Microsoft’s long-neglected Flight Simulator franchise is set to make an impressive return in 2020, the software giant revealed ahead of the E3 videogame conference in Los Angeles on Sunday.
It will be the first major update to the simulator, whose original 1982 release pre-dates Windows, since the release of Flight Simulator X in 2006.
Though Microsoft has said little about the new simulator, it has released impressive footage of real-time gameplay in 4K ultra-HD resolution (see trailer video below).
Many fans of the franchise had given up hope of Microsoft releasing a new version of the popular simulator after the company closed the Aces Game Studio responsible for the title in 2009. In 2014, Dovetail Games acquired the rights from Microsoft to port Flight Simulator X to the Steam online videogame store, which it did, releasing Flight Simulator X: Steam Edition.
The new version of the software, which will run on both Windows PCs and Microsoft’s Xbox console, reportedly makes use of detailed satellite images and Microsoft’s Azure artificial intelligence platform to create near-photorealistic scenery.
Microsoft has not revealed the exact launch date or said how much the software will cost. — (c) 2019 NewsCentral Media
