for us, where does that leave this website because I am scratching my head, as to exactly as to what the future is for it.

I’d welcome your thoughts, be reassured that John feels very much the same as I do regarding this matter.
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Re: A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Post by msm8378 »

Hard call to make. I still check the forum here daily to keep track of the development efforts.

However, FS9 remains my stopping point. IMHO it remains the version that continues to win any Pro/Con list I make.

Each of the follow on sims (FSX, P3D, MSFS-202X) have sought to leverage the capabilities of newer computing technology, but
continue to lack, substantially at times, in well rounded "coding polish".

That said, I thoroughly enjoy perusing the forum to see all of the work the developers create on an almost daily basis. So back to square one...Hard call to make.

Mat
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Re: A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Post by John Young »

Asobo, breaking the AI in SU11 is a huge disappointment, but I am resigned to the need to see what will happen by way of a fix or further development. Both Pete and I have invested so much time in trying to make AI work in MSFS, I am reluctant to see that effort wasted. That said, I will need a boost of energy to resume that route again and to be re-assured that whatever comes next won’t get broken again. That’s probably wishful thinking.

In the meantime, I am pursuing what I said I would do and that is to continue to develop for FSX/P3D because that model is also needed for MSFS conversion in any case. I’ve gone as far as I can for the moment with the T-7A Red Hawk, until I discover more news from Boeing.

I took a break for a couple of weeks, but got bored easily. Having picked up the reins again, I’m really enjoying myself at the moment with a retro RAF transport aircraft for FSX/P3D. I’m not sure it will be hugely popular, but it keeps my hand In and I think Tim might like it.

Beyond that is difficult to assess. It is becoming more and more difficult to find a project that would interest me, because so much has been done already over the years.

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Re: A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Post by Firebird »

My take on the current situation is this.

Asobo are currently well behind the drag curve when it comes to AI. This is,as I have stated before, is due to the more important non-AI related aspects of the sim. As I would expect. People do not buy MSFS to watch AI, they do it for a better flying experience than the other sims around.

As it is well documented I stayed with FS9 as I couldn't see a big enough benefit to move my base sim to another. This I decided by the cost and work involved to get a new base to the same state as FS9.

I decided to move base to MSFS as this was, to me, going to be the future. It got to a point where I had to really move from FS9 and MSFS was the only logical choice.

At the moment it is a very frustrating time with AI but I have no doubt it will improve. There would be probably no reason with Asobo continuing technical dialog with AIG, as an example, if it wasn't.

Now I am in the situation that everybody else is - waiting for improvements. I share John and Pete's frustrations. However, the fact that SU11 broke the existing AI system says to me that they haven't nailed down the finished system yet. This means that improvements will happen and hopefully increased capabilities.

In the mean time will I transition to another sim for AI? No, for the same reason that I stayed on FS9. It would not make sense, to me, to spend money and a lot of time on an interim solution.

I will continue to wait and support any efforts made here for MSFS. If I want to load up a military air power 3D screensaver I will use FS9.
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Re: A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Post by TimC340 »

John Young wrote: 04 Dec 2022, 09:20 Asobo, breaking the AI in SU11 is a huge disappointment, but I am resigned to the need to see what will happen by way of a fix or further development. Both Pete and I have invested so much time in trying to make AI work in MSFS, I am reluctant to see that effort wasted. That said, I will need a boost of energy to resume that route again and to be re-assured that whatever comes next won’t get broken again. That’s probably wishful thinking.

In the meantime, I am pursuing what I said I would do and that is to continue to develop for FSX/P3D because that model is also needed for MSFS conversion in any case. I’ve gone as far as I can for the moment with the T-7A Red Hawk, until I discover more news from Boeing.

I took a break for a couple of weeks, but got bored easily. Having picked up the reins again, I’m really enjoying myself at the moment with a retro RAF transport aircraft for FSX/P3D. I’m not sure it will be hugely popular, but it keeps my hand In and I think Tim might like it.

Beyond that is difficult to assess. It is becoming more and more difficult to find a project that would interest me, because so much has been done already over the years.

John

You spoil me John! I'd better get back to work on that building...

I think the habit Asobo have of breaking stuff with every update is frustrating for the entire development community. There are many, many threads over at FSDev each time an SU arrives and I've no doubt the big development houses have been forthright with Asobo about it. The amount of wasted or duplicated development time must be extremely expensive - you don't expect to have to rebuild your scenery three or more times because of incremental updates to the sim. I suspect it's down to the extremely ambitious update timeline Asobo have set themselves (although they toned it down a while back) which simply doesn't give the QA people enough time to fault-find and develop remedies. But I also suspect the pressure from Microsoft is intense and difficult to resist. The trouble is that MS and MSFS are getting a reputation of being very difficult to work with, and quite a few smaller developers have given up doing big projects for the sim as they know they won't work for long, and they won't get any support from MS or Asobo when they break it.

It's incredibly frustrating, as it looks so good when it's working properly - if you can ignore the photogrammetry artifacts, which, once I've seen them, I cannot! And the roads and road traffic are little better than in FSX, yet even the tiny team at X-Plane got that to work really well - and they do trains in-sim as well.

The very best thing about MSFS is the shipping AI done by KL791, which is simply sublime. I could spend all day just watching Henrik's ships! For some examples, see here.
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Re: A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Post by SeanG »

John Young wrote: 04 Dec 2022, 09:20 I took a break for a couple of weeks, but got bored easily. Having picked up the reins again, I’m really enjoying myself at the moment with a retro RAF transport aircraft for FSX/P3D. I’m not sure it will be hugely popular, but it keeps my hand In and I think Tim might like it.
Please be an Andover... please let it be an Andover.... :) I like retro!

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Re: A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Post by MIKE JG »

MSFS seems to be one step forward, two steps back as of late. Makes it really discouraging from an AI traffic standpoint. Must be absolutely maddening from a developer standpoint. The fact that it is both an Xbox product and PC based product at the same time indicate where their priorities lie these days IMO.

I'm afraid it might be awhile until AI is given any serious development in the new sim. As such, I wouldn't blame any developer, freeware or payware, for punching out for a while or for good at this point.

It's almost like MSFS tries to be good at so many things at once that it's not really that good at any one of those things individually.
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Re: A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Post by Firebird »

One thing that is particularly frustrating at the moment is the lack of support for DirectStorage.
An area that the product has struggled with from the initial release has been frame rate performance. Here is a technology, developed by MS, to improve the performance by allowing GPUs to load and expand graphics straight off of storage rather than having the CPU do it and pass the result to he graphics card.

Now you need three components for this to work. DX12 Ultimate, data on SSD/M.2 drives and capable GPUs (e.g. RTX 30 cards).

When asked directly about it in March they responded that they didn't really know much about it but that it sounded interesting and they would look at it.
When it has been your biggest issue since day one I would have hoped that they would have been aware of it and been well down the path to implementation. When you think that the technique was developed for the Xbox series you would thing that they would be aware of it since the integration with Xbox compatibility.
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Re: A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Post by TimC340 »

Poor FPS has been notable in a lot of games recently, and according to Obsidian Ant, some of it, at least, is down to lack of shader cacheing (sp?). Given the long development time of games and the rapid improvement in hardware, it’s somewhat gobsmacking that publishers still set out on developing content that cannot possibly run on contemporary hardware (thinks of various iterations of MSFS in the past!). It’s bloody annoying, especially when a decent, games-ready PC costs well over £2K to build without peripherals, and needs to be replaced or updated every couple of years.
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Re: A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Post by Firebird »

I would agree with that.
I can see that there is a great temptation to stick with the master plan of any project but really there should be an oversight person who looks out for new techniques and/or hardware that and then brings it to the project manager with a view to persuading them to change the project to incorporate something that will bring a big benefit.
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Re: A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Post by TimC340 »

For anyone that would like to add to the pressure on Asobo to deal with AI, this is the place to do it: https://forums.flightsimulator.com/t/im ... air/307490

FSLTL seems to have cracked the process of injecting AI in a variety of liveries, but even they are reporting on the various broken aspects of AI in MSFS. From their user guide:
A number of AI limitations and traffic behaviours exist in the sim which affects all AI solutions including FSLTL. These issues require fixes from Asobo which we hope to see in the future. If you wish to upvote the issue, then you can do so via the MSFS forums here.

The known issues are:

Aircraft spinning on taxiways where the path is blocked.
Wrong runway assignments for given Metar.
Runway incursions and high go-around - MSFS ATC limitation
Slow runway exit speeds
Parking at wrong terminals - limitation of some scenery design, required dev implementation
AI Altitude jumps
AI Engine sound high volume/full thrust
Aircraft labels not supported currently
Returning to the same airport you departed from can cause simconnect to fail and inject large quantities of aircraft killing FPS.

Please also note that when the injector reads real-time data of aircraft location/type/departure/destination, there is around a 30-second delay in this data, along with additional delays due to MSFS inputs. Positioning won't be 100% accurate but will be very close to real life.
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Re: A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Post by TimC340 »

The single best thing about MSFS (and FSX/P3D, but it's not half as good in those sims):

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Re: A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Post by Firebird »

It is a very good package but I have found that it hangs my sim when loading into a flight. When i disable it, it loads fine. Damned annoying I hoped that v3 would cure that.
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Re: A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Post by TimC340 »

Oh. I don't have that problem, Steve. Might be worth giving Henrik a shout.
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Re: A brand new MS Flight Simulator is coming...

Post by Firebird »

I would do but I like to have more to say than it sticks and it's your add-on that does it. As an analyst that used to hate when users said something like that and expected you to work out the cause.

I first discovered it with v2, and went through all of my addons and eventually narrowed it down to that one. What makes it even more difficult is that it doesn't necessarily happens every time. This says to me that it is due to one or two ships.

Need to get more diags somehow. Three weeks ago it was every time I loaded at Northolt. Today it is every time I load at Honington, Northolt is fine.

An analysts work is never done.
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