There are several choices:

1. Realflight G3.5. Far and away the most popular one in our club and area. The sim's been around for years, has seen a lot of improvements, and is very refined. The built-in Tx is made by Futaba, and it's a high-quality sim for about $200. Solid multiplayer support; my neighbor and I get together a few times a week to "fly" during the winter, and it would be fun to have more clubmates join in the fun. Helicopter support is not as good as FSOne and Clearview, but it's the most popular sim, and thus has the widest support and model selection.

2. FSOne. This is the new kid on the block. In some ways it's better than RFg3.5, in some ways it's worse. I don't like the quality of the controller they bundle with it, but unlike RealFlight, they allow you to use your own joystick without having their proprietary one attached... so they have a version which sells for $150 (no interface) or so as well as the one which includes the Tx which is $200. If you fly Horizon Hobby kits much, you'll find FSOne has models for a LOT of the HH stuff which is a bonus. For instance, the T-Rex (both 450 and 600) is modeled really well in this sim.

3. AeroFly Pro Deluxe. About the same price point. Don't own it, haven't used it, but I hear it's really good and has better physics modeling -- particularly for helicopters and slope soaring -- than RealFlight.

4. Reflex XTR. Many helicopter pros swear by this one. For your $200, you get a dongle to hook up your existing transmitter, and the sim. It's very pretty, and seems easily in the same category as RFG3, but I haven't flown in it myself.

5. Clearview: As a budget simulator, this is great. It's moderately realistic (except for crash damage), and you can't beat $30 for a sim. The developer constantly updates the software, like a release every week, and if you fly the more popular models there's a good chance he already has one available for download. I have this as well as RealFlight; it's hard to say which gets more time. This started life as a helicopter simulator, and it shows. The heli simulation is really good. You must provide your own interface cable for a Tx, or else buy an E-sky one ($25), or something. I bought a USB interface cable for $40.

6. FMS. Can't beat the price (free). Flight simulation is reasonable. It's fantastic for learning orientation on a budget, but you can't rely on it for things like good tip-stall simulation. It stinks for heli training, but is a reasonable choice for planks. Buy your favorite interface cable and you're golden.

7. Pre-Flight. Stay away; stay far away. Tried it, hated it. It's similar FMS, only it costs the same as Clearview. For the money, Clearview is MUCH MUCH MUCH better. It's not very popoular, so there are not many model selections, and they look terrible. The flight simulation seems OK, but I was so turned off by the 1990's-era graphics that I never looked back.

For local hobby store support (a big deal to me!) and a wide variety of airplanes, the choices are very clear: FSOne or RealFlight G3.5. For the budget-minded enthusiast, a USB cable ($40) and Clearview ($30) is a fine choice. If you feel like a total newbie and want to invest as little as possible, download a copy of FMS and then buy an E-Sky 4-channel transmitter for $25.

Hope that answers the question!

If you want a wonderful simulator for WWII-era aircraft, IL2 Sturmovik: 1946 is awesome. I plan to demo it at the next club meeting. We over-power our models so much that it's a really interesting experience to step into a virtual full-scale one and realize how hard they are to fly.

I already saved one bird this week due to my Sturmovik experience. As I came out of a Split-S, the model began to roll hard to the right. I recognized this behavior as the model hitting a stall, and not having sufficient thrust to power out of it. My reaction prior to my Sturmovik experience would have been to apply some opposite aileron. What this would have done, in fact, was deepen the stall to the right (since the stalled wing would just stall further with down aileron) and send me spiraling uncontrollably into the ground.

Instead, I just eased up a touch on the elevator, and she flew through the end of the loop beautifully.

There was a study some time ago indicating that full-scale military pilots who flew flight simulators had a substantially lower accident rate than those who did not. I cannot find it right now, but I know it's true: more sim time == better pilot able to handle unusual situations more appropriately.

I've been looking at the RealFlight G3. I think I'll go with that one. I also know a young boy trhat wants to get into this, and he'd love to fly the sim. Thanks for your input Matt.

I've been considering purchasing the Phoenix simulator. I like that I'd be able to use my own TX, plus I think it looks as good or better than realflight. Has anyone flown Phoenix before?

I'm not yet a seasoned RC pilot like you Matt, but I've had similar experiences with Janes WWII Fighters. It's quite a few years old now, but I still think it's got some of the best graphics and flight modeling for a PC game type simulator.
BTW - I tried to quote your message about Sturmovik but the quote button points to void(null).

Thanks for the heads-up on the "quote" problem... I'll see what I can do to fix it this weekend.

Yeah, you can get a feel for RC using any of a number of regular flight simulators if you go to "tower" view. Just fly it from the tower, and you'll understand the dynamics and difficulty of flying RC.

Reversing things, has anyone seen or tried using one of the virtual reality (VR) type of setups where you fly RC from a cockpit point of view? I've seen some youtube videos that look like fun. There are some AMA rules to consider, such as having the ability to fly beyond line of sight, etc. I've wondered if an acceptable practice would be to fly on a trainer cord with one pilot always maintaining eye contact with the plane, while the other flies from the cockpit view. Would that be enough to be in accordance with AMA rules, or is the mere possibility of flying out of sight a show stopper. Anyway, it's something I've thought about trying as part of my university research as well as just for fun.

AMA safety guidelines indicate that the pilot currently flying the aircraft must maintain naked-eye (well, corrective lenses are OK) contact with it at all times. Now, realize, those are the safety rules. If you're not doing this, you're flying outside the safety code, and the AMA will not protect you because you were not following its rules.

That does NOT mean you can't do it! It just means you need to realize that by doing what you're doing, you're not covered by AMA insurance or representation in court. Figure out what your plan is and go with it. Quite a number of RPV (Remotely-piloted vehicles) are in use, and they have their own liability plans. For instance, a few years ago BYU developed some autonomous ZAGI-style wings which took off from one location and landed themselves miles away. Had those aircraft caused damage to someone or something, it would have been covered by BYU's umbrella liability policy on research & development.

All that said, hooking up cameras to airplanes, particularly to video other aircraft in flight, is really cool and there are some wicked videos on the Internet which use a chase plane, cameras on an aerobatic aircraft, and camera operators on the ground. All totally within AMA guidelines as long as the pilots maintain eye contact with their aircraft.

Are there any consequences for an AMA member WRT his membership for flying outside the safety code? (Besides simply not being covered by the AMA insurance?) I ask because I don't want to jeopardize my membership because of my research activities. I'm pretty sure my autonomous airplane breaks one or more AMA rules.

As far as I know you are just not covered if you were breaking the rules.

As for VR - I've seen guys doing it at the model port. I was surprised how well it worked. I have no idea what equipment they had but it worked. Being the cautious type I didn't fly while they flew...

All this simulator junk would make a good meeting topic. Have people bring their PC's with the sims and some projectors or monitors.

I have a "pulse train to joystick" microcontroller design I did several years ago that will let you use any RC radio with your simulator. I currently use a Cirrus 9 channel radio (from the 1970's) that I've added four extra buttons to as my controller. I could bring it again.

I'll second Matt's comment about IL-2. My son and I used to play it multiplayer. I learned to land my RC plane by landing a Junker that had one of it's main gear shot off. My son was the rear gunner and he was screaming the entire time that he was going to bail out. I hit that Zen "I get it - I know how to land" as I was approaching the runway. He stayed in. I set it down on only one gear. Hardly even bent the prop.

Great fun.

OK I have phoenix now (direct from England) and so far I'm happy with it. The physics seem realistic (as far as I can tell at least). It doesn't have quite as many sites and planes as realflight, but after using phoenix for a few days at home and then trying realflight at the hobby shop, I think phoenix feels a bit more realistic. My one possible complaint about phoenix is that I swear it's easier to land in the simulator than real life, and that's where I need the most practice. I haven't tried any real-life landings for a while, so maybe I've just gotten better with practice, but I suspect it will still be harder in real life. Does anyone have an opinion on the realism factor with respect to landings in any of the simulators? One of the things I really like about phoenix is the failure settings. I've been turning on the "engine failure" which causes the engine to cutout at random times. It's forced me to learn to land dead-stick during less than desirable situations.