FSX

Video games - when I say the word, I'm sure many of you who are college-aged immediately think Xbox and PlayStation. Personally, I've never really gotten into either system, other than the occasional game of NCAA Football or Madden. During high school, when my desire for flying was arguably at it's lowest point, the only times I played video games were occasionally on the weekends. In the times before and after high school, however, I have played primarily with a flight simulator on my computer.

The particular flight sims I have had experience with are a few in the Microsoft Flight Simulator series: 2002, 2004, and FSX(released in 2006). I used FS2002 sparingly in grade school, playing more with FS2004 in that period of time. In the post-high school period, I've played with FSX almost exclusively on the PC that's part of my college's laptop program.

While FSX came out in 2006, there have been several third-party add-ons that are available online for purchase. There are some out there who have easily dropped thousands of dollars on add-on planes, scenery enhancements, etc. for the game. Myself? I've spent maybe a measly $100 (including the cost of the game and my joystick!).

CLICK HERE to see a YouTube video of just how realistic FSX can get...

The best part of FSX for me is that I'm able to familiarize myself with a lot of the systems of an aircraft that I may or may not fly someday. Almost all of the planes in the game are system-for-system, button-for-button, sound-for-sound, etc. which, in my opinion, makes the game extremely fun and realistic. More or less, FSX and its realism allow me to live out my aviation dreams in a virtual world. There's something about flying, even the virtual kind, that is just encapsulating and makes me want to come back for more each and every time.

Another neat feature about FSX is that I am able to simulate going in and out of real world airports in planes that may not be suitable for those airports. I'm also able to simulate extreme weather conditions and fly into them, whereas in real life that would never be possible. Below, I've uploaded a screen-capture video of one of my landings to showcase this. In the video, I am flying into Chicago Midway Airport in a Boeing 757-200 series aircraft. While 757's have been in and out of MDW before, the weather that I am landing in would result in a total ground stop at MDW - no planes in or out, no questions asked. In my opinion, that's what makes it so fun! Of course, this wouldn't be possible in the real world because it's too dangerous, but it also makes it extremely challenging, which is something that I definitely look for when I play FSX these days.

To give you an idea of the weather that I'm flying in here, the visibility is 1/16 of a mile, or 330 ft - basically the length of a football field - and I'm traveling at ~145 MPH (speed can be seen on the top display and dial to the left). At that speed, 330 ft is traveled in about 1.5 seconds - pretty dangerous.

In addition to these weather simulations, there is also an Air Traffic Control (ATC) feature that is added in to FSX, which allows you to basically talk to robots using a series of preset commands programmed into the game. This system, while helpful at first, is not as similar to the real world as I would like.

Looking for a real-world ATC add-on one day, I came across something called VATSIM. VATSIM, or Virtual Air Traffic SIMulation, is a free online network which provides the realistic ATC I was looking for. On the network, people who want to fly their planes log on as pilots, and people who want to be air traffic controllers log on as controllers. Communications work by way of a chat box, or by voice. On my joystick, there's actually a push-to-talk button that I use whenever I want to speak on the network.

In using VATSIM, I have greatly improved my voice communications in the real world as well. VATSIM combined with FSX have provided a practice ground of sorts for my real world flying. In FSX I also fly a Cessna 172 that is almost button-for-button like the one that I fly in real life. While the feeling of flying it in the game is far different than the feeling of flying in real life, for obvious reasons, to say that it is incredibly helpful and a great training resource would be a huge understatement.

I hope this provided some insight in to the flight sim that I use and have come to really enjoy flying with over the years. In my next post, I'll talk about what it was like to actually land at Midway Airport in real life!