...is another flight simulator! [:)]

Joining the ranks of  Austin Meyer, creator of X-plane, and Matthieu Laban  (who's on the blog roll on the right) is Andreas Jung, who posted a quite thoughtful comment on my last post.

I can't remember the most recent time I've seen this posted (or where), but I've seen it crop up a bit in the major Flight Sim forums:

Microsoft should use Google Earth for Flight Simulator.

 Leave aside for the moment the fact that Microsoft has a rival product gaining steam, the point is people like the idea of highly detailed and accurate satellite imagery-- especially of the sort Google Earth provides-- all streamed over the internet.

At first blush it sounds pretty cool, yeah?

"There's my house!" (speaking of the here's my house thing, check this link out for the ultimate in here's my houseness)

"There's Grandma's house!"

"There's the The Champs Elysées!"

"There's Yasgur's Farm!"

And so on.

I've been a fan of Google Earth when it was still Keyhole, and I think what we're doing here is pretty cool too. Having been involved with scenery/terrain design for multiple ACES games studios titles, I'd be really excited to see streamed satellite imagery appear in Flight Sim (although it could apply to just about anything if done right...), but truthfully I think people underestimate the problems the idea presents. To be clear, none of what I'm about to list are unsolvable, but they do present a barrier to implementation. The list below is not comprehensive, just what came off the top of my head:

1. There's not full coverage of the globe yet.

   True, you wouldn't need to have *everything* to make it happen, but I can already read the e-mails when it turns out (fill in the blank here of your favorite spot on Earth) isn't in the product... This means that you'd have to have some sort of hybrid between what you do have covered and some sort of generic default. This currently works in Flight Simulator (witness VFR scenery, here too, Megascenery, etc.), with specific locations, but not streaming. The progress on what is available changes daily, and I can say that I'm amazed at what's available now as opposed to even just 2-3 years ago...

2. What is covered is inconsistent in color, quality, and season.

I believe that the joy of flying over highly accurate real world imagery would be offset by the immersion break of flying from one inconsistent area to the next, and that it would happen pretty fast. I think people are way more forgiving of a how Google/MSFT might use imagery for mapping versus how they would view it's use in a game/sim. To get consistency you'd have to have a massive effort of color correction/adjustment, or a freakishly advanced automatic system.

3. No good night imagery exists.

At least that I'm aware of. And when I mean good, I mean same level of detail as day stuff. Which means that you'd have to come up with a good way to fake it. (like Megascenery)

4. All the time information is stamped into the image.

Flightsim, for example, ships with Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter, Hard Winter, and Night variations of our landclass textures. We drape these textures over DEM, light them, and render shadows into the terrain. Much aerial/satellite imagery has lighting from when the image was taken already present-- strong lighting too. This makes for great screenshots, but it does mean that you'd lose one of the neatest things about Flight Sim-- we model the march of time: leave your computer running Flight Sim, and you'll see seasons and time of day change. To replicate that with Google Earth Tech, you'd have to increase the amount of imagery by at least 5X, *and* start to track time of day/seasonal change.

5. Autogen tech isn't designed for massive aerial/sat scenery

Right now autogen tech works pretty well for what it was designed for: default scenery and small (100-400 tile) imagery areas. But as many 3rd party imagery people'll tell you, there's not enough "auto" in autogen. :)

There are mechanisms that can be used to generate buildings and the like, but designing and implementing such a system to do what is necessary in Flight Sim is not a small task.(scroll down the page)

6. Streaming, like that used in Google Earth is not a magic bullet approach for imagery display.

Even when all it's doing is displaying imagery, it's easy to get the "blurries" in Google Earth. Tack on a lot of other systems and simulation stuff, and... well... if you think it can get bad in Flight Sim...

Let me reiterate: I think the tech and potential results are very enticing, and the problems above are are solvable in one way or another.

I've linked throughout this post to some great large scale imagery solutions available already for Flight Sim, so you can see the possibilities in action. And I should note: this is something we look at periodically. Jason Dent and I talked a few years ago about what it would take to do aerial imagery for the planet at 8 meters per pixel (Flight Sim currently uses a resolution of approx 4.8 meters per pixel), and we came up with a figure of around a terrabyte (for just one season/time of day, if I remember right). Sounded pretty bluesky in 1999 (when Jason and I first talked about it), but way more doable now. Technology changes pretty rapidly these days, so who knows?

It would be neat to see my house...

Two new additions to the ACES alumni blog roll.

Kate Bigel was the Art Director who led the studio way back when I first came on, and the person responsible for hiring more than a few of us old timers here in the Art department. (now you know who to blame). She and her husband quit their jobs in time to miss the tech bubble collapse, and lit out for pastures greener-- sea green as a matter of fact. Catch up with them here...

Jason Dent (who was recently in town) was the key developer responsible for the the Flight Simulator terrain engine. Jason decided that after years of building the planet in computer space, it was time to see it up close and personal. Jason did not get out before the bubble collapsed, but it looks like he survived [;)] Actually, we got to see him on his recent visit, and he looks five years younger...Take a gander at Jason's travels here.

There's a sentiment I've seen echoed on various forums regarding Flight Simulator, with regards to testing-- especially beta testing. This sentiment is captured over at Avsim by a poster who claims "...nobody outside the MS building is a beta tester. You are a marketing tool and an extra set of eyes."  (part of a longer thread). The poster was previously involved in testing a console title.

Now, I'm *not* a tester. I'm an artist. We make bugs, we don't find them.[:)]  But I do happen to sit next to somone who is a tester, so I feel fully qualified to shoot my mouth off about the testing process here in the ACES game studio.

I imagine that console testing might very well happen as Mr._Al describes. I don't know. My experience deals with PC titles, and even there I can tell you with confidence that testing a title like Flight Simulator is a different kettle of fish than testing Half Life 2.

PC titles have to worry about a broad spectrum of configurations (how video cards/ sound cards/ memory/ CPU/, etc interact) whereas consoles don't. That means configuration testing is a part of the external testing process-- an important part. Even Microsoft doesn't have an infinite number of machines to test various configurations on-- we use a representative sample (which is a lot of machines) instead. Having a wide variety of configurations used in the "wild" (external test) as it were, drastically increases the odds that you'll catch a major crashing or hanging bug. In a sense that might be considered an "extra set of eyes," but the feedback and input (via crash logs and written feedback) are not the only way external beta testers affect final quality, and are critical to a successful release.

Simulations-- like Flight Simulator, are different than other PC titles. Flight Sim, for example, is a pretty big sandbox-- fly anywhere (except the poles...), any time of day, in a variety of aircraft technologies. You look at a game/sim like Forza, for example, and yes it's pretty realistic. Tons of cars, tons of detail. Yes, it edges into the simulations space. But...can you drive from Lillestrøm to Sørumsand? Umm... nope. You're locked into the (very detailed) areas provided. The limitation of Forza and the breadth of Flight Simulator require different testing models, differing areas of expertise. We have a great group of full time testers. They come from a variety of backgrounds, but they are certainly subject matter experts in their various areas of expertise, and yes, a bunch of 'em are pilots. That being said, we bring various outside experts onto our Beta as necessary and useful; meteorologists, air traffic controllers, pilots, and the like. Sometimes those experts are also part of our existing user community. They are listened to.

There's also the 3rd party. The mod/add-on community for Flightsim is quite large and contains both professional and amateur components, some of which have large (passionate and vocal) followings. While the team's focus has to be on the core product, we invest a significant amount of time and resources into supporting backwards compatability. Part of that back compat testing is done in house to be sure, but we invite many representative samples of add-on developers from multiple areas and "hardcore" users to our Betas to provide feedback and input precisely on those areas.

All those people have ideas and feedback. The vast majority of bugs logged are found by our internal teams (they'd better, since that's their fulltime job-- to find bugs), but the Flight Sim Beta has the highest "valid" (usually meaning "non duplicated") bugs found by external process. That ain't 'cause the code's crappy. It's 'cause the Beta testers are both informed and passionate about what they do. They care about what they're doing and give great feedback. Which makes better product.

That being said, the rap sometimes given to the testers is that they "didn't do their job, just look at this bug (fill in your own example here)!" to which I'd say;

"Hold on there Sparky! Not so fast!"

I've mentioned before this post that there are "bugs" and there are incomplete features, and that one is often confused with the other. I'm not walking some fine semantics line when I say this, it's just the nature of the beast. In part, it's why we have version numbers: we build upon what's gone before, and take advantage of new opportunities. This is not meant to excuse poor or incomplete implementation: sometimes we're guilty of that. Usually it's because time and resources don't allow for more, and we decided that something is better than nothing. That choice isn't always the right choice, but on the whole I think we've done okay.

Let me bring this post back to where I started. Here at ACES, our Beta testers (and our fulltime testers too!) have a more than average impact on the development of our products. Their suggestions and input have changed feature implementation and increased quality. Not every suggestion leads to an immediate implementation, but don't assume that because it's not in the product that it wasn't asked for, or remarked upon. (For that matter, don't assume that the team doesn't argue feature set back and forth as well. We do.) Our Beta testers are more than a "marketing tool." (we ask them to sign an NDA, and frankly would prefer them not to really mention they've tested the product at all), and certainly more than "an extra set of eyes" (although when you've got a whole planet to deliver, you need every set of eyes you can get!).

[EDIT]

There's a lively comment or two (including the person originally quoted) in the comments section of this post, and a follow up from me with a little more exposition in it, please check 'em out...

http://www.officialkwanzaawebsite.org/index.html

Burning Man in Flight Sim?!!!!!!!!!!!!

see here

I love to cruise the screenshot forums of various community sites, and occaisionally I like to share what I've found...

First off, one of my perennial favorites, Avsim's Steve "Bearracing" Cartwright. Steve has consistently been innovative in *what* he shoots and *how* he shoots it. Plus, he's prolific. Bear also is great about giving  Avsim library additions a whirl and a pic. As seen here: Latest Library Downloads and just in time for Xmas!

And a couple more links:

Before Christmas Delivery!

Ouch!!!! Hard landings hurt!

One of my favorite screenshot cruise-o-rama location is flyawaysimulation.com  Why? 'Cause they have a thumbnail preview that let's you quickly decide what you want to look at larger. You can even sort by date, popularity, or hits. Take a gander:

http://flyawaysimulation.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=My_eGallery&file=index&do=showgall&gid=10

Here's a neat one from the desert. I think the scenery is this (screens worth a look for themselves...)

One final fun one from Simflight.com:

http://forums.simflight.com/viewtopic.php?t=47157

If you haven't done so lately, why not take a quick trip over to virtual France and catch up with Matthieu:

http://www.white-clouds.org/

If'n he's on your blogroll, don't forget to change your links...

for the rest of us

It looks like he has a name now.

Here's mine:

My Unitarian Jihad Name is: Brother Shuriken of Warm Humanitarianism.

Get yours.

Anybody remember the brouhaha over “missing” bridges in Flight Simulator 2004?

(There’s a beautiful rant here: http://www.flightsim.com/cgi/kds?$=main/op-ed/ed343.htm)

What was up with that anyway? Well… lots of things really. A real cluster if you will.

We dramatically changed the way we produced scenery for the world, starting with the end of Flight Simulator 2002, and part of that change meant that we had more control of the whole scenery creation process. We also changed some key technologies used in the scenery systemaround the same time. The FS world was littered with content created for FS 95 and 98. Most of that carried on just fine to FS 2000, but by the time FS 2002 and then FS 2004 rolled around, that legacy content looked bad, and/or no longer worked in the product. And when I say it looked bad, I mean very bad. Like it was produced in 1995 or something.

Amongst that content were roughly 160 or so bridges. Some famous, some not so much.

Now, we’ve been in the process of replacing and adding (and occasionally deleting) landmarks to the world with each version, and bridges are part of that work process, but you can imagine that if you create a 1000 landmark objects, do you really want 16% of those objects to be bridges? Especially when you haven’t done objects that are arguably more important or interesting, either for aerial navigation or for cultural reasons? Heck no!

So the bridges had to go.

But wait, it's all okay ‘cause we had a much better plan.

Why not devise a system that’d put a bridge *everywhere* there’s supposed to be a bridge, or at least everywhere it’s *believable* there should be a bridge? Forget 160 bridges, we’ll do thousands… Sure, a few unique bridges would be replaced with something more generic, but it’d do until we would next be able to do them again.

Okey doke. Sounds great.

Meanwhile, back on planet reality, remember how I said that we changed the process by which we created scenery? Well, most stuff in the world came from data that had been hand massaged (or created), and road and bridge placement was no different.

Which is where we started to run into some problems.

A lot of road data was clipped to shorelines (who needs a road under water?), some road data ended inexplicably in the middle of a lake or river. Which meant that we got a lot of missing bridges (‘cause according to the data there was no bridge needed, two roads just happened to end across from each other over a river or lake…), and bridges that ended abruptly in the middle of the water. To say nothing of the tiny bridges generated between to points really really close to each other, or the multiple “fan” bridges spouted for some reason or other…

Right solution: imperfect implementation.

Most of the missing landmark bridges weren’t replaced with generic versions because of the clipped road problem mentioned above. By the time we realized the magnitude of the problem (that there were that many bridges missing), it was too late (and too risky for the ship schedule) to try and fix or replace with brand new content.

At the time, it didn’t seem like it was going to be that big of a deal. True, some content that had been around for awhile would no longer be there, but we *were* adding (even though there were some warts) a bunch of new stuff that should more than make up for the old *ugly* stuff that was now gone. We get requests for world landmark items all the time -- the Flight Sim world has missed having some pretty big landmarks in it’s day (and yes there’s many still missing…)-- and that’s where we tend to focus our efforts, making sure what’s in the product is reasonably acceptable, while adding as much new stuff as possible. Imagine how the product would be if all we did was the same old stuff over and over again. The same places’d look better to be sure, but they’d still be the same places. As far as requests go, occasionally a bridge’ll be requested, but for the most part not. Didn’t think people were really going to miss them much if at all. So we took the list of now gone bridges, and added them to the potential workload for next time.

At release of course, there was quite a great hue and cry. We quickly put that list of bridges into production to be ready if there was ever a patch, and if not, at least they’d be there in the next version.

Patch we did, so we scrambled to get as many replacements done as possible.

In the end, I think the biggest reason it became such a fiasco was there was no way to communicate to the customer not only *what* was changing, but also *why.* Yes, there’d be people who’d be upset that something they’d come to expect had changed or was gone, but the majority of people would know that we didn’t just leave something out of the product out of spite or negligence.

Wow. Long post for ole Jasers!

I’ll prop this post up, but don’t be surprised if I edit it over the next couple of days. I fear that in long posts like these I lose what I’m really trying to say, and usually after a couple of days I want to rewrite the whole thing.

 We’ll see. J

Cheers,

Jason

 The Wing Fell Off  shows off a few new screens of Over Flanders Fields for CFS3. Looks pretty good! I've always been partial to WWI aerial stuff.

From Rob's blog I worked over to SimHQ, looked for the so called "CFS 4 screens" And THEN read that they'd been pulled.

Rob does point out simhq has had some in depth roundtable discussions:

The Future of Simulations (Series 1)
Part 1:  Staff Discussion   Forum Discussion
Part 2:  Staff Discussion   Forum Discussion
Part 3:  Staff Discussion   Forum Discussion
Part 4:  Editorial    Forum Discussion
Part 5:  Editorial    Forum Discussion

The Future of Simulations (Series 2)
Part 1: Developers Roundtable   Forum Discussion
Part 2: Developer's Roundtable   Forum Discussion
Part 3: Developer's Roundtable   Forum Discussion
Part 4: Developer's Roundtable   Forum Discussion
Part 5: Developer's Roundtable   Forum Discussion

Editorial: We're All Simmers, But What's A Sim?
Forum Discussion

The Future of Our Genre   Editorial  Discussion

I'll need to read 'em.

I used to spend a lot of time cruising simhq, looks like I should get back to doing it regularly.

Also,

Found this at simhq,  that I thought was neat (though I find the site design annoying) ...

http://thevirtualblueangels.com/theblues.htm

On the left hand side of the page look for a button marked "downloads" (second from the bottom), which should take you to "movies." Neat video of a virtual aerobatics show...

Found this over at Bruce's website...

Great Images in NASA

There’s a thread over at Avsim: “THE most needed improvement to the next version?” (talking about Flight Simulator) asking for people’s input on what they’d like to see in a future version. They’re not alone, of course. There are threads just like that one all over the Web. Flightsim.com, for example, has a whole section devoted to the topic: FS10 Wish List Forum , and of course we get all sorts of mail at Tell_fs@microsoft.com.

How do all those suggestions impact the development of a product like Flight Simulator?

Do they even impact the development at all?

I think Hal summed up best what our approach to building a product like Flight Simulator is when he said “Flight Sim: (Reality – Last Version) = Goals for the Next One.” Which means, all those suggestions?

We’ve already thought about ‘em.

Really.

Now I don’t mean this in some arrogant “we think of everything and don’t need any help with what to do, thank you very much” sort of way, and to be accurate, sure there are ideas we haven’t come across before. But the simple fact of the matter is that just about every one here in ACES is first and foremost a consumer of the products we make. And contrary to popular opinion, we’re smart, creative people. We’re just as passionate as our users, and we have the burden of having to sign our name to the product. Think you’d like hearing that your product sucks day in and day out?

But the threads and discussions and mails do make a difference.

What do I mean? Well, like I said, there pretty much isn’t an idea or suggestion that’s come down the pike that we haven’t thought of (or seen from some earlier suggestion), but there’s just no way we’re ever going to be able to get it all in one version. So we have to edit. We have to plan and research. We have to prioritize.

Customer suggestion is key for that. Flight Simulator 2004’s weather system for example, came from a couple of versions worth of feedback, combined with technology that would finally enable us to make it look good. Is the weather system 100% finished and done exactly the way it is in real life? No… but it is light years beyond what was done before. Always room for improvement, but that can be said about any area of the product. The question becomes given the resources we have, and the tech available, what areas do we need to work on? Again, customer feedback is an important data point. We should never degenerate into design by committee, but we always listen to our customers.

We can’t always make them happy, but we always listen.

Don’t get me wrong here, probably half the suggestions we get aren’t so much for new features, but for bug fixes and/or feature extension (two separate things often confused with each other). That goes onto the pile as well.

As far as simulations of the sort that we here at ACES do, the job’ll never be complete—at least until what you see on screen is an exact duplicate of what happens in the real world, which is something I can guarantee you isn’t going to happen for a least a few years…   ;)

So keep ‘em coming. We read ‘em, and they do make an impact. Whether what you’re looking for makes it into the next version of whatever, or the version after that, someone here in the office is waiting for your mail, so he or she can jump up and shout: “See! See! I told you we need to implement the frim fram dihedral co-efficient! You laughed at me, oh yes, you laughed at me, but Bettina Framke of Stuttgart agrees with me. With ME”!

Okay, maybe not that dramatic, but you get the idea.

New version of X-plane is out, along with some screens. Congrats!

Additional screens (lots of 'em) from global-scenery.org

I am currently on a secret mission.

Secret, 'cause if I told you about it, I'd probably get fired, or at least in a lot of trouble.

Mission, 'cause it sounds cool...

So, y'know how I already pretty much work 7 days a week? (not last Saturday though, that was reserved for the ACES holiday party! yum) well, I usually find it pretty easy to squeeze a post or two in while I'm waiting for things to save, or open, or for code to build.

Not so much so in the last couple of weeks. Expect posting to be light (for me) through the first week of January.

Secret Agent Jason