After watching yesterday’s developer stream, I’m genuinely worried they might make the entire sim less bright, ruin the beautiful night visuals, and still leave the overly visible taxi lights untouched. The real issue here is the visibility of those specific lights, not the overall brightness. The title of the Bug #1 topic is somewhat misleading, and honestly, it seemed like they only read the first two words
Night lighting was one of the main reasons I switched from MSFS 2020, and I truly hope it isn’t ruined. Purists who want ultimate darkness can adjust their displays, but once the detail is lost, it’s gone. I’m confident that 99% of users prefer a slightly brighter look rather than an overly dark one—even the concept of “reality” here is subjective. For streamers, the brighter visuals are a godsend, of course.
So again, please do not make the whole sim darker under any circumstances! Just address the visibility of the green and blue taxi lights – that’s all that’s needed.
I did not get the impression they were changing much other than the airport lights. There was a bug when using the ‘Light row’ feature which is what was fixed. That should fix the airport lights only. I am liking the newer ground lighting in general as it is brighter than 2020. I do not like the sepia mask being such a small radius from aircraft…it is much further out in 2020 but sounds like they are not changing that until a better solution is found that can produce an image of the lights out in the distance. Hopefully they can tweak the sepia mask a bit and push it out a little further so we don’t see glowing fields beneath us!
Hopefully you’re right, but I had the opposite feeling. The taxiway lights weren’t mentioned. On the other hand, the topic was introduced by Jorg as “too bright,” which isn’t what it’s the problem of taxi lights all about. We’ll see what comes out next week
Taxiway lights are also placed by ‘light rows’ so it should fix those and the runway lighting…although I have a feeling they will still be overly bright.
Look at this. Third-party airports look amazing now with the new lighting engine! But next week, they’ll revert to the 2020 look—awfully dark and dull—and the green and blue taxi lights at “autogen” airports will still be visible from 50 nm away? I’m betting on it!
My understanding, is that they mentionned the airports edited on their end. Not the third parties airport. Some of the Asobo airport are hand made. I assume they were referring to those. The airport I made are looking good too.
They mentioned the ‘bug’ was with the ‘Light Row’ function of the SDK, so it would effect all airports where that was used. Most airport devs would use the custom ‘light rows’ instead of the autogenerated taxiways/lights. A light row is where you are basically hand-placing the lights. I used the light row function in my freeware airport and the lights are way too bright/overdone in 2024. Sounds like that has been fixed for next patch…we will see. This is why the MS default airports do not look as bad as 3rd party since the default airports use the autogenerated taxiway lights. I think the bespoke airports might use custom light rows…haven’t really checked any of them yet.
Thanks for this interesting insight. I listened to that part of the stream four times and still couldn’t make out that specific word Martial said—maybe it was ‘light row’ in French To be honest, this gentleman’s ability to clearly formulate or explain things seems nonexistent, though it might simply be a language barrier.
Anyhow, I’m a bit disappointed they’re spending time on subjective and secondary issues like lighting instead of focusing solely on core functions in this phase – stability and performance.
I think you need to be a bit more specific in what you want, as night lighting has a lot of different aspects, and no one’s asking to just “make it darker” , rather just removing unrealistic bright parts that
shouldn’t be illuminated (deserts, farmlands & such doesn’t glow in the dark IRL)
But I definitely think night lighting needs separate threads here instead of a mega thread , much better to have specific issue threads instead of just night being “too bright” or “too dark”.
I think the title of this topic perfectly expresses what I want – or are you also only reading the first words? That being said, I completely agree with you about the need to split megathreads into logical tasks. However, this requires someone competent to actively read and evaluate them. Priorities also need to be clearly set to focus solely on solving primary issues—those that prevent the product from being normally used—along with the self-confidence to reinforce them.
If your purpose of this thread is to separate the discussion into just taxi light brightness, that’s all good.
Although the devs already addressed what they are doing to the taxi lights, why create an additional thread for it…?
I’m just saying, stay with “reduce current taxi light brightness”, instead of adding “don’t touch anything else”, even though there are more adjustments needing to be done, not just the taxi lights.
If you want to object to what’s being said in the other thread, then why not just post that in the thread where those concerns are being raised, instead of creating a new thread to counter what’s being said in an already existing thread, splitting the discussion even further …?
There’s a reason the overly bright and unrealistic sepia mask is one of the most voted bug in both MSFS 2020 and raising similar amount of voices in 2024. No one is asking to just “make it all darker”, but to remove what’s being horribly unrealistic.
I guess by with being specific, do you mean don’t touch the city lamps? Their light splashes? The sky brightness? The stars? The unlit ground brightness? Or just the background gamma…?
There’s no one calling for making it all just darker afaik…
Do you mean those who think it looks weird where unlit deserts, mountains and farmlands glow in the dark? And the solution should be to turn their displays down? Or what purists are you talking about…?
I understand that you feel omniscient and therefore entitled to tell others what, where, and how they’re allowed to discuss things. Yet, you seem to be the only one missing the very simple meaning and purpose of this topic.
You also contradict yourself by criticizing discussions in a megathread while simultaneously recommending that I post my point there. On top of that, you bring unrelated themes like ‘sepia’ into this conversation, effectively making this topic just as broad as the one you’re criticizing.
It’s clear what your primary purpose is—to lecture and bash.
Not sure how to respond to that, as you seemed to react more to whatever you think my intentions / agendas are rather than what I had to say about night lighting…
You: Taxi lights bad, but the rest is not too bright, don’t touch any thing else, don’t make it darker
Me: yup Taxi lights bad, although some other parts parts are actually too bright, and needs to be darker, like the sepia mask.
I was under the opinion that it was already a broad subject, besides the taxi lights that’s already addressed, you also tell the devs to not touch anything else, don’t make anything else darker.
And I disagree on that very broad statement and specify why. (Sepia mask)
What ever assumptions / opinions you have about me personally and whatever agenda you seem to think I have, ”omniscient, entitled, lecturing, bashing”, send me a private message if you want to talk about that, and let’s just talk about the night lighting here.
We all want night to look awesome. I want it to look realistic as well.
Yes, the title of this topic means exactly what it states—please do not touch the sim’s brightness; only correct the visibility of taxiway lights. To be honest, I think that focusing on visuals at this stage is completely counterproductive. Here’s why:
Subjectivity: Brightness is highly subjective and depends on individual preferences, display quality, and settings. Debating it can be endless and ultimately lead nowhere, as some posts in this topic already demonstrate. The popular “too bright” megathread highlights this even more clearly.
More Urgent Core Issues: There are far more pressing issues that need immediate attention, such as stability, performance, the SDK, and the marketplace. I strongly believe developers should focus exclusively on these core problems for now.
As for me, it’s clear from my previous posts that I like the current brightness and overall look of the sim—it looks absolutely gorgeous on my 55" OLED TV with HDR. But let’s set this personal bias aside for now
