So, I have been flying ‘the other simulator’ mostly as of late, but the last couple of days was spent in MSFS again, although my focus in this sim has changed to IFR with bigger aircraft.
new top 5
A320 (FBW) - frankly I find as a package it is better than the Fenix
A320 (Fenix) - the aircraft on it’s own without QoL features is a deeper sim than the FBW still
Bae 146 (Just Flight) - fat and ugly, but here she comes
Honda Jet (Marwan Gharib) - really dig this one
747-8 (Salty) - we need some good Boeings in this sim from other devs than PMDG
To be fair most of my airports are freeware with a few exceptions of some meaningful ones I visit more often and some very well reviewed/detailed ones.
Mainly I like the scenery that adds details to explore:
Okavango Delta
Antarctica
Panama Canal
GB Orbx POI packs
Seafront “Vessels” packs
France VFR
Orbx City packs
….that kind of thing.
Definitely going to get the North Sea oil rigs for helicopter shenanigans when that comes out!
Nice! So far I rarely see the outside of the planes I fly, so I haven’t really cared about paint jobs, but I plan to get more into following correct procedures and once I figure out how to do walk-arounds in VR, I could see myself taking a few more minutes enjoying that Red Arrows livery…
LatinA319: the smaller sized airliners are pretty fun because I can visit the smaller international airports
LatinA321 NEO: I love doing medium routes with it
Cessna 195: Great to fly a classic
Mooney m20J: I love flying the Mooney with their tail
Cessna 182: it feels like cheating on cross country trips with that much power and I love the Garmin panel doing those trips having the map there instead of using the map screen
I’m already needing to update my top five:
3/10/22
Top Five:
IndiaFoxtEcho M-346
FlyingIron F6F-5 Hellcat
FlyingIron Spitfire Mk.IX
IndiaFoxtEcho MB-339
Milviz Cessna 310R
Old list
Flying Irons F6F-5 Hellcat
Milviz Cessna 310
FlyingIron Spitfire Mk.IX
FlyingIron P-38L Lightning
Asobo Local Legend #5 Beech 18
The IndiaFoxtEcho Leonardo M-346 is a beautifully modelled military twin-engine transonic trainer aircraft that in my limited experience with it to date beats the Just Hawk T.1 and that is saying something.
While I was waiting for the M-346’s release I reacquainted myself with the MB-339, also by IndiaFoxtrotEcho. It is well crafted and an enjoyable jet trainer and shows how far IndiaFoxtrotEcho has come in a very short time.
The Hellcat and Spitfire by FlyingIron are just marvellous, as is the Cessna 310R.
Yes, that was me, about a year ago now (I’m BH3841 in FSE). Thank you for having read that thread and I’m glad you found it interesting.
That was quite an ordeal both to set up and then to do, and I’ve no inclination to do anything similar any time soon. But I’m glad I did it because 1) I made a lot of new friends in the community along the way, 2) because of that I learned a lot of history from the other side of the Iron Curtain from folks who lived there then, and 3) it made me a rather more proficient pilot as only grinding out excessively long hops in a slow, primitive plane can, sweating the fuel consumption and often inoporative navaids.
Hopefully this will include the many NDBs shown on the charts but which (mostly) ain’t in the game because they’re probably on non-existent oil platforms. Otherwise, you’re going to have some trouble finding the platforms. I found this out with my recreating of Rust’s flights mentioned above. I needed to cross the North Sea twice using pre-GPS gear so created valid radio flightplans in SimBrief using NDBs out in the middle of the North Sea. Only to get there and find mostly silence in MSFS. So LOTS of dead reckoning across LOTS of water. Even had to use the trusty old “landfall technique” once. Like I said, this ordeal made me a better pilot
Yeah. The company became Leonardo in 2017 M-346 and MSFS list it as Leonardo M-346 in the aircraft selector section. I was expecting it to be next to my MB-339 but it wasn’t.
My old list as of July 1st:
Cessna 414
Piper Arrow III
B 737-700
Fenix A320
DA62 with mod
Update:
PMDG B737-700 (Returned to airliner flying over the summer)
Cessna 414 (Still my favorite for short trips and discovery of new land)
Piper Arrow III (Everytime the 414 would be a bit too fast)
PMDG DC6 (Whenever my kids leave time for a slower VOR to VOR airliner flight)
Hype H135 (I tried the free helicopter for the first time and love it, may catch the pro version, soon. New possibilties for sightseeing and fauna).
HPG H145,
Yep i bought the H145 after some thoughts and havent regret it one moment. Great update and with the action pack upgrade i bought as well, guaranteed fun for a long time to come.
HPG Hotair balloon
I actually havent bought it, but i will next friday when it comes out. As you propably noticed in the rest of my list, it is diverse list with all kind of different planes for different purposes. This one will be a great addition to my hangar for some relaxing flights at sunsets over nice scenery or some cloud skimming during windier days.
Honorable mentions:
FBW a320 (see previous post) best project for a free bird
FI Spittfire, another classic bird to relive the early days of flight
HP135, please get this one if you want to explore heli flights. Dont tell anybody but its free…
IFT MB339, almost forgot i had this in my hangar, but it is just a great trainer, not supersonic but designed to take it for a ride trough the Alps in the frecce tricolore livery.
there are some others as well but I for now i think its enough.
Hi there. Thanks for the update. Sorry to be the tough teacher, but you’re going to have to choose one of those or drop one of your other choices (not the glider, please!)
EDIT: same deal for the PMDG 737-800/700. Can you tell just one variant out of those please
It’s out THIS Friday, not next. 2 days. Actually midnight on Thursday but not sure what time zone. Shall we wait until the weekend before you put your list in? I’m definitely getting it too but what if it’s really disappointing?!
Britten-Norman Trislander - only bought it this week and it’s already the plane with the most flights on it. Admittedly, that’s because I’ve done a bunch of ~10nm flights in it, hopping around the Channel Islands and now the various islands on the German / Dutch North Sea coast. Those are pretty good for learning fully manual visual approaches, incidentally, and those are my biggest weakness as a fan of purple lines and autoland.
PMDG 737 (-800 if I have to choose one) - i enjoy short- to medium-range airliners and the 737 is clearly the best among them currently. Even though I prefer Airbus as a manufacturer, the PMDG 737 is just more “complete” than the FBW A320neo, so by this point I prefer the PMDG.
Aerosoft CRJ (mostly the 700), I have some fond memories of the stock CRJ700 in FSX, and this was my second purchase for MSFS. I like it, it is just nice, the lack of autothrust makes it a bit quirky but not too challenging.
BAe146 - going purely on aesthetics, this would probably make it my favourite plane, but it’s just a tad too challenging to me overall, mostly due to the lack of a nav display and the TMS which is far more fussy than the FADEC on the CRJ700. Still happy I have it, and looking forward to the Avro RJ and its more modern avionics.
FBW A320neo - it’s freeware at a standard that’s sooo far above basically any piece of freeware I had back in FSX. The biggest reason it’s so low on the list is because the PMDG 737 has basically almost entirely replaced it for me, mostly thanks to the working and finished VNAV.
