100 replies to this topic

[Daube]

I posted some comparative screenshots there:
http://www.sim-outho...w...9447&page=1

Link to the mod: http://www.gratisim....tagnes-pour-fsx
(click on lclookup.bgl below the screenshots)

This is how the default FSX mountains look like:


And this is how they look once the mountain mod is applied:

Edited by Daube, 12 January 2011 - 07:04 AM.

[BrandonF]

But in Flight, there are no stretched mountain textures.  

And by the way, I have not installed the mountain mod, as you mentioned earlier. I have not added any global scenery/environment  add-ons since my FSX reinstall a month so that I can compare Flight and FSX with a default environment.

[Daube]

BrandonF, on Jan 12 2011, 08:59 PM, said:

But in Flight, there are no stretched mountain textures.  

Maybe. Maybe it's just that the cliff texture resolution is high enough to compensate the distortion

Quote

And by the way, I have not installed the mountain mod, as you mentioned earlier. I have not added any global scenery/environment  add-ons since my FSX reinstall a month so that I can compare Flight and FSX with a default environment.

Your choice.

[niteye]

I think Flight looks really good. My main gripe with the FSX was the performance being unstable (which I hope will be fixed) and the graphics were a bit cartoony (which by the looks of it is certainly fixed).

[_TW_]

Personally, I don't see much improvement.  Sky looks like a copy from FSX w/ slightly enhanced clouds *maybe* & the blurries in the distance are just horrid.  If they don't fix the blurring effect I won't be getting Flight.  Is it really that hard?  I've played many other flying games before and the ground never looks as bad as in MS FS.  It's like they automatically force Anisotropic Filtering to 2x and no higher!

[Daube]

Toby Werner, on Jan 13 2011, 08:37 AM, said:

Personally, I don't see much improvement.  Sky looks like a copy from FSX w/ slightly enhanced clouds *maybe* & the blurries in the distance are just horrid.  If they don't fix the blurring effect I won't be getting Flight.  Is it really that hard?  I've played many other flying games before and the ground never looks as bad as in MS FS.  It's like they automatically force Anisotropic Filtering to 2x and no higher!

What other games have such detailled textures and such a distance of visibility ?
When I'm sitting in the cockpit, if I set the zoom to 1x the textures look blurry for sure, but when I set it to 0.50 (best zoom for me in the virtual cockpits), the textures are not blurry at all:

(default ground textures)

[_TW_]

I'm talking about the blurries in the Microsoft Flight screenshots on the first page.  I too have minimum blurries in FSX but they are still there obviously; zooming out definitely makes the difference.

Just sayin'...the blurries are horrid in the screenies from Flight in the first post.

[Robin.]

Have you guys ever seen H.A.W.X. 2? It looks like this:


And on modern computers, it's easy to get 100+ FPS on ultra high settings. And it uses Google Earth images (AFAIK) for ground textures. Why is it so hard, Microsoft... why?

[SuperCar1000]

Can you go everywhere in the world in Hawk?... no. That's why

[Spam]

That gradient shadowing on the buildings looks good...that shot would remind me of a combination of FSX FT hongkong and ENB bloom. not lightyears away from what we have right now...plane graphics look nicer though..

[Brad]

Sorry to bite on the slight OT'ness of the HAWX2 mention, but I would love to have that engine/scenery in MS Flight.  In my opinion HAWX2 is what the MS Flight developers should be aiming for.  When I first flew that mountain mission (I don't remember the name but it is over some seriously mountainous terrain) I couldn't even keep my mind on the task at hand.  I just kept flying over the mountain peaks and ridges marveling at the beauty and smoothness of it all - to date that's the closest any game or sim has ever taken me to the real thing.  

I know the limitations imposed when the whole planet is in the scope of the project, but wow wouldn't that be amazing if we could get something like that.

[Robin.]

SuperCar1000, on Jan 14 2011, 10:44 PM, said:

Can you go everywhere in the world in Hawk?... no. That's why

How is that the reason? Does H.A.W.X. have any less viewing distance? No. Having the whole world is mainly a storage issue. That's like saying, a game that has 32 levels is necessarily going to have 1/2 the performance of one with 16 levels. Getting a game to load ahead in the background isn't a particularly intensive procedure and a lot of games do it.

Brad, I agree that they should at least aim for such a level. Doesn't even matter if they can reach it or not, it just means our next sim will be as good as it can be made

[BrandonF]

Toby Werner, on Jan 13 2011, 05:37 AM, said:

Personally, I don't see much improvement.

That's just sad.  

I continue to laugh at how you guys don't know what the term "positive" means. "Negative" is definitely a popular word in this forum. I mean seriously, sure...there are things that MS could still improve on, but look at the positives in Flight: tree shadows, new/enhanced terrain textures, improved horizon/ocean blending, news shaders, more realistic tree coverage, smoother terrain...the list goes on and on. You guys don't seem to understand this, so I will say it again: Flight is in early development. To see such an improvement this early in development is actually very good. That means that it could still get even better. We'll just have to wait and see what the next news update/webisode/screenshots show(s) us.

[VFR_Pierre]

BrandonF, on Jan 14 2011, 08:17 PM, said:

That's just sad.  

I continue to laugh at how you guys don't know what the term "positive" means. "Negative" is definitely a popular word in this forum. I mean seriously, sure...there are things that MS could still improve on, but look at the positives in Flight: tree shadows, new/enhanced terrain textures, improved horizon/ocean blending, news shaders, more realistic tree coverage, smoother terrain...the list goes on and on. You guys don't seem to understand this, so I will say it again: Flight is in early development. To see such an improvement this early in development is actually very good. That means that it could still get even better. We'll just have to wait and see what the next news update/webisode/screenshots show(s) us.

How much did they pay you?

[Daube]

Robin., on Jan 14 2011, 03:24 PM, said:

Have you guys ever seen H.A.W.X. 2? It looks like this:


And on modern computers, it's easy to get 100+ FPS on ultra high settings. And it uses Google Earth images (AFAIK) for ground textures. Why is it so hard, Microsoft... why?

Visibility: very small
Dynamic scenery (can be enhanced/replaced by adding scenery/mesh/landclass): no
Dynamic weather: no
ATC: no
Can fly anywhere on Earth: no
Fly model: ridiculous
Realism: ridiculous
Systems complexity: ridiculous

What we have here are fixed graphics and nothing else behind. It's as valid as comparing FSX with Crysis.

[BrandonF]

CAY029-Pierre, on Jan 14 2011, 05:20 PM, said:

How much did they pay you?

$0.00  

Oh wait, I wasn't supposed to give that info out.  

Edited by BrandonF, 14 January 2011 - 09:06 PM.

[SwitchFX]

Brad, on Jan 14 2011, 01:18 PM, said:

I know the limitations imposed when the whole planet is in the scope of the project, but wow wouldn't that be amazing if we could get something like that.

Yes. That would be terrific, but do you plan on waiting in line when you're 90 to get a game?

[slik]

Daube, on Jan 15 2011, 05:45 AM, said:

Visibility: very small
Dynamic scenery (can be enhanced/replaced by adding scenery/mesh/landclass): no
Dynamic weather: no
ATC: no
Can fly anywhere on Earth: no
Fly model: ridiculous
Realism: ridiculous
Systems complexity: ridiculous

Yeah, exactly. The processor has nothing to do in games like HAWX. Yes, they look good, but there's no depth behind the graphics. No clickable buttons in the cockpit, no systems at all apart from what.. The HUD and the landing gear occasionally popping out on those rare few times that you have to land + basic lock-on-with-button-and-fire. I agree that it's fantastic fun sometimes, but it's not something I would come back to. I played through HAWX and HAWX 2 once each, and then never again.

I've been playing LOMAC almost since release date, on the other hand. Same thing for shooters.. Played MW2/BO once or twice, yet I continue to play ArmA and ARMA2 today and I am not bored of them at all.

Default FSX runs great too, on any decent PC. When you add the complex systems of PMDG, containing thousands of lines of code for the processor to run, along with HD scenery, AI programs and things like that.. Of course the performance will drop. I'm not saying that MS couldn't have done a better job, but to be honest, most of the performance issues come with addon planes and their complex systems. It's a sacrifice that has to be made, unfortunately.

Anyhow, I think they're heading in the right direction with Flight. Opening it up to more casual users is what they need to do. There aren't enough die-hard simulator fans for Microsoft to make enough revenue to justify all the time spent in making the simulator.

As long as they increase performance and optimizating in general, and make sure that proper simulation and addons are still possible, then I'll be buying flight. Visuals would be nice of course, but they aren't the key thing I look for when I buy a simulator.

Edited by slik, 19 January 2011 - 09:55 AM.

[N200PW]

OMG thank you^^^^ and guys FSX isnt that bad, it works great for me, its only crashed maybe once or twice so I'm not complaining. Every game has its faults and it takes time to work the kinks out and FSX works great now (for me).

[BrandonF]

Comparison of shot 1....done! This one was really hard to do. There are so many terrain details that must he looked at to line up these shots and get them nearly identical to the ones taken in Flight.