Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 review

Presenting the entire Earth with even greater fidelity than its 2020 predecessor, it’s strenuous to overstate what an extraordinary technical achievement Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 represents. The plane and cockpits are astonishingly detailed, both visually and functionally. The flight physics are delightfully original, and while it has its quirks, no one has even tried to incorporate our entire planet into a game with such fine detail.

Before we move forward, I want to highlight the terrible state of the servers at launch, which prevented me and many others from playing at all. These have been, at least for me, almost completely resolved as of this writing, although I still encounter occasional issues, such as the fact that I can never load all of the Grand Canyon geometry in high resolution. This was by no means an acceptable launch day experience. However, in my tests I didn’t see any indication that you’d have such a bad experience today, so I’m willing to let the past be the past.

It is worth noting, however, that due to the streaming nature of the up-to-date flight simulator, you will have a variable experience depending on your network configuration. I’m lucky enough to have a gigabit wired network, and I’ve allocated 200GB on the recent SSD to the FS2024’s “floating cache,” which stores things like terrain data for frequently visited locations. Regardless, load times, especially on first boot, are much better than FS2020, but Microsoft recommends a bandwidth of at least 100Mbps for gaming at max settings. I didn’t need that much – the maximum speed I saw on the FS2024 at any given time was about 46Mbps. But it’s worth being aware of it.

You are a pilot

Microsoft has identified three types of gamers that Flight Simulator wants to reach: hardcore amateurs who want the most realistic experience, gamers who want to earn rewards for completing challenges, and visitors who want to visit fascinating landmarks around the world. I like to think I have a bit of all three wolves in me. I appreciate the many little touches of realism. I’m a geography and architecture geek who easily delights in things like being able to fly under a faithful recreation of the Golden Gate Bridge, and I certainly enjoy seeing the numbers grow.

While I’d say amateurs and observers are well-served, FS2024’s attempt to introduce an objective-based career mode is a bit disappointing. I enjoyed practicing and taking exams to earn my recent IFR and jet certifications, but the actual economics of being an independent pilot are shallow and not very fascinating to manage. It takes many, many hours of a mercenary working on borrowed wings and handing over most of the reward in finder’s fees before you can afford to have the cheapest plane available. And while the variety of missions – from dropping skydivers to 10,000 feet to helping put out forest fires – is enough to keep things fascinating, I never got the feeling of running a miniature business that I was looking for.

Blue Tam

But that didn’t matter much when I was swimming through gorgeous volumetric clouds or diving low enough to dip my toes in the sparkling Nile. FS2024 really looks amazing. At least from a height of 1,000 feet, or when you’re admiring the many specially designed airports and landmarks – both recent and returning from FS2020 – this is probably one of the best-looking games I’ve ever played. However, pushing beyond the boundaries that human artists have touched, he does some things better than others at eye level.

I know, I know. This is not Microsoft Walking Simulator 2024. However, if you give me the opportunity to leave the plane and move around with a custom avatar, I will of course test it. I found a surprising level of reliability in many different biomes… as long as you stick to rural or wild, inland areas. Walking through the forested hills around Divide, Colorado, where I spent most of my childhood, was almost uncanny in its fidelity.

But once you reach more populated areas, things quickly become surreal and strange. Don’t expect to be able to walk the streets of Tokyo without wondering whether your graphics card is malfunctioning or whether you’re having a bad trip. This engine still doesn’t perform as well in places where land and water meet so well, which is unfortunate if you want to cruise along the Pacific coast or around the Norwegian fjords. Waves often look painted and still, and riverbanks often defy gravity in crazy ways. That’s still pretty damn impressive. I mean, they modeled the entire Earth! But these details stand out more because of how incredible the recreation is.

Different yokes for different people

Apart from a good internet connection and a good graphics card, the remaining cost of entry to get the perfect FS2024 experience is some kind of dedicated peripheral. You don’t have to spend money on the full HOTAS if you don’t want to – my trusty Logitech Extreme 3D Pro, which costs about $30 on sale, served perfectly with the keyboard next to it, which gave me access to more keyboard shortcuts.

But I also tried sticking with an Xbox controller for about 12 hours, and I can only recommend that experience if it’s your only option. It’s playable, but the lack of precise throttle control is a constant problem, and all the control surfaces are really responsive thanks to that little handle. I definitely got cramps trying to maintain the correct angle of attack for climbing and had to adjust the sensitivity for each plane to avoid going into a fatal spin during each takeoff and landing. I can’t even imagine playing with just a mouse and keyboard.

If you’re less interested in the simulation aspects, there are plenty of options to enhance your flying experience. With all the assists turned on, the game may seem quite arcade-like. Too arcadey for my taste, but it’s nice that they offer this choice. On the other hand, you can go through the pre-flight checklist and manually flip every switch in the cockpit before takeoff, and the air traffic control system is much more detailed than in FS2020. You’ll still hear a lot of amazing AI voices that I don’t like. However, given the number of missions and the different airports, it is impossible to record human dialogue during each of them.

Final destinations

The variety of planes, of which there are 70 even in the basic version, is also amazing – from commercial airliners, to fighter jets, to balmy air balloons. Each has its own quirks and challenges to learn, which makes each trip in a recent vehicle feel like meeting a recent person. Helicopters and I have never really seen eye to eye, but I have a particular pliable spot for rugged taildragger planes that allow me to take off and land quickly in the middle of some random field in Africa.

Many of these wild areas are now inhabited by migrating local animals, as evidenced by the highly detailed and brilliantly animated models borrowed from Frontier’s Planet Zoo. Unfortunately, they do not exhibit a wide range of behaviors. You can walk right up to a polar bear or water buffalo and they won’t even notice you exist. But it’s a nice little touch and another excuse to operate the fully functional photography features. There’s even a brand recent World Photographer mode where you have to take photos of various animals and landmarks, which I found to be a relaxing break from Career mode.

If you want to really put your piloting skills to the test, the weekly leaderboards also feature a selection of challenges, from perfecting complex landings to doing what I can only describe as “Top Gun shit” – trying to fly through locations like the Grand Canyon F- 18 at the lowest possible height. They’re fun, but definitely more stressful than the other modes.

This simulation is also not without some quirks, glitches and oversights. One issue I ran into repeatedly was the smaller, procedurally generated airports from which you can fly out on certain missions, where my plane would show up with one wing partially stuck in the structure, preventing takeoff. Other times I received penalties for infractions such as using flaps at too high an airspeed while my plane was completely stationary with the parking brake on. These problems are usually minor, sporadic, and can be easily circumvented by selecting a different mission. But they’re still annoying.

However, none of this detracts from what Flight Simulator 2024 represents as a whole. It takes the staggering ambitions of the 2020 simulator and runs even better on it – despite its launch woes – which is already a huge achievement. Some of the recent things it tries to introduce work better than others, but the core of what makes this long-running franchise great is stronger than ever.