Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 is coming to consoles

By Jon Silman August 24, 2020

Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 will be making its way to consoles soon, according to the game’s developer.

The game, released on PC on August 18, is the latest in a long line of releases of the popular flight simulator dating back to the first version in 1982. The game has been known for pushing graphics and processors due to its realism and scope, which has mostly relegated it to release on PCs.

A few months ago, Xbox head Phil Spencer said that the game was being targeted for release on the Xbox Series X, but there wasn’t much talk about it after that. Now, Jörg Neumann, the head of Microsoft Flight Simulator, said that the game is indeed being developed for consoles.

“We are dedicated to come to Xbox (console), we’re working really hard to make this happen. We don’t have a timeline quite yet, but we are working full speed. Because we know it’s important,” he said on the Major Nelson podcast.

There are plans to bring the game to both the Xbox One and Xbox Series X console, and Neumann said that the company has been getting a lot of requests for that very thing. He said the game already works with an Xbox controller, and that controls would be “totally doable.”

Flight Simulator is one of the longest-running series of simulators in the gaming world, and the last five were all voted simulator of the year, Neumann said on the podcast, so he felt a lot of pressure to deliver a good product.

The game uses a complete 3D model of the world with a combination of Bing, topographical maps, and Artificial Intelligence.

The game, which is typically played with multiple monitors and a flight stick, can seem intimidating and also technologically restrictive. However, Neumann told The Verge that that isn’t the case.

“We basically tried to make this an accessible simulator,” Neumann says. “Some people are speculating that you need some sort of supercomputer to run it. That’s definitely not the case. There are some pretty modest video cards and PCs. And I think it’s very similar on Xbox where there’s an entire spectrum between Xbox One and Xbox Series X. There’s continued optimization regardless, but Xbox is certainly reinvigorating our optimization efforts, is probably the best way to say it.”

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