An update has just been released for BeyondATC, bringing the much-anticipated Traffic Update into alpha. While this feature is still very much in alpha, there is a lot we can already see about how this application is going to integrate into the sim.
If you want to learn about our opinion on the initial release of BeyondATC, you can see our article here.
How does the Traffic Work?
Put simply, BeyondATC injects traffic into the sim through its external application. Once you have loaded into the sim, BeyondATC will begin injecting traffic based on the current sim time (not live time). The traffic is based on FlightRadar24 data that has been collected for a single week. This does mean that there is a limitation for seasonality: seasonal routes will not be reflected if you fly during a different time of year in the sim. The traffic imported into the sim uses whatever models you have installed in your Community folder, including AIG, FSLTL, or FS Traffic.
Once the traffic is injected, the traffic is controlled by the BeyondATC Application. This is a fundamental design difference from applications like FSLTL or FS Traffic, which inject the traffic into the simulator, and then let MSFS’s AI handle the movements of the airplanes. BeyondATC controls the movements of the airplanes through the world, in much the same way that it gives the user ATC instructions. The application is effectively just giving ATC instructions to a significantly larger number of aircraft simultaneously, and processing where the other planes should be. The application is constantly re-calculating where an airplane is, and sends updates to the sim for where the airplanes need to be represented – meaning that the simulator is not doing any traffic calculations. I contacted the lead dev of BeyondATC to better understand how the traffic works, and he provided this explanation.
We inject the plane into MS as an object. We could have just as easily injected a model of a lamp post, pushback tug or tree. It doesn’t know the difference. MS simply creates the object and positions at the place we tell it to go via a lat/lon coodinate in the world. In this case, we inject it as the plane model and then on every single frame we update its position, bank angle, heading, etc. We push some metadata to the object such as it’s speed and altitude so that data can show up on third party apps such as little nav map. Simply updating the location of an object in MS is very inexpensive in terms of FPS. It just puts the object where we tell it to, and does nothing more.
BeyondATC Lead Developer
The downside of this method is that we have to recreate the entire logic of the airplane. How it moves, where it goes, does it stop at a hold short, does it take off at this v speed on the runway or this v speed etc.
Taking a peak under the hood, the below image represents what the BeyondATC application actually sees when it is calculating aircraft positions.
The Positives
There is traffic in the simulator! BeyondATC accurately adds traffic to the simulator, as promised. All of the traffic transmits appropriately over the proper frequencies, and then follows the instructions ATC commanded it to do. It also follows all of the SID and STAR procedures, which is great for when you are following behind on airplane on departure or on approach, feels much more realistic.
The traffic now behaves in a predictable, and “on rails” manner. I’m sure all of us can think back to moments with the MSFS AI where it has spun around in a circle, or not behaved rationally, and we’ve had to choose to go around or commit to a landing despite traffic being in the way. The traffic is behaving in a manner that I would expect real aircraft to (besides spacing issues, but I will discuss these later).
You also have the ability to control the traffic density, if the amount of traffic around you is overwhelming, or underwhelming you. I personally found the default setting of “5” to be just fine for my experience though.
The performance degradation I noticed while using the traffic application was negligible. I flew into large and busy airports, with active traffic (talking my ear off), and had no noticeable drop in my FPS. This is a night and day difference for me compared to the AI Traffic experience I had with FSLTL. There is a corner case that I want to note though: I did have a sizable performance drop when trying out the Fenix at Heathrow. With the Fenix doing most of its calculations outside of the sim, I do wonder if they are fighting over the same CPU resources. Oddly, this Fenix performance degradation only happened at Heathrow, so this might have just been a weird corner case.
One unexpected benefit from this update is that, by pulling the FlightRadar24 data, the program knows which gates host which airlines/airplanes – which results in the airplanes going to their appropriate parking spots (both airline and gate code based). There is no longer a need to depend on a developer to build a good AFCAD, in theory at least. I did notice a few cases of imperfect gate matching, and white tail airplanes showing up (potentially due to missing liveries from FSLTL?) but for the most part it was spot on.
The Negatives
The traffic in the sim is pretty jumpy. When you see the traffic moving down the runway, it very clearly halts, and then jumps forward, which can be pretty disorienting. This is a side-effect of how the application is injecting the traffic positions, as opposed to having the simulator calculate the traffic position. I didn’t notice these problems as much when looking at traffic in cruise or taxing on the ground. I spent a lot of time attempting to troubleshoot the issue, and the only correlation I found is that the stutters were worst when the BeyondATC application was running in the background (the normal position), and that the stutters decreased when the application was running in the foreground on my computer. I will note that the video below reflects a more jumpy experience than I have typically – the screen recorder I use does appear to exacerbate the performance degradation.
The traffic is also unable to interact with the ground support equipment in the simulator, primarily the jetway and pushback tug. So the gates do look a bit funky with none of the jetways connected, and the airplanes look like they are just magically pushing back from their gate. This has the same root cause as the prior issue, the injector is effectively just sending a model into the simulator, the simulator doesn’t know that it’s an airplane, and doesn’t have any functional way to connect this object with the gate or with a tug. In the Traffic FAQ, the developer does state that they plan to add in a pushback tug, but they don’t appear to have identified a solution to the jetway issue.
Lastly, seeing the traffic requires some effort. The traffic only generates when you initialize the application with a SimBrief flightplan. So, if you want to visit an airport, and just watch traffic move around, you can only do that if you have a flight plan. This can be annoying if you like watching planes move around or if you are lazy (like me).
Other Thoughts
BeyondATC, just the baseline ATC program, is still in Early Access,and still has issues. You will sometimes deal with instructions that don’t make sense, limitations in re-routing, and other funky behavior. Consequently, all of the AI Traffic around you is going to behave funky as well, as it is being strictly guided by the ATC program you are utilizing, but it doesn’t have the ability to disobey if an instruction doesn’t make sense. Now there are dozens of airplanes flying around at once that may be following incoherent instructions.
Additionally, the ATC currently does not provide any separation for any traffic. I’ve seen airplanes land within 10 seconds of each other, had an airplane land on a runway that was crossing the runway that I was cleared to land on, and had no en-route traffic management. The developer does plan on integrating traffic spacing into a future update, but for right now it feels like I’m flying with a herd of cats.
Once up in the air, the en-route traffic experience is unfortunately pretty boring, at least for now. The traffic is only generated within a 200-mile radius of your departure/arrival airports. This creates a lively experience for when you are in your departure/arrival phase in flight – but not in cruise. The only traffic you’ll see/hear up there with you are airplanes that are planes that are going in roughly the same direction as you and that departed from the same departure point as you. You won’t see a lot of cross traffic or oncoming traffic, unless you are doing a short hop. In the traffic FAQ, the developer does state that this is a planned future feature.
Finally, this application is going to get more expensive with this update. BeyondATC is a pay-per-use model, which means you are paying for each time a Premium Voice is generated. Without traffic, my usage costs were roughly about $0.25 per flight. With traffic turned on, it gets closer to $0.75/flight, as you are paying for premium voices for the ATC to talk to the AI (utilizing Basic Voices). It can be pretty disorienting hearing a Premium Voice talk to a Basic Voice. This can make it tempting to switch to traffic to talk utilizing the Premium Voice, but that will make your whole flight experience even more expensive. You can fly exclusively with the basic voices at no charge though, so this doesn’t have to break the bank for everyone. If you want to check out the voice samples, you can listen to them here. Personally, I liked flying with the Traffic using the Premium Voice after I had left the gate, and until I hit cruise, and once I began my descent to the chocks, and then Basic Voice for the rest – which brought my costs up to around $1.25 per flight. That’s worth it to me, but preferences will vary.
How to Access this Update
This update is available now for users who purchased the Supporters Pack, a $29.99 upgrade for the BeyondATC base pack, and gets users access to the Experimental Branch. Once the traffic feature hits an acceptable level of stability, it will be rolled into the base pack at no extra charge. There is no timeline for when this update will be rolled into the baseline product.
For a detailed list of the features that are currently available with the update, and those that are in work, see below (from the BeyondATC Discord):
Summary
There is a lot of promise here, and it is already super enjoyable to fly with, if you are willing to deal with the growing pains that come with an alpha product. None of the issues I encountered were game breaking, just annoyances, and I think it’s absolutely ready to be a part of the simming experience. Many of my complaints are items that the developer has noted are in their roadmap to get out of alpha, and the developer has a good, albeit short, track-record of keeping to their development roadmap. This traffic feature is ultimately going to be rolled into the baseline product, once many of the bigger bugs get taken care of.
If you can handle the bugs, and want traffic in your sim now, I’d recommend looking into getting the Supporters Pack.
