Continuing the discussion from If 2024 is Working for You, What Are You Doing That I am Not?:
Right now, there seems to be a lot of fussing and complaining about FS-2024, (and a lot of carry-over fussing about 2020 as well.)
What I want to focus on here are the positive aspects of the simulators, both of them, and what it is that makes them work for you.
First of all, my hat’s off to these forums.
I can honestly say that if it weren’t for the forums here - and all the contributing members - I would have probably given up on both sims a long time ago as there is just so much to grasp - just like flying in real life. (Except that stupid beginner mistakes don’t get you killed!)
As a corollary to this, my hat’s of to the individual members, without whom these forums would be a ghost-town. To be perfectly honest, were I to try to name everyone who has helped me enjoy the sims, I’d need a macro-expansion on “@everybody” - and the list would be way, WAY to long to post in a reasonable length.
Even the moderators, (though sometimes I want to strangle them!), are part of what make this work, especially @TheSevenflyer. His gentle advice and encouragement has done much to help me adapt to this particular forum’s culture.
Best of all, I get excellent ideas on where to visit, or advice on how to fly more successfully - avoiding the NTSB or getting the aircraft mechanic upset.
It’s like a club where I can talk to, swap lies with, and generally enjoy the company of other like-minded flying enthusiasts like myself.
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Second: The sims themselves.
Before I go on - yes, I know that both sims have more bugs than a biological warfare laboratory, and yes there’s a lot MSobo could have done and/or could be doing, but that horse has already been beaten to death in other threads.
What keeps bringing me back? The shear joy of flying.
I’m not a pilot. It is very unlikely, (short of a special Act Of Congress changing rules for my benefit), that I will ever become a pilot, and about the only thing I’ve ever had the opportunity to fly, (IRL), is a balsa-wood plane with a rubber-band. (And I remember as a kid seeing who among my friend group could get the greatest number of turns on the plane’s big rubber band before breaking it.)
So enters the flight simulator to fill that void. I get to, (pretend), I’m a big-shot pilot with a stable of aircraft that would make Jay Leno envious!
And I get to fly ALL OF THEM!! Every single one!
OK, maybe I make an utter fool of myself in the DC-6 and burn up some expensive Super-Wasp rotary engines, but that’s OK. Unlike real life, I can reset the flight and try again, or pick an easier aircraft. Or hit “active pause”, get a drink and relax my hands or make a trip to the head.
Another thing that I do to make the sims work for me is I (try not to) bite off more than I can chew. I, (who finds “flying a pattern” to be a nearly impossible challenge), don’t worry about fancy instrument flights or the pickier details of long-haul flying, since there’s no joy in what’s certain to be abysmal failure.
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The Scenery:
Just yesterday I decided to fly FS-2024 out over Daytona Beach where my wife and I have a lot of memories, (What did you do in MSFS today? (Part 2) - #9242 by Jimrh1993), and I was able to find specific details that were - quite simply - mind blowing!
Even the Krispy-Kreme doughnut shop is there!
(Obviously this picture shows a time when the “HOT” light ISN’T lit - there are only two cars in the parking lot![1])
Flying over Moscow or St. Petersburg. Sightseeing where I grew up in Chesapeake Va. or Long Island N.Y. Exploring Gaza or Luxor in Egypt. Getting banned from French airspace for stunt-flying around, (through!), the Arc de Triomphe or the Eiffel Tower. Maybe I’ll take the Optica, (a great plane for sight-seeing that maxes out at a blistering 100kts and is a joy to fly), and go wandering around the Grand Canyon - or maybe Iceland or the Norwegian Fjords - there’s a lot of places I’ve never been to and in the sim I can go, bum knees and all!
What say ye?
P.S.
Please save the fussing and negative comments for the other forum threads, OK?
==================== Footnotes ====================
- Krispy-Kreme is the only food establishment that I’ve ever seen that is subject to restrictive covenants regarding construction and placement.
As far as I can tell, every Krispy-Kreme shop, (that’s not inside some other establishment like a casino, mall, or adventure park), is built on either a corner or, if along the length of a road, has a Jersey barrier along the entire length of the store’s lot to prevent left-hand turns.
The problem is that Krispy-Kreme doughnuts are so very popular, (especially when the “HOT” light is lit, signifying that the doughnut machine is running and perfectly fresh doughnuts are coming off the belt), that people have inadvertantly turned in front of other traffic to get to the shops!
