Kengi

I'm right there with you. But, where do we go to ask the real pilots about the right way to fly it? How do we set the mixture on the LEM? Hmm. I'm not far from where Jim Lovell has his restaurant... Edit: The mixture I'm referring to is, of course, is N2O4 / Aerozine 50.

And let's not forget Lunar Flight which I've been waiting for. Just $4.99! And, so long as I'm talking about flying spacecraft, you can also check out the free open source Orbiter Space Flight Simulator. You can also download it from here: http://www.orbithangar.com/orbiter.php It's pretty basic right out of the box (so to speak), so don't forget to add things like sound in the form of mods from places like: http://www.orbithangar.com/ and http://orbiter.dansteph.com/index.php?disp=d

I liked the idea of the full range of motion on the Cessna yoke, but there aren't many used ones on the market. Plenty of used Saitek Pros, though (probably from all the people who upgraded to the Cessna). Flight handles the smaller (unrealistic) range of motion well, though, with a variable input as you crank the yoke more to the left or right.

Yup. I always expected to pay full price for my new Cub after I bent the landing gear a bit on the basic model.

I bought a used Saitek yoke/throttle quadrant and have been pleased with it. Being my first I can't really compare it, but I like the feel and everything seems to operate smoothly. The only issue I have is if I leave it plugged in when shutting my system down it is no longer centered on reboot. Unplugging and plugging it back in to the USB port fixes that. I usually don't leave it on the desk after flying anyway, so it's not a major issue for me. That being said, one of the things I like about it is that it's very quick and easy to mount/dismount from the desk. I didn't realize just how important that was until I owned one.

Years ago I read a book about the construction of the ALCAN highway. There was a quote by one of the workers that stuck with me in the back of my mind and came to the front when I was in Alaska. He said the terrain was "miles and miles of nothing but miles and miles". When driving up to Fairbanks I got out of the car at a nice looking spot kind of high on an overlook and saw a marsh below extending out as far as the eye could see. I got my binoculars out to see what was beyond the marsh. What I saw was more of the same marsh as far as the binoculars could see. At that moment I truly understood what it was to see miles and miles of nothing but miles and miles. The quote really came to life at that moment. It's been about ten years since I was in Alaska, but that feeling came back to me again when flying in this game. The terrain may look repetitious at first glance, but you then spot the subtle variations which make it beautiful. Then it hits me just how far I've been flying and how much more of that marsh (or whatever) there is in all directions around me without a city or town anywhere to be found, and I start mumbling, in awe, miles and miles of nothing but miles and miles...

Microsoft should just create a version of Flight for all the people who are offended my the mere presence of non-vc aircraft in the game. Remove all the basic aircraft, leaving only the deluxe aircraft, then charge three times the price for that version. They would make a mint.

I've had no trouble like that so far, but haven't done anything worth an achievement for several days, so not sure if this is some sort of recent problem with Live or not.

Thanks for the update and tip on seaports!

When so many people here discussed their enthusiasm for TrackIR I looked into a couple of the open source alternatives (including Facetrack Noir) since the price of TrackIR was steep. I found them to be difficult to keep centered properly and required a fairly well lit room to operate in. The light from my monitor in a dark room was nowhere near enough to make them work at all. I also notice that the TrackIR camera has twice the refresh rate at the same resolution (or same refresh at half res) as the PS Eye camera. The camera I was using has the same basic specs as the PS Eye. Since it does appear to operate better than the open source freeware motion tracking software I tried (based on several videos I saw of TrackIR in the community), I've been saving up for a TrackIR to try. They have a 30 day return policy, so I can try it out to see if it really is better than the open source motion detection software I tried. Soon. Very soon...

I suspect that's very different from the "trial version" you can download from Microsoft which only contains two airports. I don't have time to check now (just about to go out for Sunday brunch!), but can check when I get back. Of course, the easiest is to just grab that database file from the Steam post for now, at least. It worked great! I have two flight plans already I'll be flying this afternoon.

Not sure about aviation units, but most GPS systems I've worked with have options for choosing to display magnetic bearing from compass, true bearing based on input from compass and offset charts from GPS location index, or course bearing based on moving averages from the location input.

Cool. The forum topic is still live, so maybe the mods there have no problem with it. Grabbing the file while I can, regardless. Thanks for the tip!

I've, at least, never had that problem. When I hit the Windows-F11 key, MS Flight goes back into a pause menu for a few seconds and re-configures the graphics for the correct aspect ratio. Everything is perfect after that, including the switch placement. You might want to check in the FSWidgets forums for a fix.

Interesting work-around. For me, it only works when the HUD is turned on. As soon as I turn the HUD back off, the GMap heading goes right back to its stuck position, so not really a work-around for me either since I don't like the idea of having to fly with the HUD on all the time. Still, now the devs have a solid clue about the problem, so a real fix may be on the horizon.

Herendeen Bay (AK33) is not exactly a piece of cake. Short runways, trees close in on either side, no lights. On runway 30, at least, you have some room to go past the end of the runway. On the others, not so much. I made several attempts before I managed a decent landing in the RV-6. I probably should have used the Maule.

That doesn't, unfortunately, work for everyone (including me). One of the dev's says this bug is a current priority at the moment, so hopefully we'll see a fix in the not too distant future. The problem for them is they aren't sure why some people have no trouble, others can fix it with either reconnect or start-in-the-air work around, while still others just can't get anything other than the NNE heading no matter what.

There are pros and cons of each approach, but as connectivity becomes more ubiquitous and reliable I just don't see myself ever putting a DVD drive back in my system. I've only had one internet outage in the past three years, and it only lasted an hour or so. Even then, I could always tether my cell phone for "emergency" connectivity if needed. On the other had, don't you just hate it when you get to the third DVD in an install (which takes longer than a similar sized download install for me) and there is a bad sector on the disc? Now you have to see if you can pay for a replacement disc and wait for the company to ship it (assuming they even will do that). I really like having the cloud keep my installation files automatically. If I had a poor, unreliable internet connection I could see the advantage of old school physical media. I guess I'm just spoiled with good connectivity. Once most of the United States catches up with the rest of the world in terms of last-mile bandwidth, I'm guessing we will see the final nail in the physical distribution media coffin.

I just flew into Unalaska (PADU) for the first time after a long flight from Adak in the RV-6. It was late afternoon (in winter) when I left, and the sun was getting low as I got close to Unalaska, but I was still in what I thought of as daylight. I flew the approach from the north as per the NDB-A DTP. It has you coming into the bay on an approach course of 166 at 3700. As I turned in to that course and entered the bay, the sun fell below the mountains to the west and all of a sudden it was night. It disoriented me a bit and I didn't get a good glide slope. I could see I was high based on the runway landing lights, and started to drop faster, but the speed picked up too rapidly. At a course of 166 I was headed right for a small island, and realized I would need to turn into a final on runway 12 near that island. Was I dropping too fast? Still going too fast I didn't make a perfect turn. Jeez, the runway is close! Too far left. Corrected too far right. Over the runway. Finally centered. See the tire marks at the wrong end of the runway. Moment of panic as I forgot the missed approach procedure. Start climbing out as I bring the flaps back up and glance at the chart. Oh, back to 166 for the missed approach. OK, Up to 3000. Hey, that's a mountain just ahead! Not climbing fast enough. Start my climbing left turn to get out. OK, can stop to think again. Got out of the bay and approached back in. This time I did get down, and about all I can say is it was a landing I could walk away from. Definitely need some more practice with that airport...

Come now, Jeroen. Didn't you just nail that 16 NM arc when approaching Unalakleet?

Yeah. Can't even remember what my last DVD game was. I've been sitting here for a few minutes trying to remember. I THINK it may have been GTA San Andreas, which would make it around 2004. I no longer have the DVD, though, since I got it as part of a bundle on Steam later on. Couldn't say for sure, though. I THINK I remember getting that as a boxed package...

I'd hate to tell you how many games I've lost because I lost or damaged the distribution media. I haven't lost a software package yet since switching to downloadable software. Heck, even Windows 8 is going to be a downloadable package! I like the new world.

Just did a passenger trip to Kake Alaska (PAFE). I got a job to fly to an airport I haven't' been to yet in Alaska (not hard to do at this point) and looked it up in the sectionals and got the DTP charts. Noticed it only had a DME localizer. Well, new experience! Dialed up the frequency and started flying in generally the right direction. Quickly figured out how to maximize the rate of closure to figure out the heading to take. Then I even did a seat-of-the pants estimate for what heading I wanted to approach at and how to figure the offset based on how fast that rate of closure changed. Ended up coming in just where I expected to, and followed the advice in the procedures to check out the runway first (even though I kind of knew it would be OK in MS Flight). Flew over, entered a pattern, and made a perfect approach and landing. Even my passengers seemed impressed! Definite feel-good moment there... As a reward, Flight gave me a clandestine cargo mission and I got to fly through some nice canyons and evaded the fuzz!

OK, outside of the sim world (back in the gaming world) this is an old question which has already been settled. When a company which uses online distribution/authentication is about to go out of business, they release downloadable installation kits and disable the online verification systems. The SOP in the industry is to make these available for a "reasonable" time, which almost always ends up being 12 months, to grab your copy of that version from an official source. Honestly, though, I wouldn't expect Microsoft to go out of business before you no longer have any wish to install Flight on any future system you will have at that point. However, if anyone really is that paranoid about downloadable software distribution, then by all means, just buy games which are available on CD/DVD. Personally, my computer doesn't even have a CD/DVD drive, so I'm more worried about a company that doesn't make its software available via download. Even FSX is now a downloadable product.

Please read the posts from above your own and it will answer your question.