I've been glued to A Pilot's Life w/ SLC so use airliners only for about 3y now and would like to add some purpose to flying small planes commercially as it were, preferably an app that scores my pilotage.  As a airliner flyer I miss a lot of great scenery so that is in part what I'm addressing plus it's fun to fly the TBM and other lighter planes it's been a while now.

Cheers

I've tried most of the career apps that are available, but my vote for small (and larger) planes would be for On Air Company. It has come on leaps and bounds since it first came out and has massively improved. The developers are constantly working on it. The downside is that it is subscription based, but if you take out a 2 year subscription it's only 3 euros a month.

You can set it up to be as easy or as difficult as you want. You can run a company or work for other companies that are player run or NPC type real life airlines.

Neofly

FSEconomy. Dated but flexible, it let's you fly any plane you want almost anywhere on the globe. And there is a good community on the forum.

OnAir and Neofly would be my runner-up and third place, respectively. Neofly forces you to start with specific airplanes, which I find too limiting. OnAir has too much airline management involved for my taste.

Other options include

- AirHauler: get's the job done, but feels a bit lonely

- FSCaptain (alpha version for MSFS): has many limitations at this stage

- Newsky: Very good in general. Can be used with smaller planes, but the economy really bites you then. You should have at least 12 pax or so on your flights to survive.

- FlyLat: promising start, but I haven't used it much. At this point, it may be too limited in its features for small airplanes.

- FSCharter:  seems also more geared towards regular routes for larger planes.

Peter

Edited August 27, 20241 yr by qqwertz

FSEconomy is lots of fun. and the previous poster is right. Very good community.

 

Is FSEconomy still on the FS2004 airport database? That's one of the reasons I quit using it. You'd take a job not realizing the airport didn't exist anymore. Got kinda silly, especially when you'd see Meigs pop up, and that's been destroyed for more than 20 years.

I generally like Neofly, though I kind of fell off of using it because a few bugs were getting overly annoying. I should check it out again.

 

 

 

I really thought about FSeconomy and realized I have no time to commit to anything, even that.

For now, I just pretend everything.

Example: I take off in a GA plane (414 chancellor) from KTTD to any large airport and fly something from there. Then make my way back to KTTD

Ever thought about joining a VA that is doing GA instead of an app only? There are quite a few out there that are not doing only this modern tubeliner thing. And depending on the VA tool in use you will have full consistent aircraft state plus ranking etc... in such a VA you will usually find the same mindset GA flying folks also. Just an idea 😉

Cheers T.

OnAir user here.  Not a fan of the subscription model but the dev is constantly adding features (can even run your own industries to generate cargo/pax, etc).  I just use it to fly in whatever part of the world I want to fly in (I have a few different aircraft scattered around the world).  

12 hours ago, eslader said:

Is FSEconomy still on the FS2004 airport database?

Yes, and that will never change (according to the devs). I learned to check first before committing to a flight, and you would notice it during the flight planning stage at the latest. Even if you happen to make a flight to a non-existing airport, you can still land nearby and afterwards fly to a nearby airport. You can get used to it quickly.

I use NeoFly. It gives me a purpose and (for a while) also something to aim at as you advance from novice pilot to senior captain. Once you reach senior captain (takes a while) there are no further advancement options thoughm but you still have the purpose of flying missions.

I mostly fly transport missions (people or cargo) but you can also to choose to tow banners in a specific area, fly parachutists, fly tourists over a particularly scenic area, become a fire fighter etc.

In its most strict mode you have to earn money in order to buy new aircraft but you can also rent available aircraft. But you choose a less strict mode that allows you to do anything without having to work for it.

I like it that hard landings can destroy your cargo (you will even hear things break) and will wear down the aircraft so you will have to spend money on repairs. I also like the virtual secretary that tells you that "the passengers have gone crazy at the tax-free shops on the airport" or becomes enthousiastic when a famous VIP is one of your passengers.

When you start a flight you will get a list of available missions suitable at your airport and can filter on things like range or type of mission. You can also see the missions on a map.
Missions with VIP's are restricted to jet aircraft unfortunately.

When you want to rent or buy a specific aircraft you must either be lucky it is available at your current airport or fly to another airport where it is available. You can search for a specific type and see a list of locations. Mostly, larger airports will have mostly jets and larger prop airliners while you can find the smaller GA's at the smaller airports.

 

I second Neofly. It also has helicopter-specific missions, and can take advantage of helipad addons to provide more destination.

In my campaign currently, I fly the A2A Comanche around the world while my hired airliner crew racks in money 🙂

So I’ve also been down a similar road and seem to have found a great middle ground. 

The Skypark was my start. Great flexibility and purpose but the app stagnated with //42 and has now been sold to TFDi and I’m hopeful. 
 

I tried NeoFly and various others that are similar (FSCharter and AirHauler 2). I didn’t like the outside management aspect. I want to fly and not manage stuff. 
 

I then joined The Pilot Club and their OnAir VA. This was starting to feel right but the subscription cost of OnAir is a prohibitor. This is a great setup and they have some other benefits. 
 

Finally, I’ve settled into Walker Air VA, this has provided the blend of APL and GA and enough flexibility. 

Neofly looks real interesting.

Walker Air VA charter section also looks very good.

I think I will try that one has it fits more my needs.

Both good recommendations.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Great info, I was looking for an career app too. Not a fan of subscriptions so On-Air is out, looks like Neofly is the more popular, will give it a try.