I just concentrate on proper taxing procedures, take off and landings. If you're more focused on making fake passengers happy you will never be 100% focused on what's most important. Piloting the plane. :)

 

Trouble is, in Flight you have precious little else to know how good your landings are. There's the sound gear makes on touchdown, and possible vocal complaints from the passengers if you do badly, and that's about it. I am sorely missing instant replay, or even some simple diagram that would show me the horizontal and vertical speed, the touchdown point, pitch, etc.

 

After many hours in Flight, most of it spent in the Maule, often I still cannot tell until the very last moment how good my touchdown is going to be. And when it is bumpy, I do not always understand why, since by now I *know* what it's supposed to be like. It's hard to learn if you are not given a clear feedback. So "happy passengers" is one of the few ways to tell, although when they aren't, the game won't tell you why. I've decided that some form of visual feedback after each landing is the one feature I am missing the most. More than a GPS, AP or new aircraft.

 

All that said, I've also noticed that very often the voice actor comments ("Great landing!" etc.) seem to have no relation to whether you are awarded the Happy Passengers bonus. Likewise the "health" indicator. It may turn to the orange question mark, and you may still get the bonus (and a "Great landing!") Other times it stays green all the way, but no bonus. It seems inconsistent, could be a bug.

 

It's annoying how at the end, they'll always be so happy, even if you made them sick during the flight (and some of them get sick for no reason.)

 

Yeah, MS scriptwriters seem to have written only the happy good-byes. I suppose it's a marketing thing. Complaints during flight are a training device - they tell you you're doing something wrong, and they will even alert you if you fly too low at night (psx have night vision, I guess). But complaints at the end would be a downer, and gamers don't like that. MS wants to keep gamers happy, so...

If one lands too hard, and wants to try again, maybe press 'pause' and return to last checkpoint and try it again.

If one lands too hard, and wants to try again, maybe press 'pause' and return to last checkpoint and try it again.

 

Yes, that works. I did a long flight once and something went wrong after landing (can't really remember what it was) and I crashed the plane... I decided to load the last checkpoint because I hated ending a long flight like that. After landing safely the second time around I got all the rewards I could get. It's amazing how soon people forget you almost killed them a few minutes earlier...

I was never getting happy passengers until just recently...and I couldnt work out why on some flights I got happy passengers but on others I didnt ...my landings and taxiing are almost always the same, then I realised ...the times I was getting no happy passengers were when I made rough adjustments to altitude or heading (not overly rough, but not smooth either), so now I take my time whenever I need to adjust heading/altitude and doing it this way gives me happy passengers every time. (except in wind, which has the same effect as making rough adjustments).

I was never getting happy passengers until just recently...and I couldnt work out why on some flights I got happy passengers but on others I didnt ...my landings and taxiing are almost always the same, then I realised ...the times I was getting no happy passengers were when I made rough adjustments to altitude or heading (not overly rough, but not smooth either), so now I take my time whenever I need to adjust heading/altitude and doing it this way gives me happy passengers every time. (except in wind, which has the same effect as making rough adjustments).

 

Standard-rate turns (the lower marks on the TC) and slow altitude changes (500fpm, except on climb-out) certainly can't hurt and may help a lot. Also ensure you make coordinated turns, using proper rudder deflection (centering the ball in the TC).