FS 2004 Aircraft
We constantly see posts on various forums about how poorly we model aircraft, how we should have chosen this aircraft instead of the one we did, etc. We see this so much we've developed pretty thick skins, and frankly some of the criticism is well deserved.
When I joined the team the aircraft list for FS 2004 was already in-place and the team was well into production. So whether I want to or not, I can't take any blame or claim any victories for the choices which were made. I do however think that the historic aircraft which were chosen were all worthy choices. In retrospect, we should have had better representation of the world history of flight with less emphasis on US aircraft, but that's water under the bridge now. Maybe we will learn from that mistake going forward...
The actual process to determine what aircraft are included in any version of Flight Simulator is a prolonged battle as there are so many strong opinions on the team. Going forward we are becoming less focused on keeping what has been done due to personal attachment or the money and sweat invested and will be focusing on what experience a given aircraft will provide for the user and to some extent what new capabilities it brings to the simulator. This isn't a veiled clue about the aircraft included in FSX, just an insight into where we may go in the future.
With the FS9 historical aircraft we raised the bar significantly with the instrument panels, gauges, exterior models, VC's, aircraft systems, and flight models. We still have room to improve in all of these areas (and are improving for FSX), but I am very proud of the quality of those aircraft. My personal favorites to fly are the Vega and the Comet, and they were also two of the most problematic aircraft to find good source for.
Speaking of source material, we go to great lengths to find the best possible source to build our aircraft. We have had representatives of the team travel to the RAF Museum in Hendon, to the Canadian Aviation Museum in Ottawa, the Experimental Aircraft Association in Oshkosh, and to Kermit Weeks Fantasy of Flight in Florida. Each of these facilities allowed us to spend several days photographing their aircraft spending hundreds of combined hours sitting in the cockpits taking more than 1000 photos of each aircraft (covering pretty much every square inch inside and out). We have also been blessed to have met many individual aircraft owners that have been willing to let us photograph their aircraft and even take us flying to get the feel of the aircraft in flight. A DC-3 isn't cheap to operate so this isn't a small deal. Poor me for having to endure such punishment sitting in, touching, and dreaming about all of these aircraft.
Just as a quick side comment, one of the aircraft I spent an hour or so sitting in was a Messerschmitt bF 109 at the Canadian museum. The aircraft had been recovered from a Russian swamp/bog and was restored to excellent condition including all of the original bullet holes from when it was shot down. When the aircraft was pulled from the bog the pilot's remains were still in the aircraft, and the story is that the restoration team couldn't get the smell out of the leather and canvas belts and other cockpit stuff. And let me tell you did it ever stink in that cockpit. It was really quite an experience sitting in that thing with the canopy closed... Eventually you get used to the smell and it's tolerable. The 109 has one tight little cockpit and I have a hard time imagining actually being in combat in it with the poor visibility and all.
In addition to extremely detailed photography, we also gather audio source whenever we can by recording operating aircraft both inside and outside from multiple perspectives. I've read some forum posts where folks don't believe a DC-3 sounds like what we have in FS 2004, but having been in the cockpit both on the ground and in the air, I can tell you that on a good sound system, it sounds exactly like we have it. Same goes for the Ford Tri-motor, the Jenny, and many of the others as well.
The Flight Simulator aircraft team has really talented and enthusiastic people creating aircraft, unfortunately we always have too many aircraft to build and too little time to build them. As a result we have to apply a broad stroke across the board for mass appeal and not dive very deep into the details of any one aircraft. Of course that leaves a lot of room for super detailed aircraft to be created by any one of the fine third party developers creating aircraft for Flight Simulator.
