OS Neutral Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024

[Macalicious2011]

Join us for the Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 Technical Alpha in October - Microsoft Flight Simulator


It's now possible to register to participate in an Alpha. I don't like the term Alpha for a game that's due to be released in a month and is already accepting expensive pre orders.

Alpha is usually for games that are 2-3 years away from release for which the bugs and feedback have lots of headroom for improvements.

This is not true for FS2024. MS will stress test content streaming. If it doesn't work well it's not like they can reconfigure the Azure resources or refractor the code and test it all in 3-4 weeks.

Either way I will take part and have submitted my PC specs. I am curious whether 16GB will be sufficient if I use a large rolling cache. Looking forward to it

It's baffling that the specs are demanding yet th game will run on the Series S. That console is proving to be en engineering marvel.

 

[avro707]

I think we’ve been so used to the old sims that have had drawbacks from old Flight Sim software (ie, not optimised for multiple core CPUs) that we’ve just accepted the need for the best high clock speed CPU and some mega potent video card.

This is quite a big difference.

I won’t do the alpha test - just no time.

 

[Regulus67]

I doubt that would have been as good an experience as a properly native Flight Simulator, especially using a VR headset which is an amazing experience.

Sit inside one of the advanced airliners (like the 777 of PMDG or the 737, even the Fly By Wire A320) and you really have an impression of really being there. It's way more natural to operate them in that way instead of using a normal computer screen.

I have been looking at a few youtubers with flight cockpits, and I am amazed what is possible.
One I watched for the first time last night. Found him because he is selling his Boeing 727-200 cockpit (Norway).

Mr727sim

He has used some real parts

 

[Huntn]

I have been looking at a few youtubers with flight cockpits, and I am amazed what is possible.
One I watched for the first time last night. Found him because he is selling his Boeing 727-200 cockpit (Norway).

View attachment 2435903

Mr727sim

He has used some real parts

View attachment 2435904

If the instruments work, I’m impressed. Early in my airline career I piloted one of theses.

 

[avro707]

If the instruments work, I’m impressed. Early in my airline career I piloted one of theses.

There was a guy in Sydney who buiit a full 747-400 simulator with motion rig as well, it was quite famous.

There is also the Concorde simulator that has all the instruments working, I believe it still runs from a PC but from what software I don't know. I couldn't say what level of systems detail it has. I know there is a detailed simulation of that in Prepar3D... Forget about the one in MSFS, just read the forum post about it and comments from the developer... If you know the systems of that plane well, you'll just spot the inaccuracies right away.

I think the old mainframe computers that used to power it have been acquired but no idea if they are capable to be connected to it again (or if they even work anymore). It has no motion rig. As far as I know the other one in France was also decommissioned.

It's a shame they didn't keep one in fully working condition with the motion rig, it would have been a very unique experience for paying customers. But obviously that's a big ask to keep one of those operational and it is multiple stories high as well.

 

[Macalicious2011]

Did anyone of you receive an invite to the alpha? I didn’t. Having watched a few videos of it the clouds and trees are stunning. Call me a newb but the tablet inside the cockpit looks practical.

From what I understand, the buildings won’t look better unless they have been handcrafted. I think FS2020 might get a few more world updates before MS sign post us to 2024.

Its early days for the FS2024. It will be best judged 3 months after launch when gamers have been able to thoroughly test it and reflect on its strengths and weaknesses vs FS2020.

For me it will be a choice between buying 2024 or spending the equivalent on marketplace updates and mods.

What doesnt sit well with me is that FS2024 is a £60-100 live service game. In 4-6 years they will switch off the servers and push players into buying the sequel that will likely be more expensive.

I don’t mind free to play live service game but paying full price for one doesn’t sit well with me. It’s a throw away culture. Just look at Forza Horizon 4. Servers will be switched off in December and you won’t be able to buy add ons.

I am also a busy dad. I worry that one evening the kids will be in bed, I will fire up FS2024 and either there is an issue with FS servers or my internet is facing disruption. Xbox could mitigate this by allowing 100% caching for a specific route. Like an offline mode. Currently it appears that FS2024 cache some content but not all of it.

 

[avro707]

The aurora looks great.

 

[Huntn]

Did anyone of you receive an invite to the alpha? I didn’t. Having watched a few videos of it the clouds and trees are stunning. Call me a newb but the tablet inside the cockpit looks practical.

From what I understand, the buildings won’t look better unless they have been handcrafted. I think FS2020 might get a few more world updates before MS sign post us to 2024.

Its early days for the FS2024. It will be best judged 3 months after launch when gamers have been able to thoroughly test it and reflect on its strengths and weaknesses vs FS2020.

For me it will be a choice between buying 2024 or spending the equivalent on marketplace updates and mods.

What doesnt sit well with me is that FS2024 is a £60-100 live service game. In 4-6 years they will switch off the servers and push players into buying the sequel that will likely be more expensive.

I don’t mind free to play live service game but paying full price for one doesn’t sit well with me. It’s a throw away culture. Just look at Forza Horizon 4. Servers will be switched off in December and you won’t be able to buy add ons.

I am also a busy dad. I worry that one evening the kids will be in bed, I will fire up FS2024 and either there is an issue with FS servers or my internet is facing disruption. Xbox could mitigate this by allowing 100% caching for a specific route. Like an offline mode. Currently it appears that FS2024 cache some content but not all of it.

Replied to here:

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/owning-vs-licensing-a-video-game.2439952/

 

[avro707]

People are running this with 16 core processors and seeing it utilise 8 cores.

That’s a big change. Previously on 2020 only about 1 and 0.25 cores would see much use, that’s my experience using a 28 core Xeon.

That’s puts all the squabbles over multi-core support to an end.

I would love to see if multiple GPUs would work - but that’s doubtful.

 

[Macalicious2011]

People are running this with 16 core processors and seeing it utilise 8 cores.

Amazing. Looking forward to seeing how it will utilise my 5800x3d.

 

[Macalicious2011]

I am hype and look forward to the game. My favorite new features are:



-Fully simulated aero

Flight planning: FS2020 was lacking in this area. The solution was third party £60-80/years ago tools or apps that run on an ipad or seperate screen but integrated in a clunky way. Now there will be a native solution.
-Real time tracking of ships

 

[wonderings]

Looking forward to checking this out when it is released. Barely played the current version on Gamepass, but I have watched a little on what they have added for the 2024 and it looks pretty spectacular. It also has me wanting to upgrade my GPU to get better visuals. Flight Simulator and Star Citizen are about the only games that I care about the graphics. Currently I have a 2070, looking at upgrading sometime soon to a 4070 with 16 gig ram.

 

[Macalicious2011]

Looking forward to checking this out when it is released. Barely played the current version on Gamepass, but I have watched a little on what they have added for the 2024 and it looks pretty spectacular. It also has me wanting to upgrade my GPU to get better visuals. Flight Simulator and Star Citizen are about the only games that I care about the graphics. Currently I have a 2070, looking at upgrading sometime soon to a 4070 with 16 gig ram.

4070 has 12GB RAM. I had one and upgraded to a 4070ti Super. Both are great depending on if you play at 1440 or 4k.

 

[4sallypat]

Anyone know if you can pre-order the Limited Edition version in the US?

I can only find it available in Europe and they won't ship to the US.

 

[avro707]

Currently I have a 2070, looking at upgrading sometime soon to a 4070 with 16 gig ram.

With 2020 some people end up out of memory with 24GB on some GPUs, so suggest going for the maximum you can get in the world of nvidia.

I have 32GB VRAM with W6800 Radeon Pro which is fine for 4K - just not quite powerful enough for best frame rates (though it is very stable).

 

[Huntn]

Looking forward to checking this out when it is released. Barely played the current version on Gamepass, but I have watched a little on what they have added for the 2024 and it looks pretty spectacular. It also has me wanting to upgrade my GPU to get better visuals. Flight Simulator and Star Citizen are about the only games that I care about the graphics. Currently I have a 2070, looking at upgrading sometime soon to a 4070 with 16 gig ram.

Check out Cyberpunk 2077… amazing visuals, intriguing story.

 

[Huntn]

4070 has 12GB RAM. I had one and upgraded to a 4070ti Super. Both are great depending on if you play at 1440 or 4k.

I noticed recently when experimenting, that Cyberpunk 2077 with my setiup (signature) was running at high/ultra on a 2k monitor and at low on a 4k monitor. 🤔

 

[avro707]

Apparently it will work in MSFS 2024, but note tomorrow (or Thursday) the FlyByWire Airbus A380 is being released in early form. First time we get a real serious simulation of the super-heavy machine.

Can't wait, the A380 is my favourite large airliner.

One warning note, they say the graphics aren't quite optimised yet so performance (FPS) might be lower than normally expected. On VATSIM there are worries that airports (sorry Dubai) will be flooded by huge numbers of A380s.

Holding patterns will be different with the large numbers of these A380 super aircraft flying around.

 

[dimme]

FlightSim fan here, I started with a commodore64 and have been going on since. The last MSFS I had was FSX excelpt for beta testing MSFS2020, but it was no where near finished then. Now days the only computer I have that is powerful enough is a Mac (Windows laptop won't run MSFS2020) I am pretty happy with Xplane12. But I have watched the YouTube videos of MSFS2020 & 24. I really don't care for the missions or walking around the plane. But I love the scenery. I think they have done a fantastic job. With Xplane I make my own Orthos and I'm pretty happy especially at 5,000ft and above. But I have a question about the MSFS scenery how accurate is it once you get out of the major cities of the world. I live near a major city but out in the suburbs so with I be able to fly over my house and recognize it, it the modeling that accurate. Thanks!!!

 

[avro707]

I live near a major city but out in the suburbs so with I be able to fly over my house and recognize it, it the modeling that accurate.

I haven't tried 2024 but I do live outside of city in the suburbs and can recognise landmarks nearby where I am in 2020, it is quite accurate.

 

[4sallypat]

Any XBOX users that are using yoke, flight sticks, rudder pedals, etc ???

 

[Richdmoore]

Any XBOX users that are using yoke, flight sticks, rudder pedals, etc ???

Yes. Any keyboard/mouse works out of box.

For flight controls, Honeycomb Alpha XPC works (you then can hook a proprietary hub to make Bravo Throttle and Charlie rudders with it. I believe Logitech rudders will work as well).

Turtle beach has a yoke as well as a flightstick, and can hook their brand rudders up via one of those devices.

Thrustmaster makes a hotas one x, cheap and can hook their brand rudders up through it as well. (It’s much better designed as flight game stick than a flight sim stick, but it works well for the lower cost vs a more sim focused setup.)

Hori makes a flightstick as well, but haven't heard good things. No rudder support that I know of.

I also helped beta test firmware for a roll limitless converter, that will allow the pc only honeycomb alpha yoke, or a stand alone (normally needs the Xbox alpha xpc and Xbox hub) bravo throttle or Charlie rudders to unofficially work with the Xbox. I think other pc only flight controls could work as well via this method, but they have to be programmed to work by the developer, although he seamed very open to expanding the supported flight equipment.

 

[avro707]

That thing is huge:

Have to download the installer for FlyByWire addons, then you can get the A320 and the A380 both. I just had a quick look at it, I have the 4K version but there is an 8K resolution version also.

First ever time in an MS Flight Sim product there has been a serious A380 simulation. It will be interesting to see what it's like to fly this 550+ tonnes behemoth. Supposedly they feel similar to an A320 to fly thanks to the systems but it's a huge plane. This one is the -842 version (RR Trent 972B-84 or 972-84).

 

[IvyKing]

First ever time in an MS Flight Sim product there has been a serious A380 simulation. It will be interesting to see what it's like to fly this 550+ tonnes behemoth. Supposedly they feel similar to an A320 to fly thanks to the systems but it's a huge plane. This one is the -842 version (RR Trent 972B-84 or 972-84).

One of my high school classmates flew C-5A's in the USAF. I asked him what was like flying them and he said that flying them was just like flying a giant Cessna.

A B-36 (D model or later) would be wild one to simulate, probably need at least or more computer and screen for the flight engineer. 6 turning and 4 burning...

 

[avro707]

One of my high school classmates flew C-5A's in the USAF. I asked him what was like flying them and he said that flying them was just like flying a giant Cessna.

A B-36 (D model or later) would be wild one to simulate, probably need at least or more computer and screen for the flight engineer. 6 turning and 4 burning...

I know this is getting a bit far from the original discussion, I watched a video with Prof. Capt. Jürgen Raps, FRAeS (the former chief-pilot of Lufthansa and pretty famous) going into a lot of detail on flying the A380 and the plane in general, it's interesting that it seems to be relatively similar to much smaller Airbus planes to fly and that transferring over isn't that difficult.

Not bad at all when you consider what it is.