2021 has really been the year of the clouds, in flightsims. Ok, MSFS arrived in 2020, but I bought it as a christmas present for myself, so for me, MSFS is very much a 2021 experience. DCS got a cloud upgrade in the spring, which, apart from looking very good, made a huge tactical difference in the sim.
Traditional clouds in flightsims have looked like 2D billboards, turning as you move around them, or building up like small puffs of smoke, as you approach them.
One of my favourite experiences when flying for real, is interacting with clouds. Breaking out on top of an overcast, basking in the sun, is a wonderful experience. Flying around the cloud tops, dipping down into the clouds only to break out below them again, is a very important part of flying. A realistic rendition of clouds is one of the things that I have been missing in flightsims.
I donât really know how or why, but it seems like someone cracked the code on how to do realistic looking virtual clouds, without tanking the performance.
I updated IL-2 Great Battles to the latest version, 4,701b, and went flying amongst the new cloudsâŠ
IL-2 GB already had pretty nice clouds, but not without their share of problems like pixelation around aircraft.
Now the clouds in IL-2 look phenomenal! Since I fly in VR, I only have the clouds on the next highest setting, but man are they looking the part!
There are so many new cloud formations and levels of coverage to choose from.
TL;DR is that the clouds look much more like real clouds and now make a big tactical difference, without affecting the performance in a negative way.