What are some apps (paid/free) for using on a new Mac?

Pages, Numbers, Keynote, GarageBand. All free on the App Store.

Not free but close: LibreOffice, Find Any File (FAF)

Not cheap but indispensable: BBEdit

Best free entertainment app: About by PCalc (yes that is its name — search for it)

Daisy Disk

SuperDuper!

Carbon Copy Cloner

AppCleaner

Automater

MS Office

FreeOffice

Burn

Install Disk Creator

Mactracker

VMWare Fusion

WiFi Explorer Light

Paint X Premium

If you're looking for a realistic flight simulator …

https://www.x-plane.com/

How realistic is it?

"The retail version of X-Plane purchased at X-Plane.com is not certified for flight training right out of the box, since certification requires a software and hardware combination. However, the software available for about $60 at X-Plane.com is almost identical what is found in the $500,000 full-motion FAA-certified [flight training] platforms."

https://www.x-plane.com/pro/certified/