Who has been Simming for 20 years or more ?

[jaydee]

Hi all . First can i ask the Mods to not move this to some obscure Section. Its not about "other Sims". Its about BOX today in 2017. That's why I posted in general discussion. Thanks mods (I hope).

Due to recent posts about old Hardware and the need to follow the never ending upgrade path for Better Eye Candy, Better CPU Usage, Better FM , Better AI and all that we want from BOX as Pilots in 2017 etc etc.

I decided to Google one of my own Posts....Riva TNT.

At the time I was playing Falcon 3. If Anyone Today whinges  about software Reliability they have no Idea ! Every 20 min was BSOD...And Just Google Falcon 3 to see the "Most Advanced Cockpit" (at the time).

Then Falcon 4 was Released. Astonishing Graphics, Massive Dynamic Campaign......I waited for my Copy and Folder to Arrive from the US...It arrived and my Pc Couldn't run it....So I upgraded and still couldn't run it. Had to wait for Patch 108 ... Went up to Internet Café and Downloaded it to CD. Cost me 20 Bucks and I Couldn't get home fast enough.

Look, here is my Point pertaining to BOX Today : Look how far we have come !..For a new Simmer to BOX, you Buy, download and notwithstanding some minor Hiccups you are Flying in 30 minutes. Even if you have a 2 or 3 year old PC, it good enough to enjoy the 2017 Graphics rendering in BOX.

Just look at what We Pilots Have today. Graphics, FMs and Simulation Realism... From a Small team....I Paid Twice the Price in 1998 for Falcon 4 as I did for BOX in 2014... Allow for Inflation !

20 years of Simming and I am NOT complaining about BOX or the Direction it is Going.

j ~S~

 

 

 

[Finkeren]

Started 1991 with SWOTL, Their Finest Hour and Red Baron in quick succession. Played almost all WW1 and WW2 themed sims since then.

[HappyHaddock]

I can't be alone in remembering MS Flight sim vs 1 released way back in the very early 80's, played most flight sims through to the late 90's, then after years away re-discovered ROF and loved it as it offered the feeling of flight I'd always wanted from sims in my youth.

 

I've dabbled here with BOX to see what direction ROF may one day head and whilst it is undoubtedly great in terms of modelling and visuals and miles ahead of the sort of sims I started with 35 years or so ago  it hasn't grabbed me the way ROF did, though I periodically check these forums to see what's taking place.

Edited March 22, 2017 by HappyHaddock

[=EXPEND=CG_Justin]

I'm getting close. I started in 1999 with a copy of CFS1 flying on my cousin's computer with just the keyboard. I bought my first joystick (non twist style, cant remember the model) two days later, and the rest is history. I still have every non-digital copy of every sim I ever bought, though I have sold, discarded, or given away hardware and peripherals to other simmers I've met over the years. I have also made some of the best friends I've never met in this hobby. When I think about it, I could have had my real PPL a couple times over with all the money I have spent over the past 18 years. But I, like so many others, are so woefully hooked on this hobby that I think I will be doing it as long as I am still breathing.

Edited March 22, 2017 by CG_Justin

[unreasonable]

Moi. My first plane game was F-19 Stealth Fighter, in 1988. A very good game it was too.

[Retnek]

Started 1991 with SWOTL, Their Finest Hour and Red Baron in quick succession. Played almost all WW1 and WW2 themed sims since then.

BIG GRIN - SWOTL, yes, a 386-CPU and maybe a HD of 20 MB - but that sim was quite advanced. My first flight sim around 1988 (starting from one 3.5'' floppy on a ATARI 1024 ST) was subLOGICs "Flight Simulator II", a very basic product in any aspect. But one could start a jet in the morning in Frankfurt, correct the flight path over Greenland at lunch and land during tea-time at JFK - see

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Microsoft_Flight_Simulator#Third_generation_.28Amiga.2C_Atari_ST.2C_and_Macintosh.29

 

Lot's of Real Life circumstances stood against a pilots licence, so until now I feel that joy: at least I can fly this way - I don't think I missed any "important" flight sim release since then.

Edited March 22, 2017 by 216th_Retnek

[Rjel]

1990. LucasArts BoB: Their Finest Hour was my first.

[Guest deleted@50488]

Since 1987, FS3 in an Apple :-)

Edited March 22, 2017 by jcomm

[jeanba]

1984 : FS2 on Apple IIe

[310_cibule]

I have started in 1990 with some weird sim on Mac (one hellcat with radar, two zeros and a betty). Followed by Air Warrior III, CFS 1, 2, 3, European Air War, Jane's WWII Fighters, B 17 II (my beloved), Il 2 series, DCS... I may forget smthg.

 

Does anybody here remember the community project Target for tonight? After dissappointment caused by the fact that B 17 II ended up as a purely off line sim community started to work on its own sim based mainly on Lancaster and Bf 110 (but not only). http://www.combatsim.com/memb123/htm/2001/08/t4t/ Unfortunately it revealed after some time that they bit off more than one can chew.       

[Pajeka]

1988, Vague memories of F/A-18 Interceptor on the Amiga 500.

[Dutchvdm]

I started in 1995 with USNF Gold. That's almost 22 years ago.... I was 12 back then. There where some earlier tryouts with "Knights of the Sky" and "Spitfire40" on a MSX something....(Really can't remember). 

 

Grt M

[707shap_Srbin]

2000 - Flying Corps Gold.

2003 - WarBirds: Free Host (Online).

[Feathered_IV]

SWOTL here too.  Probably in 1992 I think,  although it was borrowed software.  My sister had a boyfriend that owned it and she could only visit him if I accompanied her.  For three glorious summer weeks we would go round there, and while they sat on the porch smooching, I was inside intercepting formations of B-17s in a deadly menagerie of Luftwaffe fighters.  The graphics were so good, that if you squinted really hard those blocky shapes actually looked a bit like a B-17.

 

At the end of the three weeks my sister dumped the guy.

 

I was devastated... 

[150GCT_Veltro]

1986 C64

 

1990. LucasArts BoB: Their Finest Hour was my first.

 

Wonderfull sim, with a great campaign. We need something similar today for the online campaign with a very simplified concept: destroy % of factories, aircafts, pilots, HQ ecc. ecc.

Edited March 22, 2017 by 150GCT_Veltro

[=EXPEND=Capt_Yorkshire]

i started with wings on the amega 500,  good times .

[=VARP=Cygann]

F-15 Strike Eagle on C64 when i was just 6 years old (dad bought me C64 when I was 4y old), followed by Falcon: F-16 - my favorite game of early days of gaming (played this one on 286 PC, 486 2 years later).

 

I can't say I played them all since then, but I know I have played most of them and always liked flight combat sims.

 

Good days, but even better ones ahead since I hope to be simming for far longer then I already have been

 

S!

[Haza]

It was 1984.  The game was Solo Flight for the Commodore 64.  

 

[Plesski]

Am I really that old?

 

https://youtu.be/hiLtyRiTTH4

 

But you are right - we went a really long road.

 

P.

[limeymcscrote]

1981 (?) - Worlds of Flight on TRS-80 Color Computer

[FlyingNutcase]

1981 (?) - Worlds of Flight on TRS-80 Color Computer

 OT: Oh man, I played Slag'em on a friends older brother's TRS-80. One of the exciting multi-player games ever (nuclear defense/offence) - 1981 aged 12.

 

Fast forward to uni and Falcon on floppy disks on an Apple. c.1990.

 

Fast forward a bit more to SWOTL - that was just pure awesomeness. c1992 on a 486-SX25 with mono monitor (how I wish at the time I'd gotten the DX-33, lol).

 

Then a big break until I discovered IL2 in 2003 - that was a big leap to take and I was "home, sweet home".

[sinned]

1986 Artic Fox and 1988 Strike Eagle

[Nocke]

Started working as a freelancer in 1995 at the age of 26, needed a PC for that, which was then my first own computer. In the shop I saw a strange apparatus called "joystick", and they explained me what that was. So since I already was in the process of spending I bought it, plus a copy of USNF which had strategically been placed nearby. Then quickly came CFS?, IL2, and now BoX...

[6./ZG26_Klaus_Mann]

I'm in my early Twenties. How would I?

[Retnek]

Does anybody here remember the community project Target for tonight?

I do, been a bit into that, too. Later 252 Sqdr emerged from it (right, Cat?), some IL2-46 mods and add-ons, SEOW-events, oh yes, good old times, greetings to the silverbacks

[THERION]

I started in 1992 with Dynamix Red Baron (amazing for that time then) and SWOTL. As input device I had my keyboard and a simple Gravis joystick (fugly!), but I was already hooked

for not to say addicted to flight sims...

 

Then I bought my first serious input devices, a FCS combo with rudder pedals from Thrustmaster (750 bucks!!!). I added Strike Commander to my collection, went on with Flying Circus,

Wings of Glory, Pacific Strike, Microprose F14 and Hind, EAW, PAW and the first IL2-Series.... and now to end up with some DCS modules, ROF and BOS, BOM BOK.

 

After all of this I still prefer to fly manual meaning in props. Jets are fun to fly but not that challenging for me... and to be honest there are too many knobs to memorise - I'm too old for this.

 

Cheers

[dburne]

I started in the early 90's with Red Baron as well, using an old Kraft joystick.

Upgraded to the TM FCS not too long afterwards also.

[Hutzlipuh]

Hmm early ones i remember are ACE , Solo Flight , F14 Tomcat (4 or 5 disks!),F19 Stealth Fighter,Gunship!... on the good old Comodore 64 ,

F/A18 Interceptor,Airbus A320,Tornado,Battle of Britain,SWOTL,Gunship 2000,WINGS! on Amiga...

much later Flightsim 4.0 , Falcon 3 ,EF2000 (still fond memories about that one!) Falcon 4 etc....

 

Yes its been a long road...looking forward for the next 20 years though

Edited March 22, 2017 by Hutzlipuh

[seafireliv]

I am shocked to realise that I`ve been simming for longer than 20 years... wow.

[Blooddawn1942]

Startet in 1989 with Ace of Aces on the C64. A year or so later things became interesting after I got my first Amiga. Loved all the Microprose sims! The rest is history. I played most WW1 and WW2 and several modern scenario sims since then and never paused this hobby. But it wasn't until RoF came out I got track IR and since then this hobby went through the roof regarding input devices. The pinnacle of this evolution is DCS and learning all the complex systems and BoX that puts me right into WW2.

[Pierre64]

Jet, by Sublogic, for my very first computer, an Amiga 500 in 1986…

[BMW801]

Started with Werewolf vs Commanche in 1995 and bought my first joystick.

Then moved on to US Navy Fighters in 1996.

Then Flying Corps in 1997.

Then my kids and my job kept me out of it for a while because I got the "Either the computer goes or I go" talk from the wife at the time,

then happily rejoined with IL-2 in 2003.

Things are improving at an astonishing rate and I love it more than ever with BoX and DCS.

I have insidiously kept getting into it more and have gone from only joystick to adding throttle, then pedals, then track IR.

About to put my toe in the water with VR soon, but still figuring out which device I want.

[[CPT]Pike*HarryM]

Hellcats over the Pacific, 1991

[310_cibule]

Hellcats over the Pacific, 1991

 

That was the game! I forgot the name completely.  

[SYN_Mike77]

Does this count? If so, 1972, one quarter at a time. That was a whole weeks allowance!

 

https://www.arcade-history.com/?n=desert-fox&page=detail&id=14071

Edited March 22, 2017 by SYN_Mike77

[No_85_Gramps]

MicroProse F15 Strike Eagle, on an Atari 800, 1985. Then a Harrier sim, don't remember the name. Various other titles through the years and then a break from 2005-2012 or so. ROF brought me back to simming.

[curiousGamblerr]

I'm only 24, so no I wasn't playing any video games at 4 years old... (I should have been, I didn't have anything better to do!)

 

But I did start playing Red Baron when I was ~8, so I'm at a solid 15 years now, about 60% of my life.

[pilotpierre]

Cant remember when, but it was Falcon on an Atari 512mb machine. The sim had to be loaded with 2 floppy discs one after the other. My kids were at high school I think. They were teenagers then and are now 47 and 44 so it wasprobably around 30 years ago.

[Thad]

Salutations,

 

I've been simming a l o n g time. How long. I'm not sure. I'm so old, I've lost a lot of my short term memory.

[[TWB]Pand]

Here's my Flight Sim Dossier from what I can remember and I'm sure there's more I left out.

1. River Raid - Atari 5200 - Proud owner of the "River Raiders" Activision Patch
2. Sopwith
3. JET on my first 8088
4. Chuck Yeager's Advanced Flight Simulator
5. Microprose F-19 Stealth Fighter (Before they knew what it was but made the game anyway! Hitting the Radar at Tripoli, oh yeah!)
6. Microprose F-117 Stealth Fighter
7. Aces of the Pacific
8. Aces over Europe
9. Dawn Patrol
10. F-15 Strike Eagle III
11. Strike Commander
12. Comanche Series
13. A-10 Tank Killer II
14. US Navy Fighters
15. Lock ON: Modern Air Combat
16. Falcon 3.0
17. All the Microsoft Flight Sims
18. Falcon 4.0
19. Air Warrior on AOL
20. Warbirds
21. Aces High/Aces High II. We left warbirds for the amazing graphics/FM of Aces High in 2000.
22. War Thunder
23. IL-2 Battle of Stalingrad
24. IL-2 Battle of Mocow
25. DCS: Digital Combat Simulator A-10C
26. DCS; Digital Combat Simulator Flaming Cliffs 3
27. DCS: Digital Combat Simulator Huey

And oh do I have a pile of worn out equipment to go with it!

1. I have been a Thrustmaster fan since the early 1990's when I started out flying simulators with an FCS, WCS Mark II, and an RCS.
2. After a few years, I upgraded to an F-16 FLCS and TQS.
3. Eventually I upgraded my F-16 FLCS with the F-22 PRO and modded it to make it digital from analog with the "Stickworks" SWF22 Digital Upgrade.
4. In the year 2000, I was one of the first to Pre-Order my shiny, new, all metal Thrustmaster Cougar!  I couldn't have been happier, the overall flow, the complex programming available, it was by far the best flight stick combo I had ever used.
5. Late one evening on April 1st 2011, we were escorting B-29's into Japan.  I took out an N1K, and pulled hard to engage a KI61 that was engaging the bombers.  I'm about the pull the trigger when I go into an uncontrollable aileron roll.  I finally disconnect my stick, disengage from the fight and fly the rest of the way home with keyboard trim.  The next day, I open my Cougar up and found that I broke the metal inside that keeps the X axis on track and and turns the potentiometers.  Tried to repair the damage by welding the piece, but it was apparently cast pot metal and just "melted" during the attempt.   They didn't make the Cougar any longer so I couldn't easily replace the piece.  I can't complain at all, as I had received 11 high quality years out of the stick.  Looking back, the damage was likely caused due to the high stress 'tailslide' maneuvers I had been practicing over the previous month.  
6. December 7th, 2011, I finally upgrade to a Thrusmaster Hotas Warthog and have been using it ever since.
7. March 31st, 2015, upgraded to the MFG Crosswinds Rudder pedals and couldn't be happier.
8. October 16th, 2015, I added a 10 cm extension to my Warthog Stick.