Microsoft just shared new details about what’s coming for Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024, and even a few tidbits about MSFS 2020.
During a livestream on Twitch, we heard, as usual, from Head of Microsoft Flight Simulator Jorg Neumann, Asobo CEO Sebastian Wloch, and Executive Producer Martial Bossard.
The roadmap of updates for 2026 has been update, with the developer aiming to release somethiung new pretty much every month.
Incidentally, you’ll notice that there will be three Sim Updates this year for MSFS 2024 and one for MSFS 2020. Apparently, in July we’ll also get a new free aircraft added to the base simiulator, although we don’t know what it is.
On top of that, nthere will be 3 World Updates and 3 remaining City Updates this year.
Incidentally, specific news were shared about the PS5 version and PlayStation VR2, and you can find these in our dedicated article.
Another interesting tidbit of infiormation is that the Sud Aviation Caravelle announced a while ago, has been reboted (in terms of development), as it had deep-rooted quality issues. Since it’s a very important aircraft, the developers want it to be good. As such, it’s still in development.
The developers talked about Sim Update 5, which includes a very long list of improvements. It’ll come out on all platforms “very soon.” It already passed PS5 certification, and the hope is that it’ll release next week.
It’ll include systems optimization, including CPU culling in the renderer and cockpit pointer interactions.
The number of memory allocations in some situations has been reduced, including for buildings, the electric system, marine traffic, and bridges.
Multithreading has been improved for the aircraft simulation, so the sim will be faster especially with performance-heavy aircraft.
The rendering quality settings got their own page, and there will be new airflow visualization settings including colors to show the speed of turbulence, and voxels to show where physics are happening.
There have been improvements for the simulation of thermals and turbulence as you can see in the video below. A relevant bug with helicopter ground effect has also been solved, alongside more improvements to several mechanics.
Wake turbulence will also be much more realistic in its effects. Bigger changes to turbulence will come in Sim Update 6. Improvements to cloud variety are planned and will come down the line.
Some improvements to ATC and AI traffic are coming with Sim Update 5, including improvements to model matching, especially for rotor aircraft. Changes have also been made to replacements to make sure that when a model is not available at all, at least it’ll be matched to something similar.
Incidentally, double jetways have not been prioritized just yet, but they will come at some point. .
We then get a look at the new feedback snapshots and wishlist.
Improvements to the weather radar are also coming in Sim Update 5, including better resolution and the implementation of tilt. The ability to change the spread angle will also come at a later time.
Next is the World Update 21, which will be Australia. The local legend 24 will be the CAC Boomerang. They’ll release on May 5.
Below you can find a few screeenshots and a list of the content.
Improvements to the career mode are also coming, including the two missing certifications. Incidentally, Super-Heavy Cargo has been renamed to “Oversized” Cargo.
Incidentally, bush trips will also come back for MSFS 2024, and it’ll likely be on Sim Update 7 if not earlier.
We then hear that, while the focus is on upgrading the payware aircraft first, that doesn’t mean that the default aircraft are not being updated.
As a matter of fact, two of the default aircraft in the simulator are being completely redone and four are in development for updates.
Incidentally, when payware aircraft are updated to MSFS 2024 standards with Aircraft and Avionics Update, they will also become available individually outside of the Aviator Edition. The goal is to have all the payware aircraft upgraded to MSFS 2024 standards by next year.
We then get an updatye about the next Expert Series aircraft, the Embraer Praetor 600, which we learned today should come in November 2026.
It’ll have a fully simulated electrical system down to the circuit breaker level. The same can be said for the hydraulics system, includinga full physics-based simulation, heat, and more.
It’ll also have an “engineering-grade” full-fledghed turbine simulation with each turbine individually modeled.
On top of that, the aircraft will come with deep simulations of sytsems and avionics. You can watch the full segment below, since it has some interesting video, hearing directly from Working Title’s Matt Nischan.
We then hear more about the marketplace. A feature that allows users to share their feedback with Microsoft and the developers is being tested. When that feature is live, if a product receives overwhelming negative feedback, it may be removed from the marketplace entirely. If feedback about certain content is consistently poor, Microsoft may stop hosting it altogether.
Below you can check out improvements for the marketplace in general, including ghifting to friends that will come with Sim Update 5.
Going forward, it’s likely that there will be marketplace updates in every Sim Update going forward.
We also heard that Microsoft is weighing ideas on how to improve the rating system. It may be announced at FS Expo or a bit later.
The Expert Series 2 aircraft has been announced, and it’s the Piper M600 by FSReborn, equipped with the G3000 avionics made in collaboration with Working Title. Circuit breakers will be simulated together with random optional failures involving them.
3 sets of interiors will be included, and if you don’t fly the aircraft properly, there’ll be consequences, although this will be optional.
The goal is to release the aircraft in June.
We also get to take a look at a few images of the aircraft that will be upgraded for MSFS 2024 with the Aircraft and Avionics Update that will be included in Sim Update 5, the ATR42 and 72, the Antonov AN-2, the Fokker F7, the Latécoère 631 (which actually got a dedicated video, which you can see below), and the Savoia-Marchetti S.55 and S.55X.
Lastly, we hear that Microsoft will be at FSExpo in June.
Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 is currently available for PC, Xbox Series X|S, and PS5. If you’d like to hear more about the simulator, you can watch our latest interview with Head of Microsoft Flight Simulator Jorg Neumann.
Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 is also available for PC and Xbox Series X|S, although for now, this airport is only available for PC for both sims.
If you’d like to read more flight simulation news, you can find plenty in our latest roundup article from yesterday.
If you want to go further back, we have a handy overview video of the major flight simulation news in the past week. You can watch it below. As usual, leaving a like and a comment and subscribing to our growing YouTube channel is extremely helpful.
