What add-ons to buy??

[dtmicro]

Hey Guys,

I have about $200 to $300 to spend over the next month or so for add-on scenery. I'm just now getting back into this stuff with a 3D setup. I need to know what scenery stuff to buy. I like the looks of the stuff over at fullterrain.com, are they the best?

I need stuff that does not use cheat 2d texture mapping (I've seen some of the old photo realistic textures do this), the textures need to be truly 3d (I'm assuming almost all are now-a-days).

[djadlib]

OrbX/FTX scenery does look stunning. They have 2 free downloadable regions so you can try out what they have to offer.
The downside is that they only cover a certain (smaller) part of the globe.

I (and many others) use Ground Environment Extreme, Ultimate terrain X and Real Environment Extreme. These will change the entire world you fly in.

Harro

[skipper847]

Not got it yet but im buying RexE some time soon. Real Environment Extreme essentials from there website and is ment to be good and also put some imrovement on FSX all around.

[mrzippy]

I downloaded the free OrbX/FTX scenery for Downtown Portland. It made a good difference over the standard FSX scenery.

[dtmicro]

I installed the Orbx free stuff, it's pretty ok. The best one is Australia, because unless the PNW one did not install right (and I think it did), they didn't replace many textures in the PNW one. In the Pacific NW one, that same old UGLY FSX default mountain texture is still there (the green and black almost checkerboard looking one). I absolutely despise that texture and need to get rid of it.

I'm not sure if I want to pay $90 for the FTX/ Orbx Pacific Fjords + the new Airport that looks so incredible. I'm just afraid I'll regret spending that kind of money and the real world improvement might not be quite as good as the screenshots and video look.

Furthermore, I decided to play MS Flight just to see it, and as annoying as it is, the graphics made me jealous. The textures are far far superior even to the enhanced third-party stuff I've seen so far in FSX (haven't seen that much stuff though). Other than maybe some of the OrbX custom airports, I don't think anything comes close to the NEW mountain textures MS just released for MS Flight in the Alaska add-on.

When at the correct distance, Denali Park in Alaska in MS Flight has the best mountains I've probably ever seen in a PC game. They look real for the most part. I hope I can figure out how to get FSX looking comparable.

Here are some screenshots from MS Flight in Alaska flying near Mt. Mckinley in Denali ($15.00)...
Now the mountains in MS Flight don't always look that good, but they often do, and the Hawaii mountains aren't bad either. Too bad anything comparable in FSX seems so expensive.

Denali (MS Flight w/ Alaska Add-on)

--Click image to see at full size--

[remind]

Hi did you read Orbx's PDF manual under the control panel shortcut or under where you have Flightsim installed Orbx files are all there, there are suggested scenery settings with all their secenry as in Texture size etc, depending on your system, you can play around with all these settings, the Orbx settings, also make sure you have the latest Orbx libaries installed, always install them last after any of Orbx sceneries. For Australia they kill anything FSX default has and I doubt we'll ever see any Australia scenery with MS flight, I read a review about it the other day, MS flight, it said as part of review "more like a aracde game than a simulator." If your happy to do VFR around limited area fine, but if you actually want to use it as a Simulator then it doesn't do the job" Not my words! I can't judge for myslef alaska, but I did download the free part which was part of Hawai anmd I can't say I saw any massive change to FSX.

[dtmicro]

Thanks, I did all that but still see the old texture. I do get the new textures at the airports, but outside the airport it's that old ugly texture. I've posted a screenshot, you can see where the nice grass meets ugly black/green texture.

Is this normal?



Look in the far back where grass ends to meet trees, that looks like the default FSX texture to me. I am using PNW Orbx.

[rservice]

Have you installed the latest patches,and also the latest libraries for ORBX.
I don't know if ORBX will have another sale.They say they won't,but never is a long time.
I would gues that if current sales at existing prices do not meet expectations,they will have another sale.
Keep your eyes peeled.
Ron

[dtmicro]

I found my answer by looking at their web site.
That ugly texture shows up in Orbx's official screenshots of Pacific Fjord and PNW on their own web page.

I am dissapointed, they do great graphics, but they left some of the most common textures unfixed.
They can do better, that green/black texture is horrible and they need to get rid of it if they are going to claim to be a leader in textures and graphics in this game.

Unless I can find a way to replace it myself, I cannot buy their add-on knowing that texture is in there, yuck-a-doodle-yuck.