
Microsoft Flight Simulator - doener
https://fsi.microsoftstudios.com/
======
gnrlst
Story time: as a kid I would use FS to do intercontinental flights with my
cousin. My (small) room would be divided in two: passenger seating, and
cockpit.

We would sit down at my computer and take turns flying. I would convince my
little sisters to sit down in the passenger area which were two chairs behind
a curtain (they for some reason found it less entertaining than we did and
often decided to leave early in the flight...).

We even had a little toy kitchen (borrowed from said sisters) to serve
cheerios as inflight meals.

Fun times.

~~~
dalore
Kidzania in the UK has a donated giant plane for kids to pretend to be pilots
and stewards. The parents sit inside as passengers and get served plastic
food. It's so cute.

~~~
mr_toad
> get served plastic food

An authentic experience.

------
djsumdog
I started on Flight Simulator 4 way back in the day; I think on my 286. I
remember when I first moved to Chicago I wanted to check out Meigs Field, the
airfield you started on. It's gone now, and has a really crazy story of how it
got turned into a park:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meigs_Field](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meigs_Field)

Looking at the previews for the new FS, I wonder if it will require an
Internet connection. It seems like way too much content to download/pre-
install. Will it download content as you travel?

~~~
ngold
Wow, just one look at the airfield was a massive hit of nostalgia. I crash
landed a thousand times as a kid there. At 5 frames per second on my 286.
Thank's for the link. Mayor Daley did not mess around with closing it down.
From your link.

>In a controversial and illegal move on the night of Sunday, March 30, 2003,
Mayor Daley ordered city crews to destroy the runway immediately by bulldozing
large X-shaped gouges into the runway surface in the middle of the night.[14]
The required demolition notice was not given to the Federal Aviation
Administration (FAA) or the owners of airplanes tied down at the field, and as
a result sixteen planes were left stranded at the airport with no operating
runway, and an inbound flight had to be diverted by Air Traffic Control,
because of equipment scattered on the runway.

~~~
dividuum
You can now easily do that in a browser[1], if you need a quick fix. It's the
version with aircraft and scenery designer and the audio upgrade. I had to
tune the DOSBox clock speed a bit with Ctrl-F12, but it works pretty well
(manually go through the start menus!) and I just flew the good old Cessna
around Sears Tower :-)

[1]
[https://archive.org/details/msdos_Microsoft_Flight_Simulator...](https://archive.org/details/msdos_Microsoft_Flight_Simulator_v4.0_1989)

------
speps
Developed by Asobo Studio[1], french video games studio in Bordeaux. I used to
work there, top engineers, confident they'll do a good job.

[1] [https://www.lemonde.fr/pixels/article/2019/06/17/ce-que-
les-...](https://www.lemonde.fr/pixels/article/2019/06/17/ce-que-les-352-jeux-
video-evoques-a-l-e3-2019-disent-de-l-etat-de-l-
industrie_5477576_4408996.html)

~~~
zapzupnz
French video game company with a Japanese name producing a major software
title for an American company that sells worldwide.

That might seem unremarkable by today's standards, with practically everything
being global in nature, but I appreciate details like this — _logiciels sans
frontières_ !

------
foo101
The trailer link on this page is very impressive. Here is the direct link to
the trailer:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ReDDgFfWlS4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ReDDgFfWlS4)

~~~
flyingfences
The game looks impressive!

As an aside, how do major companies - computer graphics companies especially -
still upload letterboxed videos? If I'm watching a 21:9 video on a 21:9
monitor, there shouldn't be black bars on all four sides; it should fill the
screen. The entire video was shrunk down just so that the final five seconds
could be a green-colored screen with a little xbox logo in the center?

~~~
sundvor
So I'm not the only one here with a 21:9 (3440x1440). It's pretty frustrating!

------
eternalny1
I've been using Flight Simulator since the 80s and it was one of the driving
factors that caused me to later become a commercial pilot.

I used to be into the simulation side quite intensely, and I own FSX, P3D,
X-Plane and hardware peripherals. However, the underlying engines on these
platforms are suffering due to age.

If Microsoft re-enters this market correctly (modern engine, focus on
SIMULATION, 3rd-party support, global scenery, etc) this is HUGE for this
"niche" market.

~~~
TimTheTinker
> However, the underlying engines on these platforms are suffering due to age.

Is X-Plane suffering? As far as I know, it's the only consumer flight sim that
does rigorous physics calculations -- [https://www.x-plane.com/desktop/how-x-
plane-works/](https://www.x-plane.com/desktop/how-x-plane-works/)

Or did you mean rigorous simulation of plane systems, ATC, ILS/vectoring,
etc.?

~~~
Macha
Theres basically nothing that can run X-Plane well at higher settings,
especially in bigger aircraft. Your best bet is a overclocked high end Intel
consumer CPU.

~~~
TimTheTinker
I think that says more about Austin Meyer's insane hacker mentality than
X-Plane's deficiencies. Of _course_ he'd allow setting maximum detail/frame
levels that are far above what modern desktop machines can deliver -- maybe
_someone_ with a 64-core Xeon and paired top-end NVIDIA cards wants to max out
such a system :)

~~~
Macha
More than 4 cores doesn't help with the current engine - that 64 core Xeon is
going to be clocked lower than a 9700k and perform worse. You could run 16
instances but none are going to run faster.

------
neilv
Open source community project:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FlightGear](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FlightGear)

~~~
zzless
Glad someone mentioned FlightGear. It is a pretty nice simulator, with pretty
accurate flight models, although not too friendly to setup. Once you do though
... . I used to do IFR practice in FlightGear, first for my IFR rating, then
for the ATP. Unpublished holding patterns, weird approaches (single engine
partial panel NDB was an ordeal ...), I could do thirty a day, free. It really
helped. I would script random weather, instrument failures and clearances
(with festival, I believe it was called). Not the same as a real airplane but
still a very helpful tool.

------
shorts_theory
I'm so glad that this is a thing now! My first memories of MSFS was FS98,
which was one of the few games which ran acceptably on our dated 531MHz
Pentium 3 desktop. I remember getting FS2004 a few years after and I was never
so simultaneously excited and disappointed to play it when our poor desktop
could only sputter out 4-5FPS with all the settings turned down to the
absolute minimum.

Years later when we upgraded to a more acceptable desktop, I spent hours of
free time in middle school trawling simviation for the most absurd addons,
including a Flying Hawk, a cruise ship, a space shuttle, and a BMW 760Li,
because why not? My FS2004 install swelled from its initial 3GB to 12GB with
all my addons. I've done a countless number of commercial flights and became a
lot better at landings thanks to the FSPassengers mod which added some life to
the barren FS2004 world, complete with options to serve your passengers drinks
and listen to their screams when going stalling into a free-fall :)

------
atonse
I grew up playing MS FlightSim, and my main memory of it was that we never
(for 15 years) felt like we ever had a computer powerful enough to run it at
full detail, full FPS.

Now I know that it was because their engine was never really fully optimized
for a GPU. But my brother still uses FlightSim every single day. I'm so happy
for him, but I want my kids to also learn how to fly on it. My son's already
started (mainly holding the yoke while we fly it).

So a big fist pump for this news, every single word here makes me happy.
(Emphasis on "Simulator", PC-first, etc).

------
vanderZwan
> _Accessibility is important to us. Whatever your abilities are, if you want
> to fly, we are going to do whatever we can to make that happen. Yoke and
> pedals, mouse and keyboard, controller, etc. No pilot should be left
> behind._

Although not needing it myself, as an interaction designer I was really
impressed by the accessibility support for the Xbox One[0]. Glad to see
Microsoft keep up their commitment to this!

[0] [https://www.xbox.com/en-US/xbox-
one/accessibility](https://www.xbox.com/en-US/xbox-one/accessibility)

~~~
Abishek_Muthian
Microsoft's advancement in accessibility support has found itself new respect
from me. I wish they expand their commitment to general computing apart from
gaming.

------
cybwraith
No mention of VR support yet. If this comes out without support it will be
quite sad. Xplane 11 in VR is amazing (if you can get the framerate of that
old engine high enough)

~~~
swalsh
It would be so surprising if they didn't. People put a lot of money into their
rigs. VR is such a natural thing to move to here.

------
JoeDaDude
My Flight Simulator story: I lived in Philadelphia well into adulthood and
played extensively with MS Flight Simulator. At the time, the game would start
in Oakland and you would fly across the bay to San Francisco International
airport.

One day, I had to fly for business to San Francisco, my first time being
there. As the jet approached for landing, I got an overwhelming sense of deja
vu looking out the window. I almost jumped out of my seat! Then I realized I
recognized the scenery from all those hours flying across the bay in MS Flight
Simulator.

~~~
glen1dizzy
I’ve only been to San Francisco a few times, but every time I fly over, I have
the background music from Sim City 4’s region view stuck in my head. Because I
always played the game with the Bay Area map.

------
wil421
Microsoft Flight Simulator brings back very fond memories of my childhood. I
can remember learning to fly with a joystick that pushed in and out up and
down just like real pilots!

I could never master the helicopter and I’m pretty sure I crashed into the
Sears tower a LOT.

~~~
atonse
I really miss SimCopter. The missions were so interesting.

~~~
ljoshua
SimCopter was one of the most underappreciated Sims ever! Especially fun was
loading up the cities you built in SimCity and flying around them in
SimCopter. Oh man, good times.

~~~
billfruit
Don't know how good it is, but there is Heliborne available on steam, reviews
seem decent.

------
hypertexthero
Insightful commentary about the trailer by Tim Stone at Rock Paper Shotgun:
[https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2019/06/14/the-flare-
path-f...](https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2019/06/14/the-flare-path-fsx-is-
not-the-end/)

------
dasKrokodil
In the 80s, I used to play the subLOGIC Flight Simulator II on my father's
Apple //e. Later, I wondered whether this was a predecessor to Microsoft's
Flight Simulator. Apparently it sort of was:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_Simulator_II_(subLOGIC)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_Simulator_II_\(subLOGIC\))

~~~
nineteen999
Played this as a kid (or it's predecessor FS1 perhaps?) with wireframe
graphics only on an Olivetti M21 with monochrome screen.

subLOGIC also released another very addictive game, "Night Mission Pinball".

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ttoAfg7Ehc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ttoAfg7Ehc)

These two games were my first encounter with PC gaming, along with the Infocom
games (zork etc).

------
notinversed
I just want a pretty flight sim with a handful of planes that lets me fly
everywhere in the world without dollar signs appearing in the menus.

Actually I'm finding myself giving up on video games for the exact same
reasons I gave up on television 20 years ago, I'm tired of everyone trying to
sell me more shit during the increasingly rare free moments I have.

~~~
Cthulhu_
There's still non-cash-grab yet AAA games out there, depending on what type of
game you enjoy of course. For action games there's Horizon Zero Dawn and God
of War on the PS4; HZD has some optional DLC but it's just a bit of extra
content, and GoW does not (will not?) have any of that. Just a complete game,
no attempts at upselling, etc.

------
Theodores
Why did Microsoft let the Flight Simulator franchise go to the back burner for
so long?

I know these vast corporations have to focus but it is still a mystery to me
why they let it go. Does anyone have any idea what the thinking was? What has
fundamentally changed for them to want to get back to it?

~~~
pvg
It's a niche product that requires a specialized and no-longer-common
controller. Market growth was in other places and Microsoft chased that.

Now the market is gigantic with plenty of room for rebooting beloved-albeit-
neglected franchises.

~~~
yardie
When MSFS was in its heyday flight yokes were <$50. And they were a super
common accessory. Now, you can’t find anything for less than $180 on Amazon.

~~~
mrguyorama
I'm not convinced flight _yokes_ were ever cheap, meanwhile a Logitech 3D pro
is 3 axis plus throttle for ~$35 [https://www.amazon.com/Extreme-3D-Pro-
Joystick-Windows/dp/B0...](https://www.amazon.com/Extreme-3D-Pro-Joystick-
Windows/dp/B00009OY9U/ref=sr_1_1?crid=7GKDM9DR3FYY&keywords=logitech+attack+3&qid=1561484490&s=gateway&sprefix=logitech+attack+%2Caps%2C171&sr=8-1)

------
jwalton
Come a long ways since 1.0:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27szyA9mZ8Q](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27szyA9mZ8Q).

------
nightbrawler
Spent countless hours flying around with FS as a kid. A friend and I would
also connect up our computers over dialup and fly around together.

Did anyone participate with any virtual airlines on AOL way back in the day?

~~~
djsumdog
On Prodigy, there were boards where people would log their flight time on FS4,
F-15 Strike Eagle (Microprose) and other sims/games. People would hand out
ranks and medals too.

~~~
selimthegrim
F-15 Strike Eagle II was the first game I ever played on a computer. I wrote
an indignant handwritten letter to Sid Meier c/o Microprose praising the game
but demanding a replacement floppy when the one with the desert storm
expansion got lost. (My mom let me send it after editing out my “By the
way...” preceding the request.)

------
blunte
The trailer is gorgeous. I imagine this will take a pretty hefty machine to
play at high quality.

I miss the old MS joystick that had a throttle, extra buttons, and especially
the yaw twist capability of the stick. Once you got comfortable with it, there
was no need for rudder pedals. Flying the helicopter (in full manual) was
quite a challenge, but it was doable.

~~~
falsedan
> _the old MS joystick that had a throttle, extra buttons, and especially the
> yaw twist capability of the stick_

The sidewinder? I don’t remember it having a throttle though
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_SideWinder#3D_Pro](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_SideWinder#3D_Pro)

Looks like there were relaunched and you can still get USB models from
retailers.

~~~
blunte
Yes, that's the one! There were at least to versions (generations?) - at least
one had a slider, and the other had a dome shaped knob; both worked for
throttle.
[https://www.x-fish.org/blog_picture/110607_01.jpg](https://www.x-fish.org/blog_picture/110607_01.jpg)

~~~
falsedan
Nice. Dear gods I forgot what nonsense plugs were before USB. Did it plug into
a? MIDI? port??

~~~
blunte
That was a
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_port](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_port)

~~~
breakingcups
Which, incidentally, can be used as a MIDI port with a converter cable.

------
starpilot
Pretty visuals, but I'm still wondering if the underlying physics are based on
lookup tables for stability derivatives, or if it's actually physically
modeling pressures on surfaces a la X-Plane. If it looks like a photograph,
but is a cartoon underneath (to cater to Xbox players perhaps), I'll pass.

------
enobrev
I started playing with Flight Simulator 3 or 4 - not really sure which. During
the summer I'd stay at my aunt's for a few weeks at a time, which was mind-
numbing since it was in the suburbs away from all my friends.

My cousin had left his screaming fast Packard Bell in his room after he went
away to college and since I clearly had decades to kill until my mom came to
get me, I spent a lot of time trying to figure out Flight Simulator. I had no
idea what I was doing, but I successfully flew from New York to Meigs Field at
least once, and always loved to fly around the Chicago skyline since I missed
home - and didn't know much else at the time.

I never really played the game much, away from that old Packard Bell, but the
game's a big part of my personal journey into computers - at a time when
nobody else in my world knew much about them.

------
m12k
I hope this will be one of those games that manages to do one thing better
than anyone has before: Volumetric cloud rendering. Kinda like how Sea of
Thieves has really pushed the envelope when it comes to ocean and wave
rendering.

------
benatkin
I'm really excited about this. I spent hours playing Flight Simulator back in
the 90s, and it was a great experience, and am looking forward to another
generation getting to play it!

~~~
razster
I’ve taken to watching Twitch streams, off work pilots playing M$ Flight Sim.
They tell some of the most interesting stories. But what interest me the most
is the sequences they perform. Try checking some of their streams. Can’t
recommend one off hand, all are equally good.

~~~
wjp3
Recommend any? I just searched and no MSFS categories appeared, even a game
placeholder.

Edit: Nevermind - it's here:
[https://www.twitch.tv/directory/game/Microsoft%20Flight%20Si...](https://www.twitch.tv/directory/game/Microsoft%20Flight%20Simulator%20X)

------
ggambetta
I'm ok with this if it brings the flight sims back. But I don't care about
Flight Simulator; can we get modern X-Wing and Tie Fighter next? Pleeeeease?

~~~
zrobotics
Considering how Electronic Arts has been treating the Star Wars liscence, the
chances are poor. If you're into simularors though, I heartily recommend Elite
Dangerous, but the learning curve is steep and a HOTAS is almost a necessity.

------
demarq
The first and only piece of software I've ever bought on physical media!

------
mempko
Remember when a guy stole a plane in Seattle that learned to fly via Flight
Simulator? [https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/12/us/richard-
russell-q400-f...](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/12/us/richard-
russell-q400-flight-simulator.html)

------
ElijahLynn
Looks like quite a bit of the footage was not actually from the simulator but
real-life 4K footage. The end of the video shows more of the rendered
simulation. But all in all, I feel the video started off a bit misleading.

Still looks cool, but wish they would be more honest in the marketing of it.

------
yardie
MS flight sim for Mac was the first game I paid for as a kid out of my own
pocket. I also bought a yoke to really “simulate” the experience.

With modern graphics and an updated engine I hope this version really flies!
And with VR being in reach it will no longer be necessary to have crazy screen
setup.

~~~
Cthulhu_
> And with VR being in reach it will no longer be necessary to have crazy
> screen setup.

I only have a Vive to compare with, but, having tried a bit of Elite Dangerous
on that, I'd say VR still has a way to go - it was hard to read all the text,
and a flight simulator will have a lot more dials and the like. It needs more
resolution and sharpness first.

~~~
ancientworldnow
Vive is very bad for this kind of stuff (as someone who owns one). However,
the vive pro is adequate and a couple WMR headsets like the Samsung Odyssey+
or HP Reverb make text look great (and are cheaper than the vive as well). The
tracking isn't as good, but for sims that's not an issue

------
cporios
The "For once you have tasted flight" quote is well-known tob be mis-
attributed to da Vinci:

[https://quoteinvestigator.com/2019/01/07/flight/](https://quoteinvestigator.com/2019/01/07/flight/)

~~~
pvg
By now, it's probably better to just agree on a new canonical attribution -
"Leonard Nimoy, Civ IV voice actor".

------
rdtsc
How does this compare with Prepar3D from Lockheed. I thought Lockheed had
bought MS FlightSim and even hired a good number of their developers and that
was the end of MS FligthSim

[https://www.prepar3d.com/](https://www.prepar3d.com/)

~~~
namenumber
Hard to say with just a 1m30s preview video to go off, but if those visuals
are the "basic" MSFS global graphics then they are quite impressive even
compared to copy of P3D that has been modded out with global scenery from
third party content providers. If i were to guess, its probably a
technological leap instead of an increment, as they'd be disinterested in
competing with the X-Plane and P3D install bases unless they knew they had
something that was more than a sideways improvement. I would find it weird if
they just try to be as good as the rest of the pack, at least.

As for your second question, you're right and wrong. Lockheed got the rights
to further develop the old MSFS engine, and to rebrand it as P3D, but only for
academic/professional simulation purposes. So they are not allowed to sell it
as a game, only as a learning and simulation tool. Here are some of the reqs
from the Academic License (60USD) EULA, whereamong you'll find this : (3) in
connection with Academic Education, (4) by students, instructors and staff
associated with Licensee's Academic Education, .., (6) for purposes other than
personal/consumer entertainment. Point (6) also appears in the EULA of the
Professional (200USD) license.

Though this has, AFAIK this has been done more for corporate legal reasons
than for any desire to go after individual users. I've never heard of any
revoked licenses on the above-mentioned grounds.

So Microsoft has always signaled that they consider MSFS a product still in
their gaming portfolio. Though people learned to cope with the absence.

~~~
rdtsc
Interesting. Thank you for replying.

> So they are not allowed to sell it as a game, only as a learning and
> simulation tool.

That makes sense finally. I had noticed that when was using it and always
thought they just didn't want to bother with the gaming part because there was
not enough of profit for them to restructure having to support that market.

~~~
Macha
Pretty sure it's not a coincidence that the academic edition is sold at video
game pricing.

------
andyidsinga
I'm really glad this is coming back - I've bought it several times over the
years and really enjoyed flying it. In more recent versions using the ATC and
trying to make it as realistic as possible experience - flying around between
nearby local airports.

------
atxhx
I wonder how this will run on Xbox. I've been out of PC gaming for a while now
and no way this will run on my current PC. It would be sweet if you could hook
up a flight stick to an Xbox and play this.

------
jxramos
This is great news for Allec Joshua Ibay who has a knack for faithfully
reproducing airline tragedies via MSFS.

[https://www.inverse.com/article/21385-plane-crash-
simulating...](https://www.inverse.com/article/21385-plane-crash-simulating-
aviation-disasters-youtube-flight-simulator-sully)
[https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRRGxJkqoOgI3htdVuK5F3A](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRRGxJkqoOgI3htdVuK5F3A)

------
talonx
I have fond memories of both FS9 (2004) and FS X. One of my favourite trips
was to take off from Hong Kong and land in Macau in a Learjet - they are
pretty close by, you need to make a sharp 90 degree turn, the runway is a
narrow strip with the ocean on both sides, and the Learjet 45 is not easy to
handle over short distances. All combined to make it a similar to playing a
violin piece that you keep on fine tuning the tough parts until it all flows
together.

------
Balgair
[https://www.youtube.com/user/Airforceproud95](https://www.youtube.com/user/Airforceproud95)

This youtuber does some funny videos about ATC in a video-game. His efforts
are a great mix of hopelessness and real ATC skill. A good video here:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EeC0ZTT8n7E](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EeC0ZTT8n7E)

~~~
nameistaken
Butter.

~~~
Balgair
Requesting Mayday

------
Aardwolf
I loved MS FS back in the day!

According to wikipedia, this new one will feature "Azure AI". What does that
mean?

~~~
mffnbs
I'm guessing the "AI" was used in the geometry mapping from the sat data they
used for their region maps.

~~~
joezydeco
My dream feature would be weather based on live meterological inputs.

~~~
akhilcacharya
Haven't they supported that for ages? I thought even FS2002 had that

~~~
Nas808
FS2004 was the first to feature live weather

------
iamspoilt
Oh boy! I have such great memories of playing this title. Very glad they are
rebooting this!

------
ecmascript
I just watched the trailer and holy goat shit that looks amazing. Great job!

~~~
jillesvangurp
I agree. It looks like they make full use of assets they would have access to
for Bing maps. A lot of the progress in e.g. x-plane in recent year has been
the use of map data, satellite images, and other geospatial data to generate
highly detailed scenery. I have close to half a terabyte worth of auto
generated scenery with high resolution satellite imagery, 3d meshes, and open
streetmaps based positioning of roads, buildings, trees, etc. For a small
company like x-plane it never was feasible to curate detailed scenery world
wide and even MS back in 2006 only had auto gen scenery in most parts of the
world. X-plane v10 was the first version to include open street maps based
scenery and they vastly improved this with v11.

Nowadays, Microsoft of course has access to lots of data; their scientists
have developed lots of cool algorithms to synthesize detailed 3d models from
photos and other sources, they have access to essentially unlimited hardware
infrastructure to process this, they have lots of experience building 3d
graphics libraries such as directx and have lots of experience working with
hardware vendors to deliver VR. Speaking of which, flight simulation and AR
could be an awesome use case for e.g. Hololens.

Putting this all together, they should be able to produce some really detailed
scenery and a modern rendering engine to go with that. The only question is
why they ever walked away from this. It's such a great show case for a lot of
stuff they have.

~~~
ecmascript
Yes I would love an explaination on how they actually solved it technically,
it would be very interesting. Microsoft has really, really upped their game
recently in terms of quality.

Sadly they also have upped their tracking but but, it is still pretty awesome.

------
diminoten
What kind of an investment would someone need to make to maximize enjoyment of
this game? Could I enjoy it with keyboard/mouse or should I at least buy some
specific equipment?

~~~
mcguire
I've no idea about the computer needed. (Graphics conflicts with my extreme
cheapness.) But as for controls, you really should get a yoke (or possibly a
joystick, but I've found them to be less enjoyable and/or realistic) and
rudder pedals.

That's reasonably cheap; beyond that the sky's the limit.

------
m23khan
wishing Microsoft the best but it really is a niche market - for one, there
are so many aircraft controls that you really do need some specialized
controllers (yoke) to make it enjoyable experience. Other factors include
rather mundane experience of flying aircraft (from general gamer point of
view) as well as the resource hungry requirements (OK, not so much these days
but it was quiet expensive game to run back in the days).

~~~
Stevvo
You can fly Cessna in X-Plane perfectly fine with nothing but an Xbox
controller; left stick is your yoke, right stick for look around, triggers for
rudder, bumpers for brakes, the four primary buttons for flaps and throttle,
and the 4 cross buttons for trim. Other controls you can use the mouse for in
3D cockpit as you will use them sporadically (eg lights, adjusting
instruments, mixture, carb heat)

------
ixtli
It strikes me that, as they imported satellite data, they could also provide
relatively accurate models of airport interiors ...

------
joshanderson
Microsoft Flight Simulator is, to this day, literally the only good thing
Microsoft has ever done.

~~~
shaklee3
WSL, vscode, Kinect, Xbox, plenty of things they did well.

------
sideshowb
Wasn't the original flight simulator included as an Easter egg in ms excel?

~~~
mrguyorama
Excel literally didn't exist when the first version of Microsoft Flight
simulator came out:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Microsoft_Flight_Si...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Microsoft_Flight_Simulator#Flight_Simulator_1.0)

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balls187
One of the first games I had was Flight Simulator II for the Amiga 1000.

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miohtama
MS Flight Sim might be a good pilot case (pun intended) for WebGL and
WebAssembly. The nature of simulator is not that CPU/GPU taxing. I would
assume the players play it more for the actual simulation and less for the
specular graphics.

~~~
jon-wood
> The nature of simulator is not that CPU/GPU taxing.

I think you're underestimating just how much simulation is being done in a
proper flight simulator. The really good ones are literally simulating air
flow around the aircraft, in realtime, to determine how it should respond.

~~~
Stevvo
The actual simulation part is not very taxing; it typically uses less than
half a millisecond CPU time per frame in X-Plane, which has the most advanced
simulation on the market.

------
mongol
Does the last version of MS Flight Simulator work well on Wine?

~~~
iso-8859-1
The last published test result is a few years old, but it seemed to work with
minor issues:
[https://appdb.winehq.org/objectManager.php?sClass=version&iI...](https://appdb.winehq.org/objectManager.php?sClass=version&iId=7775&iTestingId=94209)

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hirundo
Does it support VR?

~~~
whamlastxmas
Given the literally thousands of dollars of DLC available for FSX, it's very
possible they'll charge for VR

~~~
achandlerwhite
I think its worth noting that most of the DLC for FSX is is third party.

~~~
whamlastxmas
I didn't know that was a thing. Thanks

------
jdlyga
It would be awesome if this were on Oculus Quest.

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the_arun
The music is pretty good in the trailer.

------
siilats
I can do a Fyre Festival related cameo about how I learned how to fly with FS
:)

------
satysin
My reply is a little off-topic but I wanted to share as it is Flight Simulator
related.

Last year an old boss and friend passed suddenly. He had only just turned
fifty but the years of poor eating and sitting caught up with him in his late
forties.

He was a Flight Simulator addict. He held a private pilots license as well and
would fly small aircraft. Took us up a few times which was amazing. Very
different to a regular airplane. He had an amazing setup with, I think, six
screens, proper chair, and controls. We once got him a pilots cap for a
birthday for him to wear :)

So when I saw the new Flight Simulator announced during Microsoft's E3 event
the other week my first thought was how he would have loved this. He had
moaned for years about Microsoft killing it off so this would have excited him
like nothing else. It really hit me in my gut and my heart just how much I
miss that guy.

If you are having some small health problems _please_ get them checked out and
take your health seriously. My friend was there one day then the next found
sitting in his god damn home office with work documents still on the screen.
He left behind a wonderful wife and two teenage kids. Rest in Peace my friend.

~~~
musha68k
Long periods of sitting are actually very hard on your system and one of the
reasons why so many quit doing what they love.

Also tight deadlines and other maybe less obvious constant stressors might
exacerbate pernicious effects.

For that reason even junior and intermediate developers should think twice
about fair/sustainable remuneration.

Ageisim diclaimer: That doesn't mean that there aren't lots of people with
exceptionable health and/or consistent exercise / eating discipline of course.

~~~
vturner
What other areas do people with technical backgrounds move into that don't
require so much sitting? With degrees in physics and applied math, I'm not
sure where I can go and not be at a desk (or take a huge hit in $$).

Just 3 years out from school, and I can definitely notice the difference in my
physical health and mental agility. I have taken up gardening to get me
outside and eat decently well. I can still feel the effects, scary.

~~~
swendoog
If you can work from home (big if) then you might consider looking into a
standing desk + treadmill.

There are some decent options available. The "Autonomous" desk is great, I
purchased JUST the legs and use an IKEA top to save money.

Now, I'm looking at the "Treadly" treadmill. Technically, this isn't an "under
desk" treadmill, but it's the thinnest treadmill on the market and can be
operated without the bars upright. So it's perfect for going under your desk,
and then under a bed or a couch when you're not using it.

~~~
pault
Uplift[0] also sells treadmills and exercise bikes specifically for standing
desks. I purchased one of their desks a few months ago, and while it's a bit
spendy, the quality is fantastic. I expect to be using it 15 years from now.

[0] [https://www.upliftdesk.com/desk-accessories/movement-
exercis...](https://www.upliftdesk.com/desk-accessories/movement-exercise/)

------
JimBrimble35
It would be amazing if they gave this an online battle royale mode.

~~~
appleiigs
Hardcore flight sim pilots will scoff at your comment, however, optional
gamification (battle royale or missions) would make it more commercially
successful, funding future development.

~~~
rurounijones
Create a competitor to Digital Combat Simulator with this engine and watch the
fanbase jump.

