MS Flight Simulator: The End of an Era

    imageAs part of the downsizing of Microsoft , the ACES branch responsible for developing the Microsoft Flight Simulator series of games was closed . This is the final sentence, not subject to appeal. Millions of fans of the best civilian flight simulator will not wait for continuation, and dozens of companies working on the issue of paid add-ons will have to be re-qualified as management houses. Along with the dissolution of the ACES studio, hopes for seeing their second project, Microsoft Train Simulator 2 , scheduled for release this year, also collapsed .

    MSFS is one of the longest series of games: the first game was released in 1982, the last one two years ago (and about a year ago, the big MSFSX: Acceleration expansion came out). During this time, Flight Simulator gathered an army of fans, acquired thousands of free add-ons, dozens of companies worked on software and hardware for this game ... In this situation, several large companies offered to buy the game code from Microsoft, but they refused, saying that “MS remains true to the series that has proven successful for 27 years. ” What this means is not clear, because there is no one else to develop the game. Perhaps MS will remain the publisher of the game, and the development of a third-party company - time will tell. Fans of flight simulators do not lose hope of seeing MSFS2010 - let it be under a different name.

    Under the cut - a few nostalgic pictures. Rather, the history of the development of flight simulators from 1978 to 2007.


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    Typical playing place. Three monitors, joystick (or rather, hotas ) Saitex X52 , trackball, compact keyboard.

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    Not a very typical playing place. A guy bought a decommissioned Boeing 747 cabin and installed it in his garage =)

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    The first flight sim: subLogic for Apple II, somewhere between 1978 and 1982. A little more and from it MSFS will be born.

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    And these are the parents, Bruce Artwick and Stu Moment.

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    A screenshot of 27 years ago. MSFS 1.0, 1982.

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    The second version. 1984 year. Flying over New York. Check out the Empire State Building.

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    The third version. 1988 year. Flight over Paris - see the Eiffel Tower?

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    The fourth version. 1989 year. Over the Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco.

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    In the fourth version, you can see the plane outside: Cessna at the Statue of Liberty.

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    The fifth version. 1993 year. Paris again.

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    The sixth version is actually a port from MS-DOS to Windows 95, the differences are minimal. So they called it: MSFS 95.

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    The sixth and a half version. 1997, and is called MSFS 98. There are many new things: new cities from around the world (do you know?), For the first time you can fly a helicopter and, most importantly, it has become possible to develop third-party add-ons. The add-ons will make MSFS a cult game.

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    The seventh version is from the cockpit and from the outside. MSFS 2000. Three-dimensional view of the cab. Added 17 000 (!) Airports. Terrible brakes even on top processors (500MHz).

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    The eighth version, MSFS 2002. It was planned for release in September 2001, but was delayed to urgently remove the models of the World Trade Center.

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    Ninth version, MSFS 2004. Released for the centenary of the first flight of the Wright brothers, a bunch of historic aircraft, more cities and airports. Realistic (in the sense of real-time) weather, three-dimensional clouds that you can fly into.

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    Tenth version, MSFS X, 2006. The best flight simulator on the planet. Thousands of cities and airports, hundreds of aircraft, millions of fans, operating virtual airlines ...

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    The latest official addition, MSFS: Acceleration, 2007.
    Even more planes, helicopters with working winches, fighters with missiles, huge aircraft carriers, all the bells and whistles of modern three-dimensional graphics, crazy beautiful landscapes.

    Screenshots taken from the Czech website on the history of flight simulation and from Wikipedia .

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