Its been a few years since I did flight sim. I was using FSX. I stopped quite awhile back and now things have changed quite a bit and I am starting over. I used to fly PMDG 737, 777 and FSLabs airbus, q400 etc. I was running fs2crew, gsx,  topcat, tons of addon airports, orbx, like a dozen payware airports, rex weather, activesky and even some other weather engine etc. My god the money I spent now that I think about it. I just got a new computer and am thinking about starting over with MSFS. What are the top add ons to get? With MSFS is payware scenery really even necessary for flying airliners?

I'm thinking about getting the MSFS base product (of course), the pmdg 737 or fenix a320, and fs2crew. What other addons are recommended? I figure I will use simbrief for my flight planning etc. The weather in the sim sufficient? Is GSX worth adding, especially when PMDG has some ground services? Since there is a new flight sim coming out next year I want to make sure that most if not everything I get will work in the new product without having to rebuy it. Any advice is appreciated. 

So far, it appears everything that works in MSFS 2020 will work in 2024 without having to rebuy. 

The weather in the sim isn't perfect, but it's the only option as far as live weather IMO. Weather injectors like Active Sky don't have the kind of access they had in FSX, so they aren't as good - AS has declined to develop anything for the sim because of that. For me, if it's not at least as good as AS was, I'm not buying it.

Fenix A320: Try the FSW A320 first, since it's free and quite good.

I've never had luck with GSX. I bought it release day and it was a buggy mess. That's gotten better for a lot of people, but I've never managed to get it to work seamlessly. I should probably try again since I just did a total system wipe a month or so ago. Maybe it'll play nicer, although it will still suffer from a limitation that isn't it's fault involving a max number of objects that can be drawn. I know the dev works hard to fix stuff, so I'm sure it'll work at some point.

Other good addons to consider:

Aircraft

• Hjet
• Vision Jet
• Fly the Maddog
• Kodiak
• JustFlight 14
• Anything that looks interesting to you by GotFriends.

You will, btw, probably be surprised to know that Carenado is actually decent now. Mainly because their main weakness in FSX was lousy systems, and the default systems in FSX are good enough that they can just plug 'em in. Their textures are still among the best out there.

Scenery

• Anything by Flightbeam, especially KMSP

Misc

• Navigraph (now integrated with SimBrief. As with FSX you will need a Navigraph subscription to keep your PMDG/etc nav data up to date.
• Runway Lights. It's free, just google it. Makes the runway lights look a lot better (but sadly doesn't fix the problem of taxiway lights being stuck on poles in the middle of taxiways - -hopefully that goes away at some point)
• Spad.Next if you have anything more advanced than a joystick to control the sim.
• Neofly, if you want to gamify things by running missions for money. Base game is free, with a few cheap paid addons.
• VoxATC and BeyondATC aren't out yet, but they both appear to be worth a look based on pre-release materials. The default ATC is almost identical to default FSX ATC, so you know how bad that is. Those two are promising. BATC will have much nicer sounding voices, but there will be recurring costs to use them. VoxATC's voices don't sound very good at all the last I saw, but you won't have to pay anything beyond the initial purchase price.

 

BTW, if you have a VR set, do yourself a favor and give it a try with the sim. It's very immersive.

 

Edited November 11, 20232 yr by eslader

Get the premium edition.  That affords you a lot of very nice default aircraft.  Some are not good, but a lot of them fly rather well and give you an option to download enhancements that require the premium edition. 

For aircraft I would say the Fenix A320, A2A Comanche, Black Square TBM, Bonanza, Caravan, King Air, and Baron.  I know there are many others that are great, but I don't own them.  Personally, if I were you, I would wait to see if PMDG can rectify some of their issues with LNAV and other miscellaneous problems.  I never fly the PMDG anymore because the LNAV is so ridiculous.  In 20 years of simming, I've never see an add-on have so much trouble tracking between waypoints.  It will roll into a bank, then start to level out, then roll again because it's visually recalculating the necessary heading.  It ruins the plane IMO.  You will have a lot of people tell you it's fine, but once you watch it struggle, it's awful.  It's a beautiful plane with amazing sounds, but it needs work.  The Fenix is very graceful and really gives you the feeling it's flying.  I like GSX, but again, it's only something to have for larger planes.  Fenix works better with it if you use Fenix2GSX, a freeware add-on that integrates better for more accurate results. 

For weather, yes, we only have the default.  REX has an add-on for weather, but I believe it's not able to transition or inject to the sim as Active Sky previously did in FS9/FSX/P3D.  For example, we don't have cirrus clouds, which is absurd for such a modern game.  The clouds variety is lacking as well.  However, the default weather is very good and work well enough that you won't notice too many short-comings.  The AI is pretty bad, mostly in the sense that planes take off in opposite directions at times, so it can make some landings a little ridiculous.  Install FSLTL with the FlyByWire installer and enjoy!  It adds realistic models and flights that match the real world.  It's free!

No one really knows if MSFS 2024 will function 100% with all current add-ons.  I imagine some tweaking might be necessary for some, but I find it unlikely it'll be enough to pause any purchases now.  I honestly think they're trying to enhance the environment more with AI and core features that are a bit removed from flight modelling, but time will tell.  They said that Marketplace add-ons will work.

I'd recommend not to pile up dozens of addons and tweaks as in the end they just pollute your install and if you start having troubles you'll have to search for the one causing it.

Personally i only use  the map enhancement tool, the runway lights mentioned above in the sim. And the PMDG 737 ofc.

Everything else is related to flight planning. Simbrief, Navigraph and PFPX for more advanced routefinding. Thats pretty much it. I think my community folders has only around five folders in it.

Ah forgot to mention FS2Crew of course.

 

Maybe just start with the vanilla sim (it has pretty good stock planes by now) and you'll quickly see what you might need and what you don't.

Less is sometimes more.

 

Happy flying

Hmm I used to have pfpx as well. I wonder if I can find the old download email for that somewhere. 

4 minutes ago, Orlaam said:

Get the premium edition.  That affords you a lot of very nice default aircraft.  Some are not good, but a lot of them fly rather well and give you an option to download enhancements that require the premium edition. 

Thanks for this tip. 

36 minutes ago, eslader said:

. BATC will have much nicer sounding voices, but there will be recurring costs to use them.

I've been looking at BATC. I had vox previously. Was never really thrilled with Vox, but I don't like the idea of paying a recurring fee either. 

8 minutes ago, Orlaam said:

Personally, if I were you, I would wait to see if PMDG can rectify some of their issues with LNAV and other miscellaneous problems.

That is disconcerting to hear. Maybe i will get the Fenix to start then

10 minutes ago, ThomseN_inc said:

I'd recommend not to pile up dozens of addons and tweaks as in the end they just pollute your install and if you start having troubles you'll have to search for the one causing it

Yes I agree with you. I'm going to ramp up somewhat slowly. Pick up one plane and fs2crew (maybe gsx). Not going to jump on scenery right away until I see how the sim is running. Everything else will basically be for flight planning. 

16 minutes ago, Orlaam said:

Install FSLTL with the FlyByWire installer and enjoy!  It adds realistic models and flights that match the real world.  It's free!

Yes I saw this. I will download this once I know the sim is stable. 

47 minutes ago, red259 said:

Hmm I used to have pfpx as well. I wonder if I can find the old download email for that somewhere. 

I basically only use it for route finding as it is much more advanced than simbrief. It takes into account more factors like restricted airspaces, route restrictions and even makes use of FRA (Free Route Airspace) if you are flying in Europe and so on. I then copy the route over to simbrief and do the maths there.

Edit:

And yes, the PMDGs LNAV issue is a bit awkward sometimes but it does not keep me from flying it.

Edited November 11, 20232 yr by ThomseN_inc

@ red259 ,

Are you going to :

purchase MSFS2020 from Steam or MSFS?

spend time learning MSFS before purchasing Add-ons?

Spend some time in the MSFS forum?

51 minutes ago, vonmar said:

purchase MSFS2020 from Steam or MSFS?

Is one better than the other? I have a steam account but I don't have to purchase it from there if there is a reason not to. 

3 minutes ago, red259 said:

Is one better than the other? I have a steam account but I don't have to purchase it from there if there is a reason not to. 

I have the steam version and its pretty straight forward. You get updates there, you can join the beta via steam if you like. I'd go for the steam version.

12 minutes ago, ThomseN_inc said:

I have the steam version and its pretty straight forward. You get updates there, you can join the beta via steam if you like. I'd go for the steam version.

Thanks