Yeah it just blows my mind. Look at your pics. Who can beat that???
MSFS is revolutionary!!
Thatās one for that things I miss about night flying in XP. White lights from headlights, red tail lights, and the occasional emergency vehicle. It looks really cool.
And yet 3 years of works on this, when people using xplane 11.5 with addons saying not much difference it said all, there is actual lost of existent customers. Auston was always beyond his mind when he talk about others, usually things get back in your face when you are acting like this in public. Physic stuff itās now a matter of time, clock is ticking.
The only thing I liked in XP12 was how easy it is to just go to controllers in the menu bar and setup your hardware. The UI in MSFS rather sucks and is more console (game) based. Anything else in XP12 was rather dissapointing, hardly a upgrade from XP11 and nowhere near a next gen version. Such a shame though.
..and in game ads on billboards in public places like airports, stations, cities and highways.
All right. Hereās the million dollar question: which features of XP would you think are the most important to implement in MSFS? I can think of:
- multi monitor setup
- road traffic
- ground handling/friction
Fact is that no dev studio on earth can really compete with the visual aesthetics of this sim, aside from a select few that would either be Google, Amazon or have the financial fire power to go into partnership with either of those two to access the same satellite imagery.
Financially to do that would make no sense either since its already been done, right here.
The technical achievement of building a 3D world out of satellite imagery is a masterpiece of creation, regardless of arguments for flight model comparisons (which I think MSFS can likely tweak anyway).
Also, take the flight sim side out of this and the potential is enormous, imagine an FPS game with these visuals, Truck simulator, boats, farming sim etc etc its very exciting technology. Even for this achievement alone, there has to be a valid argument its one of the best games of all time.
Though, I do want to see some puddles in MSFS 
Google maps would be way too costly for XP commercial use. Microsoft owns Bing data. Giving MSFS a big edge .
I saw that a timelapse video was released a few days ago of XP 12: Laminar Research shows off 10 hour X-Plane 12 timelapse ā Stormbirds
Seems like a really odd video to release - doesnāt seem to show anything very much off (the clouds?) becuase itās really too fast to see what the scenery really looks like.
Ground handling/friction/physics for sureā¦ thankfully itās also been identified as an area for improvement and rework by Asobo, starting in SU10. Multi-monitor support already coming in SU10, at least a first iteration of.
From a recent Q&A: Live Dev Q&A - May 25th, 2022 - #2 by N316TS
Chat question ā What are some improvements that are coming for ground friction and handling? - Timestamp 3
Seb ā Four new parameters are coming in Sim Update 10. Two of them are going to give the possibility to eliminate or at least tune, but we decided to cancel it out on our plane where we tested it. Basically, an old feature that we kept from FSX. FSX was canceling out all crosswind below a certain speed. At 50 knots, you had 100% crosswind, and then it was fading out to 10 knots and then it was 0. The problem is, while you take off or land, the crosswind keeps changing. And itās very unnatural. So this is something where, in the parameters for the plane you can say at what speeds you want this to happen. So on the Cessna 172, weāre testing this, so we basically canceled the effect completely. So you have a 100% crosswind even if you are parked, or if you go very slow. If there is a lot of wind, it can actually spin your plane around, at first. So thatās one of the new parameters.
Seb ā And the other one, two parameters are there to allow you to control how sticky your wheels are when they are rolling fast. So when you are already going pretty fast in the takeoff, the sim was considering the wheels to be pretty much on rails as if there were slick tires from a Formula 1 car. Very sticky. And only the weightā¦so if you pull on the yoke, your plane gets a bit lighter. And the weight goes down, which reduces friction a little bit. But itās still static. So it means that as long as you donāt push to the side strong enough, youāre still on rails. And so, thereās two parameters that allow you to make it so that the plane drifts off. The wheels are spinning so if you push to the side, itās going to drift off a little bit, especially with plane tires that are not anything but racing tires. So we tested that with taildraggers. Taildraggers will always be hard to land and takeoff. But itās a lot more natural and easy with that. So this is something we implemented on the Extra 330 for Sim Update 10. Also, plane makers have examples of how this works, so they can use it, too. We will deploy on more based on feedback. These four parameters are a first step on improving the ground handling. So more stuff will come afterwards. But Sim Update 10 is going to be these four.
From a previous Q&A: Live Dev Q&A - March 2nd, 2022
Forum Community Question - Any update on the revamped ground physics handling/friction? In a past Q&A, we mentioned it had been done. Can you go into more detail and whatās coming up in the future?
Seb - last year in Sim Update 7, there have been a few improvements on ground physics. I think one was related to an assistance. When you turn on assistance of ground rudder ā basically itās the thing when thereās a crosswind and propeller effects and the plane goes all over the place, and you have a hard time using the rudder to just stay straight ā that is very tough. And then when you rotate, it changes a little bit because you donāt have the wheels that hold you a little bit in place anymore, and you have to do some rudder work again to stay more coordinated. On ground, youāre basically changing from one system, which is staying straight on the runway to staying coordinated in flight. You have to make the switch. The assistance takeoff rudder does that for you. And previously it was just switched off whenever you rotated. It made this hard transition when you take off. Thatās something that has been fixed so that this assistance, instead of switching off instantly when you rotate, it gradually fades out over the first 200-300 feet once you take off. It doesnāt have this brutal thing where the rudder turns off instantly. And thereās other little tweaks and improvements on ground friction that weāve been improving. Mostly for specific bug fixes on specific planes.
But still, there is a deeper rework we need to do. Basically, it all comes from heavy simplifications that were in the sim 10-15 years ago, which were always assuming that the ground was flat. Thatās why you couldnāt have sloped runways or undulated runways. The ground friction modelā¦basically when somethingās on the ground and when the brakes are fully engaged, you donāt move at all: The plane sticks to the ground. Thereās what one could call infinite friction: Thereās no movement at all. This is something we added that didnāt exist at all. And it wasnāt really needed 10 years ago because there were no slopes. When you put a plane on a flat terrain without wind, itās not going to roll anywhere. But if you put that same system on a slope, itās going to roll away and not stay there.
Thereās also wind. Historically, in the sim, there was a system so that at low speeds, any crosswind was cancelled out. The plane ignores any form of wind, when youāre below, maybe 5-10 feet/second, which is why when youāre stopped on the ground, you go full propeller power and then thereās some propeller effects, so the plane starts going left. And then, all of a sudden, the wind kicks in, and then if you have a strong crosswind, it does this sort of thing which is not realistic. In reality, if I have a plane on the ground, and thereās a strong wind, and I release all brakes, itās going to start moving: The wind is going to push it. And that currently does not happen. There are changes like that that we want to do. We want to do the ground friction model to make it 100% realistic. Which means that we donāt have to do anything: We donāt have to cancel it out anymore. Everything is going to be realistically simulated from when you stop to when you take off. Thereās no such thing as crosswind that comes in over a few knots. I think itās going to make the rudder a little easier. Youāre just fighting one crosswind. It doesnāt change over time unless thereās gusts. Also, itās going to work better on slopes. This rework is planned for somewhere this year, whenever we have time to go into that. Itās going to be compatible because the parameters are the same. It doesnāt change anything in the way you define or create or make airplanes. It just changes the way all the constraints and forces are sold so that the plane does what itās supposed to do. All the constraints are the friction, the ground friction, the prop wash, the wind, even the engine, which is slightly shaking the plane. All these things come together. Currently, itās a little bit better because we worked more in a bug fix development system, where we said, āThe plane is sliding on the slope? Letās fix that.ā āThe plane is sliding when thereās wind? Letās fix thatā Now weāre in a situation where we need to implement a real system instead of having a block of patches. Thatās basically the next step, and that will give us much more realism the precise moment when you rotate.
For example, a wheel is currently simulated as a single point. So, a wheel can resist movement or rolling or sliding when you brake. It does not resist rotation. A wheel can rotate [with a rudder or tiller] without resistance. If youāre in your car and youāre parked, and you turn the steering wheel, if you donāt have power steering, itās not easy to turn the tire because itās not a point: Itās a flat surface. Itās a patch on the ground of rubber that youāre moving. The new simulation is going to allow this. This helps with stability when youāre taking off. Currently, the plane is just a tripod of points, and as soon as the nose is up, you feel that itās already twisting because the wheels are not simulated as patches of rubber. They do not resist rotation enough. These kinds of changes are going to make the moments of takeoff a lot more precise and realistic. Later this year.
Get the demo and see for yourself what the scenery looks like. Here is a hint; itās like a time warp back to 2009.
Even the aircraft looks like a lego. 
I was hoping it would be awesome, as I wanted to enjoy XP12 since they have more airliners than MSFS currently has, but I just canāt get past those ugly graphics.
really? I found the XP cockpits to look pretty bad compared to MSFS - esp shadowing / aliasing
ground handling was the only major edge I saw for XPā¦ perf was worse for me in XP12, with a much worse look, obviouslyā¦
MSFS really needs to improve ground handling in the worst way
Saw a couple of emergency vehicles on a flight tonight from Bristol to London in XP and that was with just the standard scenery which doesnt have any night textures as yet. Thatās what I will XP for I think, some night flying (dont need to worry too much about Orthos at night) and just to polish up my flying since planes like the 172 are less floaty in XP and more difficult to land well.
ground handling - definitely better in XP right now
water taxing and water rudder control - yes
ā¦but step taxi, and actually trying to fly off the water was horrible in XPā¦ MSFS needs loads of improvement on the water physics / control - but at least you can get off the water in MSFS.
You have to raise gear. One of the streamers last night had the same issue, and once he raised gear, it was easier to take off. I assume āgearā when in water is like anchor or something.
XP12 will be a visual downgrade from MSFS, but Iām hoping I can find its own unique beauty in the XP12 world to where it wouldnāt matter much.
gear switch was up, gear visibly looked up and landed in the water in the same state and gear was up then, but couldnāt get off the water againā¦ IDKā¦
I will admit. I was thinking to myself āOk, I will probably do XPlane 12 maybe 10% of the timeā. So I was looking at planes on the store site. I would look at the promotional video for each aircraft, and I just wasnāt getting excited like I do in MSFS. Maybe it is the scenery. Maybe they are just all bad at promotional videos. I donāt know. There was a plane new today specifically for XPlane 12 that is both regular and amphibian, and I wanted a sea plane to fly with. Then I looked at the A350. I thought the cockpit was cool in that. But every other video I looked at, I was like āmehā. Truthfully I really wanted to be impressed with the B747 Anniversary edition, or the A340 that you could get the Nelson Mandela Day livery for. I looked at all the helicoptors thinking the better visuals were low to the ground, and what a better way to see them than a helicoptor. But again, meh. I will buy XP12 and those two planes, but I suspect I will try the sim a few times, then only use it if I feel like taking the A350 for a spin since that is memories for me (of the real thing), or if MSFS is down because the XBox network is broken again (which, lets face it, happens once every 6 months).
I honestly really did want to be a little bit more enthused than I am. I wanted to like it a little bit more than I do. I will still get it, but it really is just for a niche purpose for me as a flight simmer.
Well, I sorta lied, took F-14 for Spin in XP12, KMGE Rw 29, so was while watching plane, watching for hazards outside as well. One thing I like in MSFS is, in outside view, you can turn on some engine and plane readouts so you can see airspeed, altitude, heading, that sort of thing, nonexistent in XP. But hands down XP12 is way easier to set up your flight devices, took all of 15 minutes total, and to date still messing with MSFS ones. I can setup graphics in XP12 so I keep my GPU temps in the 70C range and cannot do anything in MSFS to get them below 86C, which for me is too darn hot. I have medium settings on everything in MSFS. I disagree on setting up flights, itās easy in XP, you pick your starting AP, and then setup the flight in the ATC window, you can even import a flight plan like you could in 11. You can also set up the FP in the FMC is so equipped.
Another plus for XP, inside the file structure are manuals, a link to the online XP manual, then four other PDFās inside one covering the Collins FMC and 3 others. MSFS HAS NOT GOT ONE MANUAL ON ANYTHING PERIOD, itās largest failing aside from the massive āonline presenceā.
Opinion - so far XP is way more stable than MSFS, sure must have bugs but the game does not stutter, crash, or act weird, unlike MSFS to date, which still gives users CTD, stutters, and Azure still drops out all the time in ATC control flight. XP is just a better simulator, no, not the graphic masterpiece like MSFS, but itās not designed to be, and for another 10-500K, you can get the FAA certified program and the hardware, so then you can really be an armchair pilot. I will say, some of the world scenery did not download (I opted for whole world), so there are either download issues, or bugs in the scenery keeping it from downloading. F-14 has I think a bug, because pulling out on Fuel Valves on Dashboard, does not shut down engines like itās supposed to.
Another plus, I copied over my C-17 from XP-11 into 12, and it flies just like it should and does in 11. No one can do that in MSFS, you cannot ever bring over a FSX plane, all that is blocked. Plus, if you got the smarts, in XP you can take plane maker and build youself a plane from scratch, nada in MSFS, plus the SDK is still a WIP.