How does MS Fight Simulator compare to real flights? (2020) | Hacker News Reader

How does MS Fight Simulator compare to real flights? (2020)

yeokhengmeng.com

24 pointsPotatoNinja6 comments

These simulators are fantastic, but I have yet to see a simulator that incorporates the interactions between pilots and air traffic control. One of the most difficult parts of being a pilot is applying decision making and problem-solving skills in a high-stakes environment. For pilots, a sizeable amount of safety discussions center around crew resource management because the human element of aviation can be just as challenging as dealing with bad weather or mechanical malfunctions.

Perhaps the integration of LLMs could help bolster the realism for simulators, allowing pilots to practice CRM. An LLM could also be used to simulate a co-pilot or flight attendant. Interesting.

There are things like IVAO/VATSIM networks which allow you to communicate with real people playing ATC. Back in the days (like a decade ago) there were also some speech-to-text based addons, which allowed you to do (very basic) things like go through checklist with a copilot, tell them to adjust flaps, put landing gear down etc. Not sure how much they've improved since.

But I agree, this is one area where LLM's could have major potential.

These things are already in development, with BeyondATC [0] using some combination of AI and classical "scripting", and SayIntentions [1] using LLMs (?) for everything. Also, both development teams clearly didn't focus on creating nice websites.

[0] https://www.beyondatc.net/

[1] https://www.sayintentions.ai/

I've not played MSFS2020 since just after it came out, but at that time XPlane was still king when it came to realistic rendering of flight physics. There is no question MSFS looked better, though. Wonder if that has changed?

Its harder than real flight. I know a pilot. He tried to show me how he lands his plane in flight simulator. Crashed.

Not harder, per se, just different. Much of the psychomotor coordination used to land an airplane is learned by flying the actual plane--knowing the "feel" of the jet. In your friend's defense, it sounds like the control difference between the real plane and the simulation was too much for the skill to transfer immediately.

Another issue is that simulators do not duplicate the somatosensory and vestibular system perceptions a pilot feels when flying. These systems feed a great deal of information to a pilot's brain, not as much as the visual system, but enough that transitioning to an environment where there is no "seat-of-the-pants" feel takes a moment to get used to.

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