Hard to believe that it has been over a year and a half since the release of Flight Simulator 2002, but it has, so I thought it was about time we took a quick look back at what has happened to Flight Simulator, particularly now with FS2004 Century of Flight soon to be released .
For those of us that frequent the flight sim websites such as we have here at AVSIM Online, the use of a civilian flight sim program goes beyond just using the out-of-box edition of the software. As it is the availability of all the add-on software from the numerous 3rd party developers and designers, whether that be freeware or payware, that truly is the frosting on the cake of our enjoyment of this hobby.
It was only 3 or 4 years ago that all of the add-on files for Flight Simulator were designed for FS98, but the changes since those days have been quite impressive. First there was the introduction of FS2000, which had many improvements over FS98—especially in the area of scenery and its overall presentation, not to mention the addition of so many more airports (from about 9,000 airports in FS98 to just over 20,000 in FS2000). FS2000 did have its problems though, almost entirely in the area of poor performance on most computers available to the home user at that time.
As the time for the release of FS2002 approached, the FS design team at Microsoft assured us all that the performance issues of FS2000 had all been addressed (which they did correct), plus there were to be numerous improvements in several areas, including: improved airport scenery at a number of major airports, interactive ATC, addition of AI aircraft, the adding of several new airplanes (including an amphibious Cessna), vastly improved ground texturing, lighting, shadowing effects, FS aircraft designed using the latest in graphical design tools, dynamic virtual panels, more added in the area of animated aircraft components, special effects on aircraft, autogen for trees and buildings, landing lights that worked, and the list went on.
It was nice to see and to have reported at the time, that all that Microsoft promised for FS2002 had been true. Now one could argue that this or that could have been done better, but the bottom-line was that the new Flight Simulator's performance was excellent and this combined with the many new features—well frankly, Microsoft gave us a product that is or was quite extraordinary. I am unaware of any sales number specifics, but my conversations with various members of the Microsoft Flight Simulation design team have lead me to believe that FS2002 in terms of unit sales is the most successful version of Flight Simulator to date (MSFS team members will not discuss anything related to sale numbers)! It had been reported (PC Gamer magazine), at the time of FS2002's introduction, that 22 million copies of Flight Simulator have been sold since its inception in the early nineteen eighties, a number I find to be in all probability, fairly accurate. By plotting some numbers I was given from Software Boutique, CompUSA, and Best Buy, I was able to estimate the sales of FS2002 at somewhere between 1.7 and 2.1 million copies in 18 months; even if those numbers were off by 30%, this would still be pretty impressive for a software "game" add-on!
So, what about the 3rd party designers and what have they come up with over the last year and a half? Well, considering that one of my functions at AVSIM has been to provide weekly file picks from the latest files uploaded into the AVSIM library, I can tell you that the files available for FS2002 reached a saturation point for me. The quantity and quality of the files covering all facets of Flight Simulator were so numerous and so overwhelming that it is has become all but impossible for any one person, like myself, to have them all—or even if they did, you would find that you could not spend any time flying in FS2002, as you would be spending all of your time downloading and managing your files.
One of the early changes to occur was that a few of the former freeware designers had learned their hobby well and honed their design skills to a level that they have moved upward and onward into the payware arena. As well they should too, as there are many of these designers that have brought their design skills up to a level that has literally developed into a new art form unto itself. With FS98, you could, with the help of a few available design programs, develop a panel, aircraft, or scenery add-on in just a few hours, but now the demand for quality in an add-on (particularly for the payware titles) has required that design teams spend months completing even a single project. Considering that December 17, 2003 marks the 100th anniversary of "First Flight" by the two Wright brothers, I thought it would be interesting to combine a screenshot tribute to 100 years of aviation and a look back at Flight Simulator 2002. Especially considering that the next version of Flight Simulator is to be called "FS2004, a Century of Flight."
The first question to answer is; "...was Flight Simulator 2002 perfect?" Well... no it wasn't, but if it were, then there wouldn't of been much to look forward to with the next release of Flight Simulator would there?
Whether FS2002 was/is perfect or not really doesn't matter, because between the default and the 3rd party add-on software, FS2002 has marked a real change in the evolutionary development in flight simulation. Not only can you fly aircraft of just about every description or era, but you can now fly very realistic aircraft under quite realistic flight conditions, both VFR and IFR to just about anywhere in the world that you would care to fly to. I personally believe that the Flight Simulator design team at Microsoft deserve a hardy thanks for providing such an excellent base program with FS2002 and I expect that FS2004 will be even better.
Over the last several months and after collecting a pool of approximately 12,000+ shots, I've chosen just a few (roughly 1,450) to illustrate this feature article. I should also note, that with the exception of each header jpgs, none of these shots are edited. The only thing I've done is to either crop a shot, increase the sharpness (using Microsoft's Photodraw2000 v2) after reducing its physical size, and in a very few cases I have lightened a dusk or night shot so that it can be seen more clearly. No pasting, no color enhancement, or in other words, I've done nothing to any of these shots to change them from what I originally got directly from FS2002.
I'm going to review the changes, improvements, and show a few of the add-ons for FS2002 and I will present these screenshots in a way that also celebrates the 100th anniversary of powered flight as well. So, sit back, enjoy browsing through the following, and do realize, I've only touched the surface of what you can do with FS2002. To start off our screenshot tour of FS2002, we're going to begin with what is the core of flight simulations, the aircraft! I've broken down the catagory of aircraft into various groups, beginning with available FS aircraft by a timeline, starting in 1903. Then I've arranged the aircraft, not included in the time-line, into various groups, based on their basic design intent whether that be a General Aviation aircraft or maybe an aircraft more befitting the Modern Military, etc. Following the aircraft sections, we will be posting additional sections covering; Panels, Scenery, Unique Features and/or Vehicles, Special Effects, and my own personal "Top 30 Picks" of the best freeware aircraft (from the AVSIM library) for FS2002. To ease your viewing, rather than posting the entire feature at once, we will be posting 1 or 2 new section links each day. So for the next week or so, be sure to check back, as each new section links are added. The additional section links can be found below.
"Screenshot Tribute to FS2002" continues here: — Steve (Bear) Cartwright
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