Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 Confirms Huge Improvement Over Previous Game

Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 will have a drastically smaller install size than the previous game in the series, coming in at just about 30 gigabytes. The much smaller install size means Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 players will need to clear out a significantly smaller space on their Xbox or PC hard drives than expected.

The follow-up to Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020, the newest entry in the series was one of the games revealed at the Xbox Games Showcase in June, alongside 29 other games and expansions. Continuing the tradition as a realistic aircraft simulator, the upcoming game is also slated to introduce more than a dozen new mission types when it launches on November 19.

As for the file size, a game preview post on September 19 from the official Xbox Wire states that developers were able to trim it down dramatically thanks to the inclusion of cloud streaming technology, which means more of the game's content can be accessed remotely without eating up a console or PC's precious hard drive space. Highly detailed areas will not be directly installed onto consoles and PCs. Instead, the specific details that are on a player's current flight path will be streamed to their devices, meaning that players' consoles and PCs won't have to hold the minutiae of map data for parts of the world that they're not actively engaging with. This should especially come in handy considering the new feature in Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 that lets players land and exit an aircraft anywhere in the world, seeing its details up close while on foot.

Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 File Size

The last game in the series had an install size of around 130 gigabytes, meaning its successor will take up less than a quarter of the space of its predecessor. While it featured several redeeming qualities, such as sporting great graphics and a wide variety of aircraft, the massive file size was one of the worst things about Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020, and its high requirements kept some fans at bay.

While the game's launch is still a couple of months away, fans of the series seem eager to get their hands on it. As an added bonus, Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 will be a day-one release on Game Pass Ultimate on November 19, so members won't even have to pay anything more than their subscription fees to access it immediately.

​​​​Source: Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 Confirms Huge Improvement Over Previous Game