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| Flight Simulator 2004 - A Century of Flight |
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from Giles Co, Va 2007-05-09 04:28:34 1 out of 3 found this reivew helpful |
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| Pros: Extremely life like with exact real weather time and life like controls. Works awesome with a stick. Several planes to choose from and I love the flying lessons option. |
| Cons: One of the reasons I love this game is because of the life like scenary but on this version there are hardly any buildings and roads. |
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| Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004 - A Century of Flight |
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By IanLynch 2007-01-09 00:00:00 2 out of 3 found this reivew helpful |
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I've always had an interest in aviation, and of course in the Microsoft Flight Simulator series. No other flight simulator to date can match the sheer depth, realism and quality that these 'games' bring. So does the '2004: A Century of Flight' editio (Read full review at Review Centre)
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| Cons: -A high spec computer is required to fully enjoy some of the simulators qualities. -Textures can look a little low res and blocky at lower altitudes. -The many features and depth may be a little daunting to those new to the series, however there is plenty |
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| Review of Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004 - A Century of Flight |
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By Rasech 2006-09-24 00:00:00 2 out of 4 found this reivew helpful |
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Microsoft Flight Sim is amazing. You need a pretty good Computer to run it on though. The graphics are brilliant. You can fly to any registered airport in the world!! I went on holiday to France and when I got back I typed in the airport names. They (Read full review at Review Centre)
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| Pros: Really Realistic Great Graphics Loads of ad-dons Good Value for money loads of different airports |
| Cons: Very Complicated |
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| Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004 |
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2006-09-05 21:28:10 2 out of 3 found this reivew helpful |
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this is not Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004it is a BOOK about Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004I feel ripped off ------buyer beware (Read full review at Overstock)
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| Review of Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004 - A Century of Flight |
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By DeclanJames 2006-02-04 00:00:00 2 out of 3 found this reivew helpful |
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Have you ever dreamt of roaring down a runway in a Boeing 747? If yes, then you should definitely buy the Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004 - A Century of Flight PC game ! To me it doesn't even seem like a game! It's like having your own Cessna perma (Read full review at Review Centre)
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| Pros: Best simulation game money can buy! |
| Cons: The ground graphics and texture are not realistic. |
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-- Alfred Poor, PC Magazine  2 out of 4 found this reivew helpful |
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| "The world changed when Wilbur and Orville Wright took their first powered flights at Kitty Hawk 100 years ago. Microsoft commemorates this event with Flight Simulator 2004: A Century of Flight. You can pilot 20 historic flights, including the Wright Flyer's first launch and the first airmail route. In addition to wonderful graphics and multimedia flight-training materials, this version offers Internet-updated dynamic weather, improved airport scenery for more than 24,000 airports, and 3-D cockpit controls. The best flight game is better than ever." ...
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| -- Maxpc Expert, Maxpc 1 out of 3 found this reivew helpful |
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| Flight Simulator 2004: A Century of Flight Come fly the friendly skies with Michael Abolins. Do you want those peanuts? Simulators take their inspiration, and borrow liberally, from real life - as they're supposed to. But how about switching it around, borrowing an idea from a sim and incorporating that into real life? Who hasn't, at one time or another, wished they could speed up time, a feature found in many flight sims, including this one? Speed up the seconds, minutes and hours on a lousy Friday afternoon in the office? Another peroration from your boss/lover/mother? You know the stuff. The Wright stuff What wouldn't be on our wish list would be the historical aircraft from Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004: A Century of Flight. Most of them are an absolute dog to fly, thanks to primitive mechanics and the aerodynamics of a wet pup. However, there's no denying their importance as aviation milestones: there's the 1903 Wright Flyer (which looks suspiciously like the airplanes you built as a kid out of two chairs, a laundry horse and two blankets - unsurprisingly it flew just about as well, staying aloft for just 12 seconds), the first heavier-than-air powered aircraft to achieve sustained, controlled flight (not counting that French one obviously), and the dumpy Douglas DC-3. It's after the Wright brothers' achievements that this simulator is named, celebrating the centenary of their world-altering feat. Just about every other notable aircraft from the first 50 years of the 20th century is included, except warplanes. As you'd expect, alongside these museum pieces are the more contemporary planes - the Boeings, Cessnas and Lear jets that you're familiar with from your rock-star fantasies and Jeremy Spake inspired nightmares. As far as the simulator itself, it's as polished as one of Tony Blair's media smiles. One notable advance over previous versions is the introduction of an improved weather system. Clouds now look and act more like their real-life counterparts, scudding lazily across the sky on a calm summer day, or closing in on you with an immediacy that causes you to remember that if man were meant to fly, God would have given us a more robust digestive system. A force-feedback joystick is essential, as most prospective purchasers of this game will know. Not only can you feel the aircraft respond to your commands, but now you also feel the weather. The turbulence as you descend through a bank of cumulus clouds, the wind pushing and skewing you sideways; it's all very visible on screen and tangible through the joystick. Enjoy an always-on internet connection and you can have real-time weather updates delivered and incorporated into your flight every 15 minutes, mirroring the conditions wherever in the world you happen to be flying. Manual labour The graphics have been updated, too, though they're lacking the wow factor of some of the effects seen in Combat Flight Simulator 3 - for example, the dazzling chrome effects haven't been translated to its civilian sibling. The virtual cockpits have been improved to include interactive controls - you can now operate the switches and dials with your mouse in both the standard and virtual cockpit modes. The landscapes and scenery remain pretty much unchanged, and the airports are more detailed, but otherwise the countryside is more suited to cruising at 40,000 feet than low-level sightseeing. Hugely detailed and fully-interactive Garmin GPS systems make sure you get where you're going, while the improved ATC system does its utmost to confuse those armchair aviators who've not studied that particular chapter in the weighty tome that is the manual (in pdf form, natch). The learning centre has been beefed up to accompany the flight school, offering insights on flying techniques, the weather, learning to fly for real, and joining virtual airlines online. Now you can read about Charles Lindbergh's solo non-stop crossing of the Atlantic in the Spirit of St Louis before recreating the flight yourself. Considering that Microsoft is also responsible for Encarta, it shouldn't come as a surprise to find it's a ripe source of knowledge, but it's a pleasant discovery nonetheless. Flight club Flight Simulator 2002 was a pretty big leap in terms of content, interaction and visuals over anything that had come before. Starting up this latest refresh for the first time is like discovering that, despite all your hopes, your in-flight meal is the same old vulcanised poultry substitute. Yet when you delve deeper, you can see clearly where the improvements have been made. It's doubtful whether fair-weather flight sim fans will get much more out of this than they would from FS2002, but for the enthusiast, A Century of Flight is worthy of the pride and bluster that the title implies. Michael Abolins This article first appeared in PC Format Issue 153 - October 2003 Click Here to Shop Format page for printing Email article to a friend ...
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| -- Maxpc Expert, Maxpc 1 out of 2 found this reivew helpful |
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| The Wright stuff What wouldn't be on our wish list would be the historical aircraft from Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004: A Century of Flight. Most of them are an absolute dog to fly, thanks to primitive mechanics and the aerodynamics of a wet pup. However, there's no denying their importance as aviation milestones: there's the 1903 Wright Flyer (which looks suspiciously like the airplanes you built as a kid out of two chairs, a laundry horse and two blankets - unsurprisingly it flew just about as well, staying aloft for just 12 seconds), the first heavier-than-air powered aircraft to achieve sustained, controlled flight (not counting that French one obviously), and the dumpy Douglas DC-3. It's after the Wright brothers' achievements that this simulator is named, celebrating the centenary of their world-altering feat. Just about every other notable aircraft from the first 50 years of the 20th century is included, except warplanes. As you'd expect, alongside these museum pieces are the more contemporary planes - the Boeings, Cessnas and Lear jets that you're familiar with from your rock-star fantasies and Jeremy Spake inspired nightmares. As far as the simulator itself, it's as polished as one of Tony Blair's media smiles. One notable advance over previous versions is the introduction of an improved weather system. Clouds now look and act more like their real-life counterparts, scudding lazily across the sky on a calm summer day, or closing in on you with an immediacy that causes you to remember that if man were meant to fly, God would have given us a more robust digestive system. A force-feedback joystick is essential, as most prospective purchasers of this game will know. Not only can you feel the aircraft respond to your commands, but now you also feel the weather. The turbulence as you descend through a bank of cumulus clouds, the wind pushing and skewing you sideways; it's all very visible on screen and tangible through the joystick. Enjoy an always-on internet connection and you can have real-time weather updates delivered and incorporated into your flight every 15 minutes, mirroring the conditions wherever in the world you happen to be flying. Manual labour The graphics have been updated, too, though they're lacking the wow factor of some of the effects seen in Combat Flight Simulator 3 - for example, the dazzling chrome effects haven't been translated to its civilian sibling. The virtual cockpits have been improved to include interactive controls - you can now operate the switches and dials with your mouse in both the standard and virtual cockpit modes. The landscapes and scenery remain pretty much unchanged, and the airports are more detailed, but otherwise the countryside is more suited to cruising at 40,000 feet than low-level sightseeing. Hugely detailed and fully-interactive Garmin GPS systems make sure you get where you're going, while the improved ATC system does its utmost to confuse those armchair aviators who've not studied that particular chapter in the weighty tome that is the manual (in pdf form, natch). The learning centre has been beefed up to accompany the flight school, offering insights on flying techniques, the weather, learning to fly for real, and joining virtual airlines online. Now you can read about Charles Lindbergh's solo non-stop crossing of the Atlantic in the Spirit of St Louis before recreating the flight yourself. Considering that Microsoft is also responsible for Encarta, it shouldn't come as a surprise to find it's a ripe source of knowledge, but it's a pleasant discovery nonetheless. Flight club Flight Simulator 2002 was a pretty big leap in terms of content, interaction and visuals over anything that had come before. Starting up this latest refresh for the first time is like discovering that, despite all your hopes, your in-flight meal is the same old vulcanised poultry substitute. Yet when you delve deeper, you can see clearly where the improvements have been made. It's doubtful whether fair-weather flight sim fans will get much more out of this than they would from FS2002, but for the enthusiast, A Century of Flight is worthy of the pride and bluster that the title implies. Michael Abolins ...
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| -- Itreviews Expert, Itreviews 1 out of 2 found this reivew helpful |
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| Break out the party hats, poppers (no, not that kind), jelly and ice cream, 'cos guess what - it's trusty old Microsoft Flight Sim's birthday. This year's version celebrates 20 years of Flight Simulator with several jolly games of pass the frozen toilet discharge and musical airfields. Well, we think they'd make great multiplayer games anyway. Flight Simulator 2004 actually celebrates a hundred years of powered flight, letting you take control of the original 1903 Wright Flyer (not that you can fly it much more than 100 feet, even if you're lucky) and many other famous 'planes from throughout the last century. Suffice to say there's an extensive range featuring plenty of famous oldies and all the standard models like Lear Jets, Boeing 747s and even one helicopter. And they're simulated to perfection, with authentic cockpits and instruments, engine sounds, top speeds, flight handling... every little detail is fine tuned to make sure the experience of flying a Cessna as opposed to a Boeing is incredibly different. This is realism with a capital 'R' and it doesn't stop with the 'planes. There's a fully simulated air traffic control system, proper taxi lanes, flight patterns and air space transitions, GPS navigation, realistic weather (to the point where you can actually download current real world weather conditions off the Net every 15 minutes; how cool is that?) and a complete set of various pilot examinations which serve as training tutorials. These are great for novices, as the student pilot lessons teach some important basic flying skills which aren't immediately obvious, such as why power doesn't necessarily translate to speed and why you should trim your plane properly. There's a host of lessons on flying, taking off and landing (including instructions on how to use the airport's landing indication systems), along with more complex material on how to fly large passenger and cargo jets. Options, options, options... this simulation has more options than a hyperactive stockbroker. It's not just the extensive tutorials that are well stacked, there are also introductory Windows Media videos illustrating the absolute basics of flight sims and all sorts of help-based goodies. And the range of gameplay choices is exceptional. It's possible to plot your own custom flights using GPS, with nitty-gritty details like being able to specify instrument failures at certain points. Then there are the historical flights. Fancy flying a Curtiss Jenny in a barn-storming exercise, or a de Havilland Comet in the classic 1934 England to Australia air race? Tons of modern set flights are also provided, including a guided tour of Hawaii's volcanoes, cargo pilot tasks, helicopter and float-plane pilot scenarios. There are even missions where you become a personal chauffeur pilot to some rich novelist. Graphically this is all splendidly rendered on the higher visual settings and again, attention to detail is prevalent. Fly over Niagara falls and you can even see the 'Maid on the Mist' tourist boat bobbing along. If you have a lesser spec PC, Flight Simulator 2004 still looks pretty smart with medium settings and it runs smoothly too. Should all this not be enough for you, there are also multiplayer options provided via the Web site, though these are fairly basic as this game is really a single player oriented experience. There are a few drawbacks here but only minor ones, excepting the major and obvious fact that if you're not into leisurely-paced flight sim gaming you're going to be pretty bored. Some of the tutorials seem slightly bugged, which is a shame, and the collision detection is pretty ropey. It's also worth noting that a joystick is really a must, as it's something of a pain to fly with just the keyboard. Microsoft - Flight Simulator 2004: A Century of Flight features - Verdict Flight Simulator 2004 is more expensive than your average PC game, though of course it's not a game, or even a sim, but practically a new way of life as a pilot! You can learn a great deal about the real art of flying here within and it's jam-packed with an amazing level of detail in terms of the content, graphics and world locations. The visual enhancements, more detailed environments, extra sophistication with elements like the "live" weather and old classic planes to fly, make this a considerable advance on the last version. It's worth the asking price. Microsoft - Flight Simulator 2004: A Century of Flight price Buy Flight Simulator 2004: A Century of Flight securely online at a bargain price £49.99 inc. VAT Reviewed on: PC www.microsoft.com/uk/games Read more reviews of Space and Flight Sims Read our Buyers Guide to Space and Flight Sims ...
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| -- CNET Expert, CNET 1 out of 2 found this reivew helpful |
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| For more than a century, human beings have used engines to pull, push, or lift themselves into the air, and for the past two decades, Microsoft Flight Simulator has let armchair pilots explore the exciting world of aviation on their PCs. Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004: A Century of Flight commemorates this double anniversary by offering more planes, better graphics, and more options than ever before right out of the box, but the game will likely reach its full potential only if it receives great support from its player community. These clouds aren't just for show. A violent thunderstorm brews within. Fans of the previous games in the series will be up and running in no time thanks to the new game's familiar interface, but Flight Simulator 2004 also happens to be the most beginner-friendly game in the series. It's easier to access game options, and each option is actually explained by the game. There's also an excellent interactive flight school hosted by aviation veteran Rod Machado that serves as a surprisingly deep training tool. There is enough written material included about the planes, the history of flight, and flying tips to fill an encyclopedia. As such, Flight Simulator 2004 represents one of the rare instances in which online documentation is wholly superior to a printed manual. The documentation includes articles that are supplemented with Web-page-style hyperlinks, which lead to more detailed information about a particular topic. Some even whisk you directly into the cockpit so you can actually re-create the particular flight (or series of flights) discussed in the article. While the fascinating historical articles by Flying magazine's Lane Wallace were commissioned by Microsoft, many of the other articles included are reprints from magazines like AOPA Pilot , and it is amazing to see how the real-world tips provided in these stories can be directly applied in the simulator. And you'll need all the information you can get, because most of the new planes in Flight Simulator 2004 are cranky old antiques that require your undivided attention. The entire history of civilian flight is represented in the game, from the original Wright Flyer that can't even struggle its way out of ground effect to a Boeing 747-400 that can haul hundreds of people higher than 40,000 feet at Mach .85. You can retrace Lindbergh's steps across the Atlantic in a re-creation of the Ryan NYP "Spirit of St. Louis," see what Amelia Earhart's trip across that same ocean was like in a Lockheed Vega, and haul freight over the mountains in a Douglas DC-3, among other things. The Sopwith Camel was not brought over from the previous game into the new game--this is strictly a civilian flight simulator, without any military prop planes or jets, but it still offers plenty of different aircraft to fly. If you plan to fly any of the vintage aircraft, be sure to invest in some good controller peripherals, specifically rudder pedals or a joystick with a twist handle. It's impossible to take off and land in taildraggers like the Piper J3 Cub and Curtiss Jenny without a lot of dancing on the rudders. And once they're airborne, ponderous antiques like the Vickers Vimy biplane can barely turn unless you stomp on the pedals. Rudder controls also are a must for flying the two helicopters modeled in the game, which include the familiar Bell JetRanger and the new Robison R22 Beta. The Beta is a skittish little chopper that is hypersensitive to controller input and offers a wholly different flying experience from that of the heavier and more stable JetRanger. The overall flight model feels very similar to that of Flight Simulator 2002 and is well suited to capturing the nuances of the game's slow and underpowered historical planes. For example, when landing a taildragger, you should be able to float in slowly at a steep angle for a traditional three-point landing or come in more quickly at a shallow angle to land on the main wheels, keeping forward pressure on the stick until the tail gradually loses lift and the tailwheel gently settles on the runway. The latter option is essential for landing a small plane like the Piper Cub in high crosswinds, and the new game models it perfectly. Flight Simulator 2004's virtual cockpits are interactive, so most of these switches can be adjusted with your mouse. Aside from the historical aircraft, Flight Simulator 2004's big news this time around is its weather effects. You can set up in-flight weather any way you like or go for the ultimate in realism by having the game automatically download real-world weather reports from the Jeppesen database every 15 minutes. We tested this feature in a variety of weather conditions flying out of a hometown airport, and sure enough, the conditions depicted onscreen corresponded with what we saw from the window, for the most part. Even if you don't choose to use the real-world weather option, the game can dynamically change its weather conditions so that a flight that begins in clear blue skies might end up in pure instrument conditions as you try to feel your way down to the runway in a violent thunderstorm. The addition of true 3D clouds that drift through the sky and merge into one another as weather conditions change adds a realistic touch to the game that static screenshots simply can't convey. Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004: A Century of Flight Review of Flight Simulator 2004: A Century of Flight (PC) Flight Simulator 2004's graphics are improved over those in the previous game, but they're not exactly photo-realistic just yet. Buildings still use low-resolution textures, and the ground looks much better from a high altitude than it does when you're flying low and slow. The game's interactive virtual cockpits are a great new feature, since the ability to control most switches, knobs, and dials with the mouse when the 3D cockpit is enabled adds some much-needed functionality to that view. Unfortunately, the textures used in the virtual cockpits are low resolution and very ugly--hopefully this is something that inventive computer artists among the Flight Simulator fan community will address. On the outside, the planes look beautiful, with vastly more-complex models adorned with gorgeous high-res textures that sparkle in the sun, and the game also sounds impressively realistic, since the developer recorded engine noises from actual planes for use in the game. The planes might not look great on the inside, but they're beautiful on the outside. Of course, whether you can enable all of these fancy new effects and maintain a reasonably smooth frame rate depends entirely on your computer. At 1600x1200 resolution with all the graphics settings cranked at their highest, our 2.66GHz test system with a Radeon 9700 Pro video card and 1GB RAM tended to slow down in thick cloud cover. Things smoothed out considerably as the fluff cleared from the sky and the buildings in dense cities faded into the background, but if you've got a computer that just barely meets the game's minimum system requirements, don't expect to run the game smoothly with all the graphical settings turned all the way up, unless you actually prefer to watch a slideshow. Almost a thousand new airports have been added to the game's world database, providing more than 24,000 places to land ranging from quaint grass strips to bustling international airports complete with signage. The game also features an improved air traffic control (ATC) that works well for the most part. At controlled airports, ground control provides taxi clearances and instructions, and it is possible to follow the taxiway signs to your destination or turn on a handy overlay that visually displays your assigned route. Once in position, you can tune the tower frequency with a single keystroke to ask for clearance for takeoff, and the air traffic controllers then answer air space transition requests, provide directions to the airport, and provide other information when you are airborne. It's also possible to request clearance to land, and the air traffic controllers respond with instructions for entering the landing pattern or simply tell you to come straight in to a specified runway. If you screw up, the controller will tell you to go around for another try. The system works well thanks to an improved ATC menu, but it's still far from perfect. For instance, when we tried landing a small Cessna at a large international airport in exact accordance with the provided instructions, an AI-controlled DC-10 jumbo jet thundered overhead with only a few feet of separation since it was landing on the same runway. Still, ATC works much better than it did in the past, and casual players can just as easily ignore it completely. Another new feature in the game is the use of modeled Garmin GPS products--these can be helpful when interacting with ATC and planning approaches. They aren't easy for beginners to grasp, because they use the same buttons and knobs as their real-world counterparts, but a training video is included, and once you get the hang of it, the GPS becomes an indispensable tool for finding your way around Flight Simulator's vast world. Historical markers are included for the Wright brothers' historic first powered flight. Despite the addition of all the new planes and the excellent library of information in Flight Simulator 2004, longtime fans of the series will find it to be a rather conservative addition to the series. The core flight model and terrain graphics engine remain more or less untouched, and on the whole, the new game seems very similar to its predecessor. The new game's multiplayer is still rudimentary and allows only for basic formation flights and air races, though you can't expect much more from a noncombat sim. Still, longtime Flight Simulator fans should definitely upgrade to the latest version. And the new game's flight school and interface changes may be just what's needed to bring in newcomers--especially those who were intimidated by the series' traditionally steep learning curve. You could say that Flight Simulator 2004 is still a straightforward simulation, but if you have even a passing interest in flying, you'll definitely get your money's worth from it. ...
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| Microsoft MS Flight Simulator 2004: A Century of Flight Complete package |
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| from 2 stores |
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