How is FS made?

[JVC_systems]

I was wondering how is Flight Sim being made? Do they always have to start modeling all planes, hills, mountains, terrain, mesh, rivers, houses over again or do they just edit previously made terains, river, etc?  Like for example in order to make FS2002 terrain mesh, rivers, houses, they had to just edit FS2000 terain, rivers etc and to make FS2004 they had to edit FS2002 terrain, rivers etc? Or do they just start everything from scratch and model everything over again? Any replies would be greatly appriciated!
JVC_systems

[KD_VB_FS]

You might want to check the following article:
http://www.microsoft.com/games/flightsimulator/fs2002_articles_makingof.asp
Almost everything you asked for can be found there!
Enjoy!  

[loomex]

And to think I always thought it was magic pixie dust

[Jared]

yeah that's pretty much how it's done...

[Scottler]

It all starts with a rock, two band-aids and 3 tbsp of extra crunchy peanut  butter...

[bdenni]

Gee, I thought they downloaded most of it from places like here.

[ozzy72]

The evil pixies over in Seattle put together lots of clever numbers and letters and things (sort of like Alphabeti-Spaghetti). Then they charge us lots of money for it....
Then some people who actually know what they're doing (freeware designers), come along and fix all the balls-ups by the evil pixies so the program is fun, works, and is accurate!

Ozzy

[born_2_fly]

I wish if they downloaded some of the stuff from here i think fs would be 1000000000000000 times better! Personly i think its appuling how people sitting at desks getting paid thousands of dollors produce somthing with appuling flight dynamics, blurry textures and something 300 times worse than a freeware designer can knock up in a day for nothing! Sorry microsoft fans (if there are any out there...)

Born_2_fly

[cerphr]

M/S FS was featured on a recent Discovery Channel /  Wings program about Flight Simulation.  They showed some interesting facts on the making of it.  I'm sure it will be repeated early and often as most shows on Wings are.

[Rifleman]

They started with a front-end-loader, filled to the brim with pixels........then they started to remove the ones they didn't need in a Flight Sim, and once done, they poured it into a computer tower to make the first copy .......the Sim was then cloned many times over, and sold to us all to fly with, on our own machines.............

[flyboy 28]

[quote]It all starts with a rock, two band-aids and 3 tbsp of extra crunchy peanut

[Daz]

wish if they downloaded some of the stuff from here i think fs would be 1000000000000000 times better! Personly i think its appuling how people sitting at desks getting paid thousands of dollors produce somthing with appuling flight dynamics, blurry textures and something 300 times worse than a freeware designer can knock up in a day for nothing! Sorry microsoft fans (if there are any out there...)

dont forget there modelling the entire world!!! 22,000 airports would take a hell of a lot of time to accurately design...they havent done it so bad this time round though