What other realistic flight simulators are available other than microsoft ones?
X-Plane is the major competitor to Microsoft Flight Simulator for general desktop flight simulation. There are more specific simulators for specific types of flying, such as combat or helicopters or gliders, or IFR practice. Either MSFS (FS2004 or FSX) or the latest version of X-Plane would work well for just general flying practice. X-Plane is good for experimental aircraft and for unusual flight regimes, MSFS is good for normal flight with real aircraft and IFR. Neither MSFS nor X-Plane are “certified” or “approved” by the FAA in themselves for flight training time that you can log. For that, you need specific configurations of hardware and software that the FAA has approved. These configurations can use X-Plane or MSFS, but it’s the entire, specific configuration that the FAA looks at, not just the software inside. In general, anything certified by the FAA for any purpose is going to be at least ten times more expensive than a simple desktop copy of X-Plane or MSFS, and often much m
