'Lo!

I had ATC Sim 1 for years; quite enjoyable. After losing it with my last computer, I went without for a long time. Just a few days ago I got ATCS2.

Gee - it would be nice to be able to play the thing. 

Take this mini review/rant for what it is. I haven't gotten all the bugs worked out yet, perhaps my mind will change in the future but for right now, my advice would be 'don't waste your time and money'.

First, it's functionally no different than ATCS1. Oh; it has several new features, such as 'real pilot voices' that sound so stilted they're even worse than the computer generated voice, and a 'real ATC' feature that allows the program to download near-current ATC info; the idea being you get to control 'real planes'. There is also a multiplayer setup where you can control FS9 players; apparently. Cool so far, but:

No speech recognition. Oh; it says there's SR on the support website; but no mention of it either in the game or manuals. No info on setting it up. No SR program visible in the ATC Sim folder. No info on how to set it up if it exists. On the support site, it lists the required program - but no info on how to find it on the web. I searched for quite some time; no help at all. The support forum can't be accessed apparently - at least, I tried for over an hour and it's the only time registering for a forum has ever screwed up - it gave me no chance to choose or set a password; the register page hung on application. Now, I apparently have an account and no way to use it.
Online support is apparently extremely limited; during work hours I'm not likely to be near my computer. And he specifies NO questions to be asked regarding speech recognition.

Sorry; maybe I'm just an old grump who expects too much but if you're going to sell a product; you'd better be prepared to provide effective customer service, in my opinion. The info I need to get this working might well be out there somewhere; either in the manuals or somewhere on the site, but if it is I can't find it and it's annoying me big-time. ATCS1 involved starting its SR software, training it, then turning on the sim and playing. So far, I've been trying for two solid days to get this going and frustration's peaking.

And yes, SR is critical - I've no interest at all in typing my commands in.

(sigh) Well; I'll keep trying - I paid eighty bucks for this, I'm not gonna give up easily.