The First Sim I Ever Flew (Seriously)

The F-14 and Acceleration Carriers Credit: SimShack.

Let’s just start out by lying directly to you the reader. Because in all honesty, the title is clickbait as hell. The first sim I actually flew was X-Plane 9. My 2010 HP Pavillion could not handle X-Plane 9. I would play it for a while, kinda just screwing around. I only ever flew with a mouse and keyboard back then. What you think my parents were going to shell out the money for a top tier setup for a 12 year old? Fuck You.

The XP9 Demo I’ve probably clocked several hours in. Credit: Laminar Research

That’s unfair to my parents, they actually spent a lot of money trying to give me and my brother experiences that made us well rounded people. Anyways one year for christmas, I think it was my mother who got me a Logitech G Extreme 3D Pro Joystick. I had a little bit of practice with that one. My middle school had them in it’s computer lab. So I paired it up with a copy of Microsoft Flight Simulator X: Steam Edition. I recently found a copy of FSX in a computer museum, so that should tell you a lot about the antiquity of it.

I think going from XP9 to FSX should maybe count as a downgrade, but if you played FSX in it’s golden era or gold edition era, you get it. There was a campy magic to FSX that you seriously can not capture today. We’re talking intercepting aliens in NASA F-18s, Landing in a hurricane on a carrier, Transporting cursed ancient artifacts through the Amazon in a Gruman Goose. Seriously FSX was magical for a kid. I started up a realistic plane that I learned to fly myself, and then I would fly over my ACTUAL REAL WORLD HOUSE! It’s not a big deal today, but back then. By the way, good luck explaining how cool this was to your parents. I mean, yeah it’s a video game, but that sense of accomplishment was pretty well earned.

The G-21 Goose. Credit: Dovetail Games

I felt like a real pilot, and I only grew more obsessed. By the time I was in high school I was introduced to VRS TacPack, which added weapons to the game. I also bounced around a couple small groups for combat squadrons. One of these squadrons was where I learned the F-4B/N. I also slowly transitioned into the F-14D from there. I should probably mention that by this time, I had gone to Space Camp, and upon my return, was rolling under the callsign Rocketman, based off a very proud moment for me where I won a trivia competition by naming every US manned rocket. By the end of my senior year, I’d moved into DCS and had some practice with the F-15, since that was all I could afford. The Extreme 3D had been replaced with a Saitek X-52, and the HP Pavilion had been replaced with a new Lenovo laptop. I also knew I was headed for the Navy, with a ship out date for that July 3.

The F-4B/N I spent my High School Years in Credit: Fly Away Simulations.

In the Navy, I picked up FSX again after a hiatus. DCS was great, but I had no one to fly with, and I was just kind of going through the motions. FSX saw the start of what would soon become a new challenge for me. Air Hauler 2 was an extension that allowed for a Virtual airline experience. You’d see your airline planes at your airports, AI flights would happen during yours. Think of it almost like AI vatsim. Things were rough early in. We started with C-119s and DC-3s. Eventually we moved up in the world with our fleet of 707s and 727s. The Pan Am and TWA Jet Age was a sight to behold. Man I miss those days. I saw TWA and Pan Am 707s fly out of Lambert STL Airport. I would fly the Kai Tak approach into heavy storms. I saw all kinds of amazing things happen in that simulator.

By 2020 we retired FSX. It was an older platform and the next in the series, FS2020 or MSFS was out. Air Hauler 2 was depreciating and we moved our VA operations to the new Guardian Air Alliance Framework, A bespoke solution that we now have near full control over. The DCS F-14A/B from Heatblur scratches that VRS Itch I had for years. If you want to check out our Pan Am and TWA Virtual Airline, You should check out this link here. I love the simulator selection I have now, but there are times when I would give anything for one more round the world trip on FSX in an old 707.