Circling back around to the beginning of Black Square’s arrival on the Microsoft Flight Simulator aircraft market, the developer has returned to their original product with a completely redeveloped effort aimed at simulations of the Beechcraft Baron and Bonanza aircraft. Let’s have a look at what is on offer!

Three variants of each, bundles, more

Competition for high fidelity general aviation aircraft has been heating up in recent years and Black Square’s latest efforts revisit two aircraft projects that helped propel the developer into one of the more prominent aircraft developers around.

A few of Black Square’s early projects were based on MSFS 2020 aircraft offering cockpit replacements with analogue systems instead of the glass cockpit offerings that came with the sim. Things quickly grew from there with added features and fidelity. Later the developer would tackle a variety of other aircraft projects, most which have been upgraded to 2024 standard at this point. Two, the analogue Baron and Bonanza, hadn’t and that was because the changes to the core of the sim made those upgrades impossible. The developer then set out to, in his own words, “make the best Baron and Bonanza that I could offer from the ground up.” They are now here.

The aircraft are built ground-up with all of the usual Black Square features. A 165 page manual, tablet interface with data visualization showing you how systems are working in real time, physics based engine simulation, hot swappable avionics, over 100 random, scheduled or performance-triggered failures, physics based sound system with sounds coming from Boris Audioworks, detailed flight model and on the list goes. This is the kind of simulation where ambient temperature will affect how you start the aircraft and overloaded electrical systems will see the lights dim due to the extra load.

With the Baron Professional there are three airframe variants on offer: Normally Aspirated B58, Turbocharged B58TC and Pressurized B58P. The Bonanza also has three: Normally Aspirated A36, Turbonormalised B36TC & Turboprop Conversion B36TP.

All of that does come at a premium. The Black Square Baron & Bonanza Professional Bundle comes in at $64.99 USD from the Just Flight store. Or you can purchase just the Baron or just the Bonanza for $44.99 USD each. The bundle deal only applies if you buy them together and it doesn’t stack if you buy them individually later.

Study up

Just Flight and Black Square have released three video overviews with a first look, followed by an airframe overview and finally a deeper look at the systems. If you want to see what the fuss is all about, those should help provide an overview of what is on offer.