Flightsim

[Vollgas]

I am creating this post for no particular reason other than to share this hobby of mine with the community and see if maybe there are others like me who enjoy it.

I generally play on MSFS 2020, and I usually like to fly the PMDG 737-800 or the Hans Hartmann ATR 72-600, although the FBW A32N is amazing as well. I have been meaning to try the PMDG 777F, but I find long haul flights kind of boring, plus I play on VATSIM and I do not know radio procedure outside of Europe.

Spoiler

I use the Logitech G Saitek Pro (including thrust levers) and the Logitech G Pro Rudder Pedals. I got all of it for under 100 Euros from a second hand store, and I honestly love both pieces of equipment, especially the pedals.

Spoiler

As I stated above, I usually fly on the VATSIM network for ATC, and when I can afford it I like to pay the Navigraph subscription for the updated AIRACs, and for the extreme convenience of having flight charts synchronised with your game location in airports for which I do not own scenery. I like to fly for Worldwide Virtual, a Virtual Airline that allows you to do whichever flights you please for whichever real life airline you want. Finally, I even made my own livery for my Virtual Airline using Blender (the only time in my life I've used that God forsaken program). It has some issues, but I think it looks decent enough.

 

[AstroNoodle]

Thank you

 

[Phola]

This is really cool!! I don’t know much about flight sims, but it sounds way more immersive than I thought. The fact that you fly with live ATC and even made your own livery in Blender is super impressive. Do you always fly with full realism, or do you sometimes just relax and fly for fun?

 

[kerzify]

Flight Sim is great, Especially Microsoft, Got a rig of my own that I play MFS on and also play VATSIM, As for rig, I couldn't tell you which one I have one of these

 

[Jimmy Bovine]

Really cool, didn't know we had flight simmers here. I mainly play IL-2 Sturmovik, BF-109 F4 main using the ancient Microsoft Sidewinder force feedback joystick from 1998. Used to use Oculus Rift, but the resolution was so low I kept shooting down friendly German planes, so I went back to using the monitor. The sense of speed and scale was something very special in VR though, would totally recommend it!

 

[Vollgas]

it sounds way more immersive than I thought

It's one of those hobbies where the more money you throw, the better the experience. If you were filthy rich and had nothing better to spend the money on, you could buy a super-beefy computer and setup a home-made cockpit in a room just with commercially available products. I have included a few setups I've found on-line from people's setups. Some products (planes) for many Flight Simulators even have certificates which grant them the validity to be used for real life pilot training. However, setups like these tend to cost several tens of thousands of dollars in the end (except for the bottom one, which is actually kind of budget-friendly). Regarding immersion within the software itself, it can get as immersive as you want to push it to be. Personally, I even file my plans through the Eurocontrol tools to make sure that my route would be legal in real life.

Spoiler

Do you always fly with full realism, or do you sometimes just relax and fly for fun?

I started flying with a very cheap, very crappy controller, and in a very crappy computer (and in Microsoft Flight Simulator X, which has not aged very well). Flying recreational aircraft felt like a rather tedious craft, as the limited controls and inputs really made it annoying. Commercial aircraft, however, have autopilot, so I started to focus on learning how to fly them instead. Now that I have a semi-decent computer (although MSFS consumes VRAM like crazy, which severely impacts FPS) and a semi-decent budget-friendly setup, I do find myself doing some more flights close to the ground, enjoying the views.

Really cool, didn't know we had flight simmers here. I mainly play IL-2 Sturmovik, BF-109 F4 main using the ancient Microsoft Sidewinder force feedback joystick from 1998. Used to use Oculus Rift, but the resolution was so low I kept shooting down friendly German planes, so I went back to using the monitor. The sense of speed and scale was something very special in VR though, would totally recommend it!

I pray for the day a good mixed military-civil aviation simulator is released.

 

[HDRcade]

I haven't played any flight sims for decades - but the closest I'd got in recent years was Elite Dangerous - I really like space stuff and it was right up my street. It's basically a fantasy quasi-realistic space travel and exploration simulator that has a lot in common with flight simulators, with a sprinkle of RP, factions, combat and in-universe politics. I almost bought a flight stick controller for it.

You can do stuff like deliveries, luxury tourism cruises, bounty hunting, refuelling stranded ships, discover new systems/planets or just be a space pirate.

Can recommend it, although many find it boring or too much of a learning curve.

O7