April 6th, 2023 Development Update - Microsoft Flight Simulator

This week’s Screenshot Challenge winner is Twitter user pommes_l, featuring a Boeing 747 flying over New York City. If you’re interested in participating in our weekly Screenshot Challenges, check out the contest details in the Community section below!

Earlier today, we announced the annual Spring Sale in the Marketplace. Over 1,100 products currently have reduced prices for the next two weeks, with some products having discounts of as much as 93% off! If you’ve been waiting to buy an addon product for Microsoft Flight Simulator, be sure to check the Marketplace to see if it or any other products that catch your attention are on sale!

To purchase these discounted items, visit the Microsoft Flight Simulator Marketplace, select ‘Featured’, scroll down to ‘Special Offers’, then select ‘See All’ and look for the savings.

In addition to the Marketplace sale, we are also discounting all editions of Microsoft Flight Simulator (Standard, Deluxe, and Premium Deluxe) by 25% for Xbox and PC via the Microsoft Store! If you’re a new player interested in flying the virtual skies of Microsoft Flight Simulator, now is a great time to jump in and take advantage of these savings!

Finally, we hope everyone celebrating holidays enjoys the long weekend!

– MSFS Team

Feedback Snapshot

See last week’s Development Update blog for the most recent version of the Feedback Snapshot! Click here for the web-friendly version of the Feedback Snapshot.

Development Roadmap

Click here for the web-friendly version of the Development Roadmap.

Marketplace Update

Click here for the web-friendly version of the Marketplace Update.

There are 19 new and 35 updated products in the Marketplace this week. Thursday’s Marketplace update generally goes live between the release of this blog post and 5pm PT.

19 NEW PRODUCTS: 13 ON PC, 6 ON XBOX
New on PC and Xbox	New on PC	New on PC and Xbox
New on PC and Xbox	New on PC	New on PC
New on PC	New on PC	New on PC
New on PC and Xbox	New on PC and Xbox	New on PC and Xbox
	New on PC

35 UPDATED PRODUCTS: 22 ON PC, 13 ON XBOX
Updated on PC	Updated on Xbox	Updated on PC and Xbox
Updated on PC and Xbox	Updated on PC and Xbox	Updated on PC and Xbox
Updated on PC and Xbox	Updated on PC and Xbox	Updated on PC
Updated on PC	Updated on PC	Updated on PC
Updated on PC	Updated on PC	Updated on PC
Updated on PC	Updated on PC and Xbox	Updated on PC and Xbox
Updated on PC	Updated on PC and Xbox	Updated on PC and Xbox
Updated on PC and Xbox		Updated on PC and Xbox

Marketplace Backlog

Current Backlog: 1,038 Total

Marketplace submissions are assigned a priority (P1-P4, with P1 being the top priority) based on defined internal processes and metrics. We review and update the priority system regularly to ensure it is best serving both our players and 3rd Party Developers.

BACKLOG: NEW PRODUCTS

CONTENT TYPE	P1	P2	P3	P4	Total
Aircraft	7	3	28	20	58
Mission	0	0	62	0	62
Scenery	0	0	37	232	269
Livery	0	0	110	40	150
Airport	1	2	178	125	306
Other	0	4	15	4	23
Total	8	9	430	421	868

BACKLOG: UPDATED PRODUCTS

CONTENT TYPE	P1	P2	P3	P4	Total
Aircraft	13	3	13	0	29
Mission	0	0	7	0	7
Scenery	4	4	9	26	43
Livery	0	0	11	12	23
Airport	2	8	16	35	61
Other	0	6	1	0	7
Total	19	21	57	73	170

SDK UPDATE

Asobo

SimConnect
- We fixed some calls to the NavData API that could freeze the sim.
- We added an EnumerateControllers function.
WASM
- We renamed FastWasmCompilation to Wasm Debug Mode.

Working Title / MSFS Avionics Framework

MSFS Avionics Framework
- Check out MSFS Avionics Source Code Mirror to access the latest Avionics Framework source code.
- Find documentation about the avionics framework here: MSFS Avionics Frameworks and Instruments.
- Upcoming framework updates:
  - Adding rudder auto-coordination to the framework autopilot option. (AAU_02)
  - Fixing bug with framework flight plan sync between instruments that could occur when not using the standard copy event. (AAU_02)
  - Adding new nav_radial_error topic to the NavProcSimVars Event Bus publisher. (AAU_02)
  - Fixing a bug in CasSystem where deactivating a suffixed alert when it was not active can corrupt the alert state. (AAU_02)

THIRD PARTY UPDATE

As of 03/26, we have now approved 209 (+0) third parties into the in-sim marketplace and – so far 184 (+0) have released 1,790 products on PC (+13) and 1,507 on Xbox (+14).
In total, 2,748 products (+13) have already been released in 3^rdparty stores and the in-sim marketplace. Beyond that, another 774 products (-2) from 3^rd party developers are in production (348 announced, 426 unannounced). In total, over 3,522 3^rd party products (+10) have either been released or are in development.
Airports:
- 1,882 airports (+9) are either released or are in various stages of development.
  - 1,614 airports (+5) have been released on the platform so far in various stores.
  - 1,008 airports (+0) have been released in the in-sim marketplace.
  - 122 airports (-1) beyond the released airports have been announced.
  - 146 airports (+5) are not announced, but the dev let us know that an airport is in production.
Aircraft:
- 589 aircraft (+1) are either released or are in various stages of development.
  - 224 aircraft (+5) have been released on the platform so far in various stores.
  - 162 aircraft (+6) have been released in the in-sim PC marketplace.
  - 138 aircraft (+6) have been released in the in-sim Xbox marketplace.
  - 207 aircraft (+0) beyond the released aircraft have been announced.
  - 158 aircraft (-4) are not announced, but the dev let us know that an aircraft is in production.
Scenery:
- 882 scenery packs (-1) are either released or are in various stages of development.
  - 770 sceneries (+0) have been released on the platform so far in various stores.
  - 291 sceneries (+0) have been released in the in-sim marketplace.
  - 19 sceneries (-1) beyond the released scenery have been announced.
  - 93 sceneries (+1) are not announced, but the dev let us know that scenery is in production.
Mission Packs:
- 169 mission packs (+1) are either released or are in various stages of development.
  - 140 mission packs (+3) have been released on the platform so far in various stores.
  - 74 mission packs (+4) have been released in the in-sim marketplace.
  - 0 mission packs (+0) beyond the released missions have been announced.
  - 29 mission packs (-2) are not announced, but the dev let us know that they are in production.

Community Fly-In

April 7 is Good Friday, one of the most important religious holidays to those people who follow the Christian faith. In recognition of this occasion, we will fly to Vatican City where the Pope annually delivers a Good Friday mass service to the world’s estimated 1.3 billion Catholics.

The flight will also see us visit several other beautiful and noteworthy areas around Italy, including Salerno, the Amalfi Coast, Capri, Mount Vesuvius (and the nearby ruins of Pompeii), Naples, and Rome. Of course, no flight to Italy would be complete without plenty of discussion about pizza!

Event details are available here. All are welcome to participate!

Community Video

Here on the MSFS Team, we’re always really touched to read about how flight simming brings families closer together. We have previously featured several stories on this topic in our “Why I Fly” series of videos on YouTube, such as Carl and Tiffany Hancock and Jose and João Antunes.

Earlier this week, we were thrilled to see a new video from a member of our player community, YouTuber James Newall, in which he documents the process of building a new gaming PC.

This wasn’t just any PC build video, though. This new computer was a gift from James to his father, a retired Royal Air Force officer who had the opportunity to fly in multiple military aircraft throughout his career including the Hawker Hunter, English Electric Canberra, and English Electric Lightning. With this new PC, James’s father is now able to re-live his glory days in the RAF and once again take to the (virtual) skies thanks to Microsoft Flight Simulator!