Jun 09
30
Games That Simulate Real Life Jobs?
The Simulation market has been around for a long time. It’s still here and bigger than most people think. We know about Flight Simulators with their hardcore followers, but what else is out there?
Well surprisingly, after doing a little bit of digging around, there are a LOT of simulation games. Straight away, I’m going to discount things like SimCity, just because those sorts of games are more of a management game, rather than a hands-on simulation of something from every-day life.
As mentioned, this is probably the most well-known simulator, and is so well supported that you can buy hardware add-ons for the game, including proper yokes, rudder pedals and throttle controls. And that doesn’t even count the huge number of software add-ons, with new scenery, airports, aircraft – you name it.
For the truly enthusiastic, the game comes complete with a very good Air Traffic Control system, ILS systems at airports, with all the correct approaches you would expect. And the detail inside the cockpit has to be seen to be believed – the aircraft feel & look as per their real-life counterparts. Of course, this is not a lot of fun for the casual gamer as there is no “achievement” other than completing a journey. There are no timetables, or anything to stick to, it’s completely left open to the gamer to work out what they want to accomplish. There are, however, lots of missions which are also available and can be completed, to give the casual gamer a reason to play the game. The various tutorials, from learning the basic controls, to flying IFR, are there to help too.
There are other civilian-based flight simulator games like FlightGear (open-source), but most are of the military type, focusing on dog-fighting and missions. IL-2, and the classic F-16 are two that spring to mind in this genre.
Flight Simulator is the best system for the home, accurately simulating the physics and flight characteristics of the aircraft. Born in 1982, as version 1, Flight Simulator X, released in 2006, is the 12th version of the game – and hopefully not the last. ACES studios, owned by Microsoft, were closed in January 2009, so the future of this long-running game series is unknown.
Train Simulators
Included in this section are Microsoft’s Train Simulator, Rail Simulator, Trainz, and more recently Railworks. As the title suggests, the simulator puts everyday people behind the controls of various types of trains on differing duties. With Trainz, you also have the added burden of multiple trains, almost like a virtual railway set.
The idea is that various real-world routes are recreated that either have a target, such as moving freight from one area to another, or a timetable, such as making stops at stations picking up and dropping off passengers. There are goals to the various scenarios, but they aren’t rigorously enforced or even recorded anywhere historically. So again, the emphasis is on completing the route as you see fit.
Although very much dominated by the railway enthusiast (or train spotter as we like to call them) this genre has a surprising amount of add-ons, hardware wise, for the games – Including full size controls! This sort of game requires concentration and knowledge of the signal systems/trains – and knowledge of the various routes.
The talked about sequel to Microsoft’s Train Simulator has been cancelled for the foreseeable future, when Microsoft withdrew funds from the creators – ACES studios.
Truck/Lorry Simulators
All created by the same company, who are also responsible for a Bus Simulator, the long distance truck or lorry simulator genre has really been born by SCS Software who are located in Prague, Czech Republic.
The Truck titles produced by the company are (US Based) Hard Truck: 18 Wheels of Steel, Across America, Pedal to the Metal, Convoy, Haulin’, American Long Haul & Big Rigs. Their latest, Euro Truck Simulator, moves away from the US for the first time. You wouldn’t expect a truck-driving simulator to be that popular, but it appears on the surface it’s doing very well.
The idea, as you can imagine, is to pick up various loads from different places and take them somewhere else – in a nutshell. The type of load varies, depending on experience, and the cash rewarded from delivery can be used to upgrade your cab with all the latest gizmos – fluffy dice not included.
Bus Simulators
Rather surprisingly, this genre has 3 entrants! SCS, famous for their creation of the 18 Wheels of Steel & Euro Truck Simulators, have turned their hands to Bus Driver, using the same graphics engine. But also, Contendo Games, based in Germany, have released a Bus Simulator of their own. And finally, another German producer, Astragon, have created their own (German-only) offering called Bus Driver 2009.
Although the basic idea is to stick to a close timetable, and drop off passengers while driving around the city, Bus Simulator goes a little further and creates the ability to rent or buy bigger buses, ad marketing and more – as well as driving the buses themselves. SCS’s Bus Driver just includes the ability to drive buses to unlock more routes/buses – which must be completed pretty much in order.
Garbage Truck Simulators
Not surprisingly at all, there is only 1 taker for a Garbage Truck Simulator. From the creators of Bus Simulator – Contendo Games have also given you the choice to be a “refuse collection officer” or whatever the official job title is nowadays..
Take command of a rubbish truck and go around the streets, ordering your gang to jump off and get the garbage cans as you drive past. Time schedules have to be kept, and members of your crew have to kept an eye to make sure they have the correct skills necessary for some of the more challenging tasks, like disposing of nuclear waste.
Ship Simulators
Yes that’s right – you can also take control of a ship! Dominated by one company, VStep in Holland, Ship Simulator 2008 is quite popular with a hardcore following. Astragon have also created a Ship Simulator, although only available in German.
Ship Simulator 2008 puts you in control of everything from large commercial liners, to small water taxis. Take to the seas in the Titanic, or ferry people to the Isle of Wight. And believe it or not, there are also hardware add-ons available for Ship Simulator, complete with a small ship’s wheel! Another, worth noting,
addition to the ship simulation market is the shareware Virtual Sailor, which works in much the same way as Ship Simulator 2008, but was last updated over 2 years ago.
Space Simulators
And now onto the final frontier – not really an “every-day” job, but one I thought that couldn’t be left out.
The most popular freeware version is “Orbiter”. You would be forgiven for thinking it’s only about Space Shuttles – however it supports all sorts of satellites, craft – fictional or otherwise, and the ISS. The simulator is very tricky to learn and understand at first, but I have been told it has a really good, open, playing system once you get past these initial hurdles. The last update was unfortunately quite a while ago, so you could say it’s fading away.
Commercial offerings are pretty sparse to be honest, although Space Shuttle Mission 2007 is definitely worth a mention. As you can guess, purely a Space Shuttle simulator, but a very good-looking one. Start out at launch, to in-orbit manoeuvres, and then glide the thing back to Earth when finished. Everything simulated, even down to floating around in the cabin in micro gravity!
More space simulators worth noting are Exoflight (freeware) & Apollo Simulator.
Other Simulators
As we get into the world of the obscure – there seem to be simulators for anything and everything. In fact, so odd are some of these that I had to verify they were actually real products! Most of the following are from a German company called Astragon, and also only available in German. What a shame for us English speaking people!
- Deep Sea Fishing (Trawler) Simulator
- Farming/Agricultural Machinery Simulator
- Driving Simulator – Yeap just like getting in your car, and driving around the streets.. Odd.
- Excavator Simulator – JCBs and big earth movers!
- Crane Simulator
- Sailing Simulator
- Forklift Simulator!!
I think we can safely say that simulation software is here to stay, no matter how obscure some of the things simulated are. Where there are gamers that want a little bit more out of their gaming experience, focusing on the details of making something as realistic as possible, there will always be a market for the games.