St4rgun

Exactly, as described a dozen times. This is not "only" complaint, it's massively ruining immersion having the blue sky shining through the bottom of my view in an otherwise dark cockpit. As the "mask" is already there I simply don't understand what takes months (ok, let's be honest: YEARS) for the team to switch it to black regardless of applied AA type. Before 2.9 it was not a problem, because I always used MSAA which shows it properly black, but now after a month and two more patches later I'm getting really frustrated with it. I really hope this bug patch only missing because some miscommunication and will be corrected in the next OB at last.

All right then, for everyone using VR and knowing what I'm talking about: I described the missing black VR mask which cuts off the non visible parts of the HMD, and indeed is missing. Try looking straight or up and check it out only with peripheral vision. Or just take off the HMD and look at the monitor screen: the black cutting mask is missing. I's a well known, REPORTED bug for YEARS. This mask only shows when MSAA turned on. In other cases it's transparent, that's why the sky showing through. When with 2.9 the new AA method arrived (DLAA) I switched off MSAA to use DLAA instead, and this caused losing the mask. Simple as that. @BIGNEWY, any thoughts?

Dear @BIGNEWY with maximum respect may I ask what is the explanation that the VR mask is still missing when not using MSAA (using no AA or using other AA methods)? The DLAA technology is the best what happened to this sim visually recently, but the missing VR mask really ruins the experience, it's very bad. Is it really that resource-intensive work to patch it? Not to mention the still existing over-exposure behavior in the cockpit view, the washed out visuals are not so appealing. I know, that's some fine tuning stuff and there're are much higher priorities in the current OB state. Maybe some options to turn it off? At least some autoexec parameter?

I'm using VR exclusively and DLAA is phenomenal. Really very, very nice to live without shimmers. Overall rhe cockpit displays are perfect for me, except the forementioned choppyness-induced slight smearing. The black and white TGPs are the worst, the radar line in F/A-18 is not bad at all, the tiny radar sweep indicator in F-15 and F-16 is "ghostly" smeared, the quick changing digital indicators (fuel flow in F-16 and F/A-18) are a bit "laggy", like having some afterglow, but very little, not annoying at all. All the analog gauges are perfect for me. The images in the mirrors ate also smeared upon fast movement. It's something in the refresh rate of these. I think ED should consider refreshing all of this in every frame in the future to avoid the DLAA/DLSS side effects.

For me it seems the root cause could be the lower framerate of the MFDs (or the mirrors). I set MFD's resolution to 1024 originally which affected the resolution of the mirrors as well (with 512 the mirrors were very ugly). But now if I even switch it to "1024 every frame", nothing changes, they are definitely not updated every frame. As the new AA methods (TAA, DLAA/DLSS) are temporal AA solutions it seem they don't like if the input material is choppy for them. Interestingly not a single smearing of the outside world is perceived when moving my head as looking out of the cockpit. But the choppy, low framerate updated things are smearing upon movement, like: MFDs, mirrors, even other AI airplanes.

Thanks @BIGNEWY. Unfortunately it seems that it didn't make it to the last patch. Is this fix needs very high developer resources? Just asking because the missing VR mask completely ruins the otherwise STELLAR performance of 2.9 with DLAA... To have the mask properly shown was the only reason for me in the past to use MSAA at all. This bug has been here for months (or even years).

The "not showing VR mask" issue is long related to MSAA turned off. For me also came back this time, as I switched from MSAA to DLSS with DLAA, so no VR mask. @BIGNEWY Have you noticed this missing mask feature with other type than MSAA anti-aliasing?

The so For me the best settings right now with G2: set Custom render scale to 150% in OpenXR Tool's settings use DLSS Quality in DCS There's some minor ghosting here and there (like at the trailing of the planes, or the moving radar beam line on MFD, etc), but the image quality is much better than MSAA with usable framerates. No more shimmering and HUGE sweet spot on the G2 with these settings. Unfortunately the clouds still should be set to ULTRA to eliminate all the aliasing os some distant cloud layers which eats up performance. For me the SSS causes a lot more graphical glitches with the shadows, so it's turned off right now.

We're ALL eagerly waiting to see those options... Keep up the good work, we're counting the days. If only next week would be THAT week of 2.9, hmm....

DLAA should be much higher quality in DCS in VR. MSAA only partially works here (shimmering everywhere), plus MSAA requires much more resources (as I understand in VR it's not compatible with hardware MSAA of the cards because of the deferred shading of DCS).

Here's my 2cents based on experience with MSFS and Reverb G2: DLSS is the BEST visual quality in that sim in VR, period. The trick is that in VR you'll need quite a bit of supersampling for not only anti-aliasing but for correctly counter-distort the lenses. That's why the G2's 100% resolution set to around 3100x3100 pixels per eye in Steam, despite the headset having "only" 2160x2160 pixels per eye resolution. The best we can do is set the headset to 3500x3500 or even 4000x4000 resolution per eye (sounds silly, eh?), and turn on DLSS to have the game's rendering lower (like the native 2160x2160) and let DLSS do the proper upscaling. The result will be not only a MUCH sharper image, but a much larger hotspot (even edge to edge clarity). It's incredible. I have very high hopes in DLSS an DLAA in DCS with VR, I'm super excited!

This is not true. Only the frame generation feature is locked to RTX 4xxx series. The feature table is the following: I have DLSS experience in VR only with MSFS. It's the best AA solution there right now. We should wait and see ED's implementation in DCS. I hope they nailed it.

Dear @BIGNEWY another question: is the auto (over) exposure corrected somehow?

I'm using DCS in VR only, and don't experience the clouds wobbling which was a bug at the beginning with version 2.7. Heavy aliasing is experienced because the semi transparent cloud layers don't handle MSAA well, so I have to use strictly Ultra clouds to minimize this issue. Right now at least MSAA 2x is also required for VR, because the black covering VR mask in the view is only displayed correctly if MSAA is on. But even with MSAA 4x some semi transparent surfaces, shiny edges and transparent textured objects (like power line pylons and fences at airports, and the leaves on the trees) are sometimes not anti-aliased at all with shimmering as hell. In 2D this is not experienced. So DLAA will be a HUGE blast, because you can get rid of the performance hungry MSAA implementation while having a proper temporal AA which is finally able to smooth all edges and get rid of shimmering once for all. Great news!

For me it seems that ED's previous strategy was to change one sub-sub version up (like 2.8.7 to 2.8.8) when having around 1000 of difference in build numbers (like having 2.8.1.34437 Open Beta as the first 2.8.1, while the first 2.8.2 was DCS 2.8.2.35632 Open Beta). It was not unusual to have the sub-sub verion higher than 9 before (like 2.7.18.30765 Open Beta), while it also happened that a massive step taken up from 2.5.6 directly to 2.7.0 (2.5.6.61527.3 Open Beta to 2.7.0.4625 Open Beta). In that particular case the change was huge, as stated in the changelog back then: "...We are pleased to share our latest update to DCS World Open Beta and the substantial range of new features and improvements that are included. Some of the highlights are new cloud technology, new piston engine propeller technology and a wide array of new features for the Hornet and Viper." So my best bet also would be great changes in 2.9

DLSS in MSFS is very good using VR. You can use the native resolution of the headset while upscaling it much higher with DLSS to get even sharper details, while the anti-aliasing is really perfect (0% shimmering). If ED would implement DLSS to 2D only then it won't even worth to start the development. DCS in 2D looks very nice and the performance is really good even with MSAA 4x.

From the newsletter published on 1st of September: "This 1st of September 2023 marks the start of our DCS 15th anniversary year, which we will kick off with an important sale to celebrate" So for me it means the 15th anniversary year will count between 01.09.2023 - 01.09.2024

Yes, my other tought also was if the silence will be so thick as now I can imagine that no patch will be deployed in September with an incoming huge 2.9 in October (like it was the case with the MT preview). Pure speculation. Anyhow I'm still more interested in DLSS and Vulkan possibilities in 2.9. Still have no answer on that topic. Maybe @BIGNEWY can give us some hints...

DLSS would essential for VR in two ways: 1. get higher framerates by reducing the rendering resolution while getting clear picture and 2. having DLAA with high quality proper temporal AA to finally eliminate all the aliasing problems which is present in VR right now. All of ED's trailers on YT are like stellar high quality movies which is how this game really looks like in 2D right now with MSAA. Unfortunately this MSAA doesn't work so well in VR (mainly with transparent textures), so in the headset's the visuals are lagging behind the quality of the trailers (shimmering, aliasing, aliased clouds etc). If only DLSS can be implemented before Vulkan for this purposes it'd be an instant huge success. Unfortunetely ED did not give any straight answer to date whether DLSS will precede Vulkan or not. So the question is simple: is it possible to have 2.9 with DLSS, while 3.0 will be Vulkan?

Let's wait for the Developer Q&A to get answers. I'm pretty sure ED could clarify the roadmap with DLSS, Vulkan and versions.

I don't think so, it'll be rather 2.8.9 first. The exact phrase from the newsletter: "DCS: A-10C II Tank Killer has undergone updates to its datalink and fixed several bugs for its next Open Beta update. This will form part of the larger DCS 2.9 update that is currently in pre-release testing." For me DLSS would be a must for 2.9, as it was already available back in the first video in January. I'll be very disappointed if DLSS would be postponed after full change to Vulkan in 3.0 which could take at least a year at this pace...

... and about some marginal core features' development status.

I use the MT preview as its general performance is better than the ST version. Plus if I don't use it I'll not notice this blackout bug. Actually I'd try to always help the devs to give as usable information as possible to eliminate these bugs. As you can se, not you, nor @BIGNEWY noticed this issue, so this is some weird stuff where I should make more *work* in it to dig deeper. As you can see in my signature my hw is more than adequate and not exotic.

Ok guys, calm down. I'm sorry if my kind words hurted anyone, it was not intended. Of course it's obvious that the core development team has *nothing* to do with the modules, right? Ok. So then what is the reason that since the introduction of MT already elapsed more than 3 months and we still have the same freeze-for-seconds-with-blackout "feature" in VR? It's not existing in the ST version, but the otherwise perfectly fine running game makes this bug which was never experienced before and it is really problematic. It's so severe that honestly I tought that maybe a hotfix will be deployed, but actually nothing happened. Fortunately this freezing became sparse, but it's always there in all of my flights more than once and in critical situations. About the auto-exposure: i *like* auto-exposure a lot, but I *hate* auto-OVER-exposure of the outside when seen from the cockpit. The auto-exposure works perfectly when seen in F2 view, but ruins the visuals when experienced inside a "darker, more closed" cockpit, like the Mi-8. The winter and the desert maps are the worst, but just check out the Mi-8 free-flight instant acion on Caucasus to see "wonders". This is clearly a bug, which @BIGNEWY already reacted to , but said that this problem is: 1. not prioritized and 2. would take precious human resources to eliminate. Don't get me wrong, the general visual clarity is superrb and the performance of DCS in MT VR is very good for me, it just seems that the visible progress in the previous months slowed somehow. I'd like to avoid the situation of the new clouds, where after years the heavy aliasing in VR is still happening even on ultra settings with no perceivable changes months after months. Anyway, we have half a year to have what ED will be able to finish until the end of the year. If it will need more time, then... we'll wait more. Peace.

I hope that with releasing of Sinai map, the F-15E and starting the Summer Sale the ongoing hype will settle a bit and the team can shift focus on ironing out the bugs of the core at last (MT freezing for seconds, auto-over-exposure, the last introduced long loading times, etc.). As they mentioned MT is recommended for F-15E anyway, so it's not really feasible to go back to the ST version in the long run. Personally I would be more happy if they stop deploying any new maps or modules for at least a quarter, while giving the long awaited core features (just as a reminder in January 2021 ED mentioned that Vulkan is expected in Q3 2021, so it's due long time ago...). We're patient, but half the year is already passed. We've less time for the DCS core to really shine in 2023.