Flying High with Flight Simulator 2000

Microsoft, like many other companies, is looking ahead to the new millennium by adding more desktop aviator fans to its popular 17-year-old series, Flight Simulator. This year, the company is making sure it brings in new aviators and appeasing its hard-core fan base with two options - a standard version and a professional version.

Peter Parsons, the title's product manager, says that rather than copy code over from the last version of Flight Simulator - the team started fresh. It abandoned the old code to build from scratch, although Parsons will admit stealing a little of the physics code from Combat Flight Simulator and optimizing it. Flight Simulator 2000 soars into the new year with 16-bit color, improved sound, volumetric fogging and lighting effects, DirectX 7.0 support, better textures, and more detailed cities.

Both versions come complete with several new aircraft. The standard version of the game adds the Concorde and Boeing 777-300, while the professional version adds the Mooney Bravao and the King Air 350 alongside all the planes featured in the last version of the simulator. Yet the planes look better in 2000, with more-accurate textures, easier-to-define plane parts, and realistic surroundings. To make sure the planes feel real, all aircraft models are endorsed by their makers, and FS 2000 comes with endorsements from Cessna, Bombardier, and FlightSafety International.

FS 2000 is bigger than ever with the addition of more than 20,000 worldwide airports to its databases. The previous version only sported 3,000. And for pros, the game also offers signal beacons to those airports, to make the title even more realistic. You'll be able to plan your flight easily with a graphical flight planner, use a basic GPS to find where you are, and an improved weather system to make sure you feel all the bumps in the air.

Both versions come with an option to download weather data to help you simulate weather conditions wherever you are or wherever you want to be. Flight junkies can alter their conditions with a cloud editor and weather editor to give them open skies, or they can crank up the pressure for flying in a full-blown thunderstorm.

If you're looking to fly through detailed replicas of your favorite city, FS2000 includes London, Paris, New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Chicago. The pro version uses those cities, plus Boston, Washington DC, Seattle, Berlin, Tokyo, and Rome, and more than 40 other pre-existing cities.

Microsoft reports that more than 50 percent of the fans of the title are registered pilots or pilots-in-training. This made the option to build a pro version of the game even easier. The upscale version adds instrument flight rules (IFR), a flight dynamics editor, an instrument panel editor, and a 300-plus page manual (users weren't fond of the last version's 40-page manual). For those looking to take their flight training from the desktop to the skies, the game comes with a sample of Cessna's training program along with discounts on products from FlightSafety International and King Schools.

That fan base also includes those who fly the many custom add-ons. And Microsoft has worked with add-on developers to help make sure their products will work with the FS 2000. The company has been steadfast in preparing those developers for adding newer FS 2000 wares to the game's offerings. To make sure the community is supported in all its needs, Microsoft will be expanding its FS area soon after launch with more information, flight tips, and FS news.

The long history of Flight Simulator has also garnered the attention of the military along with its civilian aviators. Parsons talks about a Navy officer that soared through the ranks at flight school - all the way up to the Admiral's List. His commanders, amazed at the officer's achievement, asked him where he had flown before. His response was that he was a flight-sim fan. Now, the Navy and Air Force are is evaluating the use of FS in their pilot programs. The Navy evaluation study will be concluded this winter, and the Air Force study will conclude sometime next spring.

Both versions of the Flight Simulator 2000 for Windows 95/98/NT/2000 are expected to ship around November 1.