~Microsoft Space Simulator

Reviewed by Raymond Hunter.

Enjoying flight-sims, especially FS5, the arrival of a new
aviation Sim interested me. Space is one of those places that
sounds interesting, and you really want to go there, but never
have the guts, or the feeling that you're never going to be the
lucky one out of thousands. Having visited the Kennedy Space
Centre recently, I have a rough feeling of what space flight is
like,including the take off procedures, so I felt I had a head
start.

Installing the game was no major probs, except it asked you what
time zone you wanted, and didn't even offer you GMT. The game
requires EMS, so a quick config swap, and we were ready.

As you leap into the game, you're presented with a view in space,
consisting of stars, a planet, and a space station(the closest).
You can tell already, by the detail of the Space Station, that
this is going to be a very accurate game. Indeed it is, however
Microsoft have made it as easy as possible to get into the game,
which rather leaves it a bit plain. From the missions, you can
select either Apollo 17 mission(last trip to moon) or
Spaceshuttle flight.

Spaceshuttle flight: Rough idea - fly to Space Station, dock, fly
back and land. Sounds complicated? No. Tragically, boring.
Takeoff is all automatic, it flys you there, plonks you in front
of the Station and Says, now dock. Really, who on earth(pun)
could make a mistake. Pull joystick down, push +, collect points.
On the return, the runways' ahead of you. Keep going, on target,
land on black Strips. Mission over. Sadly, no skill or practice
required, and any landing practice could be picked-up from FS5.
You do get to watch take-off, and ejection of the main solid-fuel
tanks, which are very well timed.

Apollo 17 mission: Land Probe on Moon, i.e. get thrust settings
right, re-connect with thrusters. Mission over, points given.
Both missions were completed successfully, and watching the
animation took the longest.

Even though the missions are slightly lacking, you must praise
the high quality of detail all the way. KSC ground mapping is
perfect. Their bitmaps are stunningly accurate. All the roads,
and tracks in the Centre match up to the real thing. All
information, ejection of fuel tanks, timing is perfect. Moon
looks exactly like every moon should. Ground Detail 100%. If only
there was some skill in it.

Also lacking is the sound. Adlib support. Either music or Sound
effects. For a game covering such a huge array of elements, and
showing such an effort made by the nice people on the team, the
sound was a bit disgusting. One or two bangs would make a huge
change to this games appeal.
Thankfully, your graphics cards are used, up to 1 meg. It's
surprising to see so few games making use of groovy hi-res PC
modes.

Despite this, there are many great situations.
You can Orbit earth, and all the other planets, spacewalk, and
like all MS products, this one is huge, with options all over the
shop. A highly recommended game, pulling a good 90%