FSX Demo Review

After a flight or two, I think I've tested FSX Demo enough as to talk about it. First of all I would like to say that this is my personal opinion. This opinion is against many opinions I've heard since this demo was released. Many of you didn't like this demo, I respect that opinion, so respect mine :-)

The specs

It's important to say that I own a low-end PC, in which I've tested this demo. I'm not gonna judge FSX because of this fact, I understand the MS position of developing a high requirements game to offer the most realistic graphics. Not all of us are able to enjoy them, so I'll focus on the non-graphical part as well.

The main problem of my PC is the graphic card, I couldn't use AA and a low resolution (1024x768x32 on a 19' display). Furthermore, my graphic card is DirectX 8.1 only, so I can't see any of those amazing effects like water reflections.
This is my PC:

AMD Sempron 2800+ running overclocked at 2.14Ghz.

512MB of RAM at 400Mhz.

ATI Radeon 9000 64MB AGP 4x.

Seagate Barracuda 7200 160GB 100 2MB of cache.

The graphic settings

Those were my graphic settings while I was testing it (as well as when I made the screenshots at the bottom). As you see, low - very low settings. I got about 25-30fps (sometimes 15), which is not as bad as people say. Also think that this is a demo in development, so it doesn't have to be like the final version of the product. It should get better!

The review

Okay, time for the hard part :)

Remind this is a demo, and not a finished product!

Graphics: I'm not gonna add anything in here. Enough is said with the screenshots. MS has done the job and you can see it. Of course, if you can afford a machine better than mine!

Scenaries: They are much more detailed than before. Photorealistic textures and water reflections make it look great. Again: not for me, for those with a good pc. The airports are suppoused to be better, but I haven't been able to check that in this little demo.

Aircrafts: Check the CRJ cockpit, the default aircrafts are much better than before. What can we expect from PMDG, PSS, etc? The animations are pretty much the same.

Sound: I haven't seen anything different here. If it's better, I don't feel it.

Score: 8,5/10

This is the score of the Demo, but I hope I can set a higher score once the final version is released.

The cool things

The cameras (lots of them, some of them are pretty cool, like one below the landing gear).
The camera moving inside the virtual cockpit as if it was your head.
The missions.
A button to make screenshots.

The crappy things

The ATC has not changed at all!
The flight model... as bad as it was!
The camera control is hard :S

Conclusion

Most of the people expected a lot out of this game. The truth is that MS did a huge job to code this tenth version of their Flight Simulator. Some are disappointed because this is not what they were expecting. People complain about the frame rate.

What do I say? In my humble opinion this version does the trick. I mean, they have improved, they've given what the general public wants: better graphics. You don't have a more realistic flight simulator regarding physics or detailed cockpits, but now you feel more like you are actually inside a plane and you are flying that thing. MS can't do things that a 1 percent of the public wants, FSX is a game, not a realistic simulator. If you want a realistic simulator, go buy X-Plane, MS' FSX and X-Plane are running different races. While X-Plane is everyday more realistic, FSX looks better.

For me, FSX is good enough for what I expected. I haven't been able to test it as well as I should, but I will in the future, as soon as I get a high-end PC.

The perfomance? You can't ask for amazing graphics and really-high frame rates. You have to choose from one of them, not both. And Microsoft chose to put inside FSX the best graphics a nowdays PC can handle, and I'm talking about a double core, SLI graphic cards and stuff PC, not my crappy machine! The graphics are amazing, they'll look even better on Vista D10 computers, and that's all.

For the simmers? You get a funnier flight expereance, similar to the FS2004, a few new things, and that's all. But I like it. I can only say: wait for the cool addons to come.

I'd also want to say to those who are disappointed, that wait for the final version on October 3rd. Don't say no to FSX this soon!

The Screenshots

Raining.

CRJ 2D cockpit.

The cameras.

The water effects with the lowest water quality.

So this is it. Hope you enjoyed reading it.