I'd recommend a sim that teaches pre-flight checks.
I'd recommend a sim that shows a beginner safety in starting, handling, and setting up the plane properly with throttle cut, securing the wing, checking the battery before each flight, and many other things an instructor goes over.
I've seen the sim graduate. He's the guy that sometimes flies with his antenna down for a few hundred feet of the life of his trainer.
He's the guy that sometimes lands with the plane coming directly at him and it hits him in the legs, because that's how he landed 1000 times on his sim but mysteriously the plane flew under him without him jumping up out of his office chair.
He's the guy that flies a dead battery, puts others at risk, stands flying in the runway, and so many others things that he took for granted relying on a sim.
He needs to combine his sim experience with guidance from an instructor. Yes, he can learn that vital 5% very quickly, and apply that knowledge on his replacement trainer. If it's glow, he's got a lot more to learn.
Equally thinking a student only needs a sim, is a costly mistake as well. I think a student would learn more watching rc airplane searches on youtube!
I never watched a beginner once show up with a trainer, with sim only experience, and even think to look ahead of his aircraft by the way. You must have forgotten that was told to you by a more experienced pilot to do with about half your list there. A student doesn't know what to look for but the spacebar to reset his plane on the runway.
What a sim does wrong is teaches the beginner to think a take off, staying in the air in any haphazard manner, and bouncing down without parts falling off was flying and landing. None of those things run through a beginners mind until experienced instruction tells him to do so. Don't stretch it beyond what it is. I've had sim trained people demonstrate what they don't know more than once at our field.
A simulator will prepare you 30-40% of the way to fly a plane safely with all things considered.
Get an instuctor.
Read the forums.
Naturally a lot of questions exist for everyone. This is a sound answer to consider for any beginner. A sim is not a replacement for an instructor, although he can certainly fly solo a lot sooner accompanying the sim with the real thing.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fmm-f-76MnI&NR=1