i was pretty stunned when i saw it, X-Plane 10 is looking quite promising right now, look: 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yCoDPNvOMP0&NR=1

amazed yet?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-8e8-9yzHg&feature=related

default craft preview:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-qDhY6Pj2L8&feature=related


i just wanna take this opportunity to say two words that i believe sum up every request we could possibly make -- "top that!" 


seriously, if MS manages to measure up to the advanced features and incredible looks of XP10, whilst still making it "all-welcoming and fun for everyone" such as they have mentioned, we shall have one seriously awesome simulator at hands 



i guess it doesn't hurt to point out how MS is definitely NOT ALONE in the FlightSim business - and it's got some pretty hard ground sky to cover if they wanna be still "on top" by the time "Flight" hits the shelves 

needless to say - but i feel it's impossible to overstate this - "Flight" MUST be able to run SMOOTHLY at top-settings on viable hardware existing at the time of release - X-Plane, as far as i've flown it, has a far superior looks-to-performance ratio, and that's NOT something that MS can afford to overlook anymore...


and as for us sim-pilots,  we have nothing but to gain from this situation - ain't a little competition a grand motivation? 


cheerz!

"Amazed yet?"

Ermmm... no.... I've tried X-plane (well, the demo. Ran great!) and it's just, well... OOGLY. No offense to fans but it really looks like FS2000 on a bad day. I WILL however concede that JRollons aircraft models are pure works of art! MS won't have a hard time making Flight Prettier, but boy, if they can match that level of detail for default AC *whistles*

And yes, a little healthy competition is good for everybody!

New Light wrote on Jan 16^th, 2011 at 4:01am:


You just reminded me of something else I didn't really like about X-plane 9... no traffic! and no actual ATC either! Unless I was really missing something, or it was excluded from the demo... if X-plane 10 delivers the whole package, I may try it out, but I don't know about switching... yet... the realistic experience is one thing, but a living world with terrain detail and some modest eye-candy push it over the edge to near-reality and add quite a lot to the enjoyment of any simulator. For me, only FS has that going right now. Hide & Watch!

They would need to severely need to increase texture quality for me to consider it at all.

one thing that i REALLY appreciate about X-Plane is the way the developers talk openly and straight-up to their public...

while M$ has some *urgh* publicity chump write up a perfectly generic piece of rambling on vaguely how they intend to approach the development of "flight", which sounds like a fishy sales pitch and tells us a whole lot of nothing as to what's REALLY going on - the XP10 crew has no holdbacks into blogging highly technical details on EXACTLY what they're doing, how it's going, and why they're doing it they way they are.... 


heads up, M$ - people DO NOT appreciate being "publicit'ized"... when you treat us like that it feels like politicians making vague promisses in a way they can "fine-print" themselves out of the heat, WHEN they don't deliver 


we wanna hear details from the development team, how are they addressing the performance bottlenecks that plagued FSX? how are they employing (if at all) new DX11 GPU  capabilities? - what new simulation features they're working on?

we DO NOT care for the dumbed-down, sugar-coated, "everything we do is perfect" salesmens spew of a P/R team who very likely have no idea what FS is all about!



look alive! - i advise you M$ folks in the most friendly of ways - treating folks like this is why EA is the most hated/pirated game company out there... M$ is not far behind on that aspect - and should a tie between Flight and XP-10 arise (highly likely, from what i read on their dev-blog), ppl could very well go with the guys who are "not evil" for a change 

I haven't been excited about X-Plane ever since I tried the demo. To me, the graphics are still better in FSX, but the main problem I have with X-Plane is the controls... to me the airplanes don't look like they're flying, they look like some two year old is holding them playing...

Of course, I would be thrilled if it did motivate MS but I don't think it needs to to keep it's audience. 

X-Plane looks like Graphics-wise they should be looking pretty good in a few more versions...

I'm a die hard MSFS fan and never considered switching to XP....

Until now.

After looking at those videos and reading what people have wrote, my plan is to switch to the simulator that fill what I consider the minimum requirements for the next gen of FS:

1. ATC that's more in depth then the FSX default system. It would be nice to declare emergencies but not necessary. However, as an aspiring ATC myself It would be nice to see some more real world procedures take place. For example, if one of these sims implements actual separation between aircraft, then they have a big leg up IMO. FSX IFR flights are a nice feature.. but 99.99% of the the the ATC warn me about hazardous aircraft in 2 specific situations that don't matter to me anymore. 1. When they aren't a threat. Standard separation is 5 miles horizontal and 1000 ft. vertical. If I'm at FL320, I don't give a crap what the guy at FL280 is doing. and 2. After it's already passed me. At least 50% of my traffic advisories are off. Had it been an actual situation I would be long dead before ATC got around to telling me about it.

2. Decent graphics. I run FSX medium to medium low for ground textures and slightly higher for everything else. I feel this is a fairly good standard as a base. The biggest drawback for XP10 so far is the graphics I've seen in the videos. Looks too FS2002 or 90's era console gameish for me. Of course, the videos are preliminary so no real judgement has been made just yet. I just don't want to feel like I took a step backward.

3. Improved flight model. Something we've always wanted. I think it's about time we got it, right?

4. Detailed and fairly accurate aircraft. So far since I became a Flight sim enthusiast, MSFS has impressed me with some of their aircraft and the systems therein. Of course for every model they've nailed, they messed up 3 others. So far from the video from XP10 the default look AMAZING. As long as the systems work as well as they look.

5. AI of course. I've replaced FSX AI with WOAI and it's quite nice. Hopefully something like that comes up for XP and MS Flight.

I figure since I've become used to FSX and its now technically the "old" version of FS we can use it as a base to compare the newcomers to. I have little doubt in my mind that MS Flight will blow XP10 out of the water with the graphics, however, if that's all they have to offer there's a good chance I'll be switching to XP10 if they model the flight environment as well as they seem to be. MSFS has had a long run. It's time they upped their game and stopped trying to impress us with eye candy. Beautiful eye candy it may be 

Well I hope that MS Flight does has some stiff competition. There are a large number of simmers who will never be able to experience it because MS do not intend to roll out the online service to a large swathe of Asia and Africa. It has been hard enough to get FSX in these regions, but now we face a total lockout.