Ok, first of all, CONGRATULATIONS on achieving such a GORGEOUS simulator!
After digesting the game for a couple of days, I think I’m finally ready to give my feedback to the devs, for whatever my PPL in real life is worth 
Here are my 2 cents!
A Wrong First Impression
When I played the game on Tuesday morning, I flew in a Caravan for about 20 minutes and I felt really disappointed. Even at the highest settings of realism (True To Life/Hard), my experience was that the game felt really…dumbed down. Starting from turning on the engine and the airplane systems. The checklist for the Caravan C208B seems extremely simplified. No “Ignition on, watch the Oil Pressure rise, watch the fuel flow indication, watch ITT stabilize, THEN conditioner lever low idle, watch ITT on the Green, NG min 50%, etc”. The camera controls seemed so obviously designed for an Xbox controller and the game in general…
Just felt like Microsoft was looking to nail the sale with the general public, but letting down the IRL pilots looking to stay sharp, or the hardcore sim enthusiast who maybe can’t afford a career in the skies, but want to learn the most realistic way possible.
I was already trash-talking the game in some discords and found other people that felt the same way about it. I thought I had picked sides on the fight of whether you love or hate the game.
A SECOND CHANCE, FALLING IN LOVE
Later that day, I decided to give it a second chance while streaming on my Twitch channel, and a friend who is also a real-world pilot AND also a BETA TESTER for early FS2020 helped me see the game with different eyes…
Turns out ALL the piston single-engine planes work WONDERFULLY. Not only do they look beautiful but feel pretty realistic and accurate! and it’s such a delight to fly them.
The smoothness you experience in the air when trimming the plane correctly is one great example, in XPlane11 letting go of the controls, without autopilot engaged, would most likely result in catastrophe. This is not how it feels IRL, I’ll never forget the day my ballsy instructor made me stall my 172 and showed me how the plane actually DOES recover itself from nose-diving to straight and level flight because of the beautiful aerodynamics. FS2020 gets REALLY close to that.
Switching my airport to one in a more famous location instead of my 3rd world country (lol no hard feelings there) showed me for the 1st time what the graphics of the game REALLY look like! AND then, when I was beginning to fall in love with the game… BOOM landing challenge in the French Alps at sunset with low clouds and mist over a valley.
W.O.W w h a t a B E A U T Y! 
FINAL THOUGHTS
The game does feel like it makes you go the extra mile if you really want realism high enough to practice for real-world flying and keeping you skills sharp. However, it’s worth it doing those extra little things in order to stay flying in this beautiful world, instead of going back to your old sim.
Here are a few things I believe need to be fixed or improved ASAP.
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Checklists: Come on guys, EZ fix! look at the checklist of FSX (yes, the 2009 Flight Simulator) realistic all the way! Wanna keep the general public you captured by making the game more accessible? Sure! why not? Make the checklist change when selecting your level of difficulty for the game.
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G1000 And the instruments in general: Some pilots I’ve talked to don’t like the G1000 in this game. I haven’t asked particularly why but I have noticed it’s also kinda simplified, missing some buttons and options, AND changing the COMMS frequency manually is A PAIN IN THE BUTT! can’t seem to hover over the knob for more than a millisecond before it accidentally moves to the toggle cursor.
Would be nice if you could implement the function from (yes… you saw it coming) XPlane11 where you can click on an instrument and it pops up a 2D bigger version of that instrument or screen so you can click on it without worrying about messing up or zooming in. What a comfortable feature!
- CAMERA VIEWS: The new feature that “switches you” between sections of instruments and parts of the cockpit is SO COOL once you get used to it! However, I wish you didn’t have to sacrifice the traditional free look we’re used to. it is so comfortable.
You know, that little joystick in your flight stick? What people call a “thumb hat” or “POV hat”. That’s for moving the camera around freely! Again, I love the new feature of switching between parts of the cockpit, but it would be cool if we could configure that function to the arrows on the keyboard, or even W,A,S,D. and set the free look to that part of the flight stick that is designed for it!
