UPDATE AFTER SU7 (1.21.18.0): Now all we seem to have are cumulus type clouds and ugly cotton “puffs” all over the place. They are usually the same height and are all over the place and the clouds look really bad. We have lost all cloud types that we used to see say back around SU3 and before. We have no more true overcast, lost the beautiful thin and (important) OPAQUE higher layers of overcast, broken and few, as well as lower layers of overcast, broken, and few opaque stratus type clouds. The clouds no longer have defined opaque transitions, meaning they are wispy-like and our visibility doesn’t go from good (outside of a cloud) to “nothing” when entering a cloud. It just kind of “fades” to lower visibility, especially when looking down. That takes a ton of immersion away of “flying through a cloud”. We no longer see the beautiful god rays that used to poke through the broken clouds to the ground, I’m not sure what happened but can we get all of these clouds from early release versions BACK? It seems that when MSFS first released, we had a larger “variety” of clouds, and they looked BEAUTIFUL.
Is there testing going on after SU7 where the studio maybe removed all cloud types except cumulus to accommodate the METAR weather? The new attempts to simulate overcast at an airport with METAR really looks bad and does not simulate overcast very good at all. It is almost as if the big puffy clouds are supposed to “trick” us into thinking it’s overcast or something. I’ve got over 1,200 hours in this sim and have seen transformation of the clouds go to jaw dropping beautiful, to jaw dropping awful and It’s nothing personal because the simulator is awesome, but just wanted to bring this to the attention to the studio.
If we simply cannot have METAR mixed with the prediction system (or if we do it looks like it does today) then I for one wish we could just have an on/off switch - one for using the newer “METAR system mixed with prediction system” and then the other setting to JUST use the “old” prediction only system WITH the “old” clouds we had pre SU3 (before changes had to be made for XBOX?)
BEFORE SU7 (following text is the original post from June 2021): Especially cumulus clouds and cumulonimbus. Maybe it’s the areas I’m flying in as to why I don’t see them, but I don’t see those anymore?
I’m flying in areas like Florida, where I live and looking outside in the real world this time of year (summer), I always see towering cumulonimbus clouds, cumulus, and eventually those turn into thunderstorms extending to 30,000 feet plus height. I would fully expect to see these types of clouds in MSFS (we KNOW it’s capable because we’ve all witnessed them!), but do not anymore. Please post screenshots if anyone is seeing them now? I used to see beautiful cumulus with the sun rays causing the most realistic scenes I’ve ever witnessed in flight simming since 1983!
In MSFS (NOW), all I see in Florida is this thin, transparent ugly cloud layer with lightning. Sometimes there are these “thicker” clouds that I guess are supposed to be thunderstorms that extend to the ground with rain, but still no defined edge cumulus clouds like we used to see when the sim came out. We used to be able to see defined cloud shadows on the ground, now it is only when fully overcast does the ground get darker; now we do not seem to get defined cloud shadows on the ground! The dark to light transitions can and does sometimes mess with your head when flying in real world and can be part of the challenge. What has happened to all of these things?
Last week we had a pretty bad weather system in the area, and there were definitely many more clouds with the rain squalls in the sim, but the clouds were “puffy” not well defined and kind of melted like cotton candy. Most of the time transparent especially when you get close to them. No in/out of cloud immersion like it used to be.
Were there changes to help performance to coordinate with x-box release? Please say that the original clouds will be back soon?
Does anyone see convincing, well defined cumulus and cumulonimbus/towering cumulonimbus clouds in MSFS anymore (using real weather not a preset)?
