Microsoft Flight

[EHM-1001 Robert]

Perhaps the story continues They said it is over after FSX, but now it seems a new flightsim is borning )

[EHM-1997 Alexander]

Latest press release have buried this though. Will be free to play.  Hawaii main island only with 2 planes. No ask and Microsoft app type store to sell nw areas planes etc. x-plane is pretty much the only game in town now.

[EHM-2387 Eric-Jan]

I agree.
MS Flight will be yet another app store equivalent. It looks nice, works great as an appetizer, and lures you to spend 4 to 10 times as much on add-ons and expansions that you would normally do.
Also, it is supposed to cater for every soul. Be it the arcade pilot that just wants to open up the throttle and find out what happens at the extremes of his joystick, or the down-to-the letter procedural flyer. Not sure how they think they accomplished that, BTW. Also not clear on online flying arrangements, but I suspect there will be a "community" with its own network, with multiplayer gamework. I don't see IVAO / Vatsim fitting in this concept.

So I'll probably end up downloading the free  version, and expanding a little bit (because at this moment I think I don't want to spend money on MSF, but they have a way of luring you in there), just to see what is possible, and what are the limitations.

[EHM-1997 Alexander]

I think it will be good to hook in some new young blood, but offers little to the established serious simmers. It isn't what people were hoping for and the add on developers you know and love do not appear to be interested in developing for it since they were locked out of the process part way through alpha (Orbx for example).

I think a number of MSFS devs will continue to develop for FSX and will look at making inroads with Prepare3D and perhaps evaluate producing for x-plane.

Shame really as the community got a boost after the MSFS shutdown with the announcement of flight, but it turned out to not be what people expected (wished for).

[EHM-2381 Ted]

perhaps evaluate producing for x-plane.

The PMDG guy dropped a big hint regarding possibly developing for XP today.
Time until ORBX dude starts to back pedal 3.....2......1.....

[EHM-1749 Hector]

More info. Look at the samples

http://www.avweb.com/eletter/archives/avflash/2100-full.html#205989

[EHM-2097 Andrei]

Same pessimistic tune while this is discussed in the IVAO forums (no link provided, as one needs registration to read messages there anyway).

The overall impression is that MS flight is not for "us" (= hardened FS2004 & FSX players). On the other hand, MS product advertising is always better than the product itself, so the official advertising may be telling the opposite or at least remain intentionally "foggy" about this.

So indeed this seems to leave us with only X-Plane (which is probably good) and no competitors (which is never good).

Andrei

[EHM-1997 Alexander]

FS9 and FSX are still going strong.

Aerofly also looks good, although like flight is not general purpose.