MarcE wrote: ↑06 Jun 2021, 19:46
I think we need to look at the sims more in terms of what they can do, not what MSFS doesn't have that P3D has. I think by now everyone knows which addons don't work anymore, Active Sky etc.. I don't want to compare it with FSX. This sim is 15 years old. 15!!!
But what does MSFS actually have? First of all the most obvious thing is the streamed world which is basically a replication of what we see outside. There are still several things to improve but this is done quickly. Almost every week you can find new areas being improved. Also the sim has a completely default real weather and atmospheric simulation, also implemented from real world data and calculated by the terrain. This means that while I fly in perfect weather I may see dark clouds and rain at the horizon. No sim has done that before. As everything else it's buggy, sometimes more, sometimes less but it is available as a part of the default simulator. As a conclusion one could say the whole sim world is a realtime representation of our real world. And it's constantly getting better. Why should we care about software terms like "beta" when we have an ongoing development for the next 10 (or 9) years at a speed that has never been met before?
This world has seen a HUGE amount of extremely well done freeware addons, there are thousands of airports and aerodromes available and every day dozens get added. Sights, cities, mountains. A huge amount.
Also part of this world is a beautiful lighting system, correct shadows, sun glare, correct firmament.
We have relatively good default navdata, there are SIDs and STARs available, the data is kept up to date. No missing runways, no NDBs that have been removed in 2008 (which may be a pity when flying old aircraft but is actually correct today)
Regarding aircraft we have a large amount of default planes, some work better than others. Many of these aircraft have been modded and improved, many new aircraft have been created on the base of these default planes, all for free. The flight dynamics calculation uses a system that allows correct air flow over the wings and around the fuselage. I say "allows" because we know it's not working fully correctly yet. But they work on it with a high priority. I also find it fair to keep in mind that the team has started as complete newbies to aviation who had no idea how that magic works that keeps us in the sky. They made a LOT of fundamental mistakes. But they have learned a lot, they listened to the community, listened to the "simmers" and got professional advice. Late, but they did.
All that above is part of what I refer to as "simulation". Many people ask for replay features, ground ops, cargo loading, walking people, trains, real world traffic jams, birds pooping on the wind shield and god knows what else. I leave it to everyone to decide themselves whether that's a "simulation" or "arcade". I think it's both and none.
We also have a dynamic main map in the menu to choose an origin and a destination if we wish. On this map we get an idea of the current cloud coverage, of the wind and afaik they plan to put more info onto this map. We have an easy to access ingame logbook for those who want to look up their previous flights. For those who care there are challenges and pre-defined "bush trips" which are actually planned routes through some interesting parts of the world. Hundreds more to download. The logbook that appears as a game-over screen after the flight will be removed in SU5 btw (at least that's what their development update says).
We have working icing!!! It used to be extremely exaggerated but has been reduced a lot and they will improve its appearance and behaviour further.
For the first time (since SU4) we have a correctly modelled turboprop engine which is in ongoing development.
We have an excessive view system that basically offers the possibilty to set 20 (?) personal cockpit views per aircraft and many external views that can be assigned to the keyboard or to joystick buttons completely freely.
And last but not least we have got incredible performance. No constant battles against 100 different .dll crashes, I have never had such a stable and well behaved sim.
Of course there are still many problems, but honestly I don't see anything that would let me doubt that they want to build a simulator and not a game. It will be possible to use it as as click'n'fly sightseeing game, but why not?? There is no reason why people shouldn't be able to place their Toprudder UL above Sidney Harbour and fly around with an XBox controller. This is possible in P3D too. Regarding the simulation features there is actually nothing that P3D has and that is missing in MSFS. It looks different and it is to be used a bit different but it IS a different sim. this is NOT FS11 or P3Dv6. Its MSFS2020. And as it's a new sim developers will have to develop new approaches to bring realistic addons to the platform. Accusim has been developed from scratch and maybe it has do be done again. But Scott and team (and other companies) are great developers and I see no reason why they shouldn't be able to do it. If you have watched Robert Randazzo's tutorial videos of the DC-6: I don't think it looks worse or less a simulation than the P3D version. Rather the opposite. =) And I am pretty sure that the future A2A addons will outclass the P3D models too.