| Aerosoft Germany 4 |
| Monday, 20 November 2006 | |
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Aerosoft has a long history of producing high quality add-ons, and when they offered me the chance to review two of their latest efforts; it never entered my mind to reject their offer. As well as giving me a copy of the fantastic Scenery Germany Bremen, they also provided me with a copy of the latest in a line of successful titles, Scenery Germany 4, and as an added bonus, a copy of one of their newest GA Aircraft, the Piper Super Cub, saying that it was the ideal aircraft for exploring the scenery add-ons.
There are around 25 airfields covered in high detail in the package, and each one is a vast improvement on the default version. I cant, so wont, comment on their realism as I've never been to any of them in real life, but considering Aerosoft are the developers, I would like to think that the are very close to their real world counterparts.
If you like flying VFR, then this package is great for you. Included in the scenery are thousands of VFR reference points such as transmission towers, power lines and factories etc… So flying without any charts is very each in this region. Speaking of which, charts for all the airfields in the package are also included in the download. The 51 page PDF file is very useful and makes flying into and out of the airfields that bit more realistic and fun. The charts are of reasonable quality and are very easy to use, they can be difficult to use straight from the PDF file itself, but if you print them off and store them, they are much easier to use when they are in front of you so you don't have to switch between FS and the PDF file. But seeing as this was a download product I reviewed, I can't complain at only having them in electronic format. If you like flying IFR (I follow roads!), then fear not as all the roads in the area are also included in the scenery too, so you can still make that daily commute to work, just about 500ft above the ground to avoid the gridlock. If you are more of a rotorhead, then there are helicopter landing spots included too. Many of the cities are also included in great detail; Frankfurt, Erfurt , Wiesbaden and Jena to name but a few. Also for the first time, airfields like Wasserkuppe, Suhl and Aschaffenburg are covered with high detail aerial images that enhance the scenery considerably. The runway surfaces and textures at these airports would almost have you believe you were really there, that's how good they look.
The product comes as a hefty 172mb download (installation size 600mb), which may put it out of the reach for some of the dial up users out there, but for the level of detail included, this seems like a small download size! Installation is very quick and easy, just extract the installer from the downloaded zip file, run it and then follow the on screen prompts and everything else is done for you. There are some moans and groans on forums that there is insufficient documentation to tell you what files are actually replaced by the installer, but a quick look through the Aerosoft support forums will help you out.
The included documentation comes in German and English, with 30pages in each language. It covers installation, which is always well worth a read before you go any further, list's of the high detail airports in the package (describing a few of them in detail, and, as with the Scenery Germany Bremen package, some sample flights to help you get to know the region. There is also a free simplified version of their Piper Super Cub. This is a very simplified version as all the navigation radios are taken out, so don't buy SG4 for the Super Cub, if you want the Super Cub, buy it on it's own, it's awesome!
What I love about SG4 is that it is made for VFR flight, and the airports created in high detail replicate that. They have stayed away from recreating the major airports and done the smaller airfields that only the people who live near them have heard of. The high detail airfields all come with nicely modelled buildings and some static aircraft at a few of them. My main complain with the airfields is that there is no option to start at a parking spot, you are just placed at the active, and more often than not, I was pointed in the wrong direction too. This problem is easily solved by a quick slew or taxi into your preferred position. Also at EDER , where there is a sloped runway, I always started below the runway surface. As before, a quick taxi and I was where I wanted to be, but I would've expected that for a product that is as good as this, these small problems would have been identified and corrected. Maybe this is coming in an update? These are only small problems, and are easy to live with, after all, SG4 is at it's best when viewed from the air. I loved just taking off, picking a road and following it to see where it would take me. Exploring some of the cities on route was great fun, especially around Frankfurt . This scenery is full compatible with the Mega Airport Frankfurt add-on, and I would've loved to have had the Frankfurt add-on to use alongside it! The level of detail included in SG4 is superb. The price for all this is £30, which does seem a little high, but there has been a lot of work and effort gone into this by the development team, despite the few problems. I wouldn't hesitate to pay the price though if you are a lover of VFR flight. If you prefer to enjoy your flight simming from high above the clouds, then buying SG4 would be money wasted.
Scenery Germany 4 is all about a chilled out experience and that is how it should be. There are no huge mountains to navigate around, no dangerous approaches to test you skills, you can get up there in the air and look out of the window and enjoy yourself without fear of smacking head first into a cliff. Germany is a very flat country, but the new terrain mesh provides subtle rises and drops in the terrain which just adds that little something extra to the scenery that makes such a huge difference. I highly recommend this package to everyone who likes a low and slow approach to their flying. SYSTEM SPECS: Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004 This product is not compatible with FS2002 |
