Developer Asobo's spectacular Microsoft Flight Simulator has now received its massive Game of the Year update, introducing a heap of free additions alongside its first major paid expansion, the competitive-multiplayer-focussed Reno Air Races.

Starting with the free additions, Flight Simulator's 1.21.13.0 update introduces a total of five new aircraft, some very different to those seen in the base game. The Boeing F/A-18 Super Hornet, for instance, is Asobo's first military jet, while the VoloCity is its first eVTOL (electric vertical take-off and landing) aircraft, capable of pinpoint landings and described as a taster for the proper arrival of helicopters in Flight Simulator next year.

Additionally, there's a short takeoff and landing (STOL) utility aircraft in the form of the Pilatus PC-6 Porter, plus the CubCrafters NX Cub - said to further enhance the sim's bush flying and off-airport options - and the single-seat Aviat Pitts Special S1S.

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Microsoft Flight Simulator will add a fleet of new aircraft and upgrades as part of a new Game of the Year Edition, coming as a free update for PC and Xbox Series X/S on 18th November.

There's an updated weather system, "early access to DX12" and a dev mode replay system, Microsoft said, plus new sightseeing missions and tutorials.

Five new planes, including a couple we've heard about before, will be added. These include the Boeing F/A-18 Super Hornet, Volocity, Pilatus PC-6 Porter, CubCrafters NX Cub and Aviat Pitts Special S1S.

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There's a lot happening in developer Adobo's stupendous Microsoft Flight Simulator between now and the end of the year, starting with Septembers's makeover for Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. That, however, is just the beginning, with the developer having now confirmed two new aircraft, plus a competitive multiplayer mode arriving this autumn.

World Update 6, as we already knew, arrives on 7th September and aims to drastically enhance Flight Simulator's rendition of Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. Alongside visual upgrades, it'll introduce around 100 famous handcrafted landmarks, four new airports - Lübeck, Stuttgart, Klagenfurt and St. Galle - plus new discovery flights, landing challenges, bush trips, and more.

That "and more" was elaborated on during tonight's Xbox Gamescom Showcase, and takes the form of a new pilotable plane: the Junkers JU-52. This 1930s German aircraft arrives as part of a new series of paid DLC Asobo is calling Local Legends, introducing new planes well-known in the local area of each World Update, but which are perhaps less well-known to a worldwide audience. The Junkers JU-52 arrives on 7th September and will cost $14.99 USD.

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Microsoft Flight Simulator's next big geographical makeover - this time for Germany, Austria, and Switzerland - has been delayed from its original 24th August release date and is now expected to arrive a little later on 7th September.

Originally announced in June, Flight Simulator's sixth World Update - which follows similar enhancements for Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Iceland, Ireland, Japan, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, the UK, and the United States - introduces new aerials and elevation maps for Germany, Austria, and Germany, alongside new photogrammetry cities, four hand-crafted airports, and nearly 100 points of interest.

Previous reveals from developer Asobo have confirmed three of those airports - Klagenfurt Airport (LOWK)
Lübeck Airport (EDHL), and St. Gallen-Altenrhein Airport (LSZR) - plus a number of new landmarks, including Castle Marienburg in Hanover, Holstentor in Lübeck, Deutches Eck in Koblenz, Castle Katz in St. Goarshausen, Munich's Allianz Arena, and the Riesenrad in Vienna.

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In the South of France, about 45 minutes' drive northeast of Avignon, past Carpentras with its medieval walls and its giant superstore its town-consuming market on Fridays, there's a picturesque little village called Le Barroux, piled up on a hill on the edge of the Rhône plain and topped with a chunky, sand-coloured castle, all in classic Provençal style. Behind the village, looming moodily over the scrubby hills and the silent plateaux and the vast apron of busy, fertile flatland, is the solitary, lunar peak of the Mont Ventoux: feared Tour de France stage, géant de Provence, lonely harbinger of the massed ranks of the Alps to the east.

In the village there's a house with an orchard of olive and apricot trees. It was converted from a barn in the late 60s by my grandfather, an architect from Geneva. It's still owned by my mum and her sisters. I've been holidaying there since I was born (I was named after the olive trees); I've made a visit in more than half of the last fortysomething years. But not since 2018, because I had a baby and then you-know-what happened. Maybe next year. But my mum and my aunts aren't getting any younger, and the diaspora of cousins is far-flung and thinly spread, and the place is getting harder to use and maintain with every passing season. I can feel time running out on it.

So when, inspired by Bertie's question, I finally fired up Microsoft Flight Simulator for the first time this week, I knew there was only one place I wanted to see.

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Where did you fly first in Flight Simulator? I'm intrigued by the question because I think it reveals so much. Did you fly home? What does home mean to you? Did you relive a trip? Why? And what happened when you did?

I didn't go where I thought I would. Eventually I did - I flew over Brighton Pier, over my hometown, a flight I've been lucky enough to do in real-life, albeit in the back of a tiny plane while my brother flew it. It was a present for his birthday (we're twins so I got to go along). He didn't get the whole plane by the way! Just a lesson.

And I tell you what: those small planes get buffeted around by the wind a lot, don't they? Oh, and don't do what we did and get an instructor who thinks it's hilarious to let go of the controls so those young lads on board get a thrill. It's not hilarious. I practically shat my pants.

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Microsoft Flight Simulator will reportedly take up almost 100GB on Xbox consoles.

The news came via Twitter user Idle Sloth, who showed that if you select "Manage with Game Pass" on the the game's Xbox Store page, it'll give you the full install size: 97.2GB.

As our pals at Pure Xbox report, that's just the standard edition, too, so depending upon what flavour current-gen Xbox you're running - the X or S - and what edition you'd like to play, it may take up even more than that.

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Microsoft Flight Simulator is gorgeous but notoriously demanding of PC hardware; however, developer Asobo says it'll be getting a whole lot less demanding when its next Sim Update arrives alongside the game's highly anticipated Xbox Series X/S release on 27th July.

Asobo offered a look the huge performance improvements coming to Microsoft Flight Simulator on PC during its latest developer livestream, with CEO Sebastian Wloch explaining the team has rewritten "a lot of the parts of the engine...in order to get the maximum performance out of the sim", as part of its work on the upcoming console version.

To illustrate just how effective Asobo's engine tweaks have been, Wloch demoed a before-and-after gameplay video featuring a flyover of Manhattan, captured from a PC equipped with an i7-9700K CPU and Nvidia 2060 Super graphics card - and running Flight Simulator at Ultra settings in 4K with a 40% render scale (jump to the 8-minute mark below to see the footage).

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Flight Simulator is primed to make its highly anticipated Xbox Series X/S debut in just over a month, but, before that, there's another huge World Update for PC players, arriving today and giving makeovers to the sim's rendition of Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden.

Developer Asobo is promising pilots the chance to explore "vast fjords, riveting urban vistas, domineering peaks, and centuries-old iconic castles" in its new Nordic countries update, which also brings landscape enhancements, improved regional architecture, five new airports, improved data for 100 airports, and over 78 new points of interest.

Once the World Update is downloaded (first update the sim, then grab the World Update from the in-game Marketplace) players will also have the opportunity to tackle five new bush trips - one for each of the new Nordic countries - plus five new landing challenges, focussed on Denmark's Bornholm, Iceland's Ísafjörður, Sweden's Stockholm Arlanda, Norway's Svalbard, and Finland's Vaasa Airports.

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Microsoft has said how it plans to keep Xbox One going next year even as developers make use of more powerful hardware: cloud streaming.

In a post on Xbox Wire, Microsoft said some exclusives set for 2022 require the power of the Xbox Series X and S and so will use Xbox Cloud Gaming to run on the eight-year old Xbox One.

Microsoft confirmed it will use Xbox Cloud Gaming to bring Microsoft Flight Simulator, for example, to Xbox One.

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