Before the release of the Game of the Year Edition and the Reno Air Race DLC tomorrow, the developers behind Microsoft Flight Simulator took to Twitch to talk to the community about some upcoming projects and discussed a little of the near-term roadmap. In the 1 hour 30 minute broadcast, Jorg, Sebastian and Martial answered questions from the community and had some surprise appearances from some special guests.
Jorg kicked things off with a discussion on World Update VII. The new World Update will focus on Australia and will release on January 25th 2022. The team has been busy adding new points of interest, satellite imagery and a bunch more. The Bing team has also got a lot of access to 3D cities so expect plenty of new photogrammetry cities for the region. The stream was then joined by Orbx’s Anna Cicognani who confirmed that Orbx will be bringing the Southern Cross aircraft to Microsoft Flight Simulator. As part of the Local Legend series, this will be a digital replica of the iconic aircraft that was famously piloted by Sir Charles Kingsford-Smith. It’s planned for the aircraft to release with missions and a manual; the aircraft will be made available on the same day as World Update VI, January 25th 2022.
Some attention was then turned to current and future Sim Updates. Sim Update 7, releasing tomorrow, was reconfirmed to feature (optional) DX12, an in-development replay system and massive improvements to the multiplayer set-up. It was noted that DX12 won’t bring with it any further enhancements or performance benefits, yet, but the team will be listening to feedback and continuously improving the system to make the most of the new technology. Sim Update 8, which will mostly focus on fixing bugs, will release late February 2022 and will also come with Chinese localization and an updated Marketplace user interface.
Another big name then joined the stream, this time, it was PMDG’s Robert Randazzo. Our previous post covers what he said in more detail, but in summary: the DC-6 is coming to the Marketplace next week, and the 737, 777, 747, and a number of other products are due to come to the store in the future. He also teased a 757.
A popular aircraft type, gliders, was also brought up in the stream. Whilst the development team have listed it as a Q3 2022 release, it was confirmed that a new partner, FlightSim Studio AG would be working on bringing gliders to the simulator. Work has just started, but the team has acquired talent from Aerosoft and others to help create the best gliders in the simulator.
During the live Q&A, some other details were mentioned. Firstly, supersonic flight and afterburner effects are now available to 3rd party developers, whilst Metroblue and Asobo have made improvements to the weather engine with the latest Sim Update. For those experiencing crash to desktop issues still, Asobo and Microsoft continue to work on identifying as many as possible and fixing them. Jorg said that they hope to be more transparent about the issues they’re facing and also provide more detailed information when a user sees a crash. Finally, it was confirmed the next developer Q&A will come in January 2022.
You can watch the full Q&A now over on Twitch. Come back tomorrow for more information on the Reno Air Race DLC pack, an update on the Game of the Year Edition and more. We also have an interview with Jorg coming very soon.
