A year ago, Microsoft announced that it was canning its Flight Simulator game, much to the irritation of those who'd bought and played it for years.

Now, though, it's back.  It has a new name (just Microsoft Flight), and it's free. In its new incarnation, you play it as an online game, and the adventure takes place in and around Hawaii.  Other planes and environments are, or will be, available but these will be optional paid-for extras.

Before you can play, you'll need to download the Windows client for Microsoft Flight.  From my testing, this seems to work best from Internet Explorer.  Also, note that you'll need a decent games-spec graphics card in your PC, so check the requirements on the web site carefully.  It also requires Windows 7.

Plus, be aware that the download is some 1,500 MB (1.5 GB), which is a massive amount of data.  So check that the download, and continued playing, won't take you over your monthly broadband provider limitations.  And if you're on dial-up, forget it.

If you're still interested, head to www.microsoftflight.com and prepare for take-off.