Hi there, How close is the MSFS 2020 to the real thing? Any help is greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.
That depends on what. If you mean âaircraftâ it varies from âvery goodâ to âlaughably badâ. The GA stuff - Cessnas and other small planes are pretty good. The larger you get the worse it gets.
The A320Neo and Cessna Caravan mods which are done by others and are free are good by reputation, I have not personally flown either.
The scenery/graphics are mostly excellent, well ahead of anything else. (there are some glitches).
Overall, it has the same problem any home sim has, that you donât feel the plane, roll with it etc.
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The physical sensations and feel you get from flying for real cannot be replicated with MSFS even if you have a VR system.
The sim cannot replicate the variations in G that you get flying an aircraft, that lift in the stomach as you take off or the weight reduction you feel when you practice a stall. Or the extra G you feel when you do a steep banked turn, spin the aircraft or fly an aerobatic manoeuvre.
MSFS does provide a very, very good alternative to spending ÂŁ150 an hour on flying lessons.
The dynamics of aircraft control, handling and performance do and will help anyone wanting to or learning for real how to fly.
In the early 90âs I used MSFS as a training aid during my own PPL training and it helped me get my license very quickly.
MSFS does a great job at simulating flying so if you are considering buying it the only thing you need to be aware of is the speed of your internet connection and that you really need a high end computer to get MSFS to work.
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As the saying goes in the simulation world, âAll models are wrong, some models are useful.â
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[Disclaimer] My comments may well be regarded as worthless because I am NOT a pilotânever felt I needed to risk life and limb in the air as well as in the rest of the world⊠I have flown in airliners and military aircraft as spam in the can on international flights long enough that you can catch a cold on takeoff and be rid of it before you land 
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I have owned all MS (and subLogic) versions for the PC (and 8-bit computers prior to that) and this one is as good as it gets. Donât let the detractors get you down. Work with it and see what you think. Iâll admit to not ever owning Prepar3D and only one version of X-Plane (v10(?), I think) so my comments are worthless against them as well.
That said however, I think it is pretty good. I have 8-year old hardware that I run MSFS on and I get by. Iâve never chased the fps value as the measure of how good a simulator is, so Iâm quite satisfied with my 20 - mid-40 fps and the simulator keeps me entertained.
How close is it to real flying? Donât know; never did that. I mostly use the simulator to practice and keep sorta up to date on the navigation end of flying. I worked in the NavCenter of Polaris submarines in the 60s and 70s and much of whatâs taken for granted these days was state of the art then (NavSat, inertial navigators, etc.). So, leaving one place on the planet with a plan and arriving at another is a challenging puzzle to me and I feel Iâm getting what I paid for.
Hope this is of value⊠if not, Iâll delete it.
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Thank you all for your infoâŠ
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I think itâs great for that. Probably not for the raw core of flying, but everything that goes on around it - what the dials mean, how the autopilot works, how ADF/DME/VOR work, how to start up would probably save a lot of instructor time.
OP, need more context. Why do you ask this question ? Are you a potential real pilot, or just asking generally.
If you are thinking of buying you can still ârentâ it, through XBoxPass (?). This doesnât give you everything, but gives you easily enough to see what it is like without splashing out.
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The best way to use it is for scenery gazing and, if an airplane is modelled correctly, it can be used as a procedure trainer (learning check lists and flows⊠Procedures for normal and emergency ops).
And thatâs what simulators are used for commercially (in real life): for procedure training, especially emergency procedures.
All the rest is hard to simulate correctly, as there are so many factors / variables that canât be simulated correctly (control forces, butt feeling aka motion, noises, peripheral vision & lighting etc.)
The most realistic simulation is probably possible with high quality airliners, because in those, pilots basically manage systems and do little hand flying.
In its current state, MSFS is purely a game.
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For me, every time I go up in MSFS, I get shocked at how real it looks compared to where I fly. And, for the planes I fly, itâs not really all that different from when I fly. In the sim I fly the Mooney, Seminole, Bonanza, C152 (pretty much spot on to real life with the mod), C172 (again, really good), and Iâve been flying the P149 a lot lately. In real life I fly Warriors lately, and I owned a 180 Cherokee (Challenger) for a long time. In fact, Iâm in the market for a plane now.
I see all these posts about planes floating down runways and whatever, but, for me, it pretty much matches flying for me. No floating, just the right amount of glide as when I land, with the cockpit set up properly, the same view. Stalling the C152 modded matches pretty well with my experience stalling, and I have almost 100 hours in C152âs. Not a ton, but enough to know generally.
The only nigglers are the rudder response is really bad in a couple of ways. Cross-wind landings donât really match, itâs much smoother in real life, it can get out of hand quickly in real life, but, with practice it gets smoother. And takeoffs in the YMF5, thereâs no way itâs that squirrely that suddenly at 40 knots the plane just wants to ground loop on takeoff. Flying tends to get much more progressively bad. It might ground loop on you, but, if youâre paying attention, youâll watch it go bad over an eternity in your mind. But, if youâre not paying attention, like, you let your attention wander to that car on the tarmac as youâre taxiing, things can happen that fast. Back to the YMF, thereâs no way thereâs this sudden set of forces at 40 knots. Youâd feel the change occur progressively. So, thereâs something wrong in that regard. I donât know if itâs an issue with the flight dynamics of the plane or the winds on the ground in MSFS. Maybe both, plus probably a bit of really bad rudder dynamics in the sim in general.
And of course thereâs the lack of force on the joystick which means a lot in controlling a plane. And the lack of forces on your butt as youâre making a turn. But, thatâs the compromise you make with simming. I still love it.
Be that as it may, I recently put these comparisons together for an airport I just released that I fly to a lot. KCON. So, yeah, when I take off in the sim, I get shocked at the view out the window, ââ â â â â â â , Thatâs nearly just what I see when I take off out of Manchester or Concord or Nashuaâ etc, etc⊠The lighting on the trees and view out the window, it might as well be real. Heck, thatâs one of the main reasons I fly is that view and the ability to explore and go in any direction I want 
Make sure you make those pictures big for the detail⊠Theyâre 4K with just a little jpeg compression.
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Hi there, I am just asking in general.
As I said, I donât know (and couldnât care less) about how close it is to real world flying. Iâve sat in the co-pilotâs seat a few times in Cessnas, Beechcraft King Airs, (even a de Havilland Twin Otter commuter out of JFK in the late 60s) and can attest that my Herman-Miller Aeron chair doesnât come close to the seat-of-the-pants experience I remember from those flights.
Iâve solved how to get the FBW A320neo airborne and pointed in the right direction and thatâs enough âflyingâ for me. I donât start âcold and darkâ because I fail to see what that adds to my experienceâdone it, but spawning on the runway cuts to the chase and gets me airborne way more quickly.
Iâve always been a âmaps-guyâ since childhood, so the puzzle of âwhere in the world am I?â brings the fun. I donât know how real it is compared to what real pilots do, but based on my navigation experiences, it should be close. I subscribe to Navigraph so I have the latest and greatest procedures and defined SIDs and STARs.
And, I agree, airline pilots donât do a lot of hand flying in the big rigs. Just watch some YouTube videos and youâll see that they do a few minutes at takeoff and sometimes upon arrival. Most of their time is spent monitoring their computersâŠ
Congrats. That reminded me of a short article Iâve written (well an article on some other articles to be exact) a while ago:
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i wonder, do you have the sim yourself? if not you can easily tryout for just one dollar/euro
for one month , with the xbox pass on pc.
Hi, Yes I have the simâŠI was just wondering how close the aerodynamics and fundamentals were to the real world of flying.
So, to reiterate, yes, it can be very similar to flying in the real world. Realize thereâs a lot of people here who have no idea what theyâre talking about. And many others who do.
In some ways, flying in the real world is a lot easier than in the sim because you can feel whatâs going on.
But, in other ways, flight sim can make you lazy, because, if you âget behindâ the airplane, itâs no big deal. You can basically pull over to the side of the road and youâre ok. No such luck in the air.
I recently started flying again after a 19 year layoff. Having the sim was invaluable for practicing everything associated with flying. And MSFS really motivated me to get back up there. Iâd been wanting to forever (I never wanted to stop), but, being in MSFS forced that switch.
The thing about hand flying for real at the GA level is there are a lot of tasks that need to be done simultaneously, and you canât skip any. And you need to be prepared for each step ahead of time. So practice is very important. And for me, the GNS530 mod was invaluable practice for me as when I last flew, back then there basically was no GPS, so it was a whole new system for me to learn. And, like anything, itâs hard to know what you donât know, so itâs hard to practice without knowing what to practice, so, there was some of that as well.
For instance, Iâve been using an EFB for years and years on my tablet, but, until I really got back into flying, I didnât realize what I really needed to know about using it. But, having it available to use for in MSFS has been a godsend, once I knew what I needed to know.
Iâm currently using Avare for Android. Iâll probably upgrade to Foreflight (iPad only) eventually, especially if I get into IFR flying again. I wrote up some directions on how to hook up Avare with MSFS here.
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I think it does well. It does better than anything else out there with turbulence. For example as you fly over mountains. Also due to the far better visuals i dont find spatial awarness such a problem in GA aircraft as I used to in P3D for example in terms of height above the ground as you land.
Some of the flight modelling is a bit iffy for example the amount of weathervaning you can seem to get in very light winds but with a few tweaks and some polish it will be the best home sim expereince you can get by far.
Graphically FS2020 has pleasantly surprised me. Iâve been a Private Pilot for 16 years now with around 1500hrs in my logbook, mainly on single engine props.
In terms of flight model I donât find it at all realistic at the moment. Youâd get better flight dynamics from a paper plane - at least they obey the laws of physics unlike the models in this sim.
Hopefully theyâll fix it at some point but right now they seem more concerned about the eye candy than the correct simulation of the included aircraft.
Cheers
Captain Moore
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It still has a way to go, but itâs definitely leaps ahead of FSX and P3D, and very comparable with X-Plane, DCS, and other lower profile sims out there.
How close something is to the real thing also depends on your peripherals and settup. A Logitech joystick isnât going to give you the same level of realism as a full home cockpit would. And even the best home cockpits wont feel exactly like the real thing.
At the end of the day, full realism is never going to be achievable, not even for professional industry simulators. But that shouldnât really be what matters either, as long as you get a similar experience and youâre having a good time with it, thatâs the main point
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Where did you get that cool 152 interior? Iâve only found an all black one, not with the wood panel.
Thanks!