Aerosoft's African Airstrip Adventures for FSX

By Bill Stack
3 August 2009

Screen shots by Aerosoft

Africa is a diverse continent socially, politically, geographically, and climatically. It is the world's second largest and second-most populated continent. Stradling the equator, about half the continent is in the Northern Hemisphere, and about half is in the Southern Hemisphere. It is the only continent to stretch from the northern temperate zone to the southern temperate zone. Some of its regions are dense jungles while others are dry deserts. Its highest mountains are Kilimanjaro (19,341 feet, 5,895 meters), Kenya (17,057 feet, 5,199 meters), and Mawenzi (16,893 feet, 5,149 meters), all in eastern Africa. This unique continent has the largest combination and density of free-ranging wild animals such as lions, elephants, giraffes, and primates.

Kenya is one of Africa's more than 50 independent countries. Located on the equator, in East Africa, along the Indian Ocean, it has a tropical climate that is humid on the coast and dry inland. Nairobi National Park is located about seven kilometers (four miles) west of Kenya's capital city of Nairobi. Providing a habitat safe from human activities for thousands of wild animals such as giraffes, buffaloes, zebras, hippopotami, leapoards, and lions, it is Kenya's major tourist attraction.

Aerosoft has created a package of missions, scenery enhancements and flights for adventuring in FSX around Mount Kenya. "This addon will bring you closer to the fascination, the wildlife and the beauty of Kenya/Africa," Aerosoft says in its product description.

As explained in their product description and manual, they made this mission and scenery because they were disappointed in FSX's representation of the area and its animals.

FSX Globe	FSX Map	Aerosoft Map
Scenery Location Screen shots by Bill Stack. Map by Aerosoft.

Major Features

This adventure package has several major features to enable a higher than ordinary level of simulation enjoyment: Scenery, flights, a mission, and a manual.

• Scenery. Approximately 40,000 square kilometers around Mt Kenya, the country's highest peak, is covered by this add-on scenery. More than 20 airstrips, custom scenery, landmarks, buildings, vehicles and thousands of birds and mammals are featured. Basic features include:
  
  
  • Custom LOD12 terrain mesh
  • Custom land-class definitions, textures, and blendings
  • Custom streets, roads, rivers, lakes, telephone lines, and railways with 3D trains
  • Custom Africa-typial villages and lodges
  • Custom airstrip objects and buildings
  
  
• Flights. About 30 flights start users at airports and airstrips for viewing scenery and animals and for launching adventures.
  
  
• Mission. One mission, called "career mode," leads users to carrying passengers and cargo around Kenya's airstrips. This mission starts with a short video and an option for taking the introductory flight. Thereafter, users may accept one of more than 20 "jobs" assigned at random by a dispatcher.
  
  
• Manuals. A 46-page manual with numerous screen shots explains how to install and use the package:
  
  
  • Installation procedure
  • Display settings
  • Airport/airstrip descriptions and positions
  • Free flights
  • Career-mode mission
  • Glossary

  A 25-page printable version of this manual — without the images and background paper — is available for simpler printing and toner/ink savings.
  
  

Aerosoft says "African Airstrip Adventures combines an advanced mission mode with high-definition scenery" and an opportunity to "start a career as a pilot in a fictional charter airline."

Menu	Menu	Video	Video	Go/No-Go
Mission Screens
Screen shots by Bill Stack

This package is conveniently available for instant downloading from the Flight Sim Pilot Shop.

Installation is easy. The installation program installs all needed files into the correct folders and activates the scenery. A license key is required.

Aerosoft	FSX
Aberdares Resort
Aerosoft	FSX
Buffalo Springs
Aerosoft	FSX
Embu
Scenes From African Airstrip Adventures
Screen shots by Bill Stack

Nice Features

This package differs from most others in that it provides not just scenery, bust also a mission and "job assignments" to use with the scenery. The scenery can be used without the mission or jobs, but the mission and jobs require the scenery.

The adventures include:

• A career mode that Aerosoft describes as "an unlimited adventure with job offers appearing randomly." Pilots can climb "the reputation ladder," collect rewards, and "have hours of fun as an African Safari Charter pilot," Aerosoft promises
  
  
• A single mission that leads to randomly assigned flight assignments entailing passenger and cargo flight around Kenya
  
  
• The flight assignments that may go on "for days and weeks," according to Aerosoft's manual
  
  
• Rewards that can be won upon successful completion of the assignments

More than 30 flights are installed for starting in various locations such as airstrips, water, and land, and for using various aircraft such as fixed wings, rotorcraft, and ultralights. Each flight description entices you to try it.

Scenery effects include:

• Thousands of birds and mammals
  
  
• Forest fires and water falls in the Aberdares Range
  
  
• Moving animal herds
  
  
• Flying hot air balloons in "career mode"
  
  

The scenery environment is created to suit the "mission career mode" and is not intended to be absolutely realistic, Aerosoft says.

Sparsely populated areas present unique challenges for real and simulated pilots. Most flying is visual, and most navigation is dead reckoning and pilotage (unless we rely on GPS).

The low lighting at night, which is natural and realistic in a wilderness, makes nighttime visual flying more challenging and rewarding.

A manual in two versions is included. The larger has 46 pages with many images and a colorful background "paper." The other has 25 pages and lacks images and background paper for simpler printing. These manuals provide much information about installing and using the scenery, such as descriptions of scenery areas, how to find animals, how to use career mode, and how to set display settings for optimum results.

Frame rates are about the same as when the FSX default scenery is in use.

Aerosoft responded quickly to my email inquiry, which bodes well for buyers who need technical support.

Aerosoft	FSX
Laikipia Airbase
Aerosoft	FSX
Kazula Lodge
Aerosoft	FSX
Matoni
Aerosoft	FSX
Simangua
Scenes From African Airstrips Adventures
Screen shots by Bill Stack

Comparative Screen Shots

My comparative screen shots were made as follows:

• With Aerosoft's African Airstrip Adventure scenery activated, and with my display settings according to their recommendations, I slewed to suitable "photo spots" and snapped various screen shots.
  
  
• Activating and deactivating add-on scenery in FSX is time consuming, so I made all the Aerosoft shots first, showing the position data shown at the top.
  
  
• With Aerosoft's Africa Airstrip Adventures scenery deactivated, I slewed to the same "photo spots," using the same position data shown at the top of the corresponding set of screen shots, and snapped screen shots with the default FSX scenery.

As a result of this process, each pair of screen shots is made from exactly the same position, altitude, and heading. Apparent differences in viewpoints result from differences in the sceneries themselves.

Mount Kenya: Don't end up like this!

Screen shots by Bill Stack

Native animals are scattered about the scenery.
Screen shots by Aerosoft

Embu	Laikipia Airbase	Aberdares Resort
Darkness in the wilderness makes night flying more challenging.
Screen shots by Bill Stack

Issues

Some aircraft contained in some of the flights are add-ons. Users who don't have the add-on aircraft contained in a given flight will receive an error message when that flight is opened. That error message can be bypassed, and the simulator will use a default aircraft.

There are fewer auto-generated objects such as buildings and trees in the Aerosoft scenery.

As a result of Aerosoft's reworking the terrain mesh, elevations are different from FSX at some locations. As examples, Matoni is 5,617 feet in Aerosoft's scenery and 5,737 in FSX, and Laikipia Airbase is 6,113 feet in Aerosoft and 6,148 in FSX. The FSX map shows the elevation at Laikipia Airbase as 6,109 feet.

Summary

Aerosoft's African Adventure scenery is ideal for flight simmers who want something different — something other than busy sophisticated airports and large urban areas. It's just right for visual flying and old-fashioned navigating. It's also great for visiting a part of the world and experiencing an environment that's different from what many of us in the world's developed areas are accustomed to. It taps into a sense of history as we visit areas where famous European adventurers treked a century ago. And its job assignments offer simulation pilots a convenient structure for their adventures.

Bill Stack

Learn More About Aerosoft's African Airstrip Adventures for FSX

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Bill Stack is author of several books about flight simulation, a regular author in flight-sim magazines, and a contributor to Flight Sim Com. His website is www.topskills.com

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