Microsoft Flight Simulator

Now you will fly through real and genuinely unpredictable weather, generated in real time and in three dimensions. Your 3-D cockpit is now fully interactive, and air traffic control plays a major role in planning and in the air.

Early flights took a toll on pilots that today seems to bear almost no resemblance to our experience of aviation. The strain, fear, and exhaustion felt by pilots attempting to cross the North Atlantic in an open-cockpit biplane would in the 21st century more likely be ascribed to phobia. Flying today is unimaginably comfortable from the perspective of a pilot airborne 80 years ago, or even 50 years ago.

Flight Simulator 2004: A Century of Flight brings unpredictability to the weather, and more real-world randomness (and intelligence) to the behavior of air traffic control systems and AI-generated air traffic. Add to this the advantage of fully interactive 3-D cockpits and it's possible to imagine the great unknown waiting in the skies. Ground support and meteorology were mere figments of the modern standard, and even consistent handling behavior was more than some pilots could hope for when they made their famous "firsts." Flight Simulator will always be as real as it gets, and for this version, that can mean leaving the safe and familiar world behind.