I have Fs 2020 on steam, but currently having problems starting the sim.  I get an error message saying, "an error occurred while updating microsoft flight simulator.  By the way my sim is up to date with release #9.  So what is going on?  Never had this erorr in 2 years.

Same here, and also with a friend.

Whatever the Steam server foul up was, none of the tips they provided (clearing download cache, verifying install files etc), seemed to do anything - eventually the sim did launch, but immediately went into Update mode (where I am now), where it is apparently reinstalling the entire program - just great... 

Edited May 4, 20224 yr by flapsdown
spelling

I got an automatic 151MB "unscheduled update", and the game started up and ran fine two-minutes ago. 

Same problem here - troubleshooting tips did not work (did not verify the files since that's asking for trouble) , and after several tries I loaded a different steam game which had the same problem but eventually loaded, and after that I could start MFS OK.  Very odd.   My install has been pretty stable since day 1 of release. 

Edited May 5, 20224 yr by Stoopy

20 minutes ago, flapsdown said:

Whatever the Steam server foul up was, none of the tips they provided (clearing download cache, verifying install files etc), seemed to do anything - eventually the sim did launch, but immediately went into Update mode (where I am now), where it is apparently reinstalling the entire program - just great... 

Verifying file integrity will do that too you every time. Never verify files on steam with MSFS unless you want to do a complete reinstall.

10 minutes ago, Phantoms said:

Verifying file integrity will do that too you every time. Never verify files on steam with MSFS unless you want to do a complete reinstall.

Well, that's a new one on me, but lesson learned - sure won't ever do that again... 🤪

Many of us have been bit by that one. Verifying file integrity is one of the first recommended things on Steam. Unfortunately, it's a no-no with MSFS.

Sometimes there are posts here to rename community folder which disables all those features. But the folders in Official are also just as likely to ruin any chance of booting up MSFS!

A good reason to go in File Explorer to the Official folder and sort everything inside to 'sort by date'. Then move the newest 2 or 3 folders to a temp location and try to boot MSFS. One of the recent bad folders was the G1000 folder. You could not start MSFS to be able to delete the G1000 update in content manager, but you could just move the G1000 folder out of 'Official' which did the same thing.

This plan worked for me last week. MSFS would not boot. I moved the top 3 folders out of Official and then MSFS booted up fine. Turns out it was the G1000 folder that was the issue. But it easily could have been one of the others I moved.

I learned to do this here:

4 steps: (step 4 is what I'm talking about). 4. UNINSTALL PAID AND FREE CONTENT FROM THE MARKETPLACE

https://flightsimulator.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/4408886545938

==> It says "

"Search for 3rd party packages (example: carenado-aircraft-wymf5, aerosoft-paderborn, workingtitle-g1000nxi). Delete the package folders"

But I would just MOVE them, not delete them.

It worked for me.

Here are the first things MSFS wants you to try before using the methods in the link above:

https://flightsimulator.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/4406039624338-All-versions-Loading-issues-Checklist

 

 

 

Not sure if it has to do with the issues, but I got a tiny 512 Bytes update for "Steamworks Common Redistributables" on Steam today. Haven't launched the sim as I was returning back home after a short break and still have to apply the update to SU9.