Microsoft Flight Simulator Requirements Listed, Ideal Specification Requires 150 GB of Drive Space and RTX 2080 GPU

[AleksandarK]

Microsoft's flight simulator, an upcoming game designed to bring real-life scenarios of flying an airplane, just got a list of system requirements needed to run a game. To play with Flight Simulator, you would at least need to have a quad-core CPU like AMD Ryzen 3 1200 or Intel Core i5-4460 equipped system, along with 8 GB of RAM. For graphics, you would need a GPU with at least 2 GB of VRAM, where the requirement is either AMD Radeon RX 570 or NVIDIA GeForce GTX 770 GPU. Another interesting observation is the requirement of 150 GB of drive space, meaning that this game will be pretty big. Internet connection needs to be 5 Mbps at minimum, and as you up the resolution and graphics, you would need a faster connection. You can check out the entire table below.

The need for incrementally faster connection comes out of one reason - adaptive streaming. The game looks stunning, and if you wish to play at the highest quality, parts of the game will be rendered in the cloud. Microsoft is using its Azure infrastructure to help and render parts of the game and stream it down to your PC. This ensures that your PC is capable of playing the game and Microsoft is showing how they can tap the power of cloud for uses like this.



Here you can see a footage of the Flight Simulator in action:

View at TechPowerUp Main Site

 

[Chomiq]

Radeon VII still listed in specs? Can you even get a new one?

 

[MrGRiMv25]

Never been a flight sim guy but that looks pretty damn nice!

 

[Cheeseball]

The RTX 2080 being as the ideal is most likely for 2160p though. That's not really bad.

Radeon VII still listed in specs? Can you even get a new one?

For $549.00 on Amazon, it is still possible! AMD just doesn't manufacture them anymore.

The recommended specs are made for any hardware that is capable of running the game, regardless if the hardware is still being sold/made or not. Even the i7-9800X is listed and Intel stopped making them early last year.

 

[notb]

Oh no, rendering in the cloud. Grab the pitchfork!

Radeon VII still listed in specs? Can you even get a new one?

Because it absolutely never happens that game requirements mention older gen components. Never.

CPU: AMD Ryzen 3 1200 or Intel Core i5-4460

 

[AnarchoPrimitiv]

The RTX 2080 being as the ideal is most likely for 2160p though. That's not really bad.



For $549.00 on Amazon, it is still possible! AMD just doesn't manufacture them anymore.

The recommended specs are made for any hardware that is capable of running the game, regardless if the hardware is still being sold/made or not. Even the i7-9800X is listed and Intel stopped making them early last year.

$549? Wow, If I had to work with DaVinci Resolve or some compute tasks, that'd be an absolute steal, has anyone seen the level of performance the Radeon Vii has in DaVinci Resolve?

 

[phanbuey]

Never been a flight sim guy but that looks pretty damn nice!

Right? they're starting to look great, might have to try this one out.

I can imagine in a few years the vr version will be amazing.

 

[Prince Valiant]

Oh no, rendering in the cloud. Grab the pitchfork!

Because it absolutely never happens that game requirements mention older gen components. Never.

CPU: AMD Ryzen 3 1200 or Intel Core i5-4460

No need for a pitchfork. I know I'll never buy the game now .

 

[Raven Rampkin]

Ryzen 7 PRO... Blunder, the only SKU they had at hand to test, or is there something M$ and/or AMD haven't told us?

 

[IceShroom]

$549? Wow, If I had to work with DaVinci Resolve or some compute tasks, that'd be an absolute steal, has anyone seen the level of performance the Radeon Vii has in DaVinci Resolve? View attachment 152370
View attachment 152370
View attachment 152371
View attachment 152371
View attachment 152372

And this with Windows. Is it why Mac users want Radeon 7!!

 

[Vayra86]

Never been a flight sim guy but that looks pretty damn nice!

I just can't shake the feeling that if VR will ever get a killer app, it has to be something like this. I am not a flight sim guy either, at all... but this? I would play this.

The technology used in this sim is amazing, I saw this a year back or so in preview... the combination of cloud and local processing is going to turn some heads for sure. What they're doing: those 150 GBs are just the plain flat map, with the most generic objects on them. Azure is then used to provide the localized data (taken from satellite footage and processed) of the actual environment and places it on top of the map. Some algorithms then turn those into 3D objects. Boom. 100% true to life sim that spans the entire globe. So realistically, yes, you can see your house from there...

Oh no, rendering in the cloud. Grab the pitchfork!

Because it absolutely never happens that game requirements mention older gen components. Never.

CPU: AMD Ryzen 3 1200 or Intel Core i5-4460

Hehe, see, THIS is one of those titles where I can see how cloud will bring gaming to another level. No objections whatsoever, here it actually creates a new experience.

 

[Ashtr1x]

What a pathetic disaster. Windows 1909 a.k.a not the 1809 which is enterprise long term release, means one must install the bloated bugged release garbage to run this game. Second, the Always Online Internet connection DRM system making the game essentially as a service. M$ is ruining what made gaming and computing. Both into this orwellian agenda and with GaaS essentially, you do not own anything now.

So from now, all games will follow this bs of minimum versioning of Windows OS release and ofc Nvidia's driver mandatory specification on top. Nightmare for gaming industry is already upon us due to PC culture agenda shoved into with subversive political tactics and now the Windows 10 with this it becomes worse. We are moving now from that Win7 to Win10 era, where M$ constantly updates the OS injects spyware, removes offline accounts, targeting Win32 death for their UWP trash and the DCH nightmare.

Not interested in this at all, I hope people realize the ecosystem lockdown that's upon the Computing and say no to this garbage. Wish Vulkan takes off and someone takes Linux seriously for a better computing and gaming platform, Otherwise still we have the WDDM problem which M$ designed in such a way that it updates with every pathetic 6 months updates of the Windoows 10 bugged releases.

 

[Vayra86]

What a pathetic disaster. Windows 1909 a.k.a not the 1809 which is enterprise long term release, means one must install the bloated bugged release garbage to run this game. Second, the Always Online Internet connection making the game essentially as a service. M$ is ruining what made gaming and computing. Both into this orwellian agenda.

So from now, all games will follow this bs of minimum versioning of Windows OS release and ofc Nvidia's driver mandatory specification on top. Nightmare for gaming industry due to pc culture agenda and now the Windows 10. We are moving now from that Win7 to Win10 era, where M$ constantly updates the OS injects spyware, removes offline accounts, targeting Win32 death for their UWP trash.

Not interested in this at all, I hope people realize the ecosystem lockdown that's upon the Computing. Wish Vulkan takes off, but still we have the WDDM problem which M$ designed in such a way that it updates with every pathetic 6 months updates of the Windoows 10 bugged releases.

All Windows 1909 means is that worst case you will be playing the game a bit later, when that release is mandatory.

The rest... cloud is integral to this game, its not quite like all the others. In the end the market will determine if MS can pull this Windows minimum version stuff, but you can rest assured other publishers won't be tying themselves to it. It will cost them sales.

In a general sense though I agree fully, its not a good direction when it is not absolutely necessary for the game. But I think its good to make the distinction here.

 

[notb]

The technology used in this sim is amazing, I saw this a year back or so in preview... the combination of cloud and local processing is going to turn some heads for sure.

It makes me wonder if there's some magic trick in the works for post-processing or is it the basic idea of splitting the whole frame into parts and rendering everything.

Essentially, the plane itself is what changes the most. The environment isn't changing that much (beside plane's shadow maybe).

I guess it's also a nice use case for VRS.

Hehe, see, THIS is one of those titles where I can see how cloud will bring gaming to another level. No objections whatsoever, here it actually creates a new experience.

So you're OK with rendering a huge world and delivering to a PC, but you're not OK with rendering a more standard game and gaming on a laptop or a phone.
That's just racist.

 

[Vayra86]

So you're OK with rendering a huge world and delivering to a PC, but you're not OK with rendering a more standard game and gaming on a laptop or a phone.
That's just racist.

Well, surely you can see why. The game is already 150GB without all that local data. So this here is a situation where cloud uses its primary advantage (centralized accessible storage) to save us a new hard drive. And the proof of concept is of course also pretty nice to see. The performance and smoothness of delivery will be interesting.

 

[MxPhenom 216]

Now Nvidia's new cards need to come out before this game does. I want some 3080 action for this.

 

[RedelZaVedno]

Wow these specs are VERY reasonable. One must understand that RTX 3060 will be RTX 2080 equivalent, so $300-350 GPU coupled with $170 CPU (2700x) for ideal MS2020 gaming experience is just fantastic.
And all who worry about the need of being connected to cloud constantly, you can put your worries to rest. MS has stated that user will be able to pre-download part of the map and play it off-line.
Sure, you won't get live weather and be limited to downloaded area, but still, you'll be able to enjoy sim in all it's splendor. 2TB SSD or better Optane+4GB HDD and you'll be able to enjoy local flights off line without many compromises.

 

[Kohl Baas]

Now Nvidia's new cards need to come out before this game does. I want some 3080 action for this.

You can buy your own plane with instructor + all needed lessons for that price.

 

[Cheeseball]

And this with Windows. Is it why Mac users want Radeon 7!!

Apple makes the video drivers for MacOS X (for both AMD GPUs and Intel iGPUs), especially since they recently switched over to Metal.

DaVinci Resolve heavily favors VRAM (because those plugins store data directly) and raw core performance (which the Radeon VII has 3840 of) since they are basic compute tasks.

 

[Franzen4Real]

I just can't shake the feeling that if VR will ever get a killer app, it has to be something like this. I am not a flight sim guy either, at all... but this? I would play this.

For sure, this is one example that could show real VR potential. Sounds like the devs are pretty high on adding it soon. The one thing that I find blows people away when I let them try the Rift, is the sense of true size/scale that can only be provided by VR. Something like this flight sim that has the entire globe accurately modeled to scale, with ultra hi res photorealism, is something I too would love to see. But (sorry, not to poopoo on your point here) we are talking about a flight sim which is very niche, and I can't see it ever having the broad appeal required to really make it that killer app that VR badly needs.

The technology used in this sim is amazing, I saw this a year back or so in preview... the combination of cloud and local processing is going to turn some heads for sure. What they're doing: those 150 GBs are just the plain flat map, with the most generic objects on them. Azure is then used to provide the localized data (taken from satellite footage and processed) of the actual environment and places it on top of the map. Some algorithms then turn those into 3D objects. Boom. 100% true to life sim that spans the entire globe. So realistically, yes, you can see your house from there...



Hehe, see, THIS is one of those titles where I can see how cloud will bring gaming to another level. No objections whatsoever, here it actually creates a new experience.

This was actually one of the big features originally to be in XBox One before launch, and I was pretty excited to see it in action. Never seemed to materialize though. Perhaps with this being a flight sim with far less users than XBox consoles, the sheer demand/bandwidth required to serve it is more manageable. The link below was just a quick Google search, there are probably many more that go into detail about it. Hopefully this becomes an option in many more future games. We can still have the Ultra setting that is rendering offline locally just like we do now, but then have one more step up in quality settings that utilizes cloud rendering.

Xbox One uses cloud to render “latency-insensitive” graphics

Will Microsoft’s 300,000 server cloud give the Xbox One a graphics advantage over the PS4?

hexus.net

Xbox One will render games from the cloud to reduce storage space requirements

In a bid to minimize the gaming footprint Microsoft is experimenting with a new technology that will let users play games that are actually stored on the cloud, without relying on the local storage.

windowsreport.com

 

[holyprof]

I just can't shake the feeling that if VR will ever get a killer app, it has to be something like this. I am not a flight sim guy either, at all... but this? I would play this.

The technology used in this sim is amazing, I saw this a year back or so in preview... the combination of cloud and local processing is going to turn some heads for sure. What they're doing: those 150 GBs are just the plain flat map, with the most generic objects on them. Azure is then used to provide the localized data (taken from satellite footage and processed) of the actual environment and places it on top of the map. Some algorithms then turn those into 3D objects. Boom. 100% true to life sim that spans the entire globe. So realistically, yes, you can see your house from there...



Hehe, see, THIS is one of those titles where I can see how cloud will bring gaming to another level. No objections whatsoever, here it actually creates a new experience.

VR + cloud render = order 100x pack of airplane puke bags because you will get motion sickness.

 

[Vayra86]

VR + cloud render = order 100x pack of airplane puke bags because you will get motion sickness.

But that's the thing, its not a cloud render. The cloud only streams 'a few' objects on the map, and the map itself is local. So no jittery environment or anything. And stuff like weather is always in motion regardless.

So, worst case scenario I reckon is you'll see some pop in... what's new?

 

[Joss]

No need for a pitchfork. I know I'll never buy the game now .

This.

 

[BlackSpider318]

Actually studying to becoming a pilot and have been following the development of the game for some time now, the big question for me is to buy 2080 ti now or wait for 3080 ti in early fall and upgrade to the new ryzen 4 series 12/16 core cpu?'

 

[Vya Domus]

It's not rendering anything in the cloud, that wouldn't even make sense. It's simply pulling aerial imagery map data from a server as to not store terabytes of data locally.

Come on, use a better choice of words.