Microsoft announced it will be entering the market for visual simulation platforms in January with the introduction of its Microsoft ESP platform for use in both military and commercial markets.

The company will roll out ESP with an eye on using its background as creator of the Flight Simulator franchise to find partners and developers that will use Windows-based software in serious games, immersive learning and other areas. ESP is designed to use commercial off-the-shelf hardware and software to produce visuals that are easier to create and less expensive.

“We view ESP as opening a new era in visual simulation. And we do that because we’re bringing an affordable visual simulation platform to the masses,” said Dave Boker, senior director of the Microsoft business development group for the ACES studio that developed Flight Simulator and ESP. “A lot of what Microsoft does today focuses on platforms and partners. It’s imperative for us to have a very strong partner eco system and to continue to build out a very strong and robust platform for partners and customers to build solutions on.”

While the initial version of ESP will employ Microsoft’s expertise in aviation visuals, future versions will expand to include ground and maritime operations, and indoor and avatar-centric simulations to target both military and commercial customers.

Microsoft will display ESP at the Nov. 26-29 I/ITSEC conference in Orlando, Fla., according to company officials, who would not say if ESP had any military customers yet.

As a platform technology, ESP has been designed to provide a PC-based simulation engine, a comprehensive set of tools, applications programming interfaces, documentation to support code development, content integration and scenario-building capabilities, and an extensive base of world content that can be tailored for custom solutions. Microsoft said partners and developers will be able to add structured experiences or missions, content such as terrain and scenery, scenarios, and hardware devices to augment existing solutions, or they can build and deploy solutions that address customer requirements.

To support high-fidelity, 3-D immersive experiences, ESP comes with geographical, cultural, environmental and scenery data along with tools for placing objects, scenery and terrain customization, object activation, special effects, and environmental controls that include adjustable weather.