Fly! 2

Rating:
Summary: Fly away from this game...
Review: ...So how is Fly! II inferior than Flight Simulaor 2000? Unfortunately in many ways.

Firstly, the game out of the box that you pay for has precious little when it comes to scenery. There's only one CD and a slim manual. The minimal installation takes up a whopping 1.3 GB. So when you give away so much space of your hard disk for one game, you except something big. You are then sorely disapointed.

The game takes about a minute to get to the first screen. Then after you give all the language and graphics options and click "Start",... well, for those doing this for the first time, this is my advice: have a good nap. The actual game takes a generous 4-5 minutes to load. And this is the next problem: Fly! II is extremely resource consuming. To put this into perspective, the game took a whole 4 minutes to load on my 800 MHz, 128 MB RAM, 4 MB AGP machine.

OK, so it's loaded. Next: a screen asking you to choose between QuickFlight and Adventures. The former for the firsties, so I choose QuickFlight. After 3 minutes I find myself facing a cockpit, on an unknown airport in the middle of nowhere. There are a thousand-and-one buttons apparently for everything. Ok, so I've done this before in Flight Simulator 98. Start the engine. Already started. Look for the throttle. Nowhere to be seen. Ok, check out the manual. Nothing there. Half an hour gone. Explore the menus. Ok, Options>Keys & Buttons. Alright, first step towards the sky. Got all the keys written down. Start the trottle. Started. So why's not it moving? Oh-parking brakes. OK, got those babies removed. Ok, off we go. In the air. So how do I turn? Trim, pitch, elivator? Nothing is working. Disgusted, I quit the game. Another 3 minutes. In fact: huge, huge, huge learning curve.

Now that after weeks of plodding, you've learned the game. And then you find that all those hours spent weren't worth it. There are simply no sceneries worth flying over. TRI, it seems, was in such a hurry to release this game that they chose not to put any cities at all and in a display of supreme cheek, put it in the manual that the cities were available for "free download" at their site. At 100 MB per city, it's going to take a lot of determination to sit through all those hours of Internet watching your cities creep into your system.

And now, after this thorough battering, it's time to give some plus points. There are some. First: the cockpit. The actual functioning of all and I mean all the buttons are enough to make the folks at Microsoft a blushing lot. The attention to detail is evident elsewhere: you can make a full 360 throught the plane and see everything from the floor mattress to the comfortable seats at the back. And the scenery that is there is basically decent. The planes are few, but exciting enough. There is also a chopper.(Which inspite of all appearances, is the most difficult to handle). The third party support to this game is tremendous: there are hordes of communities discussing about how to solve various bugs. GODGames itself has provided quite a few patches on it's site.

The verdict: one star definitely. Beacause today gamers are not really prepared for the Internet-platform Fly! II has accidentally got itself onto. This is a rich game poorly presented. Wait for Fly ! II Gold and hope that it will contain everything Fly! II is lacking now.

Rating:
Summary: Good game but...where's the manual???
Review: Before saying anything about FLY! 2, I have to say this: What possessed the makers to put out this game with NO MANUAL??? Maybe they think we're too stupid to read or we won't understand the contents, either way, not including a manual is a lousy way to save money. The makers of FLY! 2 should've known better, it's almost insulting...BAD MOVE. (And I don't care if there will be a manual on the web, who would read dozens or hundreds of pages on a computer screen anyway??)

The game itself, however, is really pretty good. The original FLY! (and FLY! 2K) had great panels and realistic flight modeling. What they lacked was realistic scenery. FLY! 2 makes up for that and more, adding higher resolution, high quality scenery, including free scenery downloads on their website. Sky and clouds are also well done, and some of the sunset scenes are just spectacular. The game also has more realism features, and cool special effects such as the landing gear smoking on touch down and the most realistic night lighting I've ever seen in a flight sim; the landing lights on the planes light up the runway so realistically you'll be impressed. The new Pilatus PC-12, as well as all the other aircraft (which now have bogus names) look very good, each with the near perfect panels FLY! has come to specialize in. Whoever designed this game worked very hard and very long, and did a good job, putting together a solid, state of the art flight simulation package. In a nutshell, here's the break down:

The GOOD: The best panels around, realistic flight, incredible realism settings, beautiful planes, some very spectacular effects for sky, water, scenery and planes, high level of realism, and good customer support. Overall, a high quality package.

The BAD; No MANUAL (ouch!), requires a fast machine and/or a good graphics accelerator to even get the game running, scenery not accurate enough for visual flight, the game still has a few bugs in it, no big commercial planes like some other simualations.

If you like flight simulators, I think you'll enjoy FLY! 2. I'd give it a solid four stars or more, but the lack of a manual takes so much away from the experience (for me anyway)I have to give this game only three stars.

Rating:
Summary: A great game!!
Review: Fly! II has been the target of a lot of prejudice. GODGames did make a big mistake relaeasing the game minus cities and manual, but that doesn't mean the rest of the game is trash.

Unfortunately, right from it's release, the word spread out in every flight simulator forum: GODGames and TRI messed it up bigtime, there's no manual, the game requires huge resources, it is very hard to learn and so on.

Because the pros of this game are so heavily shadowed by it's cons, it would be best to clear the cons first. There are four of these, primarily:

1. NO MANUAL: People have cried this aloud. First things first: does a manual make somebody a great flight sim piot? Does having a fancy, glossy, hardbound, colorful manual on your lap enable you to fly like a pro? The answer is NO. Sure, you do need a manual to know how the game works, and these form a small percentage of the total manual size (36 MB).

The other constant complain is the long line encountered during download. Well, there are atleast a dozen other sites where you can get the manuals faster.

2. POOR SCENERY: The epitaph poor in this phrase refers, more often than not, to city sceneries. Any Fly! II hater will also accept the fact that the land and water are rendered good, while the mountains are stunning. So how much flying does one do over a city? Hardly 5 minutes. Most of the time, you'll be looking at rivers and mountains out of your cockpit.

3. HIGH RESOURCES: OK, this is one point that cannot be defended. Fly! II does consume a lot of resources. Frankly, the minimum resources recommended by TRI is a joke: the accepted minimum is 600 Mhz, 128 MB RAM, 16 MB AGP, 1.3 GB hard disk space.

Here, however, I must directly compare with Fly! II's only competitor, FS2000. It's the same story there, minimum too minimum, just enough too big. There, Fly! II and FS2000 stand together. It's an accepted fact today that flight simulators do not come cheap: they aren't for the internet surfing computer with specs that'd make an office suite choke. They are for the real enthusiast who'll give over a GB of his hard disk and much of his RAM to get in a cockpit that feels like a cockpit.

4. LEARNING CURVE: Ironically, this con is more of a pro, because the greater the learning curve of a game, the more realistic it is. That's just what Fly! II: more realistic. With the amazingly all-working cockpit, life-like simulation engine, the user can forget the hitch it out of the hanger-take it off for a spin days. The learning curve is great, but every minute in the curve is an enjoyable experience.

And here are the pros:

1. REALISM WHOO-HOO!!: Whoo-hoo, indeed. Taking off from Bern and flying over the Swiss Alps to Italy is an unforgettable experience. All the terrain is there: the whole Earth is mapped. From the Himalyas to the Hawaii Isles, from Scotland to the North Pole, everything is there. Plus about 95 % of the airports and VOR's.

There's an incredible flight planner you can use to chart out your course. Plus there are sectional charts for the whole of US, and vector maps of the whole world.

2. DETAIL: There are eight aircrafts in Fly!II: The TRI Flyhawk Trainer, Kodiak, Aurora, Sahara, Pilatus PC-12, Peregrine 800TR and the Barracuda, plus a chopper, the Bell 407. So there's a lot of variety. But the detail of each aircraft is such that one would have sufficed.

99 % of the buttons and switches in the cockpit really do something, however subtly, to the way the aircraft flies. There are six external views to choose from plus a 360 degree internal cockpit. All the aircrafts are neatly done, with carpets and seats added for good measure. Their handling and sounds are different enough. All this adds up to a great flight.

3. THIRD PARTY SUPPORT: The third party support to this game is incredible. Already, you can download the Boeing 747, Boeing 737, Stemme Glider and even an F-16 Falcon at flight simulation sites, with the total download size less than 10 MB.

The add-ons don't end here. There are hordes of small sceneries, city sceneries, patches, tweaks with the average file size below 1 MB. And it's going on...

The conclusion, therefore, is that Fly! II fully deserves five stars. The game is worth playing, and this is for FS2000 fans: have a dekko at this game, I guarentee you'll switch loyalties.

Rating:
Summary: This is one of the best, but it requires study and updating
Review: Fly!II is in many ways, the most realistic flightsim software I have used. This fine work by TRI (Terminal Reality) was forced out the door by their publisher before TRI had finished the package - a very unfortunate occurrence which tainted the experience of early users and reviewers!

The Fly! aircraft (after the updates and patches) are the closest to reality I've seen in instrumentation and systems modeling. Most of them also have extremely realistic handling and performance. There are many aircraft, scenery add-ons, utilities, etc. still being developed. Because of the built-in tools and free developer programs, you can make a lot of scenery add-ons yourself or import the fruit of others labors. Many of these (plus a lot of help) are available at online communities such as Avsim and Flightsim.

I would not really classify this as a game, if you expect you can jump right in and be able to fly. But, if you're looking for a great simulation of flying and aircraft operation, you just found it - and like the real world, that takes time and a little effort.

Rating:
Summary: FLY II, released too soon because of MFS2002 !!
Review: I bought this game. I write "game" because this is more a game than a simulator... - I was not able to install the soft from the CD. I had to copy it first to be able to install it from my copy ? - No manual. You need to download it but... because nobody has this manual everybody is downloading at the same time and you can never get a connection... The keyboard command are not included in the box ! - Some crash too often... - No scenery, you need to download 170MB if you want to get San Francisco for example... Or order a burned CD for almost free... You have to pay for shipping...

So, I was believing FLY II better than MFS2000 but I'm very happy to have my old FS2000 ! Even more since I bought "Corporate Pilot" and Phoenix Simlator (nice job guys) add-ons for FS2000.

If you want a good flight simulator buy the old FS2000 Pro (on sale now) and try some very nice free add-on on avsim.com or flightsim.com or wait for MFS2002...

Rating:
Summary: Has promise, but features are not readily accessible...
Review: I bought this simulator because of the "Easy to Use" scenery editor touted on the box. However,I was unable to find the scenery editor anywhere in any of the menus, or even on the disk. "Easy to Use" does not mean I should have to be a programmer to even find it! Another problem is shared with the first FLY! release - it is an unfinished product. I hate spending 40 to 50 dollars for a product that might someday be patched into functionality. My 466mhz Celeron, with a GeForce 2 MX card and 256mb's of memory still struggles with stuttering. The framerate indicates in the 60's, but it stutters nonetheless. The documentation is akin to a takeout menu, and promises an extensive manual available for free online. Hate to complain, but "state of the art" flight sims should really come with a fairly hefty manual, not a link to a manual that at this date is not even available on the website! Fly! II also claims an extensive map feature, if you decide the 30 or so map packs (at 50 megs each) are worth the time and the drive space. The maps and complete manual should have been in the box, not available in the future for download. Another thing that the box doesn't mention is that you must have a 64mb video card to take advantage of the detailed textured scenery. Most of us simply don't have a 64meg card at this time, so we are stuck with low resolutions, or forced to turn off the very features that are the selling points of the game. In all fairness, this is a potentially great looking sim, with teriffic lighting and great flight models. The cockpits are the best of any of the commercial flight sims, and it is obvious that love and attention were given to FLY!II...but they should have packaged a COMPLETE sim. I gave it a 3 because it does have enormous potential, and comes from a great company. The scenery looks cool, if you have the horsepower, but I didn't recognize many features that would make VFR flying a realistic endeavor. Also, the interface is clumsy and slow, and sometimes just confusing. Hopefully, future patches will address these issues...If I wanted flimsy documentation and buggy software, I would get my games from bargain bins.

Rating:
Summary: Has promise, but features are not readily accesible...
Review: I bought this simulator because of the "Easy to Use" scenery editor touted on the box. However, I was unable to find the scenery editor anywhere in any of the menus, or even on the disk. "Easy to Use" does not mean I should have to be a programmer to even find it! Another problem is shared with the first FLY! release - it is an unfinished product. I hate spending 40 to 50 dollars for a product that might someday be patched into functionality. My 466mhz Celeron, with a GeForce 2 MX card and 256mb's of memory still struggles with stuttering. The framerate indicates in the 60's, but it stutters nonetheless. The documentation is akin to a takeout menu, and promises an extensive manual available for free online. Hate to complain, but "state of the art" flight sims should really come with a fairly hefty manual, not a link to a manual that at this date is not even available on the website! Fly! II also claims an extensive map feature, if you decide the 30 or so map packs (at 50 megs each) are worth the time and the drive space (most of them are only available as downloads). The maps and complete manual should have been in the box, not available in the future for download. Another thing that the box doesn't mention is that you must have a 64mb video card to take advantage of the detailed textured scenery. Most of us simply don't have a 64meg card at this time, so we are stuck with low resolutions, or forced to turn off the very features that are the selling points of the game. In all fairness, this is a potentially great looking sim, with teriffic lighting and great flight models. The cockpits are the best of any of the commercial flight sims, and it is obvious that love and attention were given to FLY!II...but they should have packaged a COMPLETE sim. I gave it a 3 because it does have enormous potential, and comes from a great company. The scenery looks cool, if you have the horsepower, but I didn't recognize many features that would make VFR flying a realistic endeavor. Also, the interface is clumsy and slow, and sometimes just confusing. Hopefully, future patches will address these issues...If I wanted flimsy documentation and buggy software, I would get my games from bargain bins.

Rating:
Summary: Has promise, but features are not readily accessible...
Review: I bought this simulator because of the "Easy to Use" scenery editor touted on the box. However,I was unable to find the scenery editor anywhere in any of the menus, or even on the disk. "Easy to Use" does not mean I should have to be a programmer to even find it! Another problem is shared with the first FLY! release - it is an unfinished product. I hate spending 40 to 50 dollars for a product that might someday be patched into functionality. My 466mhz Celeron, with a GeForce 2 MX card and 256mb's of memory still struggles with stuttering. The framerate indicates in the 60's, but it stutters nonetheless. The documentation is akin to a takeout menu, and promises an extensive manual available for free online. Hate to complain, but "state of the art" flight sims should really come with a fairly hefty manual, not a link to a manual that at this date is not even available on the website! Fly! II also claims an extensive map feature, if you decide the 30 or so map packs (at 50 megs each) are worth the time and the drive space. The maps and complete manual should have been in the box, not available in the future for download. Another thing that the box doesn't mention is that you must have a 64mb video card to take advantage of the detailed textured scenery. Most of us simply don't have a 64meg card at this time, so we are stuck with low resolutions, or forced to turn off the very features that are the selling points of the game. In all fairness, this is a potentially great looking sim, with teriffic lighting and great flight models. The cockpits are the best of any of the commercial flight sims, and it is obvious that love and attention were given to FLY!II...but they should have packaged a COMPLETE sim. I gave it a 3 because it does have enormous potential, and comes from a great company. The scenery looks cool, if you have the horsepower, but I didn't recognize many features that would make VFR flying a realistic endeavor. Also, the interface is clumsy and slow, and sometimes just confusing. Hopefully, future patches will address these issues...If I wanted flimsy documentation and buggy software, I would get my games from bargain bins.

Rating:
Summary: FLY2!
Review: I had bought this program because I had played the first version (FLY!) , of which I thought had a great start. This FLY2! was a sad dissapointment. For a start, No manual. If they want to save money by not printing it..okay. But to put the manual on a server which is always overloaded (impossible to get D/L)prevents anyone from enjoying the game because without a manual...no game. The controls are flakey and the NY scenery is a joke. Wait for Microsoft FS2002 (or buy the current Microsoft FS2000 Professional)if you want a guaranteed product which is easy to use.

Rating:
Summary: 3 Trick Pony
Review: I have had this package for about 8 months and I have not yet become fully proficient with all of the features that Fly II has onboard. This is a learning curve of artificial dimensions as it exists because there is no manual. Yes, I know the manual is obtainable online but I don't have time to sit waiting for an opportunity to get online to an obviously overburdened website. I have been trying for at least 5 months!

Once I do learn all of the fascinating intricacies of this simulator I am certain that it will be one of the best packages I have seen. The aircraft modelling is superb and that's trick one. Every switch, button, dial and gauge on the instrument panel works to affect the airplanes behavior! Full 360 degree view of the interior makes the Fly II a winner and that is trick two.

There is a broad variety of aircraft to select from and each is equally minute in the aircraft detail. That's trick three.

One real bummer is that it does not support force feedback. I am astonished. With all of the resources you need to run it, you would think that force feedback would have occurred to someone in development.

It's a bit pricey but I expect that once the shortcomings are handled, it will be worth it.