Cannot start Microsoft Flight Simulator ('The request is not supported' pop-up error)

Bug Reporting Hub Miscellaneous
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1

Any help would be gratefully received.

Brief description of the issue:
I cannot start Microsoft Flight Simulator. When I click on the icon to run the software, it firstly comes up with a pop-up asking if I want to allow a Microsoft Store Installer and then, regardless of whether I click ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ it then comes up with another pop-up with an error message saying “The request is not supported”.

The sim has been installed on my PC since launch day in August 2020 and has been running near faultlessly right up to and including yesterday.

No changes have been made between yesterday and today (I did download and install the add-on Self-Loading Cargo yesterday, but the sim worked fine with it yesterday and, in any case, it is separate software to the sim, so I don’t believe that would cause an issue) and there have been no Windows Updates.

Provide Screenshot(s)/video(s) of the issue encountered:

image
image1280×894 273 KB

image

Detail steps to reproduce the issue encountered:
Simply clicked on icon on desktop, error message appears.

PC specs for those who want to assist (if not entered in your profile)
AMD Ryzen 9 3900X
16GB DDR4 4400 RAM
m.2 1TB SSD
nVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 SUPER
Windows 10 (Current Version 2004, OS Build 19041.746)

2

That error message seems to indicate you have the current version installed, but the image above it shows the sim requesting elevation as it has something to install. I’m assuming you clicked “Yes”?

3

I did click Yes, though the error message appears regardless of whether I click ‘Yes’ or ‘No’.

(I believe I have seen the same pop-up asking about Windows Store installers when there is a new sim update - but every time that’s happened, it’s loaded up and taken me to the update screen in the sim without an issue. Speaking of which, I can confirm no sim updates have been downloaded from the Microsoft Store today (unless it has downloaded something and it’s not appearing in the ‘Recent Activiy’ list on the Microsoft Store’s update screen)).

If the sim is requesting elevation to install an update that isn’t there, is there any way I can get around this?

4

Just to advise - I have fixed it… sort of.

For reasons I can’t quite understand, Flight Simulator now only works if I ‘Run As Administrator’ (though I am sure I tried that earlier and it didn’t work!)

When running as admininstrator, a similar popup appears but (instead of the ‘Microsoft Store Package Dependency Installer’ shown in the screenshot above) I get this:

image
image1775×1292 588 KB

I believe the above is normal, as you often get those pop-ups when attempting to start programs as an administrator.

However, attempting to run Flight Simulator without going through ‘Run As Administrator’ still results in both of the popups in my initial post, including the ‘request is not supported’ error, and FS does not load.

I can live with it, but it would be nice to know what the cause of this is.

One thing I have reaslied is that, in order to get the add-on Self-Loading Cargo to run (as per my original post) I had to load up FSUIPC7 yesterday - FSUIPC had been installed for a while but yesterday was the first time I actully ran it (crucially, yesterday I ran it after FS had already loaded up, so today is the first time I have loaded it up since running FSUIPC for the first time).

Therefore, I’m wondering is FSUIPC has changed something which has caused the issue.

I’d welcome the thoughts of anyone with any technical know-how.

5

I’m not technical, but I do run FSUIPC7.
I haven’t had any issues from it, nor do I know of anything in FSUIPC that would cause it.

Your best bet is to try their forum.
Did you know you that when you start FSUIPC, it can be set to start the sim automatically?

6

Reminder about the Bug & Issues categories on the forum:

Before creating a topic in the Bugs & Issues categories, assure no mods or 3rd party add-ons are installed per the guidelines of this section.

The purpose of the Bugs & Issues categories is to discuss issues that affect the base simulator (MSFS default content). Please do not discuss issues with third-party addons, or modifications in this category.

If you believe your issue may be caused by a third-party addon/mod, empty your community folder, restart the simulator and try to reproduce the error.

All issues caused by, or involving third-party addons/mods should be reported to the third-party developer. All issues related to the core simulator (MSFS default content) can be formally reported through Zendesk.

7

Thank you though, with respect, I do not believe the above reminder is relevant to this case here.

There is no evidence to suggest the issue is directly related to FSUIPC. Although it was the only variable which changed between the sim loading one day and then not loading the next, as far as I am aware, its installation is entirely separate to MSFS - it merely ‘acts upon’ MSFS in real-time if enabled and, therefore, MSFS can be started without FSUIPC running, which should make it an irrelevant factor.

If I am correct with the above then, if I try to run MSFS without FSUIPC running (which is what I am trying to do), then FSUIPC should be no more a factor in the context of the above scenario than me having Microsoft Office installed on the same PC.

Presumably the scope of the reminder above is that any mods that directly ‘hard’ impacts the sim (e.g. community folder, changes to config files etc.) are removed and this was done prior to posting.

In an abundance of caution, I will ask on the FSUIPC forum if the software ‘hard’ modifies anything (I do not believe it does).

But, again, as far as I am aware, it is run alongside FS in real-time, rather than modifying files/configs etc. so therefore it should not be a relevant factor if MSFS is loaded without FSUIPC - it has, as far as the sim is concerned, already been removed in that case.

8

I doubt FSUIPC is your issue.
As you stated, it does nothing if it isn’t started.
You might be able to get around having to hit “run as an administrator” every time, by getting FSUIPC to start the sim.
Yes, you will get a more learned response on their site.

9

Is there any solution to this problem ???
I have the same problem after updating SU5 + patch.
I am not using FSUIPC. MSFS - new clean install.
I am only using MSFS_AddonsLinker.

Please help.

1 Like
10

pretty sure ?.. often users don’t checking that all files are deleted , as the FAQ mentioned.

We have some cases where users need to start the application with admin rights. May be because the users started the app one time with admin-rights and somewhat goes wrong with the rights , or a add-on do somewhat wrong, or these Linker do strange things… who knows.

Ah… and here I also found a topic: Game wont start - #17 by MichaMMA ( finally a reinstall help here the user )

11

I’m afraid the only thing that worked for me was a clean install (though note I also decided to do a ‘Reset My PC’ to ensure I was working with a fresh Windows install, too).

As someone pointed out earlier, the popup that appears (the ‘Microsoft Store Package Dependency Installer’) seems to suggest that the sim believes there’s an update to be run, when in fact there isn’t.

So, if you don’t want to do a clean install, it might be worth waiting until the next update is released by Asobo (which will hopefully be in the next week or two) to see if this enables it to install the update successfully and, in the process, clear the error.

If that doesn’t work, then I’m at a loss I’m afraid.

I had hoped a dev would come on here and give me a simple fix, such as deleting a registry key or something (my guess is it is probably a corrupted registry key) but all I got was a forum moderator giving me a ticking off and implying it was caused by FSUIPC in the process, which rather showed a complete lack of understanding of the issue (and, indeed, how FSUIPC works).

12

MODERATOR EDIT:
This post merged into this topic.

Please tag your post with #pc and/or #xbox.
pc
Are you on Steam or Microsoft Store version?
DVD version
Are you using Developer Mode or made changes in it?
No
Brief description of the issue:
I have a MSI card and wanted to set up “Dragon Center”. Then is was asked to link to Flight simulator EXE… I was told to get administrator rights .
I TOOK OWNERSHIP of the Flight sim folder… and then
the “request was not supported” when I try to start the sim.
Provide Screenshot(s)/video(s) of the issue encountered:
5

Detail steps to reproduce the issue encountered:

PC specs and/or peripheral set up of relevant:

Build Version # when you first started experiencing this issue: SU5

13

Now its possible for me when I start MSFS to right click and “run as administrator” and the game starts. Otherwise not.

Yours

Jens

14

:wave: Thank you using the Bug section, using templates provided will greatly help the team reproducing the issue and ease the process of fixing it.
Are you using Developer Mode or made changes in it?

no

Have you disabled/removed all your mods and addons?

yes

Brief description of the issue:

error message stopp loading

msfs bug
msfs bug1923×1081 156 KB

Provide Screenshot(s)/video(s) of the issue encountered:

yes

Detailed steps to reproduce the issue encountered:

doubleclick on fs icon

PC specs and/or peripheral set up if relevant:

Build Version # when you first started experiencing this issue:

SU10

:loudspeaker: For anyone who wants to contribute on this issue, Click on the button below to use this template:

Do you have the same issue if you follow the OP’s steps to reproduce it?

Provide extra information to complete the original description of the issue:

reinstall done, windows uddate done, no addons done

If relevant, provide additional screenshots/video:

16

After 2 agonizing days of dealing with this issue, I have finally fixed it and I hope it helps others because there is absolutely no other post on the internet that exists with a proper fix.

THE ISSUE:

I was getting “the request is not supported” when trying to start MSFS2020, this started after changing file permissions in order to force the flight simulator .exe to start as admin, and then it seemed like it got corrupted to hell, re-installed MSFS2020 twice, deleted everything related to flight simulator in registry, still the issue kept coming back - I was realizing my only option to fix it was a reinstall of windows, but not ready to do so I decided just starting the program as admin for a while was an OK work-around - but I decided to try one more thing and this fixed it:

THE FIX:

Locate the folder where MSFS .exe resides, mine was at

“C:\Program Files\WindowsApps\Microsoft.FlightSimulator_1.30.12.0_x64__8wekyb3d8bbwe”

the “WindowsApps” folder is usually protected and you cannot access it before ensuring you have permission, you most likely have already done this in order to create this “bug” in the first place but if not, right-click the folder and go to properties, security tab, advanced, and change the owner to “system” which is what it’s set to in my case.

If you right-click the “Microsoft.FlightSimulator_1.30.12.0_x64__8wekyb3d8bbwe” folder (or whatever it is in your case), and click on “properties” you should see it is set to “read-only” , just uncheck it so it is no longer set to “read-only” and click apply, you will probably get another pop-up regarding some files/folders that cannot be changed, click “ignore all”, the system will then finish changing permissions for the folder and files, and you should now be able to start MSFS without running as administrator. I can now run Add-on linker and re-shade which were no longer able to launch MSFS since this issue started.

I can also double click on the MSFS icon anywhere without starting as admin and all is well.

Anyway hope this helps anyone else going crazy over this like I was!

1 Like