I notice that there seem to be a lot of doubts regarding the quoted report in the flight-sim magazine "FlightXPress" (hoax..., questionable information.... and similar is mentioned in the above postings).Let me tell you that "FlightXPress" is the only Flightsim magazine in German language and it has an excellent reputation here in Europe among German speaking flightsimmers. I buy it every month since many years and you can assume that what they reported is not a "hoax".As mentioned by other posters the report is basically an impression from a presentation held by developers from the MS Flightsimulator-design team at the Blackpool (UK) flightsim-event. Moreover the author of the article obviously had also the opportunity to discuss the development of the new FS10 with two members of the MS-team (including the head of the team) and to ask some further questions.There were no handouts and according to the report the material presented was marked "confidential" (I asume the two screenshot were made with a digital camera, filming was obviously not allowed). However, the author could draw some conclusions from the presentation and his meeting with the MS-guys. I have the article now not in front of me, but I remember some conclusions:The team confirmed the change to the 3-years cycle (based on customer preference!). Naturally no release date was given but a release in the second half of 2006 (for 2006 Christmas business) seems very likely based on the information available.The development team seems to test many possiblities for improvements of the graphics (for example reflection on ground/water as indicated on screen shots), however, it is still open what will be included in the product.There seems to be a huge increase in data for the land structure (mesh?); the author mentions more than 10 times as much as for FS9. However, the problem will be how to bring that into a quantity that can be sold in the product (the limiting factor for FS9 were 4 CD's).Also for other land data (like exact roads) the team seems to be looking for new solutions.There was obviously no indication about the aircraft that should be included in FS10. In the report there is also nothing mentioned about other improvements that many simmers are so much hoping for (like better ATC, better AI-traffic handling, more realistic cockpits, maybe with FMC, ... and similar).MS seems also to confirm that the product must continue to be usable for the average user, which means that it will remain in the "games" categorie and never fulfill the expections of the real hardcore simmer (as real as possible). I guess this is necessary to reach the sales figures needed to justify the development cost of the product.You can see that the report did not really bring any "revolutionary" news. Nevertheless it was interesting to read it and - as mentioned be another poster - it is nice that we should see a new version of FS in about 12-15 months.RegardsWalter

Hey all. I am not posting to contest, or help prove the validity of the photos, screenshots, whatever they might be. I just thought I would offer a loose translation of the first post on the forum linked above. Mind you, my french is not great, but I think it will get by in this case...Hello,The simulation newspaper FlightXPress published an issue on FS10 containing the 2 pictures below:In the 1st picture note that the runway is wet, in the 2nd one note the reflection of the batiments (buildings or clouds?) in water...These pictures would have been presented by crosoft at the time of the demonstration of blackpool...http://www.flightxpress.de/So some of you can read German and can obtain a copy of the magazine in order to light up our lanterns that will be sympa. (check out the details?)Cordially.I will state again, this is a VERY loose translation.

Interesting, and teasingAs long as my PMDG fleet works, i'll take it with any mods :-)

HI there !Like Beloka (Eric) wrote further up, the scanned magazine text refers to the fact that the longer developed time (3 years versus 2) would have allowed for a major overhaul of old system structures. It is unclear from the text snippet whether this is the authors speculation, or information from the developer that this has happened. Though I'm happy with K4, it'll be great to finally see what we are presented with in the end. Especially compatibility issues IF the engine is seriously overhauled..Thanks for the info, hoax or not.-Dasher7

These screenshots are not an "hoax". While we don't know for sure how FS10 will look like, they are exactly what MS showed at their public presentation in Blackpool, everbody that attended can easily confirm.And, they showed a lot more than that, the screenshots were part of a Power Point presentation, with many more very similiar to these two. Part of the presentation even featured full motion video taken from a running sim. Nothing secret here: it's just MS didn't publish it officialy, but in was shown in public.My guess, they used a modifed FS9 engine, in fact, some of them even featured the familiar "SLEW" red sign at the bottom of the screen.