What is it ? : Highly detailed scenery covering the whole of the state of Victoria.

Filename : avic9706.zip

Availability : flightsim.com, IUP uploads, but we advise you visit the Ozpack homepages at http://www.ozpack.pcsa.net.au for the most up to date information on eachstate’s scenery, as well as utilities and information on upcoming releases.

System Requirements : Any PC running either Flight Simulator V5 or FS95.

Recommended : At least a 486 / 100, performance increases with speed / RAM.

Cost : A donation is required to the Royal Australian Flying Doctor Service, a very worthwhile cause to support.

Rating : 8 / 10. Excellent scenery with no major flaws.

The Ozpack continues to provide simmers with some of the most realistic scenery available anywhere. Whilst not going into the high-end photo-realism, satellite imaging or intensely detailed cities that many sceneries now commercially available are doing, what the Ozpack prides themselves on is an authentic rendering of every airport in a given state, and then the building up of accurate detail around the major airports and cities along the way. The end result is a scenery that any real-life pilot who jumps into his sim Cessna will instantly recognise, and can then practice most VFR procedures in the Melbourne area with the only instrument required being the ‘ Mark One Eyeball ‘ ;-)

Over the course of three years the Victorian scenery has grown from a basic rendering of the coastline and runways of the state’s airports to a highly detailed depiction of most of the state’s more frequented airports. As one would expect, the focus of the Victorian scenery is Melbourne, and as designers learn more and more new tricks, the results are borne out in the sceneries they design. The Melbourne CBD is becoming more detailed as each revision is released, and this time features such as the Westgate Bridge, port facilities, the Victorian Arts Centre and the MCG really do add to the visual realism. The texturing applied to the greater Melbourne is a credit to the design team. Whilst obviously not being able to look exactly like Melbourne from the air, features such as local golf courses, the freeways, and the differing density of the urban sprawl of the city are well depicted, and makes you drool at the thought of how accurate the rendering of cities can possibly become.

Melbourne Approach

Where many sceneries fall down is in the accuracy of the airports within their coverage.
The eye candy is fine, but most sim pilots want to be flying into the most realistic and accurate airports and airfields first, and worry about looking at the scenery later. Here we can really pick no holes in the work of the design team with regards to the accuracy of the airports. Tullamarine really looks the part when the complexity is turned right up, and one can imagine in future revisions that the scenery surrounding the airport, such as the carpark, Travelodge and the many aviation-related facilities that lie to the east of the approach into RW34 will be progressively included as changes in the way scenery is designed come through. I can imagine eventually within perhaps five years the Ozpack Tullamarine and the real-life airport will be hard to tell apart. Essendon, too, comes up a treat, as does Moorabbin. The approaches into both now look very stunning and favourable comparisons can be made with their real-life counterparts.

Other areas of Victoria with detailed airport scenery include Avalon, Geelong / Grovedale, Ballarat, and the LaTrobe Valley. Dynamic scenery is now beginning to become a feature of Ozpack sceneries, and whilst the gaggle of 727’s may not quite be Tullamarine anymore (!), it is good to see dynamic scenery being included. Again, as technology progresses, I can see a day not too far down the track when we’ll have to keep our eyes out for the A320 leaving the Ansett gate whilst waiting for the Kendell Saab to leave the taxiway after that smooth landing on RW09....

Ansett 737 on liftoff from Melbourne

So where does the scenery fall down ? Well it doesn’t, to be perfectly honest. What we now have is an excellent piece of software that can be purchased for a song when compared with many commercial releases across the world with less complexity and attention to detail. A problem that many found with the previous version (avic9612) was that the Melbourne airports were not coming ‘ visual ‘ until too close into the field, which meant a fully VFR arrival was difficult to pull off. I’m pleased to say that now Tullamarine should become visual at least 8-10 dme out, which still isn’t quite as good as you get in reality, but nobody should blame the design team for a problem that is inherent within FS rather than a scenery designer’s flaw. Hopefully someone (somewhere !) might come up with the answers. Future updates will obviously concentrate on improving the already stunning attention to detail and areas such as dynamic scenery as previously mentioned.

Installation is a breeze for either FS5 or FS6, with a fully automated setup routine that’s quick and easy to follow. Full documentation is provided, as well as a donation form to print out and send off to the RFDS when you register. The linkage of the Ozpack to the RFDS is a marvellous idea (see the interview with Tom Monnone in V.P July), and the Flying Doctor is deserving of the support of every Australian.

To the Ozpack Victoria team of Lee Firth, Ross Gridley and Neil Park, we here at Virtual Pilot salute you and wish you every success with further revisions of the scenery. Revisions and releases that you’ll read here first with Virtual Pilot.

 

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