Yes, the issues with MSFS clouds manifest well when the clouds are as dense as they should be to result in plausible aerodynamic effects. Then the shades and colors become unnatural (aka volcanic ash clouds). X-plane clouds not only look good, they also take the form of correct cloud species depending on the weather that generates them.
7 Likes
My morning feed showed me yet another weather, atmosphere and clouds update for XPlane.
They’re moving ahead in leaps and bounds, and we got one (arguable) progression with metar accompanied by one huge regression in clouds, and then absolutely nothing for years.
Honestly, depressing. The quality gap between XP and MSFS’ skies and flight / weather experience is widening by the month.
22 Likes
Has this been raised as a bug or issue anywhere I can vote on? Best just keep the pressure on. Have developers ever acknowledged that they’ve been downgrading cloud quality to accommodate consoles? Is this even the cause? I play in VR and the clouds are laughably poor quality wise in msfs 24 when compared to the early days of 2020. Definitely a huge regression, instead of the progression expected.
9 Likes
The fact that they are prioritizing dumb missions over atmosphere, lighting, clouds, and airports is truly astonishing
12 Likes
I don’t understand why they don’t improve the things that affect everyone first, such as the things you mentioned. Then address speciality stuff once the base of the sim is good.
7 Likes
I know the developers have ruled out that METAR affects cloud shape, but most of the time when I’m at an airport with METAR, the clouds look disorganized and lack a realistic shape. If I fly about 100 km away and over an airfield without METAR, the clouds are more realistic.
In these images, the first two are from near airports with METAR, and the other two are from an airfield about 100 km away.
In my opinion, there is nothing wrong with ‘cloud shape’ in any of the four pictures you posted but all of those depictions could be improved with better, more realistic coloring and lighting as well as better apparent texturing so billowing cumulus have well rounded features while soft, flowing type clouds appear soft.
They need to examine the data and make sure it produces realistic results and the team artists need to make sure it all looks good (because why would anyone want it to look bad?)
7 Likes
There are a lot more near real-time, readily available tools with which to compare and verify in-sim clouds with reality today versus in 2020. From the ground, at least.
Again, not saying it has to match 100%, but for the sake of continuous improvement, I hope people with back-end access are making such observations.
4 Likes
What bothers me is that despite having layers as shown in the METAR, in the simulator you only see an amorphous mass of clouds
3 Likes
My experience is different. I frequently fly GA relatively lowish with weather presets, but when I do fly with live weather, I very often see different layers. One can debate how well or badly it is represented, but I definitely see different layers. Just a quick grab of some recent screenshots
2 Likes
Sorry but this just doesn’t look realistic at all.
It’s the lighting that’s just awful.
I mean this whole thing leaves so much to be desired. It’s so washed out. The ground looks abysmal, colours wrong lighting wrong, and the clouds just look so dead, no light on them at all.
12 Likes
Honestly, the clouds aren’t too bad! They need some artwork improvements (i.e. ash like clouds need help) but they are not necessarily bad (they were for sure better before SU5 of MSFS 2020). But what seriously needs improvements weather wise is:
- Haze layer, we still see a dome of haze on airport areas which is unrealistic. There should be some interpolation between metar readings considering the geographic areas. There should be haze associated with atmospheric humidity which is different than smog in the Sim. The air shouldn’t be so clean and somehow the atmospheric humidity should play a role in the sky color, visibility, etc. even at higher altitudes. The Sim is capable of doing this since it does read humidity, it just needs to be implemented. Also, the problem with MSFS 2024 is the smog layer remains very shallow and looks more like morning due fog. Smog can rise significantly in real life.
- Cloud turbulence: Much better in MSFS 2024 compared to 2020 but still needs to be improved. We need to be worried when flying into CB clouds.
- Turbulence in general: There should be more of a ground effect/near ground turbulence or micro turbulence implemented in the sim. With the exception of early mornings, you will almost never fly out of an airport in real life without turbulence, specially where you have mountainous terrain. Add hot air to it and then you should have significant turbulence.
11 Likes
To me this is not bad during a recent storm at SFO. Seems good color and contrast. VR is a different story.
I have yet to encounter any cloud turbulence at all in Live. Where are you experiencing cloud turbulence of any level?
I think the cloud technology itself is a good base, as shown by the amazing clouds we had in early 2020, and even now with presets.
What happened after the metar implementation in SU5/7, I just don’t know, but the result is a clear and quite saddening reduction in their deployment and lighting. I have no idea why metar integration should have had that effect, but it’s there for all to see.
As for the layers, yes, I still see layers but there are too many transparent puffs around the edges of the layers to make them seem like a distinct stratum.
So, we continue with the current situation of waiting for the devs to get around to improving things. And I can’t entirely blame them. There are lots of us in the community who have been pleading for improvements for years, but the wishlist items are split and not at the top.
And a temporary bug about an onscreen notification not disappearing quickly enough in a beta gets over 1,000 votes in just over 24hrs? I just don’t get this community sometimes 
11 Likes
I suspect there aren’t many here that were here pre-su5 when we had beautiful weather fronts, proper overcast, multiple layers etc etc. They just don’t know how good it was. Before the days of puffy cumulus to represent every cloud at every level.
10 Likes
I had a very enjoyable flight today in XP12 from KMDW to KPIA. It started with a low solid overcast that was NOT too dark and I came near a point where the clouds were breaking and then I turned toward the airport to join my chosen pattern. light rain…rain streaks on the windshield…puddles on the runway. heres two shots near the end of trip:
I then went into FS24 and went to the same approximate parking spot at KPIA:
I have no way of knowing which was closer to reality but I know which one I’d rather see and which one I enjoyed more. I also went back to KMDW and it was at least closer to what XP gave me.
FS once had a great variety of enjoyable weather… hoping to get variety and enjoyable weather back.
15 Likes
A couple real shots from Illinois Valley Airport (KVYS, about 40-45nm NE of PIA) at 2:30-3:00 this afternoon, for comparison:
2 Likes
X-Plane can do this 
And MSFS still does this 
What are they waiting for? Will the weather system be revamped or should we keep dreaming?
6 Likes
In MSFS2024 there is definitely cloud turbulence. In MSFS 2020, there was none.