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This thread has been linked to the game 'Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004: A Century of Flight'.
Anybody got this new Century Of Flight one ? What does it play like ? Plenty of online reviews of it but none in the gaming press yet so I wondered what people's thoughts of it were ?
According to what I've read the new pilot's school makes it easier for newbies.
According to what I've read the new pilot's school makes it easier for newbies.
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Well I've come to this conclusion.
Don't be taken in by Microsoft's publicity and pretty screen shots. Running on my system, 2.6GHZ P4 HT, 512mb ram @400mhz, ATI Radeon 9800 128mb and SBLive Digital I cannot get the kind of graphics their adverts show and still make the game playable.
The training school option is indeed good, but fatally flawed, everytime you go wrong your instructor says "well I cann see you're not getting the hang of this, let's try again next time" and you're forced to abandon that lesson, hence you never make the mistakes to learn how play, and often what the instructor stops you for you will never know...frustrating.
Definitely a game that suffers from the online documentation only syndrome, you need the info as you play, so you either ALT-TAB all the time and reduce performance in game, or print it all off, not a good idea given the volume of information.
Scenery is also disappointing, the only way to really see it is the external view, and that makes proper control of the place difficult, plus the graphics engine only seems to draw what is in your line of sight, hence when you change your view direction in the cockpit their is a noticeable momeny whilst the engine draws the scenery properly. Annoying.
Sim fans will like it, but anyone curious having seen the Century Of Flight adverts and wonderful trailers would be best to steer clear at this price, thank god I got it for GAD !
Don't be taken in by Microsoft's publicity and pretty screen shots. Running on my system, 2.6GHZ P4 HT, 512mb ram @400mhz, ATI Radeon 9800 128mb and SBLive Digital I cannot get the kind of graphics their adverts show and still make the game playable.
The training school option is indeed good, but fatally flawed, everytime you go wrong your instructor says "well I cann see you're not getting the hang of this, let's try again next time" and you're forced to abandon that lesson, hence you never make the mistakes to learn how play, and often what the instructor stops you for you will never know...frustrating.
Definitely a game that suffers from the online documentation only syndrome, you need the info as you play, so you either ALT-TAB all the time and reduce performance in game, or print it all off, not a good idea given the volume of information.
Scenery is also disappointing, the only way to really see it is the external view, and that makes proper control of the place difficult, plus the graphics engine only seems to draw what is in your line of sight, hence when you change your view direction in the cockpit their is a noticeable momeny whilst the engine draws the scenery properly. Annoying.
Sim fans will like it, but anyone curious having seen the Century Of Flight adverts and wonderful trailers would be best to steer clear at this price, thank god I got it for GAD !
I cant see the joy from flight simulators really, especially with them being so expensive.
So far so good, I'd say don't buy if you have no joystick - first tried it with keybaord and it's hopeless, so went out and bought a logitech wingman joystick.
Also be warned regarding system spec and the auto configure, it set my settings far lower than they could actually goand, true to Pr's comments, I did indeed spend a good hour tweaking for best performance/graphics. I'm running a P4HT 2.6GHZ with 512MB RAM and ATI RADEON 9800 128MB RAM and it seems I can do it at 1280x1024 32 bit colour with everything fully on. Hurrah !
The training (Flight School) is good for anyone with no clue how to play, and the money and attention MS have put into this shows, admittedly some parts of the tutorial are a little too obvious an attempt by the speakers to be 'cool' but it all gels together nicely. For anyone whose ever wanted to fly I'd recommend this.
Also be warned regarding system spec and the auto configure, it set my settings far lower than they could actually goand, true to Pr's comments, I did indeed spend a good hour tweaking for best performance/graphics. I'm running a P4HT 2.6GHZ with 512MB RAM and ATI RADEON 9800 128MB RAM and it seems I can do it at 1280x1024 32 bit colour with everything fully on. Hurrah !
The training (Flight School) is good for anyone with no clue how to play, and the money and attention MS have put into this shows, admittedly some parts of the tutorial are a little too obvious an attempt by the speakers to be 'cool' but it all gels together nicely. For anyone whose ever wanted to fly I'd recommend this.
I had flight Sim 98. Rubbish.
cipro wrote:
> My brother got Flight Sim 2000, but we both found it a tad too boring.
My m8 had that game and it was pretty crap, u could just put it on auto pilot and that was it.
> My brother got Flight Sim 2000, but we both found it a tad too boring.
My m8 had that game and it was pretty crap, u could just put it on auto pilot and that was it.
Well, it came this morning (thanks SR !) and I'm sitting here installing it. 4 Discs ! 2.8 GB for a full install (other options are available but with 120GB HD who cares) Nicely it has a manual with the basics on to get you started, as well as more complete documents on the disc and integrated into the program itself. Once it's done I have to install my joystick (and dust it off!), I'll post later as to what it's like.
My brother got Flight Sim 2000, but we both found it a tad too boring. I must say though that century of flight does look pretty good, hopefully it plays alot better than FS2000 because if it does I may very well give it a try.
PC Gamer gave it 9/10, anyway I've got it on GAD now so when it arrives I'll post my thoughts on it.
I need to take a tranquilizer just thinking about Microsoft Flight Simulator 2005.
It looks pretty good....
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