Just tried to have a flight in local Boston area with live weather and it just looks bad.
Harbors that may freeze every hundred years are sheets of ice far beyond anything I’ve ever seen then all the full trees covered white with snow, it’s just not good. Deciduous trees don’t work if you’re just going to sprinkle snow on them.
I’m not as put off by the general scenery appearance in winter. It must be very complex to determine how all of the worlds water freezes and when. Along with determining when snow cover should come and go, it will never be really right.
The only thing that really bothers me is snow covered runways that are almost invisible. Since runways are more under their design control, that’s something that likely can, and should, be improved.
No I am not in least put off by winter in the sim. I live in AZ and we love any kind of winter anywhere real or MSFS. I was flying great lakes in my Totter with skis pac, great model. I noticed that the lakes were frozen over alot… since I’m not from them parts… but I did think it was a lot… you can land on the lake ice its alot of fun!
No, but my expectations were not very high. Adding seasons to a flight sim is not a small thing. It isn’t just about making the ground white. I think they did a pretty good job for a starting point.
I have to say, I am impressed that today the sim is not showing snow on the ground becuase in fact where I am flying, the snow melted away yesterday IRL. So the whole “real weather doesn’t work” thing, IMHO, is unfair.
I don’t expect every aspect of weather to be modeled, and not have hiccups. But I haven’t seen completely inaccurate weather at all – the whole time the forums are screaming about it. Maybe its where I fly – Northeast US.
+1 for getting rid of snow on runways/taxiways/ aprons. I fly the twin otter in Northern Canada, makes it very difficult to see the runway.
Very true. Ever look at cloud at the beach and say that looks like something like a cat… see the face and ears you tell the person next to you. There are 300k+ Home hobbyists who have home weather stations. That is Weather Underground alone. You can talk about the weather for hours…on the forums… I prefer to enjoy MSFS weather because its stunning. It is alot better than anything we had before MSFS.
It does work! And it is stunning!
I dont like it visually but if they had de-icing ground vehicles then that would be more interesting and ent-ICING to fly in these conditions
I was disheartened when I first started in the sim to learn that there were no such things as seasons, but found some great addons to enahnce it.
I first use Bijans season mod and terrain masks but since switched ot Rex AccuSeasons which is really nice. And also Rex Global Airport Textures does a nice job at handling snow on taxiways, aprons and runways.
Also use Rex WeatherForce which has some issues, but it renders clouds and snow much nicer than natively within the sim.
These 3 combined have given winter a nice look and feel.
I would love to see de-ice ops and have mentioned it to the folks at Pushback toolbar who are looking into it.
Green trees covered in snow, roads that ice up before the ground that surrounds them, if the weather turns warm the snow instantly is gone including ice on the lakes…
It’ll be interesting when that other one comes out in the next couple of months, snow that melts and turns to liquid or ice depending on the temp, trees that move (a little over kill but still cool), and so much more. Only time will tell and personally I can wait…OH OH and the best part, not having to rely on a network/server connection which seems to dictate how the game will run from day to day or hour to hour.
Oh boy are you in for a whole lot of disappointment…all that and it’ll still look like something released 10 years ago.
I’ll pass judgment on MSFS when they get their proper seasons implemented. Until then this is just a stopgap with many shortcomings and I’ll take it as such.
I am going to add roads to this. As someone who does a lot of VFR in northern climates, the interstates and major highways being completely covered and at at times almost invisible is just as annoying as the runways and taxiways.
I’ve just tried to do a flight in USA as UK looks so ridiculous right now with towering CBs everywhere when it should be overcast. Now it’s the snow that is the problem…
Coming into KALB I couldn’t even see the runway.
Yes I am put off by winter!
Yes, that’s a perfect example of the snow covered runway problem.
yea… gotta admit, kinda disappointing. hope they fix it before summer… lol
I have no problem in general with winter scenery but snow covered runways is ridiculous
I did not realize Zinertech went payware … uhm oops I’m still using the free version???
Anyways it seems to fix 92.35% of the snow runways, might even work better when I get around to paying for the new version.
If you’re thinking of buying Zinertech, I would suggest trying out REX Global Airport Textures. I have both, Rex is much nicer.
Gives you the option of how much wear and tear on the runways, taxiways etc… So it doesn’t look like the whole place was freshly painted.
Handles snow great as well.
Good to know.
