As MSFS doesn’t seem to be cancelled then I spent a cup of tea today thinking about what I’d like to see in a future dream roadmap of MSFS. These are sort of bigger bulky thematic things than individual wishlist posts, so more a ‘dream big’ bit of fun not to taken too seriously. Anyway, here goes and it’ll be interesting to see if people would like these things or not:
MSFS: 5 Year Celebration Edition
The first major free release will be the MSFS 5 Year Celebration launch for PC and Xbox in 2025. New and improved features include:
Seasons. Experience Vermont in the Fall, enjoy the Spring Sakura in Japan. Using the latest LANDSAT environment data and BlackShark AI we’ve provided a complete around the year seasonal effect on the MSFS landscapes.
Shared Cockpit. Invite a friend and share a flight. Full interactive Pilot Flying and Pilot Monitoring capabilities, with integrated checklists for both pilots sharing a single cockpit. Feel like relaxing? Take a seat on a player flow aircraft for the ultimate co-op experience.
Enhanced Living World.
See time-based road traffic, with the packed Los Angeles HWY 101 to the quiet desert roads at night. Bing Traffic ™ data services provide accurate local volumes throughout the MSFS World. Additional local vehicles and trucks added to each continent for more realistic active roads.
World Tides and dynamic water. Watch as the world’s seas and oceans reflect coming and going of the real tides. Advanced new waves types reflect the current weather.
Ground School. New pilots get the chance to fly with the ‘Rod Machado’s Flight School’ ™. Interactive lessons, videos and multimedia explain all the steps from first flights to your Private Pilots License check ride. Handbooks and new achievements included. Xbox Live service required.
Historical Weather. Relive the storms of the past using the new MeteoBlue historical data weather. Simply set the MSFS date and time and see realistic and accurate historical weather conditions wherever you are.
MSFS: Air Adventures Expansion
The first paid expansion pack follows in about 2026 and is called MSFS Air Adventures. The pack will include campaigns and missions with the following new features:
Search & Rescue Pilot. Fly through a number of single player and co-op mission in the shoes of a Fire Fighter and Rescue pilot. Using the new ‘Canadair CL-415 Super Scooper’ water bomber fight dynamic forest fires in an exciting new career mode. Alternatively flight urgent MedEvac and rescue missions in the highly detailed ‘Sikorsky S-76’ helicopter.
Virtual Airline. Join the ranks of a commercial airline pilot. Progress through various missions in a variety of challenging situations and weathers. Get certified on a progression of passenger aircraft from the King Air 350i to the might Boeing 747-9 Intercontinental. Includes new effects and sounds for passenger operations and interactive crew.
Bush Pilot FBO. Run your freight business and be the best. Take jobs and missions requiring you to fly into grass fields where no-one else could go. Purchase a fleet of small aircraft as the money rolls in and your base grows. Complete urgent tasks in marginal conditions, either in single player or as a co-op base experience. Includes new special FOB scenery for campaigns in Wyoming, USA, Papua New Guinea and New Zealand.
MSFS: ATC ‘Readback Correct’ Expansion
The second paid expansion is due around 2027 and provides an update ATC, traffic and weather experience using new Azure online services. Like FSX:X once did, take the role of an Air Traffic Controller for your friends and mutliplayer groups. Features include:
Speech recognition Azure ATC. Talk to ATC controllers using the radios without your aircraft. Utilizing state of the art Azure Cognitive Servces voice recognition fly with a natural way to communicate with ATC.
Be the Controller. New in-game ATC stations and equipment interfaces provided, in the Ground, Tower, Terminal and Center positions. Guide friends with realistic ATC procedures as they use MSFS using voice and text instruction messages. Earn achievements and promotions through the ATC Training program to qualify for online positions throughout the world.
Native VATIM / IVAO / PilotEdge compatibility. Connect and communicate with the network of simulator ATC services within your MSFS aircraft.
New AI Traffic ‘IntelliATC’ single player features including:
AI Traffic responses to Holds, spacing and procedural turns with a full compatibility to realistic Departures (SIDs) and Arrivals (STARs).
Traffic reacts to the players situation, as the updated Azure ATC provides guidance within the realistic rulesets.
Declare an emergency or a divert as needed, contacting the controller as needed.
Well, that was fun. Please don’t get too stuck on the paid or not bits, as more just to picture a ‘FSX:Acceleration’ sort of deal, where the sim gets periodic refreshes of new bits. I know some of these things are already available in various forms, so this is more a common Xbox / PC set that everyone can get regardless of platform.
MSFS: Anchors Away - Adds proper drivable boats. From dinghys and jet skis, to cargo freighters and yachts, to aircraft carriers and supertankers. Releases with Expert Series 205: ‘Ever Given’ with “Stuck in the Suez” special mission.
MSFS: All Aboard! - Introduces drivable trains. Now you can catch the Metro from LAX to your hotel downtown and catch the sights of The City of Angels without ever leaving your computer chair or conduct miles longs cargo trains transporting all manner of goods across the planet
MSFS: The Final Frontier - Experience the vast emptiness of outer cosmos! Fly to Mars in Elon Musks Starship or take a cruise around TOI-700 and imagine life on a distant planet. Features 1:1 scale; You can blast off from Cape Canaveral in Apollo 11 and 3 real time days later you’ll have your chance to make virtual history!
By no means am i serious. Just having fun at the idea of how far the sim could really go
I understand why you want the things you want, OP. I want them too. You have to realise though that lots of the things you want are a lot of work for minimal gain.
Historical weather for example. Hardly anyone is going to use it. It’s easier to just have third party stuff like the Storms package. Most people don’t want to fly on the 7th December 1967 and have the exact weather that Florida had- they they just want to go “ooh big storm”.
The traffic. Again, this is a huge amount of work just so one guy can get home and go look the traffic jam is still there! Just making the traffic we have now more realistic so it doesn’t drive underneath bridges and you don’t see cars doing instant 180s is enough to bring the sim up a level.
As someone who just bought a watch that does tide information let me tell you: everywhere has different tides and you need the data and it’s not all out there.
With a big product likemsfs you have to prioritise. You have to get the biggest returns for the least effort.
Hopefully this happens, and before 2027. As far as wishlist items are concerned, that’s top of my list. The way Azure voice services are currently implemented in the sim is rather basic and almost embarassingly bad considering what Azure is capable of. What’s in the sim doesn’t even match the features that were shown in the Feature Discovery video about voice support in MSFS before sim launch.
I will offer only one suggestion: Zeppelin NT adventure. The main attraction here is Zeppelin NT, complete with liveries including GoodYear, but the package would include a base with landing facility, and assets so that makers could create their own airship landing areas. One scenario I like is “camera operator”, where the airship must remain stationary over a given set of coordinates.
+1 on any space-related scenarios, Darkstar opened the door for me on that one.
Awesome thread! Love cogitating about possible future features!!
then I spent a cup of tea today thinking about what I’d like to see in a future dream roadmap of MSFS. These are sort of bigger bulky thematic things than individual wishlist posts, so more a ‘dream big’ bit of fun not to taken too seriously. Anyway, here goes and it’ll be interesting to see if people would like these things or not:
Not all of these have Wishlist topics, but most of them do: