Tech
Microsoft Flight Simulator beginner’s guide and tips
Microsoft Flight Simulator delivers on a big promise, letting you explore nearly every inch of Earth from the skies.
If you’re a newcomer to the flight simulator genre eager to take off and see the sights, that may not be so easy at first. It’s worth mastering a few basics early on.
Polygon’s Microsoft Flight Simulator beginner’s guide will give you the foundations you need to soar. Before you explore the air around everything there is to see, check out these essential tips on flying, navigating, and controlling the camera.
Complete the Flight Training first
Microsoft Flight Simulator is, unsurprisingly, a realistic flight simulator. Unlike an arcade flying game, there’s a lot you need to know before you can even take off properly. Everything you need to know to take off into the sky, stay up there, and land safely is explained in detail in the Flight Training section.
While it’s hardly exciting to recommend that everyone dive into training mode first thing, it’s essential. Flight Training covers nearly every concept worth knowing, and it’s designed to get you up in the sky as fast as possible. At the same time, it explains a handful of controls that might not be intuitive, especially if you’re planning on playing this game with a controller. These eight and short exercises will familiarize you with basic controls, navigation, and landing.
Completing Flight Training takes roughly 30-40 minutes, and by the time you’re done, you should feel confident enough to fly around the world on your own.
Which planes to use
In Flight Training, you’ll exclusively use the Cessna 152, which has a cruise speed of 107 KTAS (knots true airspeed). As you’ve learned in your lessons, that speed range is fairly good for cruising around a small area. If you want to cover more ground, you’ll need a faster plane.
In this section, we’ll discuss the types of planes in Microsoft Flight Simulator, and give you some ideas about when and why you might want to use them.
Propeller planes
Image: Asobo Studio/Microsoft Corporation via Polygon
Propeller planes like the Cessna 152 are great for flying low and relatively slow. If you plan on sightseeing around dense areas like cities or trying to find where you live, pick a propeller plane with a cruise speed of less than 150 KTAS.
Turboprops
Image: Asobo Studio/Microsoft Corporation via Polygon
Turboprops are similar to propeller planes, but they’re twice as fast and have double the maximum altitude. These are good planes to move up to after you’ve gotten comfortable with propeller planes. They’re also a good fit when you want something faster, like when going over larger stretches of land like mountains, large forests, or big lakes.
Airliners and jets
Image: Asobo Studio/Microsoft Corporation via Polygon
To cover longer distances, consider stepping into an airliner or jet. Both options have quadruple the airspeed of the plane you learned the basics on and can climb to more than three times the altitude. Both options have comparable speed but handle differently due to their size. Some airliners have much larger fuel reserves, in case you feel like simulating an intercontinental flight from the comfort of your home computer.
How to fly anywhere
One of the most exciting aspects of Microsoft Flight Simulator is the ability to fly anywhere in the world. Setting off to the skies above some of the world’s most beautiful sights — or even your home — is simple, but there are a few things worth knowing first.
Most of the world’s major landmarks are called Points of Interest. If your goal is to check out famous places or natural wonders, then all you need to do is search for them in the World Map / Free Flight mode.
Image: Asobo Studio/Microsoft Corporation via Polygon
If your destination is a famous landmark, you can easily find it by using the search function from the map screen in Free Flight mode. Once you’ve found your location, the map will zoom in on it, allowing you to set it as a departure point or arrival area. In our guide to finding famous landmarks, we recommend setting Points of Interest as arrival points and locating a suitable departure airport.
To see how your house has been modeled, check out our guide on finding where you live in Microsoft Flight Simulator.
How to use Active Pause
Active Pause is a feature that you might have seen recommend on a loading screen, but it’s not bound to any key, so you might not know how to use it.
Image: Asobo Studio/Microsoft Corporation via Polygon
Active Pause allows you to stop the motion of your aircraft and look around. Hitting the normal pause menu by pressing the Escape key on your keyboard or pause on your controller brings up your options, obscuring everything else. However, if you want to stop the action and take a look around, you need to bind your Active Pause function to a key.
The Control key works well, because the game doesn’t use it, and it’s at the bottom of your keyboard, which makes it quick and easy to access.
We staged the shot above using Active Pause. With the function enabled, we orientated the external camera (by hitting the View button our Xbox One controller) and set the position of the sun at the right height by changing the weather settings in the toolbar.
This feature is also a great if you’re trying to find your house and you need to take a moment to look around to locate it.
Have fun with the ATC options
Before you set off for your flights, be sure to check out the ATC Options. Changing these air traffic control settings won’t have a major impact on your flight, but they’ll allow you to have a little fun with the radio messages you hear while flying.
Image: Asobo Studio/Microsoft Corporation via Polygon
Whatever you write in as your tail number will appear on the back of your plane. You can add a few letters or numbers here. This makes no real difference, but it’s nice seeing your name or favorite numbers plastered on the side of your plane.
Your call sign is usually a set of identifying characters that the air traffic control team will use to identify you over the radio. Any letters you use in your call sign will be called out using the Phonetic Alphabet, but if you write in a short word, there’s a chance they will say that instead. Short names and words work great, though we found that profane language gets replaced with a generic call sign.
Amateur music guru. Lifelong coffee scholar. Zombieaholic. Pop culture junkie.
Amateur music guru. Lifelong coffee scholar. Zombieaholic. Pop culture junkie.
Being very close companies, OPPO and OnePlus have decided to create a new partnership, with the latter being a pioneer in the market. It has become the representative of the best smartphones in the group, and this will be seen very soon.
Proving this, OnePlus has announced that it will have news soon. The following brand assets will be announced on February 7, 2023. We are talking about OnePlus 11 5G and Buds Pro 2.
In recent years, OnePlus has been showcasing new hardware in an attempt to find a new place in the market. The brand has not always seen its full potential, betting on mid-range or entry-level smartphones.
The situation is changing, and the novelty will go on sale in early 2023, February 7. It is on this day that the new OnePlus 11 5G will be presented with all the expected news. We definitely have the new Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 SoC here. There's still 16GB of storage left and 256GB of onboard storage.
It is expected that he will receive a 6.7-inch OLED display with a resolution of 1440p and a frequency of 120 Hz. In the field of photography, we will have an important change: a 50 MP main camera, a 48 MP ultra wide-angle camera and a 32 MP telephoto lens with 2x zoom. For selfies and video calls, you'll have a 16-megapixel camera.
The photography partnership with Hasselblad will continue with OnePlus for fine-tuning and some additions. This alliance has brought important results for the best smartphones of the brand, guaranteeing the best photos in any situation.
In addition to the new OnePlus 11 5G, another brand new feature is also expected to arrive at the event. We're talking about the Buds Pro 2, which are solidifying an audio commitment that's becoming more of a reality. The brand promises "rich stereo quality sound with crystal clear clarity".
Stays like this marked by the beginning of February, another important novelty will enter the market. OnePlus wants to reclaim its place, and that will be the brand's bet for years to come. OnePlus 11 5G and Buds Pro 2 take the first step in this direction.
Amateur music guru. Lifelong coffee scholar. Zombieaholic. Pop culture junkie.
According to information provided by Mukul Sharma, the unidentified POCO device can be identified by the model number 22127PC95I. Due to the fact that it was first seen online, the marketing name of this equipment is still a mystery.
POCO has not launched new mobile devices, including smartphones, to the market for some time now. On the other hand, several POCO smartphones such as POKO X5 and X5 Pro have been spotted on various certification sites, suggesting that the company will release these products soon. Today a new smartphone from the sub-brand xiaomi has been spotted on the BIS India website but the device does not have a name or any other details associated with it.
A new POCO device (model number 22127PC95I) has been included in the Indian BIS certification. POCO F5 has the model number 23013PC75I. #A LITTLE pic.twitter.com/NAFloP5Crt
— Mukul Sharma (@stufflistings) December 19, 2022
According to information provided by Mukul Sharma, the unidentified POCO device can be identified by the model number 22127PC95I. Due to the fact that it was first seen online, the marketing name of this equipment is still a mystery. It is possible that it will debut as a mid-range smartphone. The Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) website, other than the model number of the smartphone, does not provide any additional information about the device. However, this seems to indicate that the product will be available in the Indian market very soon.
In other related news, POCO X5 5G has recently been seen on several certification sites including SIRIM in Malaysia, BIS in India and the US FCC. According to various sources, it is possible that this is a renamed or modified version Redmi Note 12 5Gwhich was recently released in China.
It is supposed to be equipped screen 6.67″ AMOLED display with 120Hz refresh rate and chipset Snapdragon 4 Gen 1 inside. Can run MIUI 13 based on android 12 and have LPDDR4x RAM in addition to UFS 2.2 storage. The front camera is rumored to be 8MP while the main rear camera will be 48MP with 2MP depth. May have the ability drums 5000 mAh and 33W fast charging support.
In addition POCO X5 Pro 5G has recently been seen on various sites dedicated to certification. The battery is said to have a capacity of 5000 mAh and can charge at 67W. It will come with MIUI 14 preinstalled and will support n5, n7, n38, n41, n77 and n78 network bands. 5G.
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Amateur music guru. Lifelong coffee scholar. Zombieaholic. Pop culture junkie.
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