I think its time we address the elephant in the room, and I’m going to hurt some feelings but somethings need to be said.
I say this with the utmost respect. Your ATC is poorly designed and implemented. The overall feeling of the ATC model is lazy.
Considering the advancements of technology, Its abysmal, its difficult to use and completely inconsistent. We shouldn’t have to look to 3rd party sources for ATC in a sim designed and developed around civilian flying, and it still shouldn’t feel like I am using a “polished” version from FSX.
I can’t even get up and walk away to make a quick cup of coffee and pet my dog without the controller dropping my IFR because I didn’t’ respond to a radio call within less than 2 minutes. That’s absolutely ridiculous. And why would I just refile my IFR when it wont respect my originally filed cruising altitude? Or if I request a different cruising altitude, the ATC won’t give me clearance to descend until I’m already technically on my final approach?? Better yet, in the cases of Add-On aircraft like PMDG, or Fenix, the flight plan doesn’t sync. Therefore, I can’t even refile without restarting my flight, but I’m over Greenland on a flight from Heathrow into John F. Kennedy, do you see our issue? You even offer PMDG products on the marketplace now, but the FMS still doesn’t sync.
And these are not localized, these are widespread and I’d wager that ATC is one of the LARGEST complaints on this forum. I have P2ATC, I’ve tried VATSIM, but I have a stutter and I get nervous talking to people so it’s extremely difficult. And your in-game option is horrendous. Therefore I ask that you fix the ATC or remove it until you can devote the time and manpower to making a better experience all around. I feel like it’s gone on long enough. It’s 2023 for goodness sakes. Look at ChatGBT, Microsoft’s own Bing AI? The API is extremely accessible, I don’t really think there is an excuse especially considering Microsoft’s options.
Enough is Enough Asobo/Microsoft. Please, we deserve better.
Hi there,
While I agree that we need revamped ATC, there are many ATC Wishlist topics for very specific ATC requests. I encourage everyone to look through the list and vote for what they feel is appropriate.
Can’t change ATC until you revamp flight planning and AIRAC logic. There’s still two AAUs left inr the year that hopefully will fix the remaining FMS on planes to NXi standards. Only then can you even think of fixing flight planning and AIRAC logic in the sim core code. After that - it makes sense to fix ATC. Long term plans.
Yes, been addressed umpteen times and for the purists it’s a nightmare. But, although you probably don’t agree with them, there are workarounds and procedures that will make in-game ATC work reasonably well - my last three IFR flights all were okay, ATC-wise anyway, only problems were of my making - but I digress.
We are told that there are plans and Working Title has been asked to wave their magic wands over it. But as mentioned above, it’s not a short term solution.
But if ATC is that bad for you, just turn it off, you don’t HAVE to use it.
ATC is pretty wonky but I do dig the immersion and the Azure voice models are really pretty good. A quiet cockpit just doesn’t feel right to me, no matter what I’m flying.
I think my biggest gripe is inability to request different runways/approaches from controller - filed IFR KMSP>KSUX last night and programmed a nice slow descent into an approach at RW13, ATC asks me to do some goofy STAR procedure (with my TBM930) to RW31. I have the option to “request a different runway” - sweet! So I ask for RW13 and he tells me to fly an approach to 13 but “circle to land runway 31” still. So close, guys!
I wholeheartedly disagree with all of you. This has been bad since the days of FSX, and we keeps making up (and accepting) excuses. I’m not accepting that anymore, I refuse to. They’ve had how long get the AIRAC cycle on par? They’re obviously in the business of buying out companies to meet the simulators needs (ie Working Title, RIP), so just buy out Jeppson/Navigraph. Plus, the recent development on Microsoft’s end to their AI chat bot? This needs to be made a priority if you guys are telling people to “just don’t use the ATC!!” I’m sorry, I thought this was a civilian flight sim, not DCS…
And besides, does that solves anything? No… I want to use ATC. I shouldn’t be forced to spend out of pocket for a better option, it appalling at this day in our technological age.
The amount of money I spend after already buying each iteration of whatever flight sim and NONE of these high-dollar devs can get a respectable ATC working with near limitless finances and resources? But some guy who codes and programs at home like I do, part time, financing software development out of his own pocket makes an ATC program with voice recognition? And you don’t even have to use the voice option, you can select exactly what you want it to say and it will (robotically, sure,) say it for you. It’s lightweight, takes up minimal disk space, and has a built in flight planner, taxi map, etc. One person makes all of that and you guys are making excuses for Microsoft with near limitless computer science major graduates, full stack devs, and programmer/testers.
I’m sorry, but NO! Forums like these were created for exactly this, TELLING DEVS NO!! We want better for our money. Especially for what they are charging for games and simulators nowadays.
PS: I did not move this to general discussion. This was originally posted in wishlist. I had to edit a few things but I never moved this to general discussion.
Are you saying you’re willing to get this developed for Microsoft (paid, obviously)? There are lots of other bugs and development issues aside from ATC, and the companies only have so many resources to use on them. Weather, avionics, world detail, optimizations, new aircraft, etc. all need attention from the same limited resources.
If you want real world ATC, you shouldn’t be leaving the controls anyway, right? So which do you want, realism, or casual play? Maybe just pause the sim before stepping away.
I agree but the ATC is seriously flawed and yes we can turn it off. That unfortunately ruins immersion as ATC in real life is a huge part of flying. They should just make fixing ATC a huge priority and stop adding all this new content until it’s fixed.
On my simlulator, ATC instructs me constantly to yo-yo between two adjacent flight levels until I switch it off. I can’t imagine it would be terribly hard to code in some sort of guard logic that prevented it from doing this until the ATC feature is rewritten.
I read the title and about this much of your love letter. They’re all the same after that
it’s been well documented the in-game ATC has issues. If you want a better ATC experience and don’t like the alternatives, unfortunately you’ll have to wait for Asobo to fix it, or just not use it. I’m not defending how atrocious the in-game ATC is, i’m just saying there’s no further sympathy or response you can get that hasn’t already been discussed.
These threads should be closed and linked to the superthread wishlist before they can start
I was referring to Pilot2ATC. And if I expanded my language library a little bit I would love to, it’d be a bit of a challenge as I’m a web dev but I’m sure I’d be capable of figuring it out. We use a lot of the same metrics for pulling REST/SOAP apis, in order to feed analytical data for web based applications. I’ve read that C# is similar to JS so yeah.
And I generally don’t pause my flights. Certain applications I like to use, such as OnAir, you’re not allowed to pause or use AI assistance. This is another reason why the community has been pushing for shared cockpits. And normally IRL, there is an FO onboard (or Captain if in the FO role) when coffee and Bathroom breaks occur. Now normally there are not dogs onboard either (at least ones you’re not allowed to pet) and I admit that breaks my realism cycle. Either way, getting up and stepping away from the flight deck (computer desk) happens.
Actually, I agree with you ! No point in removing it now, just enhance it Later, after all the bugs are resolved. I keep it turned off most of the time. When I want serious, logical and reliable ATC, I turn on Vatsim and talk to human controllers that actually try very hard to follow ATC guidelines. Later if I just want some happy entertainment, I turn on the built-in ATC.
He has the right to voice his opinion, just as you have the right to completely ignore the post and not read it at all.
There are too many topics locked, moved and closed as it is.
The Oscars are coming up . I going to watch for the " …and in the category of Forum Moderation, the Oscar for the best topic Locker goes to…"
can’t wait
