The Official Microsoft Flight Thread

I will defiantly buy it, however... when I got FSX. It took me several months to quit FS9 due to support / addons etc. Flight is going in a completely new direction, dare I say it; to cater for the more 'simple' people who don't want to invest time in becoming a full on enthusiast. Many are calling this an FSX rework with dumbed down settings and controls.

I really don't know, I liked the direct FS2002/04/X went and I don't think Flight can live up to what FSX currently is NOW. The longevity of flight sims is huge, FSX still looks gorgeous and still cannot be maxed out with a steady 60FPS with all addons you can think of to make it look 'real' - We will see, I do plan on buying flight; I'll hold any further judgement until I see more from MS and it's actually installed.
 
Some more updates on the site today including screenshots and some information about specs!

http://www.microsoft.com/games/flight/ said:
November 15th, 2011 – Performance & Hardware

Learn about how Microsoft Flight was developed with performance in mind

Amongst the most popular questions the Flight team has been asked via e-mails to [email protected] are those about the release date and game performance. While we aren’t quite ready to talk about a release date, we did want to share a bit about our approach towards performance and hardware.

Performance optimization has been a core focus of our development from an early stage. To achieve this, we constantly monitored game performance metrics across a range of hardware configurations and reacted each time we saw a new feature or code change that caused a dip below the established thresholds. The end result is that Flight looks fantastic on a brand new PC, but because of the emphasis on performance throughout development, it also runs well on older desktops and budget laptops.

We’ve found the game runs well on low graphics settings with hardware meeting the following specifications:
CPU: Dual Core 2.0 GHz
GPU: 256 MB card capable of shader 3.0 (DX 9.0c compliant)
HD: 10 GB Hard Drive space
OS: WinXP SP3
RAM: 2.0GB

It was also one of our goals to ensure that the game can run well with high settings on hardware that is attainable today. Based on our testing of core scenarios, the game runs smoothly on high graphics settings with the following hardware specifications:
CPU: Intel® Core™ i7 960 @ 3.20GHz, AMD® Phenom™ II X6 1100T 3.3 GHz or better
GPU: ATI Radeon™ HD 5870, NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 560 or better
HD: 10 GB Hard Drive space
OS: Windows 7 64-bit
RAM: 6GB
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The screenshots look very pretty!
http://www.microsoft.com/games/flight/

also....
...and check back in December for an exciting announcement.
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This is getting exciting!
 
Hopefully is a release date.

Seeing the sheer size of the terrain in Flight, do you think it's possible they might throw a beta out first to widen their fault finding audience?
 
No they never do public betas to my knowledge. I was involved with some testing for the FSX team when I worked in MS but it was very late in the game so none of my feedback would have changed anything.

I've read elsewhere that this product won't allow for 3rd party addons. If that is true then it is very very bad for those of us who are serious about flight simming. No support for FSUIPC either. I won't believe anything until I see it though.
 
It's nice to see that they're releasing a new model but cosnidering the level of expansion by FSX's community they got a big job ahead, putting it on GFWL probably is going to mean MS is doing to run the servers or it'll be p2p :(
 
Not sure what to expect from this but if the platform is good then I'm sure the flight sim community will knock together plenty of expansions for it.
 
Ok. So it sounds like Microsoft Flight isn't what anyone had hoped. Take what you will from this...

January 4th, 2012 – Microsoft Flight Takes to the Skies

Today, Microsoft Studios premiered Microsoft Flight, a PC game that lets players jump into the challenge, fun, and freedom of flight. Microsoft Flight will be available as a free download this spring, giving players the freedom to fly the skies over the beautiful Big Island of Hawaii, complete a variety of exciting missions, test their skills in flying challenges, or find hidden aerocaches on the island.

In Microsoft Flight, players view the world from above in a visually stunning and realistic representation of the earth, complete with region-specific weather patterns, foliage, terrain and landmarks. Players can choose to take the helm using highly rendered, accurate cockpits and authentic piloting procedures, or simply use their mouse and keyboard to control the plane in an exterior view. More experienced players can tailor the flight controls to match their skill level, making Microsoft Flight easy for beginners while still challenging for the most accomplished PC pilots.

“Many people dream of flying, but few have the chance to experience the fun of exploring the world from above. Microsoft Flight provides players the opportunity to explore that curiosity and interest,” said Joshua Howard, executive producer of Microsoft Flight. “Aviation can be incredibly technical, but we’ve taken great care to build an experience that makes taking to the skies thrilling and accessible for everyone.”

Start Exploring For Free

After downloading Microsoft Flight for free, players can jump into hours of exciting gameplay on the Big Island of Hawaii.

In addition, players who sign in to their Games for Windows – LIVE account automatically receive additional free content, including the legendary Boeing Stearman plane, supplementary missions, and access to Achievements and an Online Pilot Profile. Those looking to deepen their experience can purchase and download additional content that adds new aircraft, regions and customization options. The frequently released new content for Microsoft Flight includes daily aerocache challenges and updates that make every flight unique and fun.

Be the First to Fly the Definitive Light Sport Aircraft ICON A5

Microsoft Studios worked with the personal airplane manufacturing team at ICON Aircraft to give aviation fans the exclusive opportunity to fly the all-new ICON A5 before real-world production starts at the end of 2012. Designed by the world-class aeronautical engineers behind the Voyager spaceship, X-Prize winning SpaceShipOne, and Virgin Galatic’s SpaceShipTwo, the ICON A5 is the “jet ski for the skies,” a high-wing amphibious monoplane with a carbon fiber airframe and a comfortable, automobile-inspired cockpit with space for two. The ICON A5 will be the first aircraft available to players for free in Microsoft Flight.

“ICON Aircraft and Microsoft Flight both share the goal of making the fun of flying accessible to everyone who’s ever dreamed about it. ICON does this by fusing world-class product design with the very best engineering, and Microsoft by combining the excitement of a great gaming experience with the authenticity of a top notch flight simulator,” said ICON Aircraft CEO Kirk Hawkins.
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I had some hope for it as well, my highest hope being it would be a modern coded flight sim near identical to FSX but better GFX & coding for today's hardware and it would be compatible with FSX addons or at least the majority of it.

But that is not the case and TBH it is no surprise to me that it will be a Fly by Pay type of sim. I just knew they were going to ask payment for addons, i.e. aircraft/vehicles/airports but you gotta pay to fly anywhere but Hawaii! Now that is just plain stupid. I'm sure 90% of regular FSX users simply will no bother.

Move along, nothing to see here... back to FSX.
 
I'd love to see what level of detail the 'paid for' addons will have. I'm certain that there is nobody at MS who could produce anything close to the UK2000 sceneries or PMDG level aircraft. It certainly won't be on my list. If I'm doing a flight to Cyprus with my VA does that mean that I will have to buy every single square mile of scenery that I will overfly enroute? What a pile of rubbish.
 
I'd assumed they do some sort of "app store" system but this sounds like they have taken it way too far.

I can't see many people upgrading to such a limited game
 
Soya said:
I had some hope for it as well, my highest hope being it would be a modern coded flight sim near identical to FSX but better GFX & coding for today's hardware and it would be compatible with FSX addons or at least the majority of it.

But that is not the case and TBH it is no surprise to me that it will be a Fly by Pay type of sim. I just knew they were going to ask payment for addons, i.e. aircraft/vehicles/airports but you gotta pay to fly anywhere but Hawaii! Now that is just plain stupid. I'm sure 90% of regular FSX users simply will no bother.

Move along, nothing to see here... back to FSX.
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This, I fear will be everyone's reaction.

What a turd in the punchbowl. It seems obvious now that they would do it this way, in the age of microtransactions and subscription play.

Either that, or they figure it's so good that after trying the free bits, we'll invest in it the same way as we have into 3rd party addons for FSX. It will have to be bloody amazing to get me to buy the entire world when I could just fly it on FSX for free.

What's worse is the horrible low res scenery in their latest video. It was all lies!
 
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The Microsoft Product Lead said:
"You may have played some previous products where you're at the end of a runway with a set of complex panels in front of you. That may have been real, but it wasn't a lot of fun," explains Howard. "We're going to bring the joy of flight to audiences by making it a better game."
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I WANT IT REAL YOU IDIOT!

Why would MS not have done the market research properly and discovered that thousands of users would simply be happy with a rewritten, efficient and improved version of FSX. Crazy. Lots of nasty comments on facebook about this all!
 
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