When it comes to flight simulator games, few can hold a candle to Microsoft’sFlight Simulatorseries. Its latest entry is one ofthe most realistic and most detailed flight sims ever madeand currently holds an impressive 91 rating on Metacritic.Microsoft Flight Simulatorisn’t just the highest rated game in the series either, but also the very first to ever make its way to home consoles.
Microsoft announced thatMicrosoft Flight Simulatorwould be coming to Xbox Series consolesback in December of last year, with a tentative release window of Summer 2021. Although the start of summer is still a few weeks away, a recent pre-order listing suggests that the game could be landing a little sooner than some may have first thought.
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While browsing GameStop’s European webpage, Reddit user DaddyIngrosso spotted a pre-order listing for the Xbox Series version ofMicrosoft Flight Simulator, with a scheduled release date of Jun 15. Although the listing has since been taken down, the user was able to capture a screenshot of the page before it vanished, clearly showing both the release date and the €70 pre-order price.
Although there have been occasions in the past where GameStop listings have been inaccurate, the proposed release date seems to make a lot of sense.The Xbox & Bethesda Showcase is set to take place at E3 on June 13, so it really wouldn’t be too surprising if Microsoft announced the game’s release date at some point during the event. The game’s Xbox Series X/S version also received its ESRB rating last week, suggesting that its release could now be fairly imminent.
One of the reasons that the series has never been ported to consoles in the past is the sheer volume of files needed to actually run the games, although this seems to be something that the developers have been working on as of late. The series' most recent entry originally required a staggering 170GB of storage when it first released, althougha recent update forFlight Simulatorreduced the amount of hard drive space it required by more than half.
Regardless of whether or not the GameStop listing proves to be accurate, it seems all but certain thatMicrosoft Flight Simulatorwill be arriving at some point in the next few months. What isn’t so clear, however, is whether the rumored Xbox One port will also be releasing during the same window. In a recent Q&A session, Jörg Neumann mentioned that Microsoft is mainly focusing on theXbox Series X/S release ofFlight Simulator, suggesting that Xbox One players may have to wait a little longer before they can finally take off.
Microsoft Flight Simulatoris available now on PC and is planned for release on Xbox Series X|S in 2021. An Xbox One version is rumored.
