MSFS 2024 - Did we get what we expected?

Sunday. A day of rest and relaxation. Free flight around the Grand Canyon for an hour or so. Amazing. Then flew down the Florida gulf coast where I used to live. Scenery was fabulous and much as I remember it. Then did a couple of fire fighting missions in career to top up my reputation followed by a medium cargo mission in Indonesia and an advertising banner flight along Sydney beach. Beautiful. Might do medical mission later although finding a sunset in the vision jet is always a good end to the day.

Really enjoyable Sunday. Iā€™ve been playing like this since launch. Game worth every penny. Who cares if a plane creeps on taxi if I let the brake off?. My car does that. Not bothered if a cockpit dial looks wrong or a switch doesnā€™t work or the scenery isnā€™t quite accurate. All games have bugs. And Iā€™ve played a lot of them over the years. Itā€™s still early days for msfs 2024.

But then I donā€™t have three 60 inch 4k screens, a GTX 4090 card, the latest cpu or spend hours tweaking the video driver for this or that hardly noticeable advantage.

Is the game what I expected?. Yes. It cost me a few dollars, is a step up from 2020 and shows plenty of potential for the future.

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I wish career mode was more like actual aviation career mode. Instead of gaining XP points to level up, I wish we had flight hours as actual experience points in order to ā€œlevel upā€. Just my two cents.

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It should be about a PILOTS Careerā€¦ not an owner operator.

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Yes, the fact that they have our money and their product still doesnā€™t work as advertised months after the release IS a crazy concept. It is only because of this bizarro world of ā€œearly accessā€ and zero day patches the gaming industry has created that it would ever seem normal for a product to ship as a broken mess and THEN be fixed after release. What a crazy concept to think that consumers might want a working product to buy at launch and to not be misled by marketing materials.

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Yea, this career mode reminds me of those airline manager games you can get through the App Store.

I mean no, Asobo, I donā€™t want to simulate an aviation business. I want to simulate being a pilot. And work my way up up through flight hours experience from a Cessna all the way to a 737. And also have ranks, so first youā€™re an FO and then as you earn more flight hours on the 737, you level up to a Captain rank. Then onto senior captain, allowing you to earn bonus credits or unlock progression into larger aircraft, like the 787.

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I totally agree with comments by [StrohSchema7980] . Although I didnā€™t re-order then I was pretty quick of the mark because I was excited to get my hands on something as promising as the trailer was advertising. Unfortunately, I feel that we have been ripped off because nothing works as expected. Nowadays, I play FS2020 because it works and I can fly wherever and whenever I decide. Occasionally, I fire the FS2024 up just to see what has changed and the result is mostly the same, nothing or very little. After designing and developing software for several decades, I canā€™t understand how a project could go so diabolically wrong with all the tools available to aid design, development and testing.
The answer, as far as Iā€™m concerned, no we didnā€™t get what we expected.
Shame.

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Yes, thatā€™s it, right to the point. Iā€™m only interested in sim flying, not getting a license in business.

Mastering flight challenges was the focus of all previous MSFS versions up to FS20. Now the focus is on earning money and management tasks. And to anyone who says: ā€œYou have free flightā€, my answer is:

Where are the many spectacular mission types for the free flying pilot, who is not connected to a company, that the colorful pre-sales advertising has promised us?"

These missions, which is the only innovative and interesting part of FS 24, are only for the poor airline manager who is chasing after money.

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Yeah good point, can i get some randomly generated missions, with minimum AI generated VO ? Like just some objectives, without tracking where I taxi, how i takeoff, etc. ?

Slap a fire/emergency/deliver-to-Xairport, and a starting point + plane type (including allowing a range of planes) and let me do the rest. I feel like that should have been the MVP for FS2024 and see how it goes from there, if it can be improved.

Not this procedurally generated slop that you have to grind through.

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I didnā€™t get the working career mode that I wanted and even if it did work itā€™s severely lacking in planes and content. I have since switched to NeoFly which would of worked in 2020 so I feel that I bought the newest version for nothing.

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We were promised realtime boat and ship traffic worldwide and we got static or spinning boats that pop up only when you are in close proximity.

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Yeah pretty much what I expected.

Asobo have a track record of taking steps backward with the SUs so also expected this to be bad.

I was really hoping for the clouds to be better, but even they are worse and now have LOD so in the distance they look terrible, still grainy pixelated overblown ash monstrosities that look unrealistic the vast majority of the time. The new lighting model and atmospheric colours at least are better and do cover this up a little bit, but the clouds themselves are still v poor.

UI is a mess, how complicated is it to get to a livery nowā€¦

Blurry ground textures and melted PG.

Itā€™s what I expected and worse.

On the plus side, the flight model and ground behaviour are better.

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What Asobo and Microsoft have done with Flight Simulator 2024 isnā€™t just a mistakeā€”itā€™s calculated, manipulative, and exploitative. Charging $200 for a so-called ā€œsimulatorā€ that is barely in an alpha state is outright disgraceful. Theyā€™ve taken advantage of one of the most loyal fanbases in gaming, fully aware that many of us are already struggling with the cost of living. This isnā€™t just a disappointmentā€”itā€™s a betrayal of trust.

Itā€™s like paying full price to see your favorite band, only to find out that the bassist is the only one who showed up. Sure, a handful of hardcore fans might still stick around, but the rest of us? Absolutely not. And yet, here we are, expected to tolerate an unfinished, overhyped mess that was sold to us as the ā€œNext Generationā€ of flight simulation. In reality, it can barely render trees properly, let alone maintain a stable resolution while taxiing. Meanwhile, MSFS 2020 handles these tasks with no issue.

What we actually needed was a meaningful mid-life update for MSFS 2020: a Career Mode, a refined flight model, better ATC, and a few new planes. Instead, we got this claptrapā€”a half-baked attempt at ā€œstreaming everything from the cloud,ā€ which has only eroded any enjoyment I once had for my favorite sim.

In my industry, if I made catastrophic investment decisions with a high-net-worth clientā€™s money, Iā€™d lose my job. Likewise, someone at Microsoft or Asobo needs to be held accountable for the mess that is MSFS 2024. Remember the old taglineā€”ā€œAs real as it getsā€? In many ways, this is as sht as it gets*.

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I agree 101% with what was said with one exception. Do we really need a career mode?

Apart from the fact that this mode was put together in a rush, we are at the beginning of a fundamental change in the structure of MS flight simulation. For more than 40 years, MSFS versions have delighted us with ever new, fantastic innovations in graphics, flight models and immersion, up to MSFS 2020. Now a structural model has been added that almost all arcade games have, rewarding and punishing, making money and losing money.

Iā€™m not a psychologist, but anyone who has immersed themselves in career mode will feel the mental burden being triggered to achieve as much CR as possible. To compensate for losses or to buy a new aircraft so that even more money can be made. And will feel the same pain that players feel in the casino or on the stock market when they have gambled away their money. In FS 24 the feeling of success is the ringing CR cash register at the end of a flight, no longer mastering the flying challenge. Is this still flight simulation?

Iā€™m afraid this trend can no longer be reversed. There is still the free flight mode in FS 24, but Iā€™d rather stick with FS 20. This last version of the ā€œtraditionalā€ MSFS series still offers the joy of sim flying that I value. Without feeling the massive changes that FS 24 brought with it: Streaming only, confusing controller UI and career mode. Iā€™m not talking about cosmetic bugs, they will gradually be eliminated over time.

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Letā€™s not confuse preference or frustration with reality. The entire point of MSFS 2024 is to push past the limitations of 2020 and evolve the sim into something far more dynamic. Investing in a long-term vision instead of just recycling older content? Thatā€™s exactly what you should want from MS/Asobo.

Yes, the launch has been extremely rough but calling it a scam or betrayal? Letā€™s be serious. Accountable for what, exactly? Innovation? Ambition? Pushing flight simulation beyond what we thought was possible? For publicly apologizing and acknowledging the issues and committing to making MSFS 2024 excellent? Because thatā€™s exactly what theyā€™re doing.

Whether you play now, or wait for the major sim updates SU1, SU2 etc., the destination remains the same: forward. And if you still donā€™t agree? Get a refund and move on.

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I accept your point entirely; however I enjoyed the sense of ā€œin game purposeā€, for want of a better way of articulating it, that career mode had/has the potential to provide me with. Regards.

Imagine a product launched with bold promises and a clear vision, only to fall short in critical ways. Thatā€™s exactly where MSFS2024 finds itself. It wasnā€™t merely a rough launch; it was a miscalculation that left loyal fans stranded with a product riddled with performance issues and unfinished featuresā€”even two months on we are still in this purgatory. This isnā€™t about personal taste. Itā€™s about a product that was released incomplete, betraying the legacy and reliability we came to expect from MSFS2020.

Your casual dismissal amounting to ā€œif you donā€™t like it, move on,ā€ is ridiculous. Letā€™s be clear: this isnā€™t a matter of individual preference. Itā€™s a passionate call for accountability. Our frustration stems from investing trust, time, AND money into a simulator that promised a revolutionary leap forward, yet instead delivers a product that struggles with basic functionality. Public apologies and promises of future updates like SU1 and SU2 sound reassuring on paper, but they do little to mitigate the immediate disappointment felt by a dedicated fanbase.

Innovation is not just about pushing new boundariesā€”itā€™s about executing a vision with competence and care. MSFS2024 was meant to be the next evolutionary step in flight simulation, not a rushed experiment that leaves us grappling with persistent issues.Just watch the trailer they released and tell me thats what they delivered. We deserve a product that not only promises progress but delivers a stable, polished experience from the start. A product we can have faith in. When the sim canā€™t even manage essential tasks without faltering, the vision of moving ā€œforwardā€ feels misguided and incomplete.

This isnā€™t simply about disliking a new direction; itā€™s about holding Microsoft and Asobo accountable for a release that falls dramatically short of its potentialā€“its advertised potential. Instead of dismissing our concerns, they should be addressing them head-onā€”because innovation without execution amounts to nothing more than empty ambition.

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It is a Flight Simulator. The flying part kinda matters. Like having aircraft that are not borked, broken and have controls that work. When there are so many that are borked, broken ahd have the trim controls reversed, (causing you to NOT fly but CRASH on takeoff)f then these things need to be fixed FIRST.

On the current todo list for SU1 I see NOTHING being fixed that is annoying me daily. Their attempt to please the community by ā€œlisteningā€ to us is utterly and completely misleading. EVERYONE is talking about it. Their first chance to make up for the abysmal launch and bugs and they blew it.

Now I have to wait for SU2 which will also leave us all wanting REAL fixes that matter.

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Yes, I can only agree again. However, I notice that there are actually two basic answers to the rhetorical question in my post, which are nevertheless somehow connected.

No, I did not expect that FS 24 would be delivered so unfinished for a lot of money. And the basic changes in FS 24, streaming and new UI, can not be considered as real innovations. And, these basic elements of the program canā€™t simply be repaired by SUs. Streaming issues can effectively only be fixed by massive hardware changes (e.g. servers). And how is the almost unusable controller UI supposed to be changed into a really user-friendly UI? Demolition and new construction.

No, I did not expect that FS 24, which was presented with lots of colorful pictures and an exciting trailer, would create an imagination that was not fulfilled at all, at least not in the way one might have thought. Everyone, including me, believed that you would be able to fly new, interesting and spectacular missions in FS 24. The reality is that you can only fly them if you start a career and accept the management rules of starting a company. What that means doesnā€™t need to be repeated here.

Your expectations were mainly disappointed by the fact that a product that struggles with basic functionality was delivered. It was particularly disappointing by the discrepancy between the announcement and the truth in terms of flyable missions.

The realization and the frustration is that none of our expectations can be fulfilled any time soon. That is not possible even with the best intentions and high competence of MS/Asobo. That means stick with MSFS 2020 and hope for MSFS 2028.

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In all honesty, I donā€™t believe that MSFS 2020 has massive limitations. It was literally released 4 years ago and itā€™s not that old at all. Itā€™s still very fresh and has plenty of potential. I really do believe MSFS 2020 may have been updated to have a career mode.

We are now living in the age of constant updates that can be easily applied to any piece of software. 19 years ago when FSX released, this wasnā€™t so simple. But now it is. And what this means is that software can be updated pretty much on the go, and can become anything it wants to be with updates and patches. This includes developing a game engine overhaul. Technically it would be possible for MSFS 2020 to support a career mode.

But the truth is, Microsoft/Asobo saw a new sales opportunity. Why release a career mode for MSFS 2020 (even as a paid career mode) when they could release a whole new MSFS for $200 with new planes, visuals and features?

Microsoft/Asobo at the end of the day are profit-oriented businesses, not charities. Based on that, I believe that MSFS 2024 was released so that it provides a new source of revenue, and not because they wanted to fix a limitation with MSFS 2020. Itā€™s the same reason why Call Of Duty releases each year on basically the same engine.

And this should be obvious to EVERYONE as Microsoft owns both the Call of Duty and Flight Simulator IPs

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Great post!
Iā€™m not a doomsday or complain, complain, complain type of guy. Iā€™ve been simming since Atari Computer days !! and I am awed that something as complex as flight simulation, with the now amazing graphics we all dreamed of, is possible. I am thankful for the brilliant minds that work on these things for our pleasure.

HOWEVER- I have never bought a piece of software (of any complexity, from video editing, audio production, business, other sims, etc. that was as buggy as what I have read here in a thousand posts.

I have not bought 2024 yet because of that. I was hesitant to buy 2020 because people reported a lot of bugs initially so I waited a bit. Now I love 2020. Personally, I donā€™t see why anything needed to be improved from 2020 except available graphic detail and flight models (which were in no way bad in 2020). Why they had to change things that worked well is hard to understand. When I read about career mode on the forum it really irks me. It sounded great upfront but not being able to fly missions outside of it or having to do hours-long flightsā€¦ who designed it this way?

Bottom line is- these developers, who sound sincere on the Developer Live Streams, are way too smart to not have known how incomplete 2024 was and yet, for whatever reason and business model, took everyoneā€™s money and released it prematurely. I find that very unforgiveable. The server overload in the beginningā€¦ OK, Iā€™ll forgive them for that shortsightedness, but major bugs noticeable within 1 minute of running the simā€¦ ???

Iā€™ll continue to wait and am very grateful to all the complainers here for saving me money and frustration.

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