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[Kaleb702 Games]

Any and all that aren't on the free games list. Preferably free, but it doesn't have to be.
It has to simulate something at the very least, but preferably comprehensively.

I've been looking and looking, and I've barely found any.

[Ringmaster]

A popular one lately is the military flight sim IL-2 Sturmovik 1946. Not free but cheap ($9.99 on Steam) with a ton of content and very good portrayal of aircraft flight.

[Virex]

Conway's game of life and it's relatives are pretty interesting, but they may be too lean on the game aspect for you.

[Kaleb702 Games]

Conway's game of life and it's relatives are pretty interesting, but they may be too lean on the game aspect for you.

Ah yes, I have that.

Oh, I should really list what I have:
Golly
Orbiter
KSP
The Powder Toy
Phun
Logic Gate Simulator

[squeakyReaper]

Stronghold 3, a "Castle Building Simulator" comes out soon.

[Levi]

Stronghold 3, a "Castle Building Simulator" comes out soon.

I'm looking forward to this one.  Its going to keep me sane while I try to finish Dark Souls.

[Cheese]

The silent hunter series simulates the running of a submarine in WW2. SH3 is generally considered the best, partially because it has a huge modding community. If you want a real hardcore submarine/naval sim, Sonalysts, who also make sonar systems for real world militaries, have some cold war submarine and ship sims.

[Croquantes]

ruler of nations?

but I suggest you don't spend a penny on this game. it's a big scam by an awful company. yet for some reason, the product they continually release under a new name is somewhat compelling. even though it's awful, i can't stop playing >_<

[Robsoie]

2 serious simulators i have never tried personnally but are free and not on the list (as i would not submit games i never tried to that list) :

DARPA ACTUV :
https://actuv.darpa.mil/
Using the engine they developped in their modern subsim Dangerous Waters, Sonalysts made this simulation of those ACTUV sea based vehicle free.

SAM Simulator :
http://sites.google.com/site/samsimulator1972/home
Simulation of surface-to-air missile systems

[Spaghetti7]

Going with the war simulators, I realise some of these have been mentioned but I'm going on with it anyway.

ArmA II:
This is the ultimate combat simulator, simulating anything to do with combat you can think of, with mods to cover anything you don't think of.
Bullet drop, wind, suppressive fire, realistic damage thresholds, the traditional broken up voices traditional to the series, ArmA has it all.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARMA_2

Silent Hunter:
The ArmA of sub simulations, this is an AMAZING game.
You can play a mode in which you can just spam torpedoes at something and guaranteed a hit, or you can take the harder route and have to manually aim at, identify and sink each ship.
You are given a randomly generated campaign and sail around the world (literally, the entire world) trying not to run out of fuel, being blown out of the water by planes or sunk by a mine.
This links to Silent Hunter IV, in my opinion the best in the series.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silent_Hunter_4

IL-2 Sturmovik 1946:
Many different IL-2 game in one, 1946 has so much content. There are loads of planes (although they are not all flyable), ships, objects, cars, tanks and other things that have no relevance to a flight sim.
Also with randomly generated campaigns across the world, you can fly bombing runs against Stalingrad or fight to retain Berlin.
Forgotten Battles forms the main content of this game:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IL-2_Sturmovik:_Forgotten_Battles

[nenjin]

F-19 Stealth Fighter

Flight sim circa the early 90s. You'll need DOSBOX and can get the game from Abandonia.

This is like, my favorite flight sim of all time. Simulates modern air combat where you run stealth missions solo deep into enemy terrain. Missions are basically free form so you can play around with the game like a sand box. On a scale of 1 to 10 for "realism and simulation", I'd give it an 8.5. You've got fuel, you've got to manually land your plane to complete missions with 100% success, you've got multiple craft systems that can be damaged, crap loads of avionics, counter-measures, a weapons loadout for each mission that you get to pick from something like 25 different weapons and utilities, a decent simulation of radar and ground defenses....all of it in first person perspective.

I think my favorite feature though is how it handles pilots. You make a pilot and take them on missions, and they get scores for completing them. Your performance is tracked for every mission you fly. Your pilot can be KIA'd, captured by the enemy and ransomed back, or rescued by evac teams when you bail out over friendly terrain. You get medals for performance as well (posthumously too of course) and it's cool to look back over your pilot roster to see who the top aces were. If you last long enough, you can even choose to retire your pilot into the scoreboards.

If you do get it, be sure to turn off the engine prop sfx. It's ear-splitting PC speaker evilness that you just don't need to listen to.

Spoiler: pics (click to show/hide)

[hemmingjay]

I second the mention of Arma II if you have a good pc. On that note, I also recommend Take on Helicopters, by the same devs. It's a wonderful Helicopter Sim.

[Anvilfolk]

I'm going to go ahead and shamelessly plug in the IL2 Sturmovik: 1946 LP thread here, in the hopes of getting more people to try it out.

If it's aviation you're looking for, there's that one, the more recent one IL2 Sturmovik: Cliffs of Dover (some problems and bugs, maybe you want to wait for a few more patches before buying), and the excellent DCS series, which simulate a single aircraft to a degree of detail you can't even imagine: DCS A-10C Warthog (Close Air Support plane) and DCS BlackShark (helicopter).

I've never been fully happy with the quality of free sims in general. They're either overly complex where they don't need to be, or are a bit too amateurish. Might just be me though!

[Akura]

What do you mean by "simulator", anyway? There's a lot of different typs of sims.

Stronghold 3, a "Castle Building Simulator" comes out soon.

I'm looking forward to this one.  Its going to keep me sane while I try to finish Dark Souls.

Meh, I'm not. Stronghold 2 wasn't really as good as the first, mostly because of things like the Gong Pit(why? why would you do that? There's a reason we don't do it in DF, despite the requests to do so). Plus, I really hated Stronghold Kingdoms, with it's pay-2-win.

[Itnetlolor]

So I guess suggesting Freespace (1 & 2) and the X-Wing Series (X-Wing, Tie Fighter, X-Wing Alliance, X-Wing Vs. Tie Fighter) is out of the question? Those are great space sims.