London Gatwick EGKK is one of the busiest airports in the world.
Having been watching with the drone camera, in the last 2 hours:
Not one taxi
Not one takeoff
Not one landing
All traffic settings, including ground density, set to 100%. Loads of inert - seemingly dead - aircraft at the gates. One or two even ask for clearance…but never taxi or takeoff.
A week ago I had traffic doing something almost every 5 minutes. Now, nothing.
The annoying thing is that after I takeoff, I cannot respond to ATC as there are so many AI aircraft using the airwaves.
What happened to the good old FSX days when you had to queue to take off?
Honestly, this program is so far away from what was promised that it is hard to believe.
It may be different in US airports but here in the UK, the aviation industry has truly been killed…at least it has in this so called ‘simulator’.
I used to run the same experiment at Heathrow, back when MSFS 2020 first dropped. If you hung around for 30mins or so you would see the airport slowly (and I mean slowly) come to life. A small number of planes would begin taxiing to the runways and take off, some planes would even come into land. Then that all stopped. One or other of the patches since, which also killed-off A.I. Control as a (mostly) workable thing.
I haven’t touched this sim for a few weeks now. I think I need to leave it alone for months. Come back in 6 months and see if anything’s improved. It’s just gotten worse and worse since release and the few things I enjoyed about it (A.I. Control, A.I. offline traffic, etc) all went away.
It’s been out for two months already and we’re up to .5 and .4 was never released. I don’t remember what .1 did and .2 & .3 introduced new bugs that broke other things anyway.
You relax. I’m gonna keep whinging until the game matches the adverts.
The hype I had when it was released was unreal. I only thought about this sim and wanted to fly. Right now that hype is totally lost and my mind isn’t anymore on this sim due al the things they promised and never came out. Haven’t touched the sim for 3 weeks straight. Such a shame
One of many regressions in MSFS. Never ever have I heard “you are number 2 for landing, follow the aircraft on final” or “you are number 2 for takeoff”. Not saying it’s not in the game, but I have never heard it once, even at international hub airports.
Why would you release the game with ATC that is less capable than the older one from 2006?
Landing a 747 in Philadelphia, PA yesterday evening I heard the ATC warn me about another aircraft ahead of me on final. The other aircraft was being reported as Generic though so I have a feeling that it was another human player and not AI. This was right before I crashed in the heavy fog being displayed at the airport despite it being sunny outside my window in real life (I live just outside of Philadelphia). I do have to say that the fog representation was quite impressive though.
That being said, live traffic appears to have inconsistencies. At times it works perfectly, and occasionally it seems to fail to connect to the server.
When it works, though, it’s infinitely superior to the default solution of any other sim, simply because it actually simulates what is happening instead of simplified and outdated timetables.
it’s not perfect. For instance, parked inactive aircraft are random, but it’s a foundation for further development superior to anything the compatition launched with.
Incidentally, Gatwick is certainly a very busy airport, but I don’t expect it to be THAT busy in the late evening in covid times. If you saw no traffic, I expect that was one of the times it malfunctioned, but you should remember the live traffic (when it works) always shows the current situation (with about 15 minutes delay), regardless of the time you set.
You may have missed FSX’s launch, or any time near launch.
It’s broken here in the USA too. I have done flights in and out of KSFO, KDEN, KDFW, and KRNO. I see the same issue as the OP. Just another item not working right.
I used to hear this all the time with live traffic pre-release. I remember how impressed I was lining up for final and having a number of planes in front of and behind me.
Now I have AI traffic up at 100% and the only thing it does is prevents me from getting a word in on the radio. I really see nothing coming or going from the airport.
The thread is really about offline AI traffic but thanks for your observations.
I do not use live traffic as the aircraft disappear when the pilot turns off the xsponder and rarely taxi. The aircraft models are also entirely inappropriate for airports outside of main hubs.
Dreamliners could not possibly land at Southampton but managed it in this rather silly game (which it is currently).
My point is that the offline AI worked very well for a while but Asobo have changed something and now the AI is much worse, as indeed others have posted.
And yes, I was around for the launch of FSX. I was even around for the launch of Sublogic Flight Simulator, which later became MSFS. I was even around for Landing Simulator for the Commodore Pet (Google it).
In short, I have some experience with simulators…and I was also a pilot until my retirement.
So you’re not using the main feature and you complain that the replacement is underdeveloped?
Aircraft certainly taxi all the time with live traffic. Aicraft models are generic placeholders whether it’s live or not.
If you were around for the launch of FSX, you’d know that default AI was extremely sparse.
If you have not been able to fly a single plane for two months, you may have done something wrong when learning to take off. Try disengaging the parking brake? It certainly works for me.
Funny one about the live AI. This aircraft seems to be training landings and take offs over and over at Redhill Aerodrome, and it’s driving the live AI crazy. Now I have 3 of him on my screen.
there are many updates to come.
