Introduction

Being raised on a small island and living there all my life which is serviced by the longest running schedules helicopter service in the world, I have had a fascination of helicopters from a very early age. I don't remember the first flight that I took, as I was only 6 weeks old! My most recent experience was just before Christmas when I flew back home to spend the festive season with my family. As a serving soldier in the British Army, I have also had the chance to fly in a wide range of helicopters varying from 4 seaters, right up to heavy lift helicopters. Naturally when this latest release by Aerosoft came on the market, it caught my attention.A Scenery project with  simulation helicopter pilots in mind... what more could I ask for? As we all know, nearly every aspect of MSFS as we know it has evolved in leaps and bounds over the past few months, and becomes more and more realistic. Does this Manhattan scenery meet those expectations? Well, lets see what its all about.

Download & Installation

As with lots of commercial software packages these days, it comes as a download through the Aerosoft Online Shop. The process if straight forward enough if you are familiar with ordering products online. After creating a user account, its a simple process of following the on screen prompts and filling in the necessary fields with the relative information. On completion of the order, you will be directed to the download link and  be sent and email to your specified email address confirming the order. Following closely behind will be  an order update soon after which will supply you with the registration serial number for the product.  For those of you who have not as yet used online purchasing, and are wary about giving your credit card details over the internet, be assured that Aerosoft use a secure online service to insure that security is a premium.  The download itself is a hefty 59.7mb in total. For those who have broadband, this is a breeze. Don't be deterred if you are still on a 56k dial up, I did a second test using my dialup letting it download using my download accelerator. I got ½ way through the download  and deliberately cancelled it to ensure the resume feature worked correctly.  After about 3 hours it completed and the installation process worked without fault.

The installation of the product is again a simple process. Extracting the Setup.exe from the downloaded file, and double clicking. Whilst the setup runs through its routine it will prompt you for various information. Which language you prefer, confirm you are logged into the pc as admin, confirm you agree with the licence the product holds and your registration key. Finally it will detect the location of your Fs2004 folder and confirm that it is correct.  Its a painless process, and if I can do it, then anyone can! And that's it, your Manhattan scenery is installed and ready to used. So what are we waiting for?  Well, I would strongly suggest prior to going great guns and jumping in at the deep end, you take a minute to browse through the manual.

Documentation

One thing I found useful was the ability to download and read through the manual whilst waiting for the product order to finalize. We all like to install our new products and get straight into finding out what its all about. A few minutes reading what the developer has taken the time to write is well worth the effort. Its surprising the amount of times I have fallen foul of this and only found out later that there were a number of things that I was totally oblivious too. The manual comes in Adobe Acrobat .pdf format, and should you not already have the reader, it can be downloaded from here
Detailed information and illustrations showing the area covered	Visual representation of the heliport, and advisories in detail
The manual covers a brief history of Manhattan itself, and how this project evolved through development. It covers all the necessary areas concerned with setting up your pc to gain the most out of this scenery, and a few hints and tips thrown in as well. Various pictures and dialogue in the manual describe in detail various flight plans and approaches to fly over the city. It gives detailed routes for helicopters and at the end of the manual, a run down of all the included heliports and advisories associated with them. The document is written in a way that it will not confuse those who maybe new to the world of flightsim, and also detailed enough for the seasoned simmers amongst us.

Concise and descriptive

I opted to start from the Port Authority Downtown Wall St Heliport. It is situated at the southern end of the island with the city rising majestically behind it. Whilst panning around in the external view, the first thing to strike me was the amount of objects in the vicinity, and the high frame rates being shown. Too often we have installed a product and have had to then spend ages altering our settings to get the most of out it. When the flight loads, it uses the default Bell 206. Included within the package are a number of repaints that are common to the Manhattan area. I opted not to fly in the default helicopter, but instead loaded the super Augusta 109 by Alan Devins. This helicopter is in my opinion one of the best created helicopters for Fs2004 today. Taking off from the Heliport, I turned onto a heading of 090° and started to follow the coastline of Manhattan Island. It is immediately evident the level of intricate detail that has been included. As you pass Pier 17, the large square rigger ships "Peking" and "Wavertree" are depicted in all their splendour. The whole area on the dockside is fashioned with care and attention and really adds some alternative diversity away from the dominant skyscraper skyline. Pop up and over the Brooklyn Bridge, I continued the flight along the coast line and soon I was flying past the United Nations building. Its green glass facia glistening in the sun

Turning and Burning at  Wall St Heliport	Early morning test flight prior to business	Over the ships at Pier 17, and the Brooklyn Bridge	East 34th Heliport  with the overpass behind it	The United Nations building reflecting the sun

 Passing over Roosevelt Island the sun was now rising into the morning sky and generating some awesome visuals in the sky. Climbing up to 2000ft, Central Park was now visible off to my left. The photo realistic texture really bringing it to life.

The spectacular Central Park	I decided to cut across the north end of Central Park, and follow the coastline back into the city.  Only after making the turn and being presented with the Manhattan skyline in front of you, can you really appreciate the scale of this project. Dropping back down to around 1000ft, I flew parallel to Riverside Park, and continued up passing over the USS Intrepid, USS Growler and USS Edson all which have received the same care an attention as has already been displayed. West 30th Heliport which is one of the other modelled heliports in this scenery passes underneath us as we continue south. Ellis Island is visible in the distance sitting in the middle of Upper New York bay, with the Statue of Liberty standing proud slightly beyond. Starting the slow left turn to bring me back to the heliport I started to descend a little over Battery Park. The Heliport was visible in front of me, and I brought the 109 back onto the pad. The flight took about 20 minutes in total, which included a few hovers to look closely at the detail. It is very impressive in pretty much all aspects. There were only a couple of times when I noticed a depreciation in frame rate, but for the majority of the flight it remained constant and did not impact on the enjoyment of the flight. Looking over the magnificent Manhattan skyline Final approach back into Wall Street	The museum ships sit gracefully in the harbour
Riverside Park with great lighting effects		Ellis Island silhouetted in the morning sun

Heliports and Landmarks

The first flight was a round trip from Port Authority Downtown Wall St Heliport. Also within the package are two more which can be used for operations, and also a rooftop pad in the heart of the city. The other two Heliports are East 34th and West 30th. Both of these like Wall St are situated on the coastline.

East 34th Heliport	Approach into West 30th

Flying helicopters is not the easiest of skills to master, but with some perseverance, a very good degree of control can be achieved in a relatively short period of time. This scenery with its heliports only being small in size, and with buildings obstructing what could be your preferred approach an even higher degree of skill is required to ensure you get onto the pad. Think that sounds hard enough? Why not throw in a pad that is 100's of feet high with winds buffeting you from all sides!  Fancy your chances? Well, the Met-Life building in the middle of the city affords you the chance to test your skills. I went about the task by doing a couple of slow orbits and figuring out what would make the best approach. I like to think I have become quite proficient over the years at flying FS helicopters, so I didn't find it excessively difficult, but saying that, there are times when I find it almost impossible!

Doing a slow orbit over the rooftop helipad	Slowly back on the stick, and a touch of collective	Over the edge of the building and gently onto the pad!

There are literally scores of buildings, bridges, areas and landmarks that are portrayed in the scenery package. There are also the outlying airports that serve the city that I could include in this review but have chosen not to. What I found to be a great help was to search on the net and find various information about Manhattan, and from there go and see if I could find the area or object in question.

It is almost impossible to list and include every individual feature that is incorporated into this project as it would create an enormous review! I have compromised and included what I thought to be the best points. I am sure those who have already bought this scenery will have found many other features that I have either not mentioned or even discovered. You may find it useful to pop over to the Aerosoft Forum and see what others have commented on.

Conclusion

Considering the complexity of the Manhattan area, Aerosoft have pulled out all the stops to create a quite remarkable add on scenery package. The purchase and installation process is straight forward and allows you to be flying around and enjoying your new product in the shortest possible time. One of the main concerns that deters a lot of people is the impact it will have on their pc. Admittedly I am lucky enough to have quite a high end pc which affords minimal frame rate loss. If your system is similar to what I have tested it on, then you can pretty much guarantee that it will be a pleasure to fly.

Having written a number of scenery reviews in the past, and downloaded many packages both payware and freeware, this in my opinion is one of the nicest I have used in a long time. I have mentioned a couple of things in the "What I don't like" below, but these are things that I feel could enhance the scenery. Both the what I like and don't like are personal findings, and not be applicable to everyone. I have given this the Avsim 4 Star award which it thoroughly deserves.

In the Pipeline From Aerosoft

So, what does the future hold for the Aerosoft development team? In a conversation with Mathijs Kok, It seems to have been decided that San Francisco will be their next project. Incorporating the city itself, the piers, outlaying islands and the famous Golden Gate Bridge. Keep popping into the Aerosoft forums and it wont be long before we start seeing the progress being made on their latest project. Just out of interest, Chicago came a close 2nd!!

• None of the Heliports had a Windsock (even a static one would have looked good)
• Helicopters will occasionally bounce around on Heliport surfaces
• Being able to land on the USS Intrepid would have been nice
• The Hudson River has an un-natural slope to it on the banks of New Jersey  (Problem known by Aerosoft)