I think lighting "bigness" is entirely subjective and depends on individual eyesight and camera lens trickery, external environment, time of day, weather conditions etc.  I haven't seen any reason to use further addons to mess with it.

The less things I mess with the better, is my motto

I believe what is missing in MSFS 2024 is that the PAPI lights are static intensity which is NOT how they work in the real world where ATC would adjust them based on day, night, weather conditions.  My understanding is ATC can set the intensity level and/or if there is PCL system in place (typically smaller airports), the pilot on approach can control their intensity.  

In addition PAPI lights can flash when an aircraft is on the runway.

I don’t believe any of these are implemented in MSFS 2024 so I’d love to see a good add-on that does this (if possible via SDK) or to have Asobo implement such a system as “default” … PAPI’s are important part of the approach/landing process and something that deserves attention.

 

Yes all airfield lighting, at a towered airport, has varying levels of intensity.  At larger airports there is more control over the levels.  At smaller towered airports there may only be one or two "steps" of brightness for certain lights or even as simple as ON or OFF.

At uncontrolled airports indeed the CTAF frequency usually controls the lights...but the "steps" may be a lot less than a towered ones.  Sometimes the papi/vasi is always on , same with taxiway lights - some newer airports only have the modern reflectors on the taxiway pegs so it's up to the aircraft to provide illumination.

There is a payware app for Pilot Controlled Lighting.  I bought it and tried it a few times but afaik it only works with the edge lights and approach lights.  It's kinda pointless to see taxiway lighting and PAPIs (since Asobo made it way too bright by default) first before seeing edge or approach lighting.

Also it didn't work well in the daytime.  They may have fixed that issue now.

Airfield lighting in the day is sometimes more important especially during periods of low visibility IE instrument approach weather.

What was the name of the add-on?  I didn’t think Asobo provided any sort of interface (SDK) into real-time changing of PAPI light intensity?

And, is PAPI intensity available via SDK for 3rd party airports … if so, I wonder how many actually have this implemented?  I must admit, I haven’t see PAPI intensity feature in any airport I’ve purchased (about 640 of them).

Do we know if SU5 will finally get rid of those radioactive mushroom lights at airports?

 

I honestly can’t understand what happened to the lighting from 2020 to 2024… they just had to copy and paste it. Yesterday I was looking at a strobe light and it looked as bad as in FSX/P3D — just a tiny white dot flashing with that horrible 4-point halo

 

Edited April 28Apr 28 by juaness