I just reinstalled FSX to take some lessons again, and I am in awe. It's comprehensive. It's deep. It's step by step guidance with text, pictures, and real mission tutoring with the legendary Rod Machado. I really wish these fantastic lessons can be incorporated into MSFS. Good lesson is a necessity for any flight simulation, and it's especially so for MSFS as it is meant to attract a much larger new population into this hobby.

It has been the better part of a decade since I fired up FSX....but the lessons down in the bottom left don't cut it for you?

 

Edited January 19, 20215 yr by CaptainNick

You could always go for this, but ouch, that's a bit pricey for six hours on your own flight sim with a video link. I'd love to know if anyone is gonna go for it.

I have bought this. 

https://secure.simmarket.com/fs-academy-vfr-msfs.phtml

It looks good, and good reviews, but I haven't had chance to try it yet.

Like CaptainNick says though, the MSFS built in starter lessons aren't too bad.

Those lessons hadn't actually changed since FS2004, in fact I think they were even in FS2000!

But yes I agree, they were very well put together. I was thinking just last night actually, having a bit of a moment of reflection, about how much I've learnt from Flight Simulator over the years. This hobby and the community within it are such a wealth of knowledge. Everything from instrument approaches, how ATC works to how to fly Concorde - and even not directly related to aviation like how to build a PC.

2 hours ago, CaptainNick said:

It has been the better part of a decade since I fired up FSX....but the lessons down in the bottom left don't cut it for you?

The current built-in MSFS lessons are fun but very shallow. The FSX lessons are very comprehensive, covering many aspects and defferent levels of flying airplanes. 

It's no comparison.

9 hours ago, yanfeng12342000 said:

I just reinstalled FSX to take some lessons again, and I am in awe. It's comprehensive. It's deep. It's step by step guidance with text, pictures, and real mission tutoring with the legendary Rod Machado. I really wish these fantastic lessons can be incorporated into MSFS. Good lesson is a necessity for any flight simulation, and it's especially so for MSFS as it is meant to attract a much larger new population into this hobby.

FSX?. I don't even remember where did I put my disks and don't even know if my new computers have a DVD reader?. Wow, time passes by pretty quick!. Anyway, enjoy yourself.

Cheers, Ed

I totally agree with you. When it comes to flight sims the lessons and tutorials in FS9 (King Schools) and FSX (Rod Machado) are just the best. For utter sim newbies Id go as far as to say that they get cheap and cheerful FSX Steam Edition ,learn the ropes on that and then jump into the newer sim of their choice, be that MSFS2020, XP11 etc.

"But the graphics" I hear people say - The original side scroller Mario is proof that eye candy isnt everything 😁 Yes FSX now looks dated but thats not the point , the lessons are, and they are brilliant! 

MSFS has 8 lessons that end with soloing the C152.  No real information is provided beyond what is in the lessons in the air.

FSX has 21 trainings (https://krepelka.com/fsweb/learningcenter/lc_index_lessonsmain.htm).  There are Ground School materials to go with each lesson in the HTML documentation. 

It's not a bad recommendation to go get FSX on Steam just for the lessons.  It's cheaper and more complete then some of the 'lesson packs' people are selling for MSFS.

Be careful though-  you might get used to things like the OBS button on the Garmin working, or being able to activate a vectors-to-final approach. 😉

Edited January 20, 20215 yr by marsman2020

6 hours ago, marsman2020 said:

Be careful though-  you might get used to things like the OBS button on the Garmin working, or being able to activate a vectors-to-final approach.

What's wrong with that? Too dated for the modern planes?

Yes, the MSFS lessons are quite disappointing.  However, one shouldn't forget that with all the YouTube videos the community has produced since the launch, the total amount of free training material available to new simmers far exceeds what was available when FSX was released.  Sure, it would be nice if Asobo could spend some time adding more lessons - they just added a couple of very basic Airbus ones, and have hinted they will add more at some point - but even if they don't, I don't think newcomers to this hobby have a lack of info.  In fact, quite the opposite - it's sometimes hard to keep on top of all the info that is out there!

1 hour ago, yanfeng12342000 said:

What's wrong with that? Too dated for the modern planes?

Nothing wrong. I think all he's saying is that some the "procedure stuff" works great in FSX and lousy (if at all) in MSF2020. 

On 1/20/2021 at 7:24 PM, loge said:

Yes, the MSFS lessons are quite disappointing.  However, one shouldn't forget that with all the YouTube videos the community has produced since the launch, the total amount of free training material available to new simmers far exceeds what was available when FSX was released.  Sure, it would be nice if Asobo could spend some time adding more lessons - they just added a couple of very basic Airbus ones, and have hinted they will add more at some point - but even if they don't, I don't think newcomers to this hobby have a lack of info.  In fact, quite the opposite - it's sometimes hard to keep on top of all the info that is out there!

Yes there are now many training materials out on Youtube. Maybe too many of them. I mean they are scattered around and one needs to dig hard to get the gems. In comparison FSX lessons are very focused and structured so that beginners can easily learn step by step, and other levels of simmers can easily find lessons suited to their needs as well.

FSX lessons also integrated manuals, text instructions, pictures, graphs into unified courses, and you can hear the instructions during your tutorial missons. The Youtube videos are...just videos.

Edited January 22, 20215 yr by yanfeng12342000