French firm’s update of Microsoft Flight Simulator game uplifts 'grounded' pilots
Many aircraft remain grounded as a result of coronavirus pandemic. But would-be and real pilots will soon have the ability to travel any place in the world-virtually-thanks to the first update in years of Microsoft’s Flight Simulator game.
With usage of Microsoft’s Bing satellite mapping and cloud-powered processing, French developers Asobo Studio have sought to render the piloting experience as lifelike as possible.
Two co-founders of Asobo have even been taking flying lessons for days gone by four years after the studio was tasked by Microsoft with giving the venerable game-which dates to the initial days of gaming in 1982-its first update since 2006.
“The lessons were essential (to introduce) something sensory to the overall game,” one of these, Marcel Bossard, told AFP.
“What sensations does a pilot feel? What can he hear? How does his head move? How does the plane react under a cloud and above the ocean? In past simulations, it was somewhat rigid,” Bossard said, who's lead software engineer for the game.
The new title goes on sale on Tuesday, in the beginning for PCs, with an Xbox version to come. It really is something of a take-off for the French company, founded by 12 gaming friends in 2002 within an apartment in the southwestern city of Bordeaux.
Asobo is becoming known for gaming adaptations of several Pixar films, including “Ratatouille”, “Wall-E”, “Up” and “Toy Story 3”.
An important milestone was the release in-may 2019 of “A Plague Game: Innocence”, which won multiple industry awards and resonates in a world beset by a virulent disease.
The difference between 18 years back and now “is like learning to fly on a little plane and at the end being the pilot of an Airbus”, Bossard said.
Microsoft’s game has indeed offered generations of pilots, and enthusiastic amateurs, the chance to train on a fleet of aircraft.
Cockpits, clouds and Kilimanjaro
The 2020 version gives them control of from a Pitts Special S2S biplane to an Airbus A320 Neo or widebody Boeing Dreamliner, and the option to fly from an array of airports all over the world past detailed cityscapes and cloud formations.
For the very first time, because of Microsoft’s globe-spanning technology, the earth has been reproduced in enough detail to permit visual flight rules from the cockpit-where collision is avoided through the pilot’s vision and actions-rather than by following tracked-out routes.
Software advances since 2006, and the onset of artificial intelligence, have given the overall game designers the ability to map out the world with startling clarity, from the azure seas of the Caribbean to the graceful peak of Mount Kilimanjaro.
The realism is heightened by real-time weather data produced from Microsoft’s Bing servers, which will give virtual pilots some of the conditions within their area of flight, instead of generic clouds.
The anticipation could have been great among gamers anytime, but even more so now at a time of coronavirus lockdowns that have grounded entire airlines.
“Flight Simulator is a title that’s been played by tens of an incredible number of gamers, you will find a community which includes been waiting for many years. Microsoft doesn’t have room for error,” games expert Laurent Michaud said.
The stakes are even higher for Asobo. A successful launch will provide a springboard towards “bigger games, budgets and teams”, he said.
“When there are such high expectations, you can’t disappoint. Asobo’s reputation reaches stake.”
The French company is well alert to the turbulence ahead if its efforts fail to meet approval with the worldwide community of armchair aviators.
Flight Simulator is a “monument in the annals of video games”, co-founder David Dedeine said.
“We have had so many messages (from fans) everywhere, of most ages, even in the aviation world where many persons wished to help us,” he said. “We’re touching upon a thing that goes far beyond the merchandise.”
