Comparison and Review of FSX and Flight Pro Sim

Pro's: Microsoft's Flight Simulator X adds some outstanding new features to an already very in depth title, and even adds content that main stream gamers will find appealing for what has traditionally been a niche market. The title features the entire earths surface rendered through sat imagery with the more popular destinations depicted in exquisite 3d detail. The cockpits have received a lot of love in this generation as well. They have added voip capabilities and interesting missions to lure in main stream gamers and even the avid Flight Sim enthusiasts will have a hard time not trying them out. The pic to the right is from a helicopter rescue mission to a burning oil rig.

Microsoft added weather manipulation features as well as real time real world weather to the game this generation. Ever wanted to see what it would be like flying a 747 through a hurricane? Well now you don't have to wonder any longer! You can program any weather you want.

You can see that Microsoft has invested a lot of time and manpower updating this title with multi player voip, better graphics, real time weather, weather controls, and new missions so lets move on to the cons.

Con's: Simply put, this game is a resource hog. As you can see in the screen shot it is running at 10 fps on nowhere near max settings. The computer used was built for nothing but gaming with everything maxed out about a year ago. It is still way more than an average user would have and rocks all current games that come down the pipe. I find 7-12 fps unacceptable. In order to play it at a playable frame rate I had to turn the settings so low that it looked worse than FS 98, ridiculous. I am sure it will be playable only after I drop $3000 on building a new state of the art computer but that is not an option for me right now.

If you are one of those people who drops $3000 every year on a new system then this game is probably for you, otherwise this game will just frustrate you.

Pro's: This game, unexpectedly, profoundly, impressed me. Microsoft has been king of flight sims so long that most people, me included, rarely look beyond it to see what else is out there. It is open source with a small, fanatical community constantly pumping out new free content for it. It has over 100 different planes, helicopters, and gliders you can fly and a user friendly editor so you can add your own content. You can fly anything from the Wright Brothers first plane to an F-16, all rendered in outstanding detail, inside and out.

Flight Pro Sim, like FSX has the entire world rendered for your flying enjoyment. Want to fly over your house? Head on over and you just might see your car parked in your driveway! FPS also has real time weather as well as customizable weather. They also do something not see often in any game and that is to map out elevation on the runways so, if you are parked facing up a slight slope, waiting to take off, and let off the brake, your plane will actually start to roll backwards! This is due to their use of an Open GL graphics engine. They also have a multiplayer feature that lets you see, through Google, exactly where other players are in real time.

My favorite feature, after previous frustration, was that this game runs smooth. No sudden starts and stops, no hour long waits for the game to load, and no stuttering through high res sections of the game. The graphics were LOTs better than the settings I had to use for FSX and, as you can see in the picture at the top of this article of the sunset over the water, the sky and water algorithms are sophisticated and beautiful.

Con's: While the functionality, depth, and customization potential is as good if not better than Microsoft Flight Simulator X, while running MUCH better, there is a price, and it is a lower graphics quality compared to FSX on high settings. As you can see in this image the planes just don't look as REAL, and while the cockpits are accurate they don't compare to the Flight Sim X's feeling of being THERE.

In conclusion, this was an extremely close match up for me but I am leaning more towards Flight Pro Sim. It has all the features of FSX and more besides with the exception of VOIP. FSX might be a deal when compared to $400 previous editions but most of the extra content for it will cost you big bucks while FPS is open source and all add ons are free. While, as you can see in this screen shot, FSX has amazing graphics you can only enjoy them after an hour of loading and then at 7 frames per second unless you have the money to drop $3000 on a state of the art system. Flight Pro Sim runs smoothly, even on older systems. After it ran so well on my good computer I decided to try it out on my old junker and it ran slower but still playable and with better graphics than I could get with my good machine with Microsofts Flight Sim X.

So in conclusion I would only recommend FSX to people who only care about graphics and have plenty of money to burn. To the vast majority of people out there Flight Pro Sim is the one for you. Below are links to both.