The Microsoft Flight Simulator series turned 40 years old in 2020, and the company celebrated with the release of the simply titled Microsoft Flight Simulator. The release was far from perfect due to a load of issues dealing with the game's servers and installation process, but ultimately, the title proved that newcomer Asobo Studio had a good idea of what made the series tick. Four years later, the team decided to release Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024, a brand-new full title instead of DLC for the prior game.
Before you can do anything in the game, you'll have to install it. That seems like a strange statement to make, but no matter where you grab the game from, you'll only download a little over 11GB, which is enough to cover the installer. Starting up the game prompts you to download roughly 18GB more data, and this is where the problems start. It didn't take long for first-day players to encounter long install times regardless of connection speed.
I was given the code on day one but had other obligations to finish, so I waited for a few days before trying to play the game and still ran into install times that lasted for over an hour before deciding to quit. I tried again on a different PC, and the install went fine, causing me to take that data and go back to the original install PC to finally finish the process, which still required 10 more minutes of installation time. The passage of time meant that I was spared the streaming issues from launch, such as missing airplane parts and unreadable environments. I still have to suffer through minutes-long load times whenever booting up the game or selecting a new destination.
This is despite running the game with a 1 Gbit cable internet connection on a Ryzen 7 7700X, 32GB RAM, a GeForce RTX 4090, with the game at 4K and running off an nVME drive. The sad or funny part about all of this, depending on your perspective, was that these events and complaints also happened with the first game, so it remains surprising to see that the same issues were replicated.
Once the game finally finishes installing, the next thing you'll be prompted to do after configuring your accessibility settings is to create your pilot and co-pilot. The process is fine, and you can see yourself and your co-pilot in the game often enough that customizing both characters doesn't feel like a waste of time. However, things start to go awry when you select your voice and find out that it's all AI generated. That doesn't just apply to your character but everyone who has a speaking role in the game. The use of AI isn't necessarily bad, but the delivery will remind you why the technology isn't at an acceptable level yet, since the game has a tendency to enunciate some words incorrectly or have misplaced emphasis on other words, which makes everything sound unnatural. To be fair, this was present in the 2020 iteration of the game as well, but it feels more pronounced by comparison since there's more talking. There also seems to be an issue where some air traffic controllers relay the same information to you and talk over each other with only a second or two of delay; it gives the impression of the audio needing a good deal of work.
The game provides more activities when compared to the previous title, but what most players will gravitate toward first and often is Free Flight. As in the previous game, you choose your craft and starting point, have the option to set an end point, and away you go. Just like before, the game does an excellent job of keeping even the most casual of fans sucked into the simple joy of flight. Flying a 747 is very different from flying a helicopter, which is also different from flying a Jetson One, but each experience feels freeing. This even holds true for the hot air balloons, which are less about flying and more about observing the area from different elevations — and staying put or floating from one spot to another. The feeling of how good it is to fly is exemplified when you start to look at the environments, which are gorgeous when seen from afar. The game has a plethora of customizable options, from weather to time of day and the ability to let the real-world conditions take over; it makes for an ideal flight session every time.
The mode makes for a perfect relaxing experience, but it also differs quite a bit depending on your equipment. This is less about the kind of PC you run and more about your actual hardware for controls. True flight sim enthusiasts will no doubt have the best time with their various flight yokes and pedals, but keyboard and mouse players have more than enough keys to hold their own when it comes to piloting complicated aircraft — provided you're willing to put in the time to customize everything. Those using a gamepad will need to learn more than a few key combinations to get some of the controls going, but the gamepad can handle the basics well enough to let someone have fun, provided they're willing to turn on a variety of assists to prevent things from getting way too complicated for a device with less than the ideal number of buttons.
Free Flight is also where some of the game's flaws are most exposed. One of the more noticeable things is that the map data received only the briefest of updates. Go to the Las Vegas Strip, and you'll see the Sphere burning so brightly that the surrounding parts of the Strip look darker by comparison. By contrast, there's a neighborhood that was being built near my house in 2020, and it still isn't in the game despite Bing maps showing it when construction was only halfway done. For a game touting that it gets its map data from online sources, the lack of updates makes this claim seem suspicious when players of the 2020 iteration will see that the map is relatively unchanged.
The lack of an updated map pales in comparison to the fact that unless you're out in the wilderness, the ground only looks good from afar. Fly near a building that isn't considered a landmark, and you'll see that the texture job is slapdash at best, something you'll definitely notice at night when some buildings have faux reflections that look off. Go to the city streets, and you'll notice that the lights at night are free floating with no poles to hold them up. Trees are present where they aren't supposed to be, and streets and houses are nothing more than crudely done spikes and spires and walls. None of this would matter in a game about flight except that this game touts the ability to leave your vehicle and walk around the environment. Again, do this in the Australian desert, and it looks kind of neat, but do this at Disneyland, and you'll end up seeing what can be best described as a postapocalyptic version of the theme park.
There are other game modes if you're looking for some flying guardrails. Challenge League lets you take on events like racing or performing some precision landing techniques, and the presence of an online leaderboard makes it feel reminiscent of Pilotwings — minus things like parachuting and using a jetpack. World Photographer has you going around the world and taking photographs as the anime would suggest, but it has some bonus objectives, such as taking a picture with certain elements in the background or at certain times of the day. You'll also be tasked with taking pictures of animals, and this is where getting out of the plane makes sense since the environments and animals look gorgeous when compared to the humans, who look less glamorous. Activities mode is much like Challenge League without the leaderboards. All of the events are open, and you can partake in Discovery flights that have you flying near picturesque places like Mount Fuji, Mecca, and Yosemite National Park. On top of that, almost all of the content from the previous Flight Simulator game can be transferred, which is some consolation for those who are disappointed that this game isn't just DLC for the previous game.
The mode that will most likely get players' attention more than Free Flight is Career, which gives the game a structured progression system to follow for those who wished the first game had something similar. You start off the mode taking various lessons all in service of getting your private pilot license. From there, you can take on various jobs that only have you flying a basic Cessna aircraft. Those jobs give you experience and credits, so you can take on other tests to get other licenses. While there are certain prerequisites for some of the more complicated jobs, you'll eventually be able to do things like fly commercial airline jets, fly firefighting craft, or help with airborne construction. The end goal is to be able to take on any kind of job that requires different types of piloting skills.
Just like Free Flight mode, Career mode does a very good job of keeping you engaged in the game. The tutorial system is comprehensive enough that it feels redundant to see the training modules on the main menu. There's always some new license to get with a vehicle you may only be vaguely familiar with, and the wide variety of tasks you can take on with each license gives the game real legs, since it can feel like there's a never-ending parade of fires to put out or people to transport. Piloting celebrities may not seem that exciting, but it can eventually lead to transporting people to hospitals and other high-stress flights that give the game a less casual vibe than expected. Just like Free Flight, Career mode becomes a source of near-infinite content.
The one thing that holds back this mode is stability. There have been more than a few crashes while in the middle of a session, which means often having to repeat lessons and tasks. Objects start to flicker, and some never get rendered properly. There are times when tasks never show as completed or situations arise that make task completion almost impossible. All of these things result in a mode that takes abnormally longer to complete, so it ends up turning a fun mode into an occasionally frustrating one.
The prospect of playing this game on a portable device like the Steam Deck is tempting, but it isn't possible at the moment. The game will get through the opening company logos, but the game will try to have you connect to Xbox Live once the opening movie starts. Before you can proceed to log in, the game produces an error message related to logging in, and every option you choose has the game crash out and the system gets thrown back to the dashboard. Looking at reports from Proton.db on the previous game, it looks as if the Xbox login process is buggy for that title as well, so those hoping to fly on a portable will have to hold out hope that the issue gets fixed eventually, especially since you can't use the GE version of Proton for some reason on the Deck.
There is potential with Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024, but for every positive thing the game does, there's at least one big negative to counteract it. The variety of aircraft you can pilot is more varied than before, but you'll need to brush up on the various controls to get the most out of each craft. The ability to take photos while flying and on the ground is neat, but be prepared to only be wowed in certain areas. Those hoping for some detailed shots in more populated areas on foot will be sorely disappointed (or horrified). The inclusion of actual people would've been nice if they didn't look so last generation, and while the game has an abundance of activities and a full-fledged career mode, it would have been nice if the experience had faster loading times and was more stable overall. If this follows the trajectory of the previous game, then what you'll get in time is a flight sim that will cater to the hardcore but still be accessible enough for the casual player. Unless you're dedicated enough to want to get in right now with the latest and greatest or need more variety and objectives in a campaign, you might want to stick with the 2020 edition of Microsoft Flight Simulator for a little while longer to get your casual flight fix.
Score: 6.0/10
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