Microsoft To Offer Flight For Free This Spring

hypnosec writes "Microsoft's Flight Simulator series, which was in dormant state until now, will see a re-launch this spring and that too for free. The name of this series will be simply Flight, and players will have free access to the digital sky with this simulator. In other words, it will be available as a free download; however, the user would need to buy additional content to enhance their experience. The content that can be purchased includes aircraft as well as new environments. Microsoft states that the most amazing part of this game is the user can experience some real life locations like Big Island of Hawaii along with 'region-specific weather patterns, foliage, terrain and landmarks.'" [Video demo here.] I'd like to know where the ESRB finds "crude humor" or "mild violence" in there.

I got my beta invite yesterday

[DCTech]

And I have to say I'm really impressed with the game. The free model seems great too, especially considering that there has always been a huge market place towards Flight Simulator aircrafts, scenery etc. Maybe they will work out some deals with third party developers too. But as I'm under NDA I wont say too much, but you can sign up for beta here [microsoft.com]. I suggest you do!

Re:I prefer the old model...

[0123456]

Those community-created addons weren't free. They cost a large amount of money, but people still loved them.

That's odd. My FS2004 installation is 36GB and I only ever paid for one aircraft add-on... the rest of those gigabytes were all free addons.

Re:no put meigs field back in as the default airpo

[anypundit]

no put meigs field back in as the default airport

You won't be able to take off with the giant X's carved into the runway.

Re:I got my beta invite yesterday

[jandrese]

Amazingly enough, people already do this, albeit not with Microsoft Flight Simulator. X-Plane pilots join up with virtual air traffic controllers to efficiently run the airspace in their virtual world. X-Plane is a pretty hardcore package though that appeals to a different set of people than Microsoft Flight Simulator.

Re:I got my beta invite yesterday

[cvtan]

Mahalo for pointing out that Honolulu is not on the Big Island. Fun place to visit, but it's hardly serene".

Re:no put meigs field back in as the default airpo

[Sporkinum]

That was a sad day when the default was no longer Meigs. I think that was a throwback from Sublogic days when the developers were based in Champaign-Urbana.

Re:I got my beta invite yesterday

[Anonymous Coward]

Fight isn't Flight Simulator per-se. MS sold the Flight Simulator franchise to Lockheed Martin, Flight is a re-design from the ground up.

http://www.flyingmag.com/blogs/fly-wire/goodbye-flight-simulator-hello-microsoft-flight

Re:I got my beta invite yesterday

[Anonymous Coward]

IE saved the web? Really? Wow ...

Sure, by stagnating and spurring innovation in other browsers. Sing along: Here it comes to save the day...

You ever heard of XMLHttpRequest?

It was invented by Microsoft.

Sorry but Microsoft has a lot of great engineers working on their projects as well, including IE.

Better deals

[gr8_phk]

If you really like flight sims, X-plane is the way to go. They have lots of free 3rd party content. If cheap is what you like, FlightGear is the way to go - open source with tons of add-ons, downloadable scenerey, but the graphics are not as pretty. Both have a linux (and mac?) version of course.

Re:I got my beta invite yesterday

[the_bard17]

FSX has plug-ins for VATSIM and IVAO, just like X-Plane. Furthermore, FSX and X-Plane pilots can see and interact with each other via the virtual environment, so it could be considered platform independent. Runs on Windows, Mac, and Linux, so it's *that* platform independent, too.