I’m not a big user of the ‘load/save’ function within MFS and in fact, I’ve only been using it to save some replay-able approaches (with the live weather at the time).
My understanding is that when you load a saved flight that had “Live” weather as the preset, you’re instead given a snapshot of what the weather was at that moment in time - and it remains that way permanently throughout the rest of your flight. (Unless this changed in the last update? I couldn’t see it in the notes)
Which leads me onto my question - does anyone know where this weather data is saved, and can it be modified? The only place in the .FLT file I’ve been able to find any mention of weather is below, which doesn’t give too much away.
I thought it was stored in the SPB file, a block of binary data. However that file doesn’t get saved while sitting on the runway with no destination. So maybe that’s the flight plan or progress data. I saved again right after take off and get a small SPB file (1kb), the ones saved with bush flights are 41kb on average for Alaska, 56kb on average for France, odd.
I tried swapping out the FLT.FSSAVE file between two saves with different weather, yet that didn’t do anything. No clue what that is for. Those files are always 8,244 bytes and mostly empty, just some unicode names.
Bush flight saves include a Weather.WPR file, yet those are presets.
It’s magic! Unless it simply doesn’t get saved (anymore).
To test that, the weather has to change first.
Anyway reloading my test file, flight plan is gone, altitude setting is gone, AP off, but the weather is still the same. Will check tomorrow what it looks like
Yep, I’m in the same boat here. It looks like reloading this saved flight some time tomorrow might be the only way to know if Live Weather now updates after loading saved flights (strange that MS would leave such a big improvement off their notes, if so?).
What doesn’t help is that the toolbar is still disabled/limited after loading, so it’s something that’s gonna have to be judged with the naked eye or using the cockpit weather systems.
If anyone else has already tested this, please feel free to chime in.
The weather hasn’t really changed yet (checked first by loading at the airport and changing time to day) but at least the save game does save the current time (it’s dark now in Xianyang)
Toolbar is indeed gone, shortcut keys for VFR map and ATC don’t do anything. ATC is nagging me atm but I can’t respond. “Acknowledge last transmission” Sorry can’t “ATC services terminated” (Co-pilot radio handling is on but the co-pilot isn’t responding either)
Was live weather actually ever stored in save games? I don’t remember ever seeing any extra save files and if its not the SPB file then there is no where it can be. Slew mode doesn’t work either so only way to find out of live weather is updating is fly to the desert, long way lol.
I flew away from the clouds (headed north to Mongolian desert) so it’s definitely not static. I guess they fixed it resuming the use of live weather as set in the save file
UseWeatherFile=False
UseLiveWeather=True
thats what i edit in Bush Trips to get Live weather, it allows you to open the weather tab from the toiolbar once your ingame and auto sets it to live when you start
never tried it with a saved game .flt other than those, i believe it just makes it ignore that ‘saved’
weather data
After going through several tests today, I can confirm that Live Weather most certainly updates from saved flights. If you want static weather, you have to save a weather profile, which answers my initial question - the data is saved in the 3rd line down: “WeatherPresetFile”.
But as @SvenZ has already alluded to, what is the point? Saving/loading flights is still hopelessly broken and it’s been this way since MFS launched. I thought at the very least I might be able to use this feature to archive some of my favourite/challenging approaches, but even the NAV frequencies, CDI/OBS and all other avionics fail to save… It’s very clear why Asobo haven’t yet made any ‘Landing Challenges’ in IMC conditions!
So in conclusion, if you still want to use this feature (even with all its flaws) to save a challenging visual approach with static Weather, make sure you save your current weather as a new weather profile, then set the profile, save your flight, and the next time you load it, you should have the same static weather you flew in last time. Not an ideal solution, but hey…
@SavvySigma
Yea, too bad the save/load doesn’t work right yet. You might try clicking on the log entry for a previous flight/approach, which will give you a dropdown to refly that mission. It saves me a lot of time setting up flights or approaches I’ve previously set up and flown.
Regards
I guess you can save the weather preset yourself and link it there in the save file, or just load it after. But indeed, a lot of work while the rest is still broken. And there is no way to save a live weather snapshot as a weather preset. Maybe one day.
