It’ll be a big day for Microsoft Flight Simulator tomorrow as Sim Update 11 comes out as part of a very special 40th Anniversary edition. There’s release date times and lots of content to be excited about so let’s have a look at the latest developer update.
Free update, lots of content
What’s amazing to me is just how much Microsoft Flight Simulator has offered up for free over the last couple of years. World updates, Sim Updates, and a good chunk of new aircraft and scenery all made available for free. The 40th Anniversary Edition promises to offer the biggest chunk of free new content that we’ve seen yet.
The new aircraft included are broken up into four different categories. Historical aircraft are recreations of some of the most iconic aircraft in history and across the many iterations of Flight Simulator. We also see official introduction of helicopters and helicopter flight support built into the core of the sim which should mean that aircraft makers will be starting to fill the ranks with helicopters in short order.
iniSim’s A310 is intended to fill a gap for an included high fidelity airliner. Very curious to see how that compares to other recent offerings.
As a reminder, here is what’s included.
Historical Aircraft:
- Wright Flyer
- Ryan NYP (“Spirit of St. Louis”)
- Douglas DC-3
- De Havilland Canada DHC-2-Beaver
Helicopters:
- Bell-407
- Guimbal Cabri G2
Gliders:
- DG Flugzeugbau LG8-18
- DG Flugzeugbau DG1001E neo
True-to-Life Airliner:
- Airbus A310
And you can see all of them in the 40th Anniversary trailer that came out a few months ago.
In addition to new aircraft we also have some unique scenery entering the mix including the famous Merrill C. Meigs Field in Chicago. This was the default field of the original Flight Simulator and I have memories of playing this version of the sim and flying out of this airfield.
The airport no longer exists in real life but with this update we’ll be able to add it back in and enjoy it as it once was. Very neat!
Today, the most recent developer update included this note about the project:
Tomorrow we will be releasing the free 40th Anniversary Edition update to Microsoft Flight Simulator. This is the biggest update to MSFS since its initial release in 2020, and it has been a huge labor of love and source of pride for the development team. To our millions of loyal fans and sim pilots, from those who have been with us since the start with MSFS 1.0 way back in 1982, to those who embarked on their first simulated flight with the latest version in 2020, thank you for being part of this journey with us. The sky is calling!
Release times have been released as well.
And with that, we wait for tomorrow!
Check out the latest developer update right here. Check out the 40th Anniversary announcement note here and see the global release date times as reported by the Microsoft team here.
Stormbirds 
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