As Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 improves with each patch, “error accessing live air traffic data” and other bugs remain. So, is it worth playing, or should you wait?

What you need to know

  • Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 launched with game-breaking issues on November 19, 2024, on Xbox and PC.
  • Limited server capacity and constant crashes kept many players from playing the game within its first few days, but patches and fixes followed later.
  • Developers at Asobo Studios have recently focused on the game’s career mode to relieve the most frustrating errors.

As an analyst with over two decades of gaming experience under my belt, I’ve seen my fair share of rocky launches and game-breaking issues. The Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 release was no exception, leaving me disappointed and unable to properly review the game on its launch day. However, after two weeks of patches and fixes, I must say that Asobo Studios has made a significant effort to improve the game’s performance.


For two weeks now, Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 has faced mostly unfavorable reviews since its release. The team at Asobo Studio has been tirelessly working to address crashes and bugs that marred the experience of eager Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 fans on November 19. With the monumental challenge of delivering real-time global rendering, the initial launch day encountered issues, making the game nearly unplayable and hindering a fair review.

It’s great news that as our server capacity expands, the development team for the game, headed by Jorg Neumann, has rolled out several improvements tailored to different modes. Initially, the ‘free flight’ option was partially operational at launch; however, the much-anticipated career mode in Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 was largely unavailable due to game-halting bugs and other issues that hindered players from advancing. Fortunately, a recent maintenance phase has addressed some of the most troublesome glitches.

Maintenance is now complete! Here’s what got fixed during this maintenance phase:

Have you pondered whether the recent update for Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 has made significant enhancements that could entice former skeptics and dissatisfied fans to give it another go? Since its launch, I’ve kept the game installed on my Xbox Series X, allowing any updates to automatically install, and decided to test it out to see how well it performs now. Here are my findings from my personal experience.

A vast improvement with more work to do

Initially, the message “Activating Packages” persists briefly on the startup screen, however, this is significantly shorter compared to the long wait times during launch day, which is reasonable given that the game is loading an entire globe for real-time streaming. Moreover, when navigating freely around the virtual Earth, there may be a slight delay in texture loading, but it’s comparable to what you might encounter in some contemporary games using Unreal Engine 5.

With the latest update, the career mode in Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 now launches successfully without any crashes, enabling me to embark on my quest to obtain my ‘Private Pilot License’ and advance in this personalized journey. Aesthetically, the voices used for non-player characters such as your co-pilot lack authenticity and fall short of expectations, given the significant improvements made to Microsoft Copilot’s AI assistant voice on Windows 11. Nevertheless, it remains more engaging than simply reading text.

In Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024, certain problems persist, with some being less severe than others. The game initially shows signs of unresolved issues when you choose to ‘fly now’. This is because the bird’s eye view might linger for approximately 30 seconds or longer before transitioning to your chosen aircraft, and during this time, the frame rate on Xbox Series X experiences a significant drop as the world loads its higher-resolution elements.

Initially, when loading 3D models and textures, there’s a noticeable ‘first-time load’ effect where I see a low-quality, blocky representation of my plane’s dashboard and controls. But shortly after, these are swapped with high-resolution versions, and the frame rate stabilizes to something closer to a steady 30 FPS. Still, I’d prefer if it could be locked at 30 frames per second for a smoother experience.

An unfortunate, repetitive bug removes all engine sounds of my Cessna, or any other plane, for that matter, but a helpful comment on Bluesky points me in the right direction of fixing it by clearing the cache. Otherwise, a relatively new message frequently appears in some modes to report “Error accessing live air traffic data, retrying…” but it doesn’t interrupt your flight or become much of a serious problem.

Primarily, the gameplay experience post-update appears to adhere to a pattern: Entering a scene, experiencing some frame rate dips as the environment and assets load, followed by smooth flying thereafter. The framerate during third-person flight on Xbox Series X is somewhat unpredictable, yet it doesn’t significantly hinder enjoyment of the visuals, and it seems to be progressively improving with updates and server expansions.

The marketplace remains marked as ‘coming soon’, with no updates to report. However, the challenges menu now offers fresh scenarios, and the Boeing F/A-18E Super Hornet can be loaded without texture issues, allowing me to fly it swiftly over a piece of the United Kingdom. The game is now playable for some enjoyable experiences, and I’m looking forward to updating my review with a new score soon.

Read More

2024-12-04 21:10