Flight Unlimited III (PC)

GameSpot editors' review

• CNET editors' rating: 4.5 stars Outstanding
  Detailed editors' rating
  Overall score: 9.1 (4.5 stars)

• Reviewed by:
  Tony Lopez
• Reviewed on: 10/11/1999
• Updated on: 05/01/2000
• Released on: 09/30/1999
• Originally published on GameSpot: Flight Unlimited III (PC) Review

Where do you go after creating some of the most detailed and lush scenery ever for a flight simulator? How about a few hundred miles up the coast?

Flight Unlimited III continues the tradition of Flight II with a little bit more of everything. It's not a huge leap beyond the previous installment, but since Flight II was pretty far ahead of the technology curve, this works out just fine. The menus, graphics engine, and features are fairly similar, with just enough added to make it feel like more than a big scenery pack.

Flight III shifts the scene to the Pacific Northwest, which has been rendered in as much lavish detail as the Bay Area was in Flight II. The scenery is simply breathtaking, with nary a seam to be seen. Textures look as good at 100 feet as they do at 1,000 and buildings look like they're part of the scenery rather than simply sitting on top of it. Most impressive of all is the way rolling terrain is handled. Elevation models take you from the peak of Mount Rainier to the valleys of Olympic National Park. Unlike Terminal Reality's Fly and Microsoft Flight Simulator, which handle elevations abruptly and whose landscapes are often flat, the elevations in Flight Unlimited III are smooth and state of the art.

Matching the quality of this visual cornucopia are the object models themselves, ranging from the ten flyable planes to the buildings and moving objects. Weather and lighting are remarkably effective; rain beads on the window and lightning flashes in the distance. But most astonishing of all is the inclusion of FLED, the Flight Unlimited world-editing tool. This powerful, easy-to-use utility lets you choose any object in the game from a list and place it anywhere in the gameworld. It's simple drag-and-drop, and the items appear in the world when you next fly. These files are small enough to be traded, so you can share modified landscapes with friends. You can also place and define moving objects, such as other aircraft, and create whole airports (complete with beacons and landing lights) from scratch. It is so easy to use and so powerful that it may become one of the major selling points for this game. You can even load the landscape from Flight II into III and fly continuously from San Francisco to Seattle.

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