Microsoft Flight Simulator, the Divine Proportion, and Virtual Reality
Flight Simulator 2020 needs to have VR to fully reflect the beauty of the images shared by the team until now. Only VR can depict the full perspectives essential for the simulation to astound and impress. Only then it will be “as real as it gets”.
Since my first flight in modern days VR, in DCS, I am convinced that there is no way back to a flat screen. Only those who have never tried a flight simulation with Virtual Reality, or don’t know how to get the best from the headset they test, will continue to be “flat screen flyers”. Once you feel the world around you, there is no way back to a screen, not even a group of screens. There may be some exceptions, but everyone, from what I’ve seen, will gladly trade resolution for immersion.
I am glad Microsoft and the Asobo Studios have admitted VR is crucial and will try to have it included as soon as possible. The latest Insider’s update indicates that “ Features like ATC, Seasons, VR, Rotorcraft, SDK, etc. can be found in the Feedback Snapshot along with our current plan for next steps and timelines for resolution.” This means Microsoft is looking at those aspects of the simulation, and is listening to feedback from the community.
When Microsoft announced that VR was not in the initial plans for the new Flight Simulator, I tried to picture myself grabbing my old Track IR-style solution, and setting it up again. Yes, I may be willing to do so, but I am fully aware that in no way using a flat screen will make justice to all the beauty revealed by Lionel Fuentes, from Asobo Studios in the recent Insider’s video, Feature Discovery Series — Episode 1 (World), published on FS2020 website.
Just for a moment, imagine flying over the procedural grass patch on the French coast of Bretagne, not far from Mount Saint Michael. If you use a flat screen, it will be like a nice postcard of the region, but once you get a VR headset, I bet you can almost feel the grass moving under you. I give you a good example, although built in a different way: if you use the Project Cars 2 simulation and have the grass on the sides of the track, the difference between going over it using a flat screen and a VR headset is like night and day. In VR you feel you can almost touch it, if you’re on a Formula 1 or similar car and move your hand away from the wheel…
VR gives a better flight sim experience
Having VR in Microsoft Flight Simulator will mean that you get the real perspective of things, a better notion of the world around you, something that not even a three screen setup will offer you. There is no way screens will reproduce the 3D feeling that a VR headset gives you. So, if you want to experience the idea of the Divine Proportion as Leonard da Vinci illustrations depict it, you need to be “in world” and not just looking at it through a window.
Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 MUST HAVE VR for it to really be a next-generation simulation. It’s somehow strange, to me, that the team only now has checked that box, as the examples are all around us, from X-Plane 11 to DCS, Aerofly or IL-2 and Flying Circus, to mention the most popular. Many flight sim enthusiasts have moved to VR and in no way will go back to a flat screen experience. That’s an audience not to be forgotten.
Let’s just hope that Microsoft and Asobo Studios do a proper job, offering a VR experience above what Prepar3D offers. Maybe there are problems with the streaming of data to the simulator that make VR difficult to implement, but have no doubt, shipping it without VR will make many people unhappy. Having VR, with everything else shown until now working, will make people buy the simulation from day one, I am sure.
VFR needs VR and helicopters
Having Microsoft Flight Simulator with VR as an option — a solid option -, not only attracts a growing crowd that has moved to VR and will not look back, it will also make the simulation, for those in VR, get closer to what was and is FS’s mantra “as real as it gets”. Because, have no doubt, VR immersion makes for the simulated flight experience to be closer to the real world. It’s not just because of the landscape around you, it’s also for, and here we go back to the Divine Proportion, the exact proportion of things.
Having a cockpit that has the real dimensions and having the real sense of the size of the landing strip ahead of you, gives you a better experience overall, one that makes justice to the “as real as it gets”. You learn faster, with VR immersion. My own experience with helicopters in DCS has shown me that once I got VR, I became a better helicopter pilot, because I’ve a sense of the distances and space that in no way my 32 inch screen can give me. Hovering in place is much easier, as well as landing in tight spots. I know helicopters are not included in Flight Simulator 2020, but have no doubt they will come. With the VFR promise this sim offers, helicopters are a must, and so is VR.
I hope someone at Asobo Studios and Microsoft reads this and decides to push ahead with VR… and helicopters. Because the sim will be much better with both, and will attract even more virtual flyers to what promises to be a unique experience.
