With less than a week until the MSFS team releases the hugely-anticipated 40th Anniversary Edition of Microsoft Flight Simulator, simmers are naturally excited to check all the new content coming into the platform. Arguably the most exciting new addition will be official helicopter support, which will be showcased by a brand new aircraft built by Asobo’s in-house development team: the Guimbal Cabri G2.
Last week we got an insider view into the work being done with gliders, which is something simmers are also looking forward to getting next week. This time, the MSFS team published a new video in the Feature Discovery series, detailing the whole process behind the creation of the Cabri G2, from the modeling and texturing to the authentic flight model.
During the video, which you can watch below, we learn how Asobo’s visual artists scanned a real Cabri G2 helicopter, getting the necessary data to accurately build the 3D model of the aircraft. The audio experience is also important, so the team recorded sounds from all around the aircraft for truly immersive audio. Besides the realistic engine sounds, expect every button and switch to sound just like it does in real life.
Perhaps the most impressive aspect of the G2’s development for MSFS is how the team is attempting to deliver all the wishes of helicopter pilots of a realistic flight model for rotorcraft. By now, you’re probably familiar with the computational fluid dynamics (CFD) that is now a key part of flight modeling in the simulator (and available for third-party developers to use on their own aircraft). Asobo is taking this technology even further, expanding it to simulate even more airflow features and taking advantage of that to make helicopters behave realistically within the sim.
The CFD visualizations that Asobo has added to MSFS are a very cool way to see how air flows around the aircraft and how that same air impacts it. This new video about helicopters shows these visualizations in action with the Cabri G2 and gives us an idea of the level of depth that the physics in MSFS are being pushed to.
Asobo seems to have done a tremendous job bringing official helicopter support to MSFS, not only from a realism standpoint but also as an artistic expression when representing the Cabri G2 in the virtual world. This incredible new update is hitting the platform in just a few days and promises to be another milestone moment in the history of MSFS! Will the end result live up to the expectations? We will soon find out.
