Microsoft Flight Simulator (2020) - We're really sorry about Microsoft Flight

Valve released a beta version of Steam VR today which includes per-application frame rate locking. Based on my quick test flight, this appears to be a game-changer for MSFS in VR (and for complex sims generally).

I set a target frame rate of 40, and after some initial hitches, things were incredibly smooth in flight. Before I’d get bunches of stutters as the game constantly struggled to hit the headset hz. Now, just a smooth, consistent frame rate. 40 in VR is obviously not fantastic, but seems perfectly acceptable for civi aviation, and it now feels much more like what I am used to in something like Elite Dangerous or IL2.

Motion smoothing is still pretty wonky and a no-go for me, but this is a great starting place. The frame rate was so smooth and stable I can now look at upping the settings and improving the visuals.

Whoa nice! So if you set that stuff in steamVR what do you set in openXR?

Sorry! Not sure. Can’t speak to that since I am on an index.

That per-application frame rate stuff only works on Steam headsets (Vive, Index)

Neofly adds fuel management:

For a free add-on game, the dev is doing a fantastic job and continuing to add more features.

Yeah. It’s annoying that it still doesn’t auto-manage fuel/cargo payloads in-sim, but hopefully that will come eventually.

I may be wrong about this, but I believe that for a good while either payload or fuel (or both?) couldn’t be managed via simconnect, thus none of these addons could do it. I just checked the latest SDK docs and they both show as being settable now, so hopefully it’ll come at some point.

FSE definitely does it.

Can MSFS ever be supported by DLSS?

I have been using steam vr rather than openxr . Is the frame rate locking a maximum or a minimum? In other words, if I’m using a G2, do I set it to 90fps, which is the native frame rate of the G2, or should I set it to 45 (or 30) to make sure I get a smooth frame rate?

Also I just checked and I cannot find this new setting.

I hope that’s not for Index only. Are you running the beta for SteamVR?

It’s a max frame rate.

It’s under the per application settings, but upthread @Profanicus noted that:

Yes, I am opted into the beta. And as noted I think it might be only Index/Vive. I can’t speak to other headsets.

Yeah it was mentioned in the patch notes that it only applies to headsets that use the SteamVR compositor, i.e. Vive and Index. The settings shouldn’t show up on Oculus or WMR.

Yup just noticed that. Oh well. Soon.

As I understand it, in MSFS it’s still OpenXR, it’s just the Steam runtime for it.

Yes, but the main focus atm is getting it migrated to DX12. Additional rendering features are expected to be available after that.

I misspoke. There are two different versions of openxr: SteamVR and wmr. MSFS will use either depending on how you set it up in the developer options of SteamVR application in steam. It defaults to wmr. And I am guessing that if you don’t use steam, you don’t get the option.

You always want to use your native option, surely? That is the point of OpenXR, devs build to one target and the native runtime gives you optimal performance.

Otherwise instead of OpenXR->WMR, you’re going OpenXR->SteamVR->WMR.

@jpinard, MSFS doesn’t use SteamVR. It’s native WMR.
(I’m guessing if you change the OpenXR runtime to use SteamVR’s OpenXR, you could possibly force it to use Steam instead, but normally it’s native WMR/OpenXR with zero involvement from SteamVR.)

If you’re having frame rate issues, it sounds like the next driver release will fix that, but in the meantime, I suggest downgrading to 457.30. I did so based on the Flightsimulator.com forum discussion and it’s definitely smoother.

Installed the cool Locher scenery from Flightsim.to and realized Northern Italians are insane in the winter. Her legs have to be freezing. And that poor pup.

Really nice new Waco from Carenado in the MSFS Marketplace, only $14.95 and I had about $25 in MS points credit from Bing searches and Xbox stuff! Flies great, and the engine sounds is among the best I’ve heard in the sim.