Following some quiet time, the development team behind the highly-renowned X-Plane cloud engine addon SkyMaxx Pro has taken to the X-Pilot forums, announcing the development of the product’s fifth iteration and showcasing the progress that has been made in that regard.
Calum, author of the recent SkyMaxx Pro forum post, begins by letting readers know that version 5 of the product will finally come included with actual GPU ray-casted clouds. According to Calum, the newest iteration of SkyMaxx Pro is going to provide users with faster clouds when compared to previous versions of the product and will make use of highly complex and immersive lighting effects. Additionally, users will now be able to have volumetric clouds be drawn across the entire sky, reaching as far as the horizon itself.
The author goes on to let readers know that the clouds coming included with SkyMaxx Pro v5 are truly three dimensional, voxel-based clouds with physically-based cloud growth. Regarding performance, Calum mentions that the new product will use a novel computational method that equitably splits the workload between both the CPU and GPU, resulting in performance that, according to the author, has previously been unimaginable. Additionally, no compromises have been made regarding shaders, meaning that visible banding or slicing effects, as well as texture lookups, should be of no concern to the end-user.
Continuing with his post, Calum indicates that the addon is set to come included with an updated version of Real Weather Connector that allows users to experience virtually unlimited layers of 3D volumetric clouds when used in combination with SkyMaxx Pro v5.
Finally, it is to be noted that, although supporting both OpenGL and Vulkan, rendering options for Windows users, its compatibility is limited to the OpenGL rendering option for people using X-Plane on Mac.
Regarding pricing, existing users of SkyMaxx Pro v4 are entitled to upgrade to the newest iteration of the product within the first 60-days after its launch for just $19.99. After the said grace period, even existing customers will have to pay the full price of $35.00. The product is set to release on the 22nd of January, at 12.00pm Eastern time.
As always, if you desire more information or if you want to have a look at additional screenshots, feel free to head over to the original X-Pilot forum post linked here.
Feature List
- GPU ray-casted clouds
- Fastest performing clouds we have offered
- Most complex, realistic lighting effects of any cumulus cloud layer offered in the SkyMaxx Pro series
- Possibility to draw complex volumetric cloud formations to the horizon
- True 3D, voxel-based clouds with physically-based cloud growth
- No more rotating clouds, where the rotation of particle billboards can be very distracting while flying near a cloud (especially in VR)
- Virtually unlimited layers are still possible with Real Weather Connector in use
