It was recently brought to my attention that Microsoft Game Studios released a new free to play flight simulator, Microsoft Flight. I was very intrigued by this since I have thoroughly enjoyed Flight Sim games. After dusting off my Saitek X-52 and downloading the game I was ready to go.
My first impression of the game was that the graphics were just gorgeous. I like the amount of detail on the land itself and all of the sight seeing structures. This really plays in to a mechanic of the game where you can fly tours for NPC's.The Aerocache hunt is very interesting. When you first select this game mode you are presented with a list of Aerocache's that are available to you to find. For anyone who has done any geocaching this is very similar, you are presented with a with a couple of clues and then are to do some research on those clues. Part of the research is doing a web search on the location via the search Bing button in game. Then you get in your plane and your off trying to find the aerocahche. Another thing that I really enjoy about Flight is the objective based flying which provides you with tasks on how to fly your plane. This is something that I would have wanted in previous flight sim games. This approach helps you get familiar with the airplanes in short mission like bursts.
The only problem with this is limited number of planes that you get to start with. You only start 3 with planes. You have the option to buy more, and at the time of this writing it is only 3 more planes. The problem with this is the amount that those planes cost. If you're feeling frisky and want to expand your hangar to 6 planes, then you are going to spend at least $30 for the other 3 planes. $10 per plane seems a bit steep. Another problem that I have with this game is that you only have access to the main island. If you want to fly to the rest of the islands then you are going to shell out another $20. With that $20 you have more missions available, access to the rest of the islands and another plane is included, the Vans RV-6. While this may seem to be a little better in the way of downloadable content, there is major problem with this and it's you're limited to Hawaii. So if I wanted to fly to O'Hare I would not be able to because the only place you can go is Hawaii.
The bottom line is that this is great game for people who want to try out a flight sim game without paying for a full retail game. It will teach you the basics about a flight sim and also introduce a limited amount of aircraft to you. If it turns out that you do in fact like this game and want to expand on your flight sim playing, then I would suggest that you pick Flight Simulator X instead of paying $50 for part of a game.
