Microsoft has released the third World Update for Flight Simulator aimed at enhancing visuals for the scenery and airports in the UK and Ireland. The update has been promised since last month and comes almost three months after the previous update was released. The update also brings with it a few new activities, a bunch of points of interest, and a whole load of bug fixes to various aspects of the simulator.
As is the case with these major world updates, the focus is on enhancing the visuals of the scenery, airports, and other areas in the region that the update focuses on. This time around, the focus on UK and Ireland brings high-resolution 3D photogrammetry to Birmingham, Bristol, Cambridge, London, and Oxford. There are also five “hand-crafted” airports that include Barra, Liverpool, Land’s End, Manchester-Barton, and Out Skerries. Additionally, the company says that it has made “visual and logistical” improvements to 85 area airports.
Additionally, these World Updates also add new points of interest – architectural and scenic places of importance in a region – that feature high levels of detail and fidelity. With this update, the firm is adding more than 70 custom landmarks for users to experience in the two countries. Some of these places include famous landmarks such as Stonehenge, Westminster Bridge, the Buckingham Palace, football (soccer) stadiums such as Stamford Bridge, a host of cathedrals, and much more. Lastly, there are three new activities – two landing challenges and an “Iconic Flight in the Northern Isles”.
Along with all the visual improvements, the Redmond firm has posted the release notes for patch version 1.13.16.0 that brings a whole host of bug fixes and enhancements. These range from overall performance and stability improvements to fixes to the VR mode, navigation, terrain, and aircraft behavior. There are also a bunch of SDK updates that you can check out in the release notes.
Here is the complete changelog for today’s updates:
PERFORMANCE AND STABILITY
- Fixed various crashes across the title
- Fixed a specific crash while using Little Navmap in Bush trip activities
WORLD
- Several terrain spikes have been fixed, including incorrect cases of water elevation issues
- Water masks have been updated across various locations in the world
- Reduced the frequency of water artifacts appearing on cliffs
- Noise issue affecting clouds has been fixed
VR
- The ‘Activate/Deactivate VR’ button is now always displayed in the main menu (bottom left corner of the screen) when a VR headset is plugged in. If no controls are displayed on this button, then it means that no controls are bound to this action.
- When the toolbar is opened, it does not block interactions anymore with other menus displayed in front of it.
- The cursor doesn’t jump anymore when moving across the Options menu in the cockpit.
- Gray boxes don’t appear anymore when using the ‘Travel to’ feature in VR.
- After leaving VR mode, the sim window is no longer forced on top and the player can drag and drop any other window over it.
PLANES
- Fixed induced speed calculation bug with bi propeller engines
- Fixed the plane crash detection when landing on iced water with crash detection ‘ON’
- Fixed swapped screens in DA62 TestPilot version
- Fixed VS Knob Turn not working on the Airbus A320Neo
- Improved flaps system of aircraft: Aircraft creators can now move the wing surface’s position and camber with each flap system at each flap level
- Improved ground effect wing to ground interaction system to avoid pitch dip at rotation on some aircraft
NAVIGATION
- Latest AIRAC cycle has been integrated and is now available
INPUT
- CH ECLIPSE YOKE default preset have been added
- Fixed Thrustmaster TCA Quadrant ENG 1+2 don’t start engines
And here is a dropdown list of some of the major new points of interest that you can visit:
Places of interest:
- One Blackfriars
- BT Tower
- Newfoundland
- St George Wharf Tower
- Southbank Tower
- 20 Fenchurch Street/ Sky Garden
- The Leadenhall Building / 122 Leadenhall Street
- HSBC / 8 Canada Square
- Tower 42
- 25 Canada Square / City Bank
- 22 Bishopsgate
- Landmark Pinnacle
- Heron Tower
- One Park Drive
- The Scalpel
- The Madison
- 100 Bishopsgate
- Aykon London One
- 30 St Mary Axe (The Gherkin)
- Strata
- Palace of Holyroodhouse
- Blenheim Palace
- St. James’s Palace
- Palace of Westminster
- Glamis Castle
- Buckingham Palace
- Archbishop’s Palace, Maidstone
- Wolvesey Castle
- Floors Castle
- Balmoral Castle
- Hillsborough Castle
- Dublin Castle
- Mount Stuart House
- Blair Castle
- Hampton Court Palace
- Rock of Cashel
- Stirling Castle
- Warwick Castle
- Windsor Castle
- Blarney Castle
- Eilean Donan Castle
- Edinburgh Castle
- Caernarfon Castle
- Canterbury Cathedral
- Durham Cathedral
- Fountains Abbey
- Lincoln Cathedral
- Salisbury Cathedral
- St. Paul’s Cathedral
- Westminster Abbey
- York Minster
- Angel of the North
- Blackpool Tower
- British Airways i360 (Brighton)
- Glenfinnan Viaduct
- Humber Bridge
- Jodrell Bank Observatory
- Kelpies, The
- Maritime Greenwich
- Pontcysyllte Aqueduct
- Royal Botanical Gardens
- Royal Liver Building
- Samson & Goliath (Cranes)
- Spinnaker Tower
- Stonehenge
- Titanic Belfast
- Tower of London
- Wales Millenium Centre
- Wallace Monument
- All England Club
- Anfield
- Emirates Stadium
- Goodison Park
- Millennium Stadium
- Old Trafford
- St. James’ Park
- Stamford Bridge
- Twickenham Stadium
- Villa Park
- Wembley Stadium
- Eden Project
- London Eye
- Southend Pier
- Millennium Bridge London
- Blackfriars Railway Bridge
- Southwark Bridge
- Cannon Street Railway Bridge
- Blackfriars Bridge
- Vauxhall Bridge
- Grosvenor Bridge
- One Canada Sqaure
- Waterloo Bridge
- Hungerford Bridge and Golden Jubilee Bridges
- Lambeth Bridge
- Chelsea Bridge
- Albert Bridge London
- Battersea Bridge
- Battersea Railway Bridge
- Wandsworth Bridge
- Clifton Suspension Bridge
- Forth Rail Bridge
- Forth Road Bridge
- Queensferry Crossing
- Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Bridge
- Tees Transporter Bridge
- Tower Bridge
- Tyne Bridge
- Westminster Bridge
Lastly, there is one known issue with the ORBX London Landmarks Scenery – a third-party add-on – that conflicts with this update. The company says that it is currently investigating the issues and suggests that users disable the scenery in the interim to avoid problems.