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(More customer reviews)There has been a noticeable lack of flight simulators in the Mac software market for a long time. Amid the faltering competition, one developer has stood by the platform through thick and thin - Austin Meyer's Laminar Research and their acclaimed sim, X-Plane.
X-Plane is every bit a simulator but not much of a game. Aviation professionals should be excited by the fact that aerodynamic performance is accurately simulated using a complex physics engine. Believe it or not, most sims cheat by depending on pre-defined data that is used to estimate aircraft behavior in different configurations. It is such an accurate simulation that you can even fly on Mars or guide the Shuttle Orbiter from orbit to landing!
Superior accuracy is teamed with above-par graphics too. With satellite derived terrain, detailed aircraft models, realistic clouds, and high-resolutions, X-Plane holds it's own visually against most Windows flight sims. Though turning the settings all the way up can challenge even a G5, the graphics are scalable to support even old and low-end machines. This leaves load times the only real frustration.
With its technical emphasis, X-Plane can be very useful to aircrew as well as certified or aspiring private pilots. The program keeps a logbook of all flights, offers true to life system failures, air traffic control, airfields, charts, instrument panels, and aircraft checklists to practice with. Approaches and takeoffs can be practiced repeatedly with easy menu commands and there's a "get me lost" feature for challenging navigation skills. Two computers can even be networked in an instructor mode for training purposes.
While X-Plane isn't a combat sim and doesn't provide a real gaming experience, hobbyists and aviation enthusiasts can still enjoy experimenting with the wide variety of included aircraft - including airships, helicopters, gliders, and more. There's even an active community that uses the included content creation tools to churn out an ever-wider variety of downloadable aircraft (both real and fictional), flight plans, and scenery. Add to that a variety of challenging scenarios like water bombing, tanker rendezvous, and carrier landing, and X-Planes appeal grows.
Thanks to the author's secret weapon (http://x-plane.com/weapon.html) X-Plane is in a perpetual state of rapid development. That means regular bug fixes and feature additions. Not that it needs more! It can even playback real blackbox recordings, has both ambient ATC recordings and real-time ATC interaction thanks to OS Xs built-in speech software.
One of X-Planes coolest extras is the ability to capture the screen to a QuickTime movie. Though there is no indication that you are recording and no sound will be saved, there was little affect on the sims performance with default settings on an iMac G5.
Simple menus are always available and offer a lot of flexibility, but since development is simultaneously cross-platform, command-key shortcuts don't exist and the interface makes use of non-standard elements that may take some getting used to. Fortunately the menus and dialogs are fairly intuitive and require few trips to the minimalist printed manual or the more thorough version on disc.
X-Plane is a valuable tool for professional aviators and engineers yet it is affordable and accessible enough to appeal to anyone with an interest in aviation. Besides, it's the only civil aviation sim for sale on the Mac since Microsoft, Flight Unlimited, and Fly! faded away with Mac OS 9.
All aircrew should have a copy and visit XPlaneFreeWare.net (http://www.xplanefreeware.net/~barry/) to download relevant airframes and anyone involved in air operations should at least give the demo a try. X-Plane isn't priced like engineering software or marketed like a just-for-fun flight sim, but it succeeds as both!
Click Here to see more reviews about: X-PLANE V8 (Mac)
X-Plane 8.0 is the ultimate in general aviation simulators. With a wide range of airplanes,all-new helicopters, dynamic speech synthesis and full-planet terrain-mapped scenery will keep your eyes popping out for hours!
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