simFlight.COM Flight Simulation News Source

Every once in a while you stumble on a Wordpress Blog that is just that little bit more interesting than the average. Neptunus Lex is one of those. Today’s blog post shows a wonderful photo of a Raptor, taken by a Navy sonar operator no less ! The comments underneath are interesting also…. for military aviation enthusiasts, that is. There’s more interesting stuff on that blog, so have fun !

…. from US Homeland Security paranoia, no less! Mr. Hendrickson, a US citizen and son of  Ret. USN Captain C.F. Hendrickson acquired one of the last flying Douglas AD-4N Skyraiders (in France, no less) and brought it home with the intention to keep the history of this aircraft alive and flying! Through increasing paranoia and bureaucracy the aircraft was confiscated by the Homeland Security Dept….. If you’re a US citizen and (military) aviation lover, you can help the Hendrickson’s to get their plane back and prepare it for sharing it with the public!!! Please check out his website here and support them !

This morning i found a blog named Aerial Phenomena that recently posted an interview with Curtis Olson titled ‘Inside Flightgear‘. Curtis is the man behind Flightgear, the Open Source flight simulator that has been around for many a days and most of us have been wanting to give it a try and never got around to it (aka me, grin).  

The interview was posted on Feb 3rd but as the author explains, it is dated back from July 2008, howerver it does give quite a nice insight on Curtis himself and of course on Flightgear: CLICK.

Almost 2000 Flight Simulator Fans already joined us on Facebook. Although that is a long way to go to reach the 100.000 mark, it is encouraging to see so many people voice their support already.

To make it even easier (no registration needed) we have also opened a ‘poll’ on the FSAddon website (right hand column). Voting there means you support Flight Simulator’s future and its developers ! Flood the site, we don’t mind ! C’mon folks, lets see hands !!!

Following up on a lead from one commenter on another story we checked Microsoft US Careers Website, that is the place where MS puts up job offers, and found two very recent offerings related to ‘Flying Games’. Does this mean that MS will continue development of the Flight Simulator after the recent slash of ACES-Studio?

The most recent job on offer, dated Feb, 06th (that’s today!) is for a Lead Program Manager and here MS is looking for: “…Microsoft Game Studios is looking for a veteran Lead Program Manager/Producer to help lead the development of a new broad-attraction flight-oriented game on the PC. ”

And the second offering dated  Jan 30 is for Project Art Lead in Game Design reads: “…Does working on a small, innovative team that delivers the most immersive flight experiences available today on the PC intrigue you? Our technology makes available entire continents – potentially the entire planet – for a detailed and dynamic 3D experience. We are looking for a Project Art Lead who can define, refine, and extend the visual elements while balancing the need for fun and approachability for a broad set of users.”…

Is there hope? we thought this to be quite interesting.

Hi guys,

Well after the disappointing news of the sacking I have had time to ponder and think about what will happen now. Firstly I can not see Microsoft leasing out their code to other companies Microsoft have a history of guarding everything and normally are very guarded towards other companies seeing any of their code.

So what does this mean for us the Flight simming community…..

Read the rest of this entry »

Gals & Guys, are you a flight sim or/and aviation fan/nut/hobbyist? can you write in english? then you can BLOG!!!

Blog it right here on simFlight.com because we are looking for you, we want you to write your views and reviews and musings and rants here! don’t keep them for yourself anymore… share them with thousands of readers! 

Shoot us an email to miguel@simflight.com with a short bio and we will get you an audience!

Microsoft’s foray into the ’serious’ simulation software with ESP is slowly gaining momentum. Read what David Boker writes in his blog…. “….. At the I/ITSEC 2008 conference in early-December in Orlando, we saw many encouraging signs that our strategy is quickly gaining supporters.  If there’s one overall theme that emerged from all the amazing technology demos we saw this year, it is integration. Hardware and software companies are working together, combining existing solutions to create new ones.  This shift is great news for Microsoft ESP, our partners and customers….”. More information on Microsoft ESP here.

AOPA, the world’s largest association for pilots, has started a new initiative to get more people into the real world of flying. Through their ‘LetsGoFlying’ activities, website and blogs they provide information for would-be pilots. Through a series of blogs connected to that website pilots of all levels share their stories and experiences with the readers. I have the honor to be one of those contributors and the focus of MY blog is to show and strengthen the obvious links between Flight Simulator and real-world piloting. My AOPA blog is here, and the LetsGoFlying main website is here. Enjoy !

Dear Reader,

if you feel that urge to write rant and comment about your hobby on these pages, why not become a contributing editor? We sure can use a hand! We do not offer anything but your claim to fame and you will get to pick a shiny fantastic job title  like: Associate Editor , Managing Editor, Assistant Managing Editor, Contributing Editor, Contributing Managing Staff Associate… well you get the drift, mix & match as needed.

But serioulsy, if you’d like to blog with us please shoot an email to miguel@simflight.com.

Sometimes one just gets caught off guard in this hectic world so full of daily information overload! Like when I first read about the New Mexico ‘Spaceport America’ being under construction. Since it is not April 1st today, I guess I can report on it. The plan is to have the world’s first commercially operated ‘port’ for space flight. Since nothing has ever stopped man from his dreams, this could be reality too in not too long! Read all about it here.

I thought this would be a good time to start listing some of my favorite aviation musems. For most of us in the northern parts of th world, NOW is the time to start making plans for visits next year. One of my all-time favorites in the US is Kermit Weeks’ Fantasy of Flight near Orlando, Florida. They have a wonderful on-line shop now too! ‘Worthy’ is their collection of history DVD’s !And of course, being in Florida, you don’t have to wait till next year to visit….. how about this weekend !!??

After just posting what seemed to be an endless stream of press releases about news products, patches, etc i remembered a nice ‘rant’ i read written by a friend of mine (you will know who it is) in his blog a few days ago.

It starts like this: ‘When will YOU (FS) public relation people (do they really exist???) learn to write something more original to us news editors ? After more than 5 years at simFlight and 3 years at Avsim I am getting extremely and hopelessly bored by the continuous bloated texts that people submit us every day’ … and you can read it all by jumping to his site.

Needless to say that i loved it