A Dream Come True - Hands On With FS2002

s I write this at FL370, somewhere over Kansas or South Dakota, our 757 is making good timing back to Boston. Seeing almost 200 miles off to my north, and an hour ago just having experienced a breathtaking journey from Seattle over the Grand Tetons, I am reminded of what I and others experienced yesterday at Microsoft, in beautiful Bellevue Washington. I am still in complete shock. So is Jeff Smith of MicroWINGS, as well as Tom Allensworth of Avsim. We all had that "deer caught in headlights" look to our faces, as honestly, we sat in disbelief as to what we spent over 3 hours doing. And now, as I am cramped in so tight, my hands can barely type here, I marvel at the view outside and marvel at what is still fresh in my mind. And, I am so very very excited, just as the MS team is, that we can share with you our experience, and look forward to the day when you and the rest of your simming friends get to take the controls of the most exciting PC-based simulation I have ever experienced in my life.

All three of us chatted and knew that few would believe our zealousness. We don't blame you. Heck, I went in to MS with the same skeptical mindset I have had since toying with the frustrating FS2000. Many of you out there feel the same pain and in some cases, much more so, with machines that are "only" PIII500s or PII types. I told the really happy and friendly folks we met that "I'll be lookin' for stutters" with a chuckle, yet that was the truth. I was prepared to "tell 'em like it is" and honestly thought it might become ugly.

But, the night before the big day, we were treated (gosh, treated for sure, all expense-paid trip you know...so they might have been buttering us up, but with all the other titles out there and other people arriving, I doubt it) to a fabulous boat cruise on a sparkling evening around Lake Washington. We saw Bill's house up close ...so close, that if he was walking past a window we would have seen him beta testing FS2002. We got great views of the city on the other side of the lake, and feasted on Salmon, steak and other yummies. After a pile of brownies and a small drink (that was me, let me say some of the guys at MS had more than one and were so open about telling us stuff we were wondering if they had too much for Mr. NDA (g), I was all ears.

They all ate with us, chatted, swapped flying stories, flightsim stories and were just there to have fun with us all. It was unlike any personal contacts I have ever had before with MS people. They were always nice, but not just plain friends you felt like hanging out with. They are now. They wanted me to stay an extra day to go flying with them in their airplanes! I was not alone in thinking these great people are building a sim for themselves as much as us. When the product ships, they will go home and not take a vacation, but fly FS2002! They are all so excited about what they have created for us, you could see it in their faces, smiling, grinning, and wanted to let loose all the facts, information and goodies they have produced over the last year and a half.

After a day of gaming previews and jaw-dropping FS2002 and Train-Sim presentations, we were bursting at the seams. At 4:30 pm, the magic began. I am not lying. I am not a faker. Here is my account. Ride with me. Fly with me. And enjoy, because by the time Thanksgiving comes, you might have FS2002 and you will want to tell the family and relatives that this year, you'll be giving thanks to Microsoft and will be having dinner 'round the FS2002 in flight... the Mayflower can wait.

I entered the posh testing room where I first heard the drone of a Cessna 172 engine. Purring loudly. Then I saw the screen. Same panel as before. But my gosh, there were snow-capped peaks, sharp and jagged, against a deep blue sky outside the panel. Looks like Alaska to me. Gosh, I am good eh? It was. Near Sitka they told me. (we had 3 computers just for FS, and four of us, so as you can do the math we each basically had a machine to ourselves) They told me to just jump right in and do ANYTHING I wanted, the entire program was mine. No secrets. Just jump in and pretend it's all yours! WOW!

I grabbed the yoke (well, Sidewinder stick) too hard. Oh my. I was not looking at the old 2D cockpit. What looked just like it complete with all the Cessna dials, gauges and labeling was the 3D virtual cockpit! I bumped my view to the left where I was gaping down at the towering peaks below, reaching up at me, and the top of the door panel. Wow. A great virtual cockpit view. But something was wrong. There was no pause. I panned over there like it was running FS4, or perhaps an old version of Flight Unlimited that works fast on a new machine. No pausing? How could that be? Well, time of truth. SHIFT-Z. This was a PIII800. With 100 miles of jagged peaks, gouged-out valleys below, and clearly 1024 resolution, the ol' "dreaded" SHIFT-Z showed 53. That's right. 53. I'll say it again. 53. No. It can not be. It was. I was not alone because either Jeff or Tom in the booth next to me was giggling like a baby. They too had already seen the SHIFT-Z value. It was real. Is it a dream? Pinch me.

No dream. I looked all around. Wow. I wanted to scream. Yell for the others. Yet, the room was filled with other "gamers" that were into some fighting robots or medieval dungeon thing, so they just wouldn't understand. I screamed silently. Really loud. This was the greatest discovery to mankind. More startling than when we landed on the moon. Or Area 51. This is stuff that should be on 20/20.

They told me to press an outside view. Okay, I'll do that. Voooooooommmmmmmmmm.... the SHIFT-S key yielded a liquid-smooth, glorifying, soaring spot plane view moving into position behind my Cessna. I never liked this view before. It was a stuttering and jabbering thing that was awful on FS2000. This one was liquid smooth. FS4 like. Or, FS98ish in smoothness. Even better. Better than the smoothness on CFS2. That's right. That's the secret here. It's got CFS2 stuff in it.

As my view orbited around the most beautifully rendered 172 I have ever seen, I zoomed in closer. Rivets. Bolts. Flashing strobes that flickered off the wingtips. Like real. Like a photo. The lighting on this Cessna at sunset was so beautiful that it looked like a photo. With the mountains below, it was a fine cinema. I got back inside, and took her down, power at idle, steeply down into the valley. Outside view, inside view, 2D view, virtual view, back and fourth, furiously and wildly dancing between the two. Oh, it was so great! No stutters. Darn it - I was hunting for them. Nothing to find. Butter-smooth. Fluidity like I have never seen, and yet, I was diving into a forested valley with real trees, a real landscape with a real plane. It was real. Surreal. You know. Like a real airliner simulator. That's what it was like, only with sharper scenery details and all the trees. I mean, heavily forested mountains. Not a tree here, or there...but everywhere. Hundreds of trees in all directions. Reaching for the sky.

Using the spot-plane view I flew her down the riverbed. I wanted see how she landed so I aimed for an opening along the side of a river that had less trees, a narrow strip seemed to be calling on the side of the riverbank. Real bush scenery, everywhere! Created on the fly. Swooping at 30 fps over the river I held her off, nervous of running out of room ahead. At 55 kts, she settled in, one wheel first. Twang! The strut flexed, the tire wobbled, spun and then when I landed the other wheel, a cloud of dusty brown smoke plowed out from behind the wheels! Then the nose wheel down...clunk. More dust. Mash the brakes and haul back on the elevator. She mushed, sank and wallowed. Just like the real thing. I came to a rest near some bushes. That's right. Not just trees. Bushes. Time for some campin'!

Excuse me, cirrus clouds are wisking past me at 550 mph. Lunch was good at 37,000 feet just now. Tasty chicken in a Teriyaki-like sauce, with great rice and veggies. French butter cookies. Who said airline food wasn't good? It was not me!

I powered her up in a cloud of dust and twanged and bounced along the riverside. Yank. Up the plane went, in a cloud of fury. Now almost stalling, I lowered the nose and continued flying the Cessna for another 20 minutes. Snapping screen shots with the digital camera, stopping to breathe and chatting with my new heroes who watched with smiles behind me.

Then one of them told me to try the alternate Cessnas. There is a nice early-years model that a flight school might have. Red with some gold accents and most of all, plenty of paint peal. Dirty. Used. I took off out of Norwood, MA where I fly in real life, and toured the area. Just great. All the local hill terrain was there. Tons of houses mingled in with oak trees. And open spaces. Again, 25 to 30 fps is what I was getting.

Now, it was time for the 73'. The 747-400 was not complete other than the visual model yet, no panel etc. The "new" 737 was vastly improved over the original Orbit version. This one had a more realistic -400 body, with sharp details like the wings, wing slats, flaps, lights, and wheels. When taxiing, the wheels turned! The reversers pull back from the engines just like the real ones, exposing the mesh inside. All wing parts move snappier and more realistic than in FS2000 aircraft. Again, the frame rates had something to do with that I feel. I flew a pattern around Boston. Mostly from the outside because the beauty of it all was so complete, no virtual cockpit was ready yet. My landings were great...smooth and silky staring towards downtown Boston in all its glory. A place that is famous for frame rates approaching a 10, in FS2000. Now, 30 fps still. And, 100+ buildings everywhere in addition to the custom buildings for Boston. From the outside, landing in the 737 yields some great puffs of swirling tire smoke, and big fat black marks laid down on the pavement from the touchdown! So much for realism. Up until this point I never cared to try to land an airliner from the outside. It used to be suicidal. Replay mode will come in handy.

From Boston my love of mountains called me this time to EGE, Eagle, Colorado. The dry, brown mountains, spotted with tall pine forests and views of towering snow-capped peaks were all around me. Just a work of art! Keep in mind, this was summer textures only. A screen shot should be printed out and framed, and hung over your fireplace. My first attempt at the new ATC engine worked great. Just pop up the window where you can request your intentions. I choose to do a visual pattern. The tower cleared me for takeoff. On upwind he told me to call midfield downwind. This is all human voice, stunningly clear. On downwind to EGE I called downwind. He cleared me to land. It sounded great! My landing at the alpine airport was great, another flurry of smoke and from the outside I watched the reversers open, flaps hanging and the whole plane mushing and trying to slow down. I decided to trash the new Boeing, so from the outside threw it around really rough, trying to induce a skid. I went off the side, into the grass, with flying dirt and debris. It was awesome. Just like a scene out of a movie or something. Especially with the houses perched on the close hills, mountains 100 miles away and more, all in view! Again, at least 25 fps.

After Eagle, Innsbruck was next. Oh, what a treat! On top of this I put in puffy Cumulous. They looked great. Hanging over the peaks. And you know how bad the clouds used to be. Not anymore. Clouds kept frame rates just as high!! Innsbruck has European style villas, created all from the Autogen system. In winter, the rooftops will be laiden with snow, so I was told. The ground textures are European. And the mountains are as good as any add-on mesh you have seen! There are no words to describe the feeling I had when soaring around Innsbruck in the new Caravan on floats. Well, you'll see the pictures soon enough.

Speaking of floats. I splashed down into the bay next to downtown Seattle. All I can say, is they got me beat. FU3s water effects are old now. With over 100 buildings in view and the famous Seattle skyline, the frame rate counter hovered at around 25 with the splashing effects in full action. Just so you know, my in-cockpit flying was still yielding the same frame rates!

No stutters. Honestly, none. For over 2 hours I flew so many landings, takeoffs and aerial ballets with the spotplane, any stutters would have stood out like a sore thumb. There were none. And, we're still months from release. What is going on here? Ken told me the stutters were just about 80% hammered out now. 80%! I found NONE. I felt like stuttering, I was so shocked at what I had been seeing. Jeff Smith next to me said he was speechless over the entire experience. It had gone beyond pure fun and excitement to a state of shock. This was beyond my wildest expectations. An ambulance would have been handy for some of us.

I played with the weather menus. I messed with new planes. I started at many other airports. Oh, I must mention, you can start at an airport now, not only on a runway, but at a choice of positions and airline gates if you so choose. At SEA for instance, you can choose up to 10 gates or more to start any trip!! Gates! You heard me.

From the new Autogen scenery, new interactive ATC and new aircraft, this program will put any previous versions to shame. This is not any version of FS you have ever seen before. What they all told me was that simply, they knew they had a problem with FS2000 in terms of never having had a chance to optimize and fix the rendering. FS2K was a new platform, too new, and simply could not be fixed in a normal release cycle. Now however, with 6 more months to go, this beta version is ready to satisfy this tough critique as is! I'd take a copy now if they gave me one! Heck, I'd pay them $300 for one if I could. It's that good. And it's not even done. When I saw a preview copy of FS2K at Oshkosh two years ago, it was so bad, I didn't even want to try it. I saw on monitors of 5 fps people trying to fly the new Concorde. Well, that was then and this is now. Lead by a team of new talent, super-enthusiastic folks that are just as crazy about simming as us. They are us. They just get to work there! And they have a masterpiece on their hands. A new flying experience that will turn smiles on those who have had such a bad time with FS2K. It will turn heads. It will cause many deletions of FS2K. Heck, the team told me openly and others too, that they have all erased their FS2Ks at home and use this beta soley as their sim. Somehow, I don't believe that was the case with FS2K. Okay all you FS98ers...I guess at this time I'd say wait for FS2002, er FS8 as it's called behind the MS doors. If you have a machine that you're happy with running FS2000 on (a Cray right?), you've already got THE machine for 02. MS has not released system specs yet, but again all our testing was on PIII800s with GEForce 2s. If 25 to 55 fps at ground level sounds good to you on a PIII800, with almost full max detail and vis, imagine what you'll get on your PIII600s or dare I say, the lucky 1.4GZers!

They do recommend a GEForce to show off all the finest details. They have told me the new FS will not take advantage specifically of the new GEForce 3 technology, so just get a GEForce 2 at a store near you to see it all. That's where I'm a headin' next week. Nels doesn't know yet! :) sssshhhh.

Nothing short of amazing. Multi-million dollar visuals here. Not a stutter or pause. I cannot say enough. Choose not to believe if you want to. That's okay. Because come this fall, you will. I do now, and even though the wait will be painful, at least I know the morning it comes out, all us flightsimmers will have the greatest surprise and value coming to us we've ever seen from Microsoft. Back in the days of FS4, we were all very very happy simmers. Then came FS5. Wow. New terrain, photographic scenery etc. Non-cartoon aircraft. Then FSFW95. Ugh. SHIFT-Zing became frightening. Then FS98. Wow. Not bad right? And really great with a good machine. MS did it! Then, FS7 (FS2000). Oh no. FSFW95 all over again. Stutter-city. And now, the 21st century is here, and proudly I announce, so is OUR MS FS to render you speechless. You and I and OUR FRIENDS at Microsoft. They just built all of us what we have been wanting, for so many years. Go to your local card store now, so you can find some thank you cards.

And yes, you still don't have to believe me if you don't want to. But if I were you, excitement is a lot more gratifying.

Also, MS provided us with some exclusives, so we'll be posting that as well. Much more to come later!

Update: here are the pictures.

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