Back in the fold

[Kerberos42 0]

First off, sorry for the long post! It's been a while for me, so I'm making up for lost time!Well, its been a number of years, but I'm back in the virtual cockpit. FLIGHT has re-energized my interest in simming, and I wanted to share my experience. I was an active Avsim member years ago, but no longer remember my login or email I used at the time.A little FS background on me: I saw my first flight sim (FS 1.0 maybe) on a Apple II in the mid 80's complete with barely discernable blips on an amber monochromatic screen. I was all of about 9 or 10, and completely fascinated. As soon as I had my own home computer, the first thing I wanted was a flight sim. I had an Amiga 500, and flew with Amiga Flight Simulator II, SubLogic's JET, and F/A-18 Interceptor. The latter was more of a game, but I had more fun doing carrier take-offs and landings than the combat missions. Eventually I also had an IBM PC, and spent many hours tweaking my autoconfig.bat and config.sys files to free up enough memory to run Falcon 4.0.Through my teens my FS interest waned, with girls and other teenaged pursuits taking precedence. When I was 16 I got hooked on the idea of getting my ppl, and was allowed an introductory flight, however there were no means available to pay for such a "flight" of fancy.Fast forward a number of years to my early 20's, when I had more means available to me, I bought a smoking fast 486DX100 with 1MB of RAM and I rediscovered MSFS 95 and I was hooked again. FS98, 2000, 2002, all came and went, each version eagerly anticipated and purchased on release day (I STILL have all the original boxes). FS 2004 got me into the add-on game, and I got heavily into the hobby, investing in computer upgrades, CH products pedals, throttle, yoke along with various add-ons, Project Airbus, Scenery, Captian Sim 727, with my ultimate favorite being Level-D 767. I joined and eventually helped run a VA, also spent many, many hours flying online with VATSIM, and following real world flight planning procedures and navigation. I attempted a TRW trip in the 172, doing 1 - 2 hour legs at a time. I made it from Vancouver, across Canada, Greenland, Iceland, Europe and into Africa.I continued with the release of FSX, but life got in the way and FS fell by the wayside. Initially my computer never ran FSX very well, then I developed an interest in motorcycles and my priorities shifted again. I always had FSX installed, and a couple of times a year (and a few hardware upgrades later) I might fire up the Level-D 767 and do a hop down the coast to KSFO or KLASEnter FLIGHT. I had no idea anything was being worked on past FSX, but I stumbled on an announcement for the beta and a spark went off, I signed up and eventually received an invite. Initially I was impressed with the quality, but like many others felt MS was screwing the user base. What? Hawaii only? No Jets? No AI? No ATC? #####?? Who would want this? Alas the FS world is dead. And what's are these game elements? If I want achievements, I'll go fire up Call of Duty. I toyed with the Beta for all of an hour or so before uninstalling it in disgust.However... I downloaded the release version and spent a bit more time with it. Suddenly I "got it". Within a couple hours I was downloading the Hawaii pack, and the Maule. I've had A LOT of fun with the missions, achievements, challenges, aerocaches etc. Now I don't want to enter the is it a sim or game debate, but I wanted to voice my thoughts on what it is.Flight is: Incredibly immersive - right out of the box. Just stop and listen to the sounds. The squeaky brakes, the water, the wheels on the ground. Try opening the cockpit door at 150kts with the volume turned up. The voices during missions are unique, and while unnecessary, just add that little extra wow factor. (is there a way to ask the astronomer out? She keeps saying "If there is anything I can do....") Doing a passenger carrying job, you can hear the odd sound from the cabin - coughing, camera clicking, etc. The kayaker mission was very rewarding as well, when I found that smoke rising from the beach I actually called out "There he is!". My wife answered from upstairs, "There WHO is?" The lighting is impressive as well at all times of the day and night. The attention to detail at even small airports is incredible. All the taxiway signs, runway signs are there so you can actually navigate the airport without having to use a top down view.Flight is: very challenging. some of the missions and challenges are incredibly difficult, and not "gamey" at all. Take the RV6 IFR approaches for example - unless you've done it before you have no chance, and there is no tutorial explaining it. It's been a while since I did an IFR approach with steam gauges, that was a white knuckle, sweaty palm experience to say the least. That's the type of reaction you would get from a simulation, not a game. The Maule landing challenges were also very difficult, I hadn't crashed a plane yet until I started these - lets just say I'm keeping the Maule factory busy! The ring challenges, while obviously gamey, are not "arcadey" ie, with dumbed down controls. You have to keep your speed up to avoid stalling low to the ground, but too fast an you can't make the turns quick enough. Obviously not something that would be done IRL, but if it was, its "simulated" very realistically. I've also failed miserably in the aerobatic challenge at Dillingham.Flight is: fun and easy. Easy in the sense that I have an excellent experience without any fuss. It takes a long time to get those FSX add-ons installed and working correctly. Remember having to hunt down the right version of an add-on DLL becuase the last add-on you installed overwrote the one you had? There's always "issues", and the sense that your experience is being hampered by an addon. I'm pretty sure I spent almost as much time tweaking and making FSX work as I did flying. Maybe for some this is fine, but now, I just want to jump in and fly with minimal fuss. I still have FSX with LD 767 for the times I want to do long haul, which as of now I have little interest.Flight does this to a tee. Realistic enough to be a challenge, loads of fun without sacrificing the realism. I've discovered parts of Hawaii that I knew nothing about, and thanks to Aerocaches, I'm thinking a trip back to HI to see Kauai (Na Pali coast) and the Big Island is in the works. I'm eagerly awaiting the Alaska DLC, and anything else that is released. Paying for the game, then all the addons can't be any worse than not paying for a basic game then the DLCs. If the model eventually works like the Apple App store, the dev's (and users) will eventually come around, and we will end up with a solid product that will provide years of enjoyment with perphaps vastly more options for DLC.Thats all for now!Peter

[NismoRR 191]

Welcome back!! Great to hear that excitement as I feel quite the same way, and looking forward to what happens in the future.

[N6330V 0]

Great post Peter and welcome back. I decided to get back in to the mix last night after many years without any serious sim time thanks to Flight!

[n4gix 4,955]

Outstanding "1st post" from a "returning veteran". Welcome back! :drinks:

[Richdre 0]

Good post. I was a member here for several years and then I quit flight simmimg for several years. I tried Flight and I'm back and it feels great. Great game, great sim and a ton of fun.

[Kerberos42 0]

Thanks all for the welcome back, its good to be back! Hopefully I can dig up some helpful tips from the depths of my FS knowledge to share.

[Arwen 289]

Peter, I really enjoyed reading your post. Very well written. Nice to see another "veteran" returning. :)

[Guest]

Seems MS Flight is doing something right...! It's great to see more and more people are discovering flight simming and others are coming back to it again!

[styckx 1,872]

It is great. Avsim is very inviting from an outsider looking in choosing where to sign up. I checked out three other MS Flight forums at other places and this was the only one that looked to be actually in some sort of control where fans could express their positive views without 10 agenda driven people who hate it swarming in and stomping out the fun, yet the people with negative reviews can still say their peace without a swarm of MSF fans swarming and stomping their feet because it was a different opinion from their own. Nicely run place..

Edited March 6, 2012 by styckx

[DAD 2,661]

Nice to see another "veteran" returning. :)

interesting, didn't MS intend to attract young blood with Flight :Thinking:

[Gibbage 199]

Nice post and welcom back! I agree with everything you said! In FSX, I find myself tweaking and doing stuff OTHER then flying. Flight is just what its name suggest. FLIGHT! P.S. Nice Beemer. I like the K bike air heads! I have a DL-650 myself. Still have a stupid grin on your face once you swing your leg off? =)

[Chalkman 0]

The aerocaches are great. I've been doing the daily ones for the last few days. Really enjoyed the Pali highway one, and learned a lot doing it. With Flight and TDU2 i almost feel like i've been to Oahu.

[Kerberos42 0]

Nice post and welcom back! I agree with everything you said! In FSX, I find myself tweaking and doing stuff OTHER then flying. Flight is just what its name suggest. FLIGHT!P.S. Nice Beemer. I like the K bike air heads! I have a DL-650 myself. Still have a stupid grin on your face once you swing your leg off? =)

Thanks! That's not actually mine, (i just like the image) I currently have an R1200RT. That's a R1150ST that I originally was looking to buy. And yes, I have a stupid grin everytime I'm on it, closest thing to flying without leaving the ground.

[Gerryo03 0]

I agree. While FSX needed a lot of tweaking, this simulator is as close as you can get to real flying. I think the immersive aspect comes from the fast refresh rates and the sounds. The graphics are truly incredible even in a lower end machine.Thanks Microsoft. From an pilot, this really feels like flying!!!

[Gibbage 199]

Ugh. Sorry. Its the R series that has the air cooled cylinder heads, not the K! My next bike I want the F 800 ST. I think 1200 is a bit much for me. I get into enough trouble with my 650 as it is ;) Its my daily. Alas, this is not a motorcycle forum, but its nice to see more riders that fly.