It all started at the end of January 2008. I was doing my usual thing on the computer, and at the time I was heavily in to FPS and racing games on my PC; the typical "gamer". Custom built PC with the neon lights and all that, staying up late in the summer playing scary shooters with the volume turned up, etc, etc. (tons of fun :() At school one of my friends asked me if I've heard of FSX and I had no clue, and he said Flight Simulator X. The first thing that came to mind was BORING. Why would I waste my time flying planes, I mean all you do is turn them left and right and go up and down. But I was so wrong.A few weeks passed into February and my friend kept bugging me to buy it and try it out, I saw a few pictures from Acceleration with the fighter jets (which I thought was part of FSX) and that attracted me to buying it because I thought it would be like Ace Combat but with a wider range of planes. I liked games with fighter jets but I never payed attention to the the type of plane, name of it or anything. I was not interested in aviation at all and feared airplanes. I had no idea what lift was, didn't know what a Boeing or an Airbus was or anything. My dad knew a bit about aircraft and he used to tell me stories about them, but I didn't really have interest in the aircraft, (just the stories :(). Anyway, I bought FSX, popped the disc in the PC and installed it. I almost abandoned the game when I saw how long it took to install, but I said it wouldn't hurt to try it, and you can't return PC games so why not?I started up FSX and sat at the PC for 2 extra minutes after installation. I then I saw the welcome screen, and I still remember the FSX song that plays when you start it up. It opened up a whole new world for me. I saw the opening video of FSX for people that are new to the game, and the first thing that came to my mind were LOOK AT THE GRAPHICS! I didn't really much care for the gameplay but the world was amazing. I didn't know how to use the game at first and didn't know what a free flight was so I navigated to the missions and tried the first one. I heard the narrator talk about FS controls and everything and it was a snore to me, but I listened a little bit. At takeoff I pushed the throttle in pulled back and I took off, but because I knew nothing about airplanes I kept holding back on the yoke :(, and I found my airplane climbing constantly until it stalled, and I crashed. The first mission totally changed my impression of the game, although the scenery was plain (because it was at KEDW) I still enjoyed it. The feeling of takeoff was just amazing, its indescribable but its fun, interesting, challenging and whole lot of other things mixed together. After the first mission I went to the 2nd (I think it was Introduction to Taxiing?) and my parents were looking at me asking me if I was going to become a pilot B). I answered "Nope, I crashed already". The taxiing mission was actually pretty fun for someone that is new to airplanes and it was a challenge to stay on the lines and whip the tail around on the taildragger. I had no idea what these planes were but I was still learning. Takeoff in the Piper Cub on the nice sunny day with the traffic and the nice scenery was just amazing, and thankfully I hadn't flown any airliners yet, and didn't know that the Cub was extremely slow compared to a jet engine aircraft, so I still flew the aircraft.I continued with the missions from then on and learned about the different aircraft slowly but well. No matter if its the missions or the lessons in the learning center FSX teaches you the basics very well so you can get in the air and land without problems. 1 month into flight simulator, I started flying online to learn and see how other people fly, and its a great way to learn. If you find the right session, people are more the willing to help you out. I was a bit lost at first, because I went into a session with ATC on gamespy, but he was very nice and gave me some pointers. The next session I went to we went on extremely long flights over the Caribbean which was lots of fun and I learned how to use the GPS and flying from day into the sunset into early night is beautiful especially with the dark blue sky right after sunset with the stars over the water. It was then that I figured out that this is like the real thing, and if a flight is 3 hrs in real life it will be 3 hrs in the FS. I was being introduced to so many things and it was just a great experience, and there are things you wouldn't even think of, that you learn from. For example, I really never thought about the fuel but after having a high thrust setting I ran out of fuel and was wondering why I was losing power. (I had no idea what efficiency was at the time B)). I learned so much using gamespy, and one of the great features in FSX was shared cockpit. One day online I was in my A321 taxiing, learning my ATC procedures, I did not know how to taxi to the runway. Someone asked me if I would like some help and I said sure. I went back to the briefing room and did shared cockpit with another simmer, and we loaded up in a Cessna. He showed me how to control the rudder and yoke properly, how to control the power for taxi and where to go. Its amazing how much help you can get! Gamespy has its problems but when it works its awesome. I was also told to visit the PRC (Pilot Resource Center) and it gave me a wide range of great information and helped me learn at a fast pace. In a few weeks I learned how to somewhat use the basic instruments (airspeed and altitude indicators), control the yoke, rudder, etc. Learned the phonetic alphabet and more.As I got more into the hobby, I expanded my studies and that is when I really got interested. I started going on youtube and looking at aviation videos, searching Wikipedia and reading aircraft forums. If I ever saw anything that I didn't know I would google it and learn about what it was (exp. APU, FMC, RAT) just lots of various things. I learned a GREAT amount from this and the internet, and there are a lot of aircraft manuals and documents out there that will help you get into the little details such as how to control the pneumatic systems on a MD-11 to what the V speeds are etc. Learning how to read charts, how to fly departures (SID) and arrivals (STAR), using airways, IFR, VFR, just so many interesting things to learn. I am currently reading the FAA AIM and I am on Chapter 4 (Air Traffic Control) and plan to finish it by the end of the year. I hope it makes my simulating more realistic, and if I get my PPL in the future it would definitely help because I would be pretty far ahead on the 1st lesson :). I can't wait to do some VFR in a 172 when I get back home and explore the scenery of the USA (mainly the North and Central East Coast). I've been away from FSX for a month!I am still learning everyday and I'm glad Microsoft made Flight Simulator, because it brought me to a whole new world. Thank you very very much Microsoft for the hard work you did to make such a interesting, fun, beautiful simulator, it is a great learning experience, and for people that cannot fly in real life for whatever reason, it is a excellent alternative.Next step is my pilots license! (Hopefully). I think I was born to be a pilot, because now everytime I look at the clock or see numbers its an aircraft like 7:37 or 3:14, and this post was number 321 (Airbus A321!) (Most of the time they are Boeings, maybe I am not destined to fly Airbuses?) As long as I don't see 2:25 to often I'll be happy, because everytime I see an Antonov I pee in my pants.Sorry for any mistakes with spelling and grammar, I typed this very fast early in the morning.

I started Flight Simming when I decided to move on from Train Simming, mostly due to my prediction of MSTS2 being cancelled and also because virtual aviation has more opportunities than railways. Since I have rubbish maths, I would never be a pilot so I decided to take up the hobby of flight simulation because of the wider range of addons that simulate aircraft realistically. I have many addons, ranging from the Boeing 757/767 to MD80s and MD11s. At first, I was rubbish, but with playing around seeing how things work and later studying manuals, I got better and better.

I think I was born to be a pilot ...

There's no question about it. Do it, you won't be sorry.xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxOh darn it all, scooped again. I'd better hit Add Reply before anybody else can sneak in ahead of me. Then I'll be able to reply at leisure without losing face. Now ... Where to begin?I know, at the beginning!xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxI was born in Manhattan ... No, they probably don't want to hear about my being a Native New Yorker. Well, how about this ...I went to high school with Carol Baker, already a movie star, but I never had the courage to ask her out, even though I was just about the only friend she had. (Trust me, child actors have difficult lives.) The tough guy actor James Caan was ahead of me in school. The future movie director Heywood Gould and I formed a subway doowop group. The Kingsmen asked me to join them on tour while Louie, Louie was beginning its climb to number one -- but I declined ... ... No, they don't want to hear about that stuff either ...Okay, let's cut to the chase ...xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxTwenty-five years ago I was a software development manager. After spending three weeks of 18x7 doing an emergency project because the employee who was running late with his subsystem quit without notice, I decided to reward myself with some time off while remaining at the office to do manager stuff.Being the boss, I could set policy. So I bought the first release of Flight Simulator to run on my development computer. I can't recall whether this was the first release by Microsoft or the final release by Bruce Artwick.Does it matter?

It all started when I was working at a newspaper, I had been bitten by a radioactive spider, and found I then had strange superpowers which... Oh wait a minute, that's not right is it? Okay, you didn't hear that bit, ssssh! Fairly boring really. I liked aeroplanes when I was a kid, read everything I could about them (no flight sims, internet or PCs in those days), so instead I read about them, made models of them, painted pics of them etc (still do that). I knew a guy who had flown Spitfires in the Second World War at that time, and I would bend his ear about stuff and get him to teach me everything he knew, sadly, he is no longer with us. Then along comes the computer and the original Flight Simulator (but I didn't get FS until I think it was Sublogic's version 4 or 3, which I had on an Commodore Amiga), but before I could get into the kind of really realistic stuff we enjoy these days, I was learning to fly the real things, went solo in 1997, and had already had a few lessons a few years before that, so that was before FS was really that believable, or before it could really influence learning to fly for real.Nowadays the PC stuff is pretty close to the real deal, so I envy the people who can get some virtual stick time in a believable fashion before getting in a real cockpit, and whenever I want to fly, I can do so without leaving the house these days, which is great. What little flight sim time I had before getting into the real thing probably helped a bit, but I would reckon that all the books I read helped more, since reading books is still an obsession with me, just as it was when I was a kid. I recommend that to anyone thinking of going from the desktop to the airfield, as it certainly served me well.Al

Let's see, back in early 1990, the company I was working for lost our primary client and the company went under. I was collecting unemployment checks and needed to send out at least 2 resumes every week to get my checks and there wasn't anybody new advertising in the classifieds that week, but I knew that BAO Ltd was a local company, so I looked up their address and sent in a resume cold, just so I could list them on my unemployment forms. To my surprise, a week or so later, I actually got a call from BAO to come in for an interview, and even more surprising, by the time I had gotten back home after the interview, they had already called and offered me a job :-> - and I've been doing this pretty much ever since (well, there was a detour from 99 to 02 where I was doing WinCE kernel and driver work, and then 02 to 04 where I wasn't working for anyone :-> ).What was funny, was that I had never been up in an aircraft (commercial or GA) at this point, and the very first time I was ever up in any airplane, it was a Piper PA-28 and my boss Hugo was the pilot :->Tim

I liked aeroplanes when I was a kid, read everything I could about them (no flight sims, internet or PCs in those days), so instead I read about them, made models of them, painted pics of them etc (still do that). I knew a guy who had flown Spitfires in the Second World War.

Folks, don't get old if you can reasonably avoid it ...I should have mentioned that I'm 65 and have been an aviation fan since age 4 when I read about the death of Orville Wright in National Geographic. My 15-years-older brother flew in Korea, first as a navigator on A26 night intruder missions and then as a C-47 pilot. Like you I picked his brain for war stories. Like you I built models, in my case probably 250 of them, plastic plus control line scale. (I couldn't afford R/C.)During the 60s I imagined a home flight simulation cockpit. But I couldn't wait and instead got a PPL -- and almost landed a job at Singer-Link on the F4 Phantom simulator development project.At one point I was offered a job as an air taxi pilot, which would have led to a career in the airlines. But my wife said "I don't want to be a widow. If you take that job I will leave you." Well, folks, I chose her over flying for a living and I don't regret it. Not many men get to marry their high school girlfriends and then remain married for 45 years.So get your life priorities right for you. If you try to go commercial you will be low paid, you will scuffle for a living, you probably won't be able to form long term relationships till you're in your 30s, but in the end you might make the airlines. If that's you, go for it.In the end I was right though I don't have the cockpit, only a desktop. But now I'm the airline pilot I always wanted to be, and my mistakes won't make my wife a widow.

Don't get old if you can reasonably avoid it ...

No danger of that, everyone who likes aeroplanes is just like a big kid anyway from what I've seen. Personally, I treat life like a game of Pontoon - I stuck at 21.Al

... everyone who likes aeroplanes is just like a big kid anyway ...Al

Right. I'm still trying to figure out what to do when I grow up ...When we were 13 my cousin Paul and I swore a blood oath never to grow up. (True American Indian type blood oath, cutting our thumbs and mingling our blood.) Paul eventually grew up and became a millionaire. But you know what? I'm happy and he isn't. He's too busy worrying about how to avoid paying anything to his ex-wife. I'd love to be rich but it's never been important to me.As the wife of a workaholic detective once remarked, "He kept us poor but there was never a dull moment." That's me. If I were to check out now it would be with a rich and satisfying life behind me.

Always had a slight fascination with planes when I was a little kid. Then my parents took me to the Liberty Science Museum in NJ where they had Flight Simulator for Windows 95 out on display. I took to the controls for a bit and was hooked. As soon as we got a computer later that year, I bought a copy of FS for Win95 and haven't looked back.FS has opened up my eyes to aviation and now I am obessed with it.

FS has opened up my eyes to aviation and now I am obessed with it.

Do you look up at every passing airplane? That's the true test -- unable NOT to look.

I came in late to flightsim.I always wanted to fly as a hobby and had been taking flight lessons. I was really nervous about doing my first solo x-country. Then a pilot friend of mine recommend me to buy FS2004 and use that to "fly" some practice runs.Well, went to the store, bought FS9 and i've been addicted ever since. It's such a great tool for real world flying. -feng

Do you look up at every passing airplane? That's the true test -- unable NOT to look.

mike- A long time ago, (1940 I believe) & holding the hand of my father- I stood beneath the wing of a shiny yellow AVRO Anson at an RCAF recruiting display. And looking up, I thought it was the most beautiful thing in the world. But then I hadn't yet discovered girls!! Many model planes later, some backyard sailboat building, one terrific lady and retirement- I discovered Flight Simulator, and subsequently, the magic of multi monitors with a true-to-life wide view of the world ahead of me!!! I'm one lucky fellow!Alex Reid

Do you look up at every passing airplane? That's the true test -- unable NOT to look.

LoL so true!I moved from Los Angeles to Singapore earlier this year. Since this country is so small, their air force pretty much practices just off shore. Around 7pm every night, i can clearly see F-18s and F-16s buzzing by my high-rise on their final approach to land. In the early mornings, i often see C-130s doing low-altitude runs along the ocean. And lately, for their national day, they've been sending out Apaches along the coast to practice formation flying....nothing like jogging in the morning and seeing 3 Apaches hovering motionless above you....here's a pic of them practicing at sunset...(notice the Longbow in the middle)-feng

Do you look up at every passing airplane? That's the true test -- unable NOT to look.

Absolutely! Kind of embarrassing at times because at times there are many planes passing within a few minutes of each other, and when I'm with my friends, they always have to point out the fact that I keep looking up everytime. Also my idea of a good time is to go out with my r/c planes rather then the bar and they don't let me slide too easily on that point either.(mind you I'm 21)My goal in life is to get my PPL and my own plane, but a few months ago I went up for the very first time in a friends Warrior and got very airsick quite fast in pretty smooth air...I hope I can over come that or atleast deal with it.

I got started with flight simming as a result of my being interested in aircraft. I bought books and magazines about individual aircraft and about flying, and I went to airshows (the Abbotsford Air Show, to be specific) long before I ever got into flight sims, since my interest predated home computers by a number of years.It wasn't until 1983, when I was 23, that one of the first truly affordable home computers became available: the Timex Sinclair 1000. I bought a flight sim for it in which the only activity was that one had to land a 737 (?)--if I remember correctly, that is. By the way, the program was on tape, and it took ages (i.e., minutes) to load successfully.As I bought ever more powerful computers, I bought ever more realistic flight sims: Timex Sinclair -> Commodore 64 -> Amiga -> an Intel 386-based MS-DOS computer -> a 486 -> etc. etc. etc. / the previously mentioned Timex Sinclair sim -> subLogic Flight Sim / MS Flight Sim / subLOGIC ATP / etc. etc. etc. ... ending up where we are today.