They didn't give me many reasons to buy FSX over FS9 and I still bought it, and apparently you did too. You don't need much for a new version to sell. The fact that it will be on Windows Live will bring a whole new group of newbies into the game, er sim...I think this argument will be settled later on when we hear about compatibility with FSX:No compatibility: all new engine, started from scratchLimited compatibility: old engine, but major reworkMostly compatible: old engine, just tweaked and graphic tricks added

No compatibility is a cash cow for both side (MS & dev.), DX10 up and running like it was intented to at first for Vista (now window 7), fixed what was working wrong in FSX (popping trees, shimering ++), including SLI, Hyperthreading ++, so all of this = good FPS, sliders pushed to the max. (I hope), better Flight default scenery as we can see in their released pics. / vid., market place protecting the dev. work......and at the same time protect us from bad or buggy scenery......You are welcome to add more to this undebatable list...................just kidding...........

To make Flight run on today's hardware, more than 25% of the code is going to have do be rewritten.

Says who? Flight will run just fine on today's hardware. I reckon the first thing they are doing is identifying areas where performance is bad and tweaking those. It's usually just a few areas that hog performance, fix those and its like a new sim!

Screenshots and videos cannot tell us what they have done with the code, or what it will be, especially this early on.

It's tells use they are reusing the FSX code-base. Why? To save time and money. You seem to think ACES has an unlimited budget and forget that MS is a public company focused on the bottom line and profits for shareholders.Never forget, MS canned ACES to save a few bucks when TS2 was 80% complete and less than 9 months from release.

Excuse me while I pop some corn. :(

A former ACES member who is also woking on Flight has already stated that he was pleased that backwards compatability was no longer required.It's a new sim and it's time to move on.http://polypoke.wordpress.com/2011/01/08/why-fsx-has-rough-performance-2/

You do realize that the blog post he's referring to is 18 months oldhttp://blogs.technet.com/b/torgo3000/archive/2009/04/13/a-change-of-direction-sort-of.aspxDo you really believe what was stated back then still applies today, 18 months later?Is he even working on Flight? The Dec 2010 dev post on the Flight website says they are in the early stages of development and yet you think he's been working on Flight since April 2009.Just doesn't add up does it!He says "I've been doing a lot of shader writing recently, which I am really excited about (expecially now that the years of legacy code and requirements for supporting backwards-compatibility restrictions have been lifted)" which to me means the shader code he had been writing for FSX had lots of legacy restrictions BUT on his new project (whatever that is) he doesn't have any legacy restrictions which is happy about since he's free to experiment any shader technique he likes. Where does it say his new project is Flight?

Excuse me while I pop some corn. :(

Ok pass the popcorn.

Where does it say his new project is Flight?

It doesn't, but through common sense, we can take an educated guess and say it is very likely the project he was working on is now called Flight.

So let me ask you a question. Why would anyone buy Flight? My friend, people need reasons to pay $70 for a new version of a game. Otherwise they will all buy FSX in the bargain bin.

They didn't need too many reasons to purchase each new version between FS5 and FS2002, and they were all rubbish :(

A former ACES member who is also woking on Flight has already stated that he was pleased that backwards compatability was no longer required. It's a new sim and it's time to move on.

I can certainly see the logic in that, but it will not encourage me to purchase MS Flight. I have spent too much money on FSX over the past two years adding high quality UK terrain, airports, and scenery to simply throw it in the bin and start all over again.

Most of us have invested in FSX.Decideing if and when your going to get Flight is a decision many will have to make.However, after Flight is released, some may like it so much that FSX wiil seemm dated.Also, no one has to get Fllght the moment it's released but even if you do, there is no reason to not to continue to run FSX for a while also as many did when FSX was released. Hey, we all knew this day was comming sooner of later. We should embrace it. It's all part of the positive eveolution of Fligt simming. :(

I would be surprised if MS Flight is not compatible with FSX aircraft and especially scenery: In an evovling ecosystem such as flight sim, orphaning 100% of older software upsets 100% of existing customers and is 100% a bad decision.The porposition that you need a complete break with the past for a new sim engine is a false dichotomy.Cheers,- jahman.

I would be surprised if MS Flight is not compatible with FSX aircraft and especially scenery:  In an evovling ecosystem such as flight sim, orphaning 100% of older software upsets 100% of existing customers and is 100% a bad decision.The porposition that you need a complete break with the past for a new sim engine is a false dichotomy.Cheers,- jahman.

I was accepting your argument until you used 100% has you standard.   That killed your point, sorry!I understand the concern some have about abandoning previous flight sim code, However, in many other aspects of our lives we abandon previously purchased goods for newer, next generation versions.  I have yet to see folks ask for parts of their old GM car to be incorporated into their new GM car,  parts of their old wardrobe to be fashioned into their new wardrobe, parts from their old dvd player to be manufactured into their new dvd player, etc.   And these have significantly more investment required.

If it was any other company other than Microsoft I might buy the argument of completely breaking off with the past. The problem is, we are talking about Microsoft.History 101Apple puts out a new operating system with a graphical user interface (the Macintosh) and it has no compatibility with the Apple II.Commodore puts out a new operating system with a graphical user interface (the Amiga) and it has no compatibility with the C64.Atari puts out a new operating system with a graphical user interface (the ST) and it has no compatibility with the Atari 800.Microsoft puts out a new operating system with a graphical user interface (Windows) and it has a lot of compatibility with DOS.Acknowledging the fact that the other three examples were mainly hardware producers, I still find that Microsoft has a history for making a great effort at trying for compatibility with their older software. If Microsoft wasn't like this we would have had a Vista operating system today that worked great, but you certainly wouldn't be running FSX on it! Yes, I said Vista, I doubt that Windows 7 would have come along as fast as it did if Vista had not been released prematurely. After all, it is hard to come out with new features while still trying to maintain so much compatibility with the past versions.Regards, Mike Mann

For what it's worth- Microsoft is the biggest gorilla in the park- they have to be extremely careful in what they say about future products. A failure to keep a public promise or a future product description (even an implied promise), could result in complaints from competitors that MS was engaging in anti-competitive behaviour. That is, trying to hurt a competitor by unrealized promises.The cost of an enquiry from government lawyers could sink any potential profits from Flight.Wait for Flight to be released before drawing conclusions.AR

Huh? They do that all time time.. not quite sure how that's illegal since it's not apart of the Sherman Act. Case in point Visual Studio... Sun couldn't even sue for MS's less than standard version of java. Even VC++ wasn't fully ANSI compliant even when they claimed it was.

FSX was and still is an incomplete simulator full of bugs because of it's premature release, now try to imagine the same peoples working on it to take the bugs out, making it fully working in DX10 mode and adding some of the today's features like SLI just to take this one.......would you care if they (MS) call this finished and improved FSX Flight?

I for one hope that Flight is all new code with no consideration for backwards compatibility. I can only imagine possible design meetings for previous versions where coders might have shown something really cool and revolutionary only to be shot down because it significantly breaks backwards compatibility. At some point, you have to declare a turkey done and get the next one in the oven. Don't get me wrong, I appreciate an effort to be inclusive to older addons, but if that inclusiveness serves to be a hindrance to creating a stable, smoothly operating platform out of the box, I say ditch it. Besides, I'm a bit of a cynic and enjoy a little schadenfreude from time to time. I'd be lying if I said that the howls of indignation from those who spent thousands on addons that are now useless in Flight because they feel Microsoft owes them something didn't amuse me a little bit.

I haven't uttered a single "howl of indignation", and I certainly don't think that Microsoft owes me anything.