Microsoft Flight Simulator 2000
This Game Gets a Fresh Coat of Paint. However, Even a Series Like This Can't Escape Controversy and a National Tragedy.
Flight Simulator 2000
The next game in the series, Flight Simulator 2000,
was released in late 1999. The game engine received a major overhaul.
This was so that the game could start taking advantage of 3D
accelerators and the graphics capabilities offered by Microsoft's
DirectX technology. As mentioned in the previous article, FS98
was based on the same game engine that's been used since FS 5.0
from 1993 for MS-DOS. Their were some caveats to have a greatly
enhanced game. The newest game in the series demanded a more powerful
computer than the previous versions. The minimum requirement for Flight Simulator 98
was a Intel 486 running at 66MHz. For this game, those minimum
requirements were increased to a Pentium 1 running at 166MHz. However,
many users declared that the game was unplayable, even with this minimum
spec. As a result, the recommended minimum requirements was a Intel or
AMD processor running at 400-500MHz. This made the newest incarnation of
the game much more demanding than its predecessor. These systems were
still somewhat pricey when the game was released in 1999.
This wasn't the only issue plaguing the game though. Because FS2000 was the first game based on a largely revised game engine, that engine wasn't as well optimized as it could have been. As a result, even users on high-end computer systems noticed performance issues and game stuttering at times. FS2000 supported 3D elevation, which allowed the scenery to adjust to the elevation. However, as a this was a new feature, most of the scenery for the previous game was obsolete, as it didn't support this feature. Also noted in the Wikipedia article, GPS was added into the game for the first time. This made plane navigation and flight even more realistic. A supersonic Concorde and the Boeing 777 passenger jet was added to FS2000 as well.
In this latest incarnation of the FS, their were now 17,000 airports worldwide. This brought the number of total airports in the game to around 20,000. All of these airports, combined with GPS navigation, allowed for the simulation of international flights on a much wider scale.
This wasn't the only issue plaguing the game though. Because FS2000 was the first game based on a largely revised game engine, that engine wasn't as well optimized as it could have been. As a result, even users on high-end computer systems noticed performance issues and game stuttering at times. FS2000 supported 3D elevation, which allowed the scenery to adjust to the elevation. However, as a this was a new feature, most of the scenery for the previous game was obsolete, as it didn't support this feature. Also noted in the Wikipedia article, GPS was added into the game for the first time. This made plane navigation and flight even more realistic. A supersonic Concorde and the Boeing 777 passenger jet was added to FS2000 as well.
In this latest incarnation of the FS, their were now 17,000 airports worldwide. This brought the number of total airports in the game to around 20,000. All of these airports, combined with GPS navigation, allowed for the simulation of international flights on a much wider scale.
9/11
This was the
current version of the game that was out when the September 11 attacks
happened. It's been reported in the media that the hijackers used the
Flight Simulator for practice. This claim was later proven to be false,
as the pilots received real training in Florida. One thing to note that
even though the Flight Simulator provides the opportunity for a person
to fly a plane virtually, it's not a replacement or substitute for the
real thing. Even if the hijackers did use the software, that alone
wouldn't have provided them with the capabilities to carry out the
attack. Shortly after that tragic disaster, Microsoft released a patch
that removed the Twin Towers from the game. It was reported that the
game was removed from store shelves at Virgin Megastores and Woolworths in the UK shortly after the disaster.
9/11 did have a impact on this series. The Twin Towers have always been a fixture of the New York scenery in the previous games, and it now seems unusual that they weren't there anymore. It's a reminder that a game series can't escape a national tragedy of such magnitude. Especially when that series received unwarranted attention that it didn't deserve as being a contributor to the disaster.
Software in itself isn't neither good or evil. It's just a collection of computer code made up of 0's and 1's that doesn't have moral attributes. As a result, the software is morally agnostic. I find it ironic that this particular piece was written when Trump is making another baseless, absurd claim about how social media algorithms are politically biased. Code cannot contain political affiliation. Code cannot contain human feelings or beliefs either. The code that is their is a reflection of the environment that the software is trying to imitate.
What makes software acquiring moral attributes is how people use it. Time and time again, video games are the correlation, and not the causation, of incidents in real life. One could use the Columbine School Shootings as an example. The shooters were constantly bullied in school and they suffered from mental health issues. They were fans of Doom. However, they already embraced a violent state of mind, and they would have gone out to commit their horrible act regardless of whether they played the game or not. Them playing Doom was irrelevant to their horrific crimes. If someone plays a particular game, it's because that game is a reflection of that person. The person is question already had those particular feelings about the situation.
9/11 did have a impact on this series. The Twin Towers have always been a fixture of the New York scenery in the previous games, and it now seems unusual that they weren't there anymore. It's a reminder that a game series can't escape a national tragedy of such magnitude. Especially when that series received unwarranted attention that it didn't deserve as being a contributor to the disaster.
Software in itself isn't neither good or evil. It's just a collection of computer code made up of 0's and 1's that doesn't have moral attributes. As a result, the software is morally agnostic. I find it ironic that this particular piece was written when Trump is making another baseless, absurd claim about how social media algorithms are politically biased. Code cannot contain political affiliation. Code cannot contain human feelings or beliefs either. The code that is their is a reflection of the environment that the software is trying to imitate.
What makes software acquiring moral attributes is how people use it. Time and time again, video games are the correlation, and not the causation, of incidents in real life. One could use the Columbine School Shootings as an example. The shooters were constantly bullied in school and they suffered from mental health issues. They were fans of Doom. However, they already embraced a violent state of mind, and they would have gone out to commit their horrible act regardless of whether they played the game or not. Them playing Doom was irrelevant to their horrific crimes. If someone plays a particular game, it's because that game is a reflection of that person. The person is question already had those particular feelings about the situation.
Cessna Skylane passing the Chicago Skyline with the Sears Tower in the background.
No VM this time (This Game Hates Virtual Machine)
As the title implies, I had no luck getting FS2000
running the way I wanted in any virtual machine software. For VMware
Player running the game on Windows 98/ME with the UniVBE Vesa drivers, FS2000
could only run the game with software rendering. Since the game engine
was now revised and it's now geared towards 3D accelerated gaming, FS2000
looks ugly in software mode. Not only that, the game constantly complains that it's running in "Safe Mode" now. I gave FS2000
a try under VMware running Windows XP, which does have access to 3D acceleration. Because the FS2000
game engine hasn't been as well optimized, those performance issues
mentioned earlier in the article affected the VM as well, making the
game unplayable with 3D acceleration. Those performance issues and
stuttering that plagued several real users back in 2000 returned to
VMware with a vengeance in 2018. The same happened with VMware with
Windows 7 32-bit as well.
Like VMware Player, VirtualBox running Windows 98/ME doesn't have 3D acceleration, and one has to use the UniVBE Vesa drivers as well. The story with FS2000 with Windows 9x repeats here. VBox with WinXP, like VMware running XP, has 3D acceleration capabilities as well. However, FS2000 doesn't recognize the 3D accelerator drivers for Windows XP in VBox at all. As a result, the game could onyly run in "Safe Mode" as well. Virtualization software was out of the question by this point.
Well, bare metal it is. Their was no installation issue though. Since the computers of today have far more drive space to expend, the full installation with all the scenery was a no-brainer. My copy of FS2000 came with 3 CD's. The installation on modern hardware took only a couple minutes. Installing this game back in 2000 would have taken 15-30 minutes. We've come a long way! The game had no issue recognizing my Nvidia GTX950. When this game was originally released, the Nvidia GeForce series of accelerators didn't even exist yet. Everybody embraced the Voodoo accelerators, along with the DirectX GPU's like the ATI All-In-Wonder and the Nvidia TNT Rage adapters. This game had no issue running on a AMD FX Quad-Core CPU running at 3.8GHz per core. Many old games have compatibility issues with modern, multi-core CPU's because they were released at a time when the only technology that existed were single-core processors. SMP motherboards (the precursor for multi-core processing) with sockets for extra CPU's were rare, beyond expensive for most home consumers, and mainly restricted to the server room. This game ran far better than expected. We came a long way since 1999!
The game played very well, and it was fun flying around in the supersonic Concorde around New York City. This game series just keeps pushing itself farther and farther. How far can this series go?
Like VMware Player, VirtualBox running Windows 98/ME doesn't have 3D acceleration, and one has to use the UniVBE Vesa drivers as well. The story with FS2000 with Windows 9x repeats here. VBox with WinXP, like VMware running XP, has 3D acceleration capabilities as well. However, FS2000 doesn't recognize the 3D accelerator drivers for Windows XP in VBox at all. As a result, the game could onyly run in "Safe Mode" as well. Virtualization software was out of the question by this point.
Well, bare metal it is. Their was no installation issue though. Since the computers of today have far more drive space to expend, the full installation with all the scenery was a no-brainer. My copy of FS2000 came with 3 CD's. The installation on modern hardware took only a couple minutes. Installing this game back in 2000 would have taken 15-30 minutes. We've come a long way! The game had no issue recognizing my Nvidia GTX950. When this game was originally released, the Nvidia GeForce series of accelerators didn't even exist yet. Everybody embraced the Voodoo accelerators, along with the DirectX GPU's like the ATI All-In-Wonder and the Nvidia TNT Rage adapters. This game had no issue running on a AMD FX Quad-Core CPU running at 3.8GHz per core. Many old games have compatibility issues with modern, multi-core CPU's because they were released at a time when the only technology that existed were single-core processors. SMP motherboards (the precursor for multi-core processing) with sockets for extra CPU's were rare, beyond expensive for most home consumers, and mainly restricted to the server room. This game ran far better than expected. We came a long way since 1999!
The game played very well, and it was fun flying around in the supersonic Concorde around New York City. This game series just keeps pushing itself farther and farther. How far can this series go?
Cessna Skylane passing the Chicago Skyline with the John Hancock Tower in the background.
British Airways Concorde taking off from London Heathrow.
World Trade Centre to be removed from MS Flight Simulator
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