A new hotfix is coming to Flight Simulator to further address issues after SU5

The Flight Simulator team has recognized the mounting problems that have been reported since the release of Sim Update 5 last week and is now getting ready to launch a second hotfix that aims to fix many of these issues.

Sim Update 5 has been a polarising new release for MSFS, one that has brought significant performance improvements at the cost of some underlying changes that had implications elsewhere on the experience. Simmers have been reporting degraded visual quality and frequent crashes, while third-party developers are still scrambling to update their add-ons in order to make them compatible with SU5.

As we expected, Asobo and Microsoft have been hearing about all of this and, perhaps a little later than ideal (but then again, SU5 only came out last week), publicly admitted that the reported problems exist, are being actively investigated, and that a new patch is being prepared to further address them, after the first hotfix that was released shortly after the update came out.

This second hotfix is expected to come out this Friday or Monday, and will address the hottest topics that have been debated by the community, namely:

  • Missing volumetric lighting
  • Popping objects and stutter when moving camera – a new option to cache scenery will be introduced with the upcoming World Update 6 on August 24th
  • Low-resolution ground textures
  • CTD’s
  • Washed Out graphics – a new option will be introduced in an upcoming Sim Update to change overall brightness in the sim
  • Aerosoft CRJ fixes
  • Fixes to incorrect altitudes from ATC
  • Further fixes to temperature spikes.

To illustrate the improvements to the low-res graphics at high altitude, the developers shared a few screenshots showing how this will look after the new hotfix. These show the view from 30.000 feet down to New York, both in daylight and at night, where the ground textures look significantly more detailed.

msfs high altitude texture detail 1

msfs high altitude texture detail 2

While this new hotfix hopes to address some of the most important issues reported by the community, the team is aware that there is a longer list of problems, which they are looking into and will provide further updates by the time of the next Feedback Snapshot on August 12. In the meantime, hopefully, the new patch will bring enough improvements so that those most affected by these issues can get some enjoyment out of the sim.