Just like it did back in 2019, Asobo Studios and Microsoft had a complete mic drop moment back in June at the Xbox Games Showcase, where out of nowhere, Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 was revealed.
The reaction to this reveal, however, was unlike that of its predecessor. Excitement quickly turned into confusion and even a bit of bitterness by many in the flight sim community. All of this was due to the fact that Asobo had already set a strong precedent that Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020, as it’s now being unofficially labelled, was set to be a long-term project that would be refreshed and upgraded for a decade. But, now, a sequel is in the works—and it’s coming very soon. What happened to the existing sim, and what will happen to it in the near future? Asobo has provided some interesting answers, but some mystery remains.
Hitting the ‘service ceiling’
Every aviation nerd is familiar with the term “service ceiling.” It is the maximum height at which an aircraft is rated to fly at; any higher and the engines will not be able to produce enough thrust to maintain lift, resulting in a stall. What does that have to do with Asobo’s projects? Well, as Jorg Neumann, Head of the Microsoft Flight Simulator team put it, this is essentially where the existing Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 is at in terms of capability.
This revelation came from Asobo’s recent panel at FlightSimExpo 2023. Held a few weeks after the initial reveal of the incoming sim, Asobo took the opportunity to provide some more granular details about it. To summarize, Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 is being built with an upgraded version of Asobo’s in-house engine. This is allowing for far greater technological achievements and refinements over its predecessor.
This includes bountiful improvements such as multi-thread support, a more streamlined client that will have enhanced data management, resulting in smaller file sizes and faster download speeds. Also, the new engine features far more robust physics and weather simulation.
All in all, Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 is bringing some big improvements to the experience that the flight sim community have come to enjoy in the four years that the existing Microsoft Flight Simulator has been on the market.
But, the thing is, the version of the sim we have today (as of July 2023,) is not the same as when it initially released. True, this literally applies to the version number, but also its feature set.
So much has been added to the sim in the last four years which has all been a part of Asobo’s promised commitment to consistent updates. As Jorg pointed out in that same panel, Asobo has released 33 updates in 33 months and there’s still more to come as the rest of 2023 progresses. So, again, where did Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 come from and why isn’t it just one huge update to the existing sim?
Outgrowing the nest
Going back to Jorg’s statement about Asobo hitting the limits of Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020, such a phenomenon is not at all unheard of in game development. In fact, it’s happened time and again over the decades.
In the earlier days of gaming which certainly does apply to this series considering it’s nearly as old as all of gaming itself, developers had some constraints to contend with. Not only was the hardware limited, but so was their ability to cram their ideas into a single project.
Of course, just about every game was and is created with the hope it’ll be a success, but that’s not a guarantee. Back in the early days, whatever ideas hit the cutting room floor before a game was shipped were usually lost forever unless a sequel was made. Sometimes, there’d be too many ideas for a single game and a sequel was essential to flesh those extra schemes out.
For several years, Microsoft Flight Simulator as a series grew with the advancement of computer hardware. As big new strides in the space were made every few years, a new entry in the series would be released to take advantage of those technological benefits.
This pattern remained consistent until the 2006 release of FSX, where Microsoft would infamously leave the series on the shelf for about 15 years. That’s why the aforementioned 2019 reveal of Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 was so jaw-dropping. It wasn’t just a new entry in the series, its over-the-top presentation alone was mind-bending. The richness of the details seemed almost unreal. It was real, and it’s only gotten better since.
And, that’s the big difference with this existing iteration of the sim. Unlike past versions which needed service packs and/or entirely new versions to make big strides, this version of the sim has been treated practically as a live service title, with regular new content and sim updates over the last four years. With that now infamous quote from Jorg prior to release about this being a “ten-year project,” simmers expected this to be the status quo for quite some time.
Jorg actually did sheepishly reference this very quote during the FlightSimExpo panel, but all he said about it was that “there’s a variety of reasons why I said that.” No specifications, no clarifications—that was the quote.
However, bringing the point back to how ideas sometimes outgrow a project, I theorise that Asobo initially really did intend to stick with Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 alone for the long haul. But, at some point, the team realized they wanted to do more and the community was asking for more. Therefore, those ideas grew larger and larger, beyond the capabilities of the current sim. So, with that “ten year project” quote looming in the background, it really seems to have taken on a new meaning.
“The biggest undertaking in flight simulation”
The above quote comes from Jorg during the Expo panel; that’s how he and his team are describing Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024. This is, of course, a very lofty claim. Considering all that’s already been achieved with the existing sim, this claim certainly shouldn’t be dismissed as unsubstantiated.
This also provides more context into his admission that the current sim is maxing out its limitations.
While Asobo has not come out and actually stated verbatim that Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 initially began out as some kind of update to the current sim, such a case at least seems to fit the details that have been provided so far. I mentioned earlier how such a phenomenon is not unheard of and there’s one recent high-profile example of such a case—The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom.
Interestingly enough, when it was first revealed in its fullest form, the reaction from several folks echoed that of the reaction towards Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024—”Why couldn’t this just be Breath of the Wild DLC? It looks so similar!” While such comments were made to take a dig at the game’s apparent high level of similarity with its predecessor, as it turns out, such thoughts weren’t entirely off beat.
Zelda series producer, Eiji Aonuma, confirmed in an interview that Tears of the Kingdom originally did begin its development as an expansion to Breath of the Wild. But, as the team started adding more and more ideas, it then morphed into an entirely new project. Tears of the Kingdom has gone onto be quite the success, which goes without saying.
Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 looks poised to have a very similar story. With that being said, just as much as I am excited to see how it turns out, I still have some concerns.
A tale of two wings
To address the initial wave of confusion and angst generated by the initial reveal of Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024, Asobo released an FAQ several hours later.
This addressed a few key queries, but one point I’d like to really highlight is the confirmation that Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 will still be supported following the release of its successor. Jorg went on to reconfirm this during the FlightSimExpo panel.
Even in the lead-up to release, the existing sim still has several updates and content drops slated in its development roadmap that Asobo is continuing to work on. Additionally, that FAQ also confirmed that existing add-ons will be compatible with the new sim, so any purchases made within the next few months will not simply ‘go to waste’.
While this is all great news, I am very keen to see exactly how Asobo intends to execute this feat.
During that same keynote, we learned that Asobo has close to 200 employees. They are joined by various other partner companies that have all been contributing to Microsoft Flight Simulator over these past few years.
We now know that for some time now, the core team at Asobo has been split between continued work on the current sim and building up its successor. So far, they seem to be balancing this workload well.
But, once Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 is finally out in the wild, what can those who choose to stick with its predecessor really expect to enjoy moving forward?
Jorg pointed to one such big update that’s coming in the new sim that the team will “attempt” to retrofit into the existing sim which is that of the implementation of seasons (a feature that’s been promised for some time now.) While this one point may seem easy to overlook, it’s a bit telling of how this duality of sims may play out.
The way I see this going is that the two sims can and will coexist, but Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 will no doubt be getting the brunt of the attention. Perhaps this won’t be as pronounced at first, maybe for around a year. But, as time goes on, that attention will shift in its favour.
Such a thing has happened before several times in this series. The most recent example being that of FS2004 and FSX.
Released two years apart and built on the same codebase, many add-ons were cross-compatible between the two. This includes aircraft, airports and even a lot of utilities. But, of course, the FSX version of each product was more robust.
Since Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 will have more advanced features than its predecessor, it’s highly likely history will repeat itself in this way.
Sébastien Wloch, founder of Asobo and who joined Jorg on stage at the FlightSimExpo panel, outlined some of the improvements that are being implemented into the new sim, such as how aircraft will feature a far larger number of modelled control surfaces.
He mentioned how he was able to port existing models into the new sim within a matter of minutes and then added in the new control points. Such tools will be made available to add-on devs, making the porting process seemingly painless.
Considering this, then, I do expect that for as long as it seems feasible, Asobo and add-on devs will simply benefit from two very similar revenue streams. Those that jump ship to Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 will have a better experience, but those that stick with its predecessor will still be able to buy and download new content as long as it’s produced.
However, this all just refers to content. As for big sim updates and utilities that improve the core functionality of the existing sim, I can’t imagine Asobo will keep up the same cadence for the ‘old’ sim after its successor releases.
I honestly expect that Asobo will continue to flesh out Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 right up until the release of Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 and that will serve as the foundation for the incoming sim.
Then, MSFS 2024 will essentially handle all the heavy-lifting of functionality improvements moving forward. Asobo will definitely keep servers for MSFS 2020 active for the foreseeable future, as so much of the sim is in the cloud as it is—so continued online support is a must. There’s the keyword right there, “support”.
Support systems
All Asobo has to do to honour its promise of continued support (at the very least) is to simply keep Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 in functioning order. As for big improvements made to the core sim after the launch of its successor, however, I highly doubt that will be the case.
Two appropriate examples of what this support operation may end up looking like comes from two of Microsoft’s other branches, Windows and Xbox.
Just like the sim series, Microsoft has a history of supporting different releases of its Windows OS. Currently, the primary focus is on Windows 11, with continued “support” for Windows 10. However, Windows 10 hasn’t received much in the way of big upgrades since the release of Windows 11.
Interestingly enough, Windows 10 was originally launched with a promise of being the start of a new generation of Windows, where Microsoft would just keep updating it for years and years to come. Somewhere along the line, that plan changed and we got Windows 11. Sound familiar?
As for Xbox, Microsoft also has an established history of supporting two different generations for some time, as is the case with most other console manufacturers. The Xbox Series X|S succeeded the Xbox One family in 2020, but it’s only as of 2023 that Xbox Game Studios has ceased development of new first-party releases for the Xbox One.
Meanwhile, there are still new third-party titles for both generations on the horizon and the Xbox One family is still being supported with online services and the like. But, clearly, the focus is mostly on the Xbox Series systems, so it’s only a matter of time before even third-parties start skipping out on the Xbox One more en masse.
So, again, these are all varying examples of “support” that give us an indication of how things might play out for these two sims. They’ll share a pool of players for some time, but it will be interesting to see how many will migrate to the successor and how quickly.
Either way, Asobo has big plans for MSFS 2024 and it will certainly try it’s best to coerce users to flock over. After all, why would they go through the process of creating a large, new project for it to only be mildly well-received?
There are currently 12 million customers who’ve enjoyed Microsoft Flight Simulator which means 12 million potential returning customers, all before new ones inevitably flock in. Of course, if Asobo can get a dollar out of each of them again, they’ll try to. ‘It’s just business,’ after all.
Setting a precedent
Even if Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 does live up to its promise of being the most feature-rich sim to ever hit the genre, this whole move from Asobo has now changed the chemistry of the community. Now, it knows not to expect to be playing the exact same iteration of the sim for years to come. Now, there’s potential that wallets will need to be opened again within a few years to enjoy the delights of the next big release.
This isn’t new. Again, this series (as well as its competitors) has always functioned like this. But, in the case of this iteration of the sim specifically, the promise of “ten years of support” did initially sound like it would be a ten year investment into the same core product.
Asobo still has yet to confirm if returning players will need to pay full price for the new release, or if they’ll get some kind of discount. Particularly worried are those who purchased the $120 Premium Deluxe version of the sim. Sure, there’s no rule that says they must be compensated, but as the old saying goes: “Once bitten, twice shy.”
Despite this particularly troublesome reveal, however, I have high hopes for Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024. I’m very eager to see just how much more feature rich it will be, as we now know it will have a wealth of activities and also big technological improvements.
I’ve poured nearly 1000 hours into Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020, so you best believe I intend to do the same, if not more in the new sim. Hopefully the transition will be as smooth as Asobo is leading us to believe.
