Flight Sims for a 10 year old?

[JustRob]

So, my nephew is in love with Flight Simulator X...or rather, he likes flying around and crashing into stuff. My dad wants to get him something he can fly around in and dick around that's somewhat simple for a 10 year old who doesn't read instruction manuals for anything to play. Any suggestions?

He would prefer something for PC, but the kid has all the modern systems at home so any suggestions would be awesome.

Something arcadey I think would be best. Anything with a free flight mode would be cool.

[jb143]

I love Crimson Skies. It's arcade style in that you don't need to know or learn how to fly a plane to enjoy it. It's a game and has a fun story but you could just fly around if that's all you wanted to do as well. It's theme and style is similar to Talespin...but with people.

Edit...though it's not exactly modern. It came out in 2000 but shouldn't be too hard to find.

[norkusa]

HAWX 1 & 2 are pretty deep and have freeflight modes. IL-2 Sturmovik is another good one. Blazing Angels and Ace Combat are pretty fun too but are more arcade than sim.

If he has a PS2, I recommend Aero Elite, Sky Odyssey, Lethal Skies and the all Ace Combat games.

[crazyjackcsa]

Fighter Ace is a free download/offline play. I've never played it online but that's what I use it for. Flying around, crashing into stuff, dropping bombs. It's WWII based, and you can play as the 5 major countries in the conflict.