SoFly is back with another cool weather-focused product for Microsoft Flight Simulator. Following the release of A Guide to Flight Simulator, Landing Challenge Pro, and Weather Preset Pro, SoFly is now launching STORM, which looks to offer some unique thrills to MSFS users with the introduction of hurricanes and other kinds of storms in the sim, along with a wide variety of hand-crafted missions.
The core feature of STORM will definitely be hurricanes. SoFly looked into the records of notable recent hurricanes from all over the world, noting their exact locations and size, and went ahead with their re-creation using the weather system in MSFS. The result is an extensive collection of historically accurate hurricanes that simmers will be able to see from a safe distance in MSFS, or risk venturing into for some necessary scientific research.
Besides the historical hurricanes, which include some famously powerful ones such as Katrina (2005) and Michael (2018), STORM also features a few fictional hurricane scenarios to test your skills in various conditions. Furthermore, simmers will find a selection of new storm-related global weather presents to further challenge themselves in some additional special scenarios.
The addition of hurricanes and powerful storms is already a good reason to take a closer look into STORM, but SoFly will be offering even more with this package. There’s also a variety of missions in different formats, designed to be educational and exciting. These include 10 Landing Challenges, two slower-paced Discovery Flights, 10 Educational Missions, story-driven missions, and more. You can even choose between the default A320 and the FlyByWire A32NX for the educational airliner flights.
Most of these missions (Landing Challenges excluded) will come with fully-voiced sections, either by your co-pilot providing some useful information about a nearby storm or even by a Geography and Natural Hazards Specialist who will teach you more about hurricanes and their impact on the affected regions.
SoFly told us about some of the limitations that simmers will encounter, which are in no way a deal-breaker. For example, the hurricanes and supercells remain static in their specified location. Also, some wind data and other hurricane-specific features may not be 100% accurate due to existing sim limitations. SoFly also says that while some supercells are included with STORM, the team had planned for more. Unfortunately, Sim Update 9 broke this functionality, but Asobo is aware of this issue, and, pending a future update, more of these storms will be added when possible.
As usual with all SoFly products, customers can expect to get regular updates to STORM, which will add other kinds of storms, such as cyclones and typhoons, but also additional missions. STORM hopes to bring to MSFS pilots the thrills of being a virtual storm chaser, so it would be great if the team manages to keep up with real-world events and provide simmers with on-time new storms to tackle in the simulator!
STORM will be available very soon for Microsoft Flight Simulator, first through SoFly’s own website and other third-party stores, and later in the Marketplace, where it will be available for both PC and Xbox. All of this content will be priced at just £9.99 | €11.99 | $12.95 + applicable taxes, which sounds very reasonable.
See below a quick rundown of the included features in STORM and stay tuned for further news regarding the release of this exciting new product from SoFly!
- A large number of Hurricanes (historical and fictional) are injected into Microsoft Flight Simulator
- Global storm presets that preset a challenge anywhere in the world
- Fully voiced story-driven missions
- Educational airliner flights to the eye of the storm; choose between the default A320 or the FBW A32NX
- All-new discovery flights and authentic audio tour
- Microsoft Flight Simulator first: interactive manual as you fly in the simulator
- Tough and thrilling landing challenges
- Flight plans leading you to the hurricanes are included, or discover them on your own
- Detailed PDF guide helping you find the hurricanes and storms included
