
Free-to-play Microsoft Flight released - ukdm
http://www.geek.com/articles/games/free-to-play-microsoft-flight-released-20120229/
======
bane
Better sims:

<http://www.flightgear.org/>

<http://www.x-plane.com/desktop/landing/>

~~~
snitko
FlightGear appears to be what X-Plane used to be at version 5. X-Plane (which
is now at version 10) is quite impressive and enjoyable indeed. I play it all
the time.

~~~
Nick_C
Just to note, Flightgear is open source and free. It uses a pretty good flight
dynamics engine and the basic aircraft are modeled accurately. The Cessna 172
handles just like a real one. For free, it's great. It's let down, if you can
call it that, is the eye-candy is not as good.

------
jhandl
Beware: Windows only. I know, it should be obvious, but it's been a long time
since a large company dumped an .exe onto my downloads folder without even
checking what OS I'm on.

I'll stick with X-Plane. It works on all major platforms and it's an awesome
simulator. I miss the ease of use of the old MS-FS, though.

~~~
Ogre
Is it obvious? My very first paid programming job was on a Mac (and Windows)
game published by Microsoft.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Close_Combat_series>

On the other hand, it's possible that the second one of those was the last Mac
game published by Microsoft as well.

~~~
lutorm
Dude, you worked on Close Combat? That's one of my all time favorite games. To
this day, I still fire up "A Bridge Too Far" sometimes when I'm isolated with
my laptop in some hotel room. :)

~~~
Ogre
That's great! Unless you're playing it online you're not really hitting my
code, I did the networking for both. CC2 had a completely rewritten network
layer, one of the very few client-server RTS's I know of. I left part way
through development of #2, but my understanding is they kept my network code
all the way through #5.

------
hoag
Agreed, X-Plane is now the place to go for an authentic flight simulation
experience.

------
MaggieL
Sad to see what the once-mighty Microsoft Flight Simulator has become.

~~~
lutorm
Yeah, it's depressing that as computer and graphics power, multi-monitor, and
eye tracking is becoming mainstream, realistic flight simulators are
apparently no longer an interesting market niche...

~~~
ekianjo
Time to kickstart(er) a new project to prove them wrong, then ? Just like
double-fine was being told by publishers that Adventure games were a thing of
the past.

~~~
Ralith
Nah, realistic flight sims are still a thing, and getting better every year;
you just have to know where to look. X-Plane, DCS, etc.

~~~
lutorm
Care to keep going there? ;-)

I'm mostly interested in the realistic WW2 online combat genre, which seems
pretty dead. The only things around I know of are Warbirds and its cousins
WWIIOL and Aces High. While all of them appear to be actively supported, they
all date back to the last millenium.

Anyone know any others?

------
harshreality
Does it still use parameter-based flight dynamics of MS Flight Sim, or does it
use real, if crude, flight dynamics based on wing shape and plane model
geometry, like X-Plane does?

------
simonh
It may be very basic by comparison, but the FS in Google Earth is a bit of fun
and a good way to introduce kids to flight simulation.

------
arjn
Has anyone tried it already ? I'm at work and I have to wait till I'm back
home before I can try it.

~~~
lotharbot
Yes. It's running quite smoothly for me. Very enjoyable, simple little flight
game.

I'm a bit disappointed by how little content there is. Including the paid
library, it appears you can get the Hawaiian islands and five aircraft. As an
FSX owner with FS2003 experience (teaching children via
[http://www.museumofflight.org/education/aviation-learning-
ce...](http://www.museumofflight.org/education/aviation-learning-center) ) I'd
like to see a drastically expanded library of locations and aircraft.

