If only the company in the title knew how to scale servers in the cloud

The debut of Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 yesterday was met with severe turbulence as servers struggled to keep up with user demand.

Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 was hotly anticipated. New life was breathed into the old franchise in 2020, and fans have anxiously awaited the sequel, hoping it would iron out some of the rough edges and add some new modes and detail.

However, the launch, at 0800 Pacific (1600 UTC) on November 19, did not go well for a large number of users. Many reported lengthy loading times and hours spent listening to GPU fans. Users whose initial load had gotten past 90 percent but then stalled were advised by the Microsoft Flight Simulator support account to reboot and try again.

The timing of the incident is unfortunate. While customers who had spent three-figure sums on the title struggled with connection issues, Microsoft's Ignite event was getting under ...