The latest development update saw lots of new information revealed including, World Update 17, Local Legend 18, MSFS 2024 UI previews and a small talk about the 2024 simulator. The team also discussed Sim Update 16 on stream, with a Q&A throughout.
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World Update 17
World Update 17 is focused on the UK and Ireland, with lots of work focused on Ireland. Their digital elevation model has been updated to allow for higher resolution data. Lots of new POI’s and airports have been remodelled by hand to go with the new DEM data. A lot of focus was on Ireland as it was mentioned that the country was underserved initially, giving more love to Ireland.
The Isle of Man also received some updates, POI’s such as Peel Castle, Castle Rushen, Chicken Rock Lighthouse and many more were all given a fresh look. A few airports got a remodel such as Stansted, Cork Airport, Sumburgh Airport, Farnborough Airport and more. Many cities in England have received some updates including Leeds, Brighton, Bristol, London, Liverpool and more.
World Update 17 will be released just as Farnborough air show begins, so the team wanted to give the airport a nice refresh. It was mentioned that iniBuilds is behind Farnborough Airport. Another pleasant addition was Gibraltar, an overseas British territory. That was all that was shown off for this segment, with a release date being set for the 23rd of July.
Local Legend 18 and 707 Update
Local Legend 18 will be a helicopter and is made by iniBuilds which has already been finished and tested. However, on stream, Jorg mentioned that they are still trying to finalise their licensing contract before a release. This was all that was said on stream and no images were given due to the licensing issues, but a release is coming.
An August release date for the 707 was mentioned as the team said the aircraft, made by Aeroplane Heaven, was not meeting their expectations. No exact date was given, but the goal is to release it alongside Sim Update 16.
MSFS 2024 UI Previews
Shared near the beginning of the stream were a few pictures of the UI we can expect to see in MSFS 2024. These previews were of the control settings. The UI has had a big change up from the current simulator, and much of it has been adjusted for ease of use. Controls in the new simulator will now be able to be set to a specific aircraft, along with a general set of controls for all aircraft.
Controls will also be adjustable in the simulator while flying with an additional button added to the toolbar rather than going to the menu. All controls set up will now be saved in packages, meaning you will be able to share your control configuration on certain hardware. Hardware manufacturers will also be able to do the same, this allows for them to set up configurations specifically designed for their hardware.
Q&A and Other
The rest of the stream was a mix of questions from the community, mainly on MSFS 2020. The first was a mention of Sim Update 16 and when we can expect it. The team couldn’t give an exact date, as there are a few fixes that need to be made ready for Sim Update 16. Jorg also mentioned that the last part of their Brazil World Update has been finished, so we can expect a release soon.
Relating to MSFS 2024, more in-depth information will be provided in September, at which point they’ll start answering questions from the community related to the new simulator in developer streams. Jorg talked about the July surprise, which was supposed to be an aircraft that would have launched alongside the Olympics, but unfortunately it wasn’t quite ready yet.
There are a few other questions that were answered in the stream on YouTube, but that was all the main content covered by the team. World Update 17 releases tomorrow as of writing (23rd July 2024). Check out the rest of FSNews for more flight simulator-related content.
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