Sailing Simulator/Game?

Ok, I've played flight sims before, just wondering if anyone knows of anything comparable with regards to sailing. Thinking it might be quite helpful as far as learning the basics.

 

Virtual Skipper is probably the most famous:
http://www.virtualskipper-game.com
I've tried it few years ago, it was probably very much improved by now.

Then you have Sail Simulator:
http://www.sailsimulator.com/
and Virtual Sailor:
http://www.hangsim.com/vs/

I remember Virtual Skipper as a nice game, with a possibility to partecipate in regattas (with all the strategic thinking involved) and a nice graphics. Don't know much about the last two, but I guess they'll have the same limit the Virtual Skipper has: you can't feel the breeze and salt on your skin, you can't feel the boat moving under your bottom. And then, there's the time factor - flight simulators are dealing with fast moving machines, so the game involves you pretty much. And you can do a lots of things - aerobatics, combats, takeoffs and landings, fly-bys amid city skyskrapers (sorry for bad memories it can bring back...) in pretty short time.
In case of sailboats, well we all know that in real-life sailing you better leave your watch on the shore and look at the position of the sun to establish how much is enough for today... If you pass your time in this way in real life, it's all time spent well. If you pass the same amount of time in front of your PC screen playing a game (as spectacular as it can be made), well I call it time wasted.

 

Sure, but on the other hand you can't sink and drown from a lack of experience.

 

Well, it's called natural selection.
If we keep on relying on computers too much, we will end up weakening the human race. Even those who can't swim will be able to win a regatta instead of drowning, as the nature wants it to be...

 

Oh, I have full intentions of getting in a real boat as soon as possible, but in the meantime, any knowledge I can pick up is going to help.

 

I wouldn't really recommend virtual skipepr if you want to really learn anything. All you do in that game is steer...your crew trims the sails, handles the sheets, and everything else for you...only thing to learn there is how close you can cut it to pinching w/o puttin' yourself in irons.

 

Sailing is very intuitive and the body naturally understands what to do in short order when aboard. Take a ride on a small sailboat. No sailing game will teach you the things you'll learn in an hour on the water in a small, well performing sailor.

Sailing games are about tactics and decision making, not actual sailing.

Find a sailing club and volunteer as crew one Saturday morning, maybe some frost biting. A day of sailboat racing, preferably with a casual skipper will offer you so much more, that you'll have to go back for more, just to verify what you think you've learned.

If you want the basics without risk of getting spray in your face, then pick up a sailing book primer. You'll learn the concepts, the name of the strings, why you need to pull on them, etc. but it's still meaningless until you feel the tiller fight your insistence to go toward the wind or the varying pressures in the sheets as gusts come and go. Once aboard, your body will naturally lean outboard as the boat heels (just like on a motorcycle), you hand will naturally resist the tug of the tiller and the pull of the sheets. It's human derived magic, not rocket science.

 

€ 5.- off sailsim at shipsimul and a trailer http://www.shipsim.com/products/stentec sail simulator.php

 

I agree with PAR here. I did my sailing course in Feburary to which was great. I had sailed with the club that I am with from last November on the clubs sailing yacht (which doubles as a rescue boat) in weekly events which helps you learn quickly to develop skills which made the sailing course that much easier. Plus I can't wait for the start of the new sailing season Yea.

 

If you got the wife to flash the lights on and off and got her to throw buckets of ice cold water at you while you did the simulator you would still be no where near reality as is the flight simulator.

Im quite sure that even 1000 hours on flight sim 747's would not be transferable to even a PPL.

My first yacht,- dinghy what ever was a 48 foot ketch I bought in Hongkong. I lived on it for 2 weeks looking up masts and pulling on ropes seeing what does what,-- then took it out,--- a month later I took it down the coast of Phillipines to Singapore with my girlfriend.

I was scared shitless on numerous occasions and fell to my knees even though I am an athiest.

I am still scared shitless on some occasions after 10 years of sailing. And thats how it is.

 

There are some sail boats for the MS flightsim that work
reasonably well.

Also several power boats.







Of course, they do airplanes best: