MSFS Closer To Photorealism Hopefully...

[SAMF2000]

MSFS 2004 Was a big improvement but you still needed to Buy Add ons
such as MegaScenery to get the photo realism in areas... If you can get
such photorealism in a game why can't MS Just make a Full game With
Megascenery graphics in it to begin with? Would this slow down systems
that much? I just don't understand it. Maybe MSFS X Will be a step
closer to photorealism... I tried the demo and it really is
incredible..preordered a copy already.

[mma...@my-deja.com]

SAMF2000 wrote:
>If you can get
> such photorealism in a game why can't MS Just make a Full game With
> Megascenery graphics in it to begin with?

Because creating that scenery takes a huge amount of work... I'm sure
they would do it if people were willing to pay $5000 per copy.

Mark

[SAMF2000]

Well I guess it all comes down to $$$ . I just tried NY Megascenery
with FS2004 And it looks great. Took about 30 minutes to install and a
few gigs of hd space. I realize now that having such realism worldwide
would be impossible unless you devote 100 GB Drive space to the game.
And about 5 hours to install on 10 DVD's
As for the price , $5000.00 seems about right since they charge
$10-$20.00 just for each section of U.S.A! I bet the Simulators at
boeing and USAF Have Megascenery type graphics everywhere...jealous.

[Mxsmanic]

SAMF2000 writes:

There's more to a simulator than photorealism.

--
Transpose mxsmanic and gmail to reach me by e-mail.

[Garrot]

SAMF2000 wrote:
>I bet the Simulators at
> boeing and USAF Have Megascenery type graphics everywhere...jealous.
>

Nope, the real simulators are more about realism than graphics. The way
it should be.

[Simon Robbins]

SAMF2000 wrote:
> Well I guess it all comes down to $$$ . I just tried NY Megascenery
> with FS2004 And it looks great. Took about 30 minutes to install and a
> few gigs of hd space. I realize now that having such realism worldwide
> would be impossible unless you devote 100 GB Drive space to the game.
> And about 5 hours to install on 10 DVD's
> As for the price , $5000.00 seems about right since they charge
> $10-$20.00 just for each section of U.S.A! I bet the Simulators at
> boeing and USAF Have Megascenery type graphics everywhere...jealous.

Photographic scenery in particular is licenced for use by the FS add-on
publishers, which iis why it's quite expensive for a relatively small
area. Also, this scenery doesn't exist for large parts of the world.

When you consider that photographic scenery for the UK alone costs about
£40, scale that up to the entire world and yeah, you'd be up into the
thousands of dollars for the product. And of course you'd never bother
to fly over most of it. Much better to make the FS product cheaper and
let the 3rd party publishers specialise in the high-fidelity scenery in
my opinion.

Si

[Simon Robbins]

Garrot wrote:
> Nope, the real simulators are more about realism than graphics. The way
> it should be.

True, but if you want to fly VFR, and navigate using real charts, you'd
can't beat the real scenery to fly over.

Si

[RM v2.0]

>
> There's more to a simulator than photorealism.
>
> --

But why does realism and Photorealism have to be mutually exclusive? What
people seem to want is both a highly realistic sim and beautiful graphics.
Both can be done, especially with MS resources.

[Mxsmanic]

RM v2.0 writes:

> But why does realism and Photorealism have to be mutually exclusive?

It doesn't, if money is no object.

Photorealism requires lots of data, which usually has to be licensed
for a lot more than it is actually worth, which raises the price of
simulation software.

> What people seem to want is both a highly realistic sim and beautiful
> graphics.

It depends on which people you ask. I don't want a simulator that
costs $8000.

[Mr. Sylvestre]

I guess it depends on what kind of "as close as it gets" activity one is
interested in.

For some, it could be VFR navigation. Currently available third-party
photorealistic sceneries are OK for that. In that case, you don't need
the full world covered, as your interest is probably limited to an area
you know IRL or to a couple of charts you have. Hence, the current
business ecosystem shared by MS and the third-party providers do make
sense. OTOH, it also does make sense for MS itself to provide at least
one very detailed area with the base product to showcase the game engine
capabilities (Martha's Vineyard in a previous version of MSFS).

Others essentially look at MSFS as a landing simulator, i.e. they are
interested in what they believe is the most challenging phase of the
flight and prefer it to relatively "boring" cross-country flight, VOR
tracking, ATC procedures etc. In that context, landing on what is
essentially a flat aerial photo with a few textured 3d boxes
representing buildings is bound to be disappointing and a fully
synthetic scenery à la Lock On or Condor is much better w.r.t.
suspension of disbelief. This also applies to flying close to the
relief in a mountain environment, as inevitable discrepancies between
aerial photo resolution (textures) and digital elevation model (mesh)
resolution often produce things such a rivers going down then up(!) then
down, roads beyond the edge of cliffs or along 30% slopes, lake surfaces
which aren't flat... all things that instantaneously spoil any sense of
realism (at least to me).

It's not that photorealistic sceneries are bad, but these have to be
used with realisitic expectations, and it's also nice to have some sims
which provide an alternative for nap-of-the-earth flight enthousiasts.

Just my 0.02 €
Regards,
Mr. "hey, I didn't use the T-word" Sylvestre.

[Mxsmanic]

Mr. Sylvestre writes:

> OTOH, it also does make sense for MS itself to provide at least
> one very detailed area with the base product to showcase the game engine
> capabilities (Martha's Vineyard in a previous version of MSFS).

Is there such a spot in FS2004? If so, where?

[Henri Arsenault]

There is a really simple solution to the humungous databases for scenery.

Microsoft should use Google Earth terrain! The program could download
the scenery it needs right from the web, without needing any space for
storage. And the resolution would be great - I can see my house on
Google Earth.

It's free, but assuming that google wants to be paid, users could
subscribe to a special Google account that would give the program
access. I would gladly pay $50 a year to have Google Earth scenery on my
flight simulator.

Henri

[Mxsmanic]

Henri Arsenault writes:

I want 3D scenery, not just flat paintings.

[The Reid]

Following up to Mxsmanic

>I want 3D scenery, not just flat paintings.

Hello Mixi !
have you looked at UK VFR scenery, which is 2D arial photos, over
an enhanced terrain mesh with added 3D ground objects where
needed? Works for me.
--
Mike Reid
I will agree bendybuses are a good idea when they build bungalows on Mayfair
Walk-eat-photos UK "http://www.fellwalk.co.uk" <-- you can email us@ this site
Walk-eat-photos Spain "http://www.fell-walker.co.uk"

[Steph]

"Mxsmanic" <mxsm...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:v20me2t4afosu81o6...@4ax.com...

Google earth is very 3D topographically
Try slant view

[lindsay...@gmail.com]

Hi there,

I would guess that MS would use their own satellite imagery for FSX
which is actually better than Googles for most of the out of the city
areas (rural areas).

I havent heard any rumours of this yet, but at a guess it would seem
feasible that if you are connected to the net while playing to get your
real world weather then you should theoretically be able to download
your terrain mesh and texture tiles while doing this.

Hopefully the possibility of this hasnt been overlooked.

I guess we have to just keep watching to see what the plan is.