Bear's Cave The world of Flight Simulators short reviews by Steve "Bear" Cartwright 2-Apr-2001 Project Opensky Boeing 747-400 Canadian by Project Open Sky/Shane Stong poscan742.zip uploaded 25-Mar-2001 1,169Kb FS2000 aircraft Project Open Sky released their "Freeware" version of Boeing's largest, the 747-400 a couple of weeks ago, but the first to make it to our library, here at AVSIM, is Shane Stong's re-paint in the livery of the Canadian "Proud Wings", one of my personal favorite liveries by the way! The team at Project Open Sky responsible for this aircraft are Misushi Yutaka and Hiroshi Igami for the overall design and Johan C. Dees handling (pun intended) the Flight Dynamics. Shane applied the excellent paint/external texturing and he did an outstanding job in one of the most beautiful liveries ever presented to the public, the Canadian "Proud Wings" paint scheme! This aircraft upload makes use of the default FS2000 panel (4-jet heavy panel) and default sounds, but a quick search in the library should offer you several excellent choices in panels or sounds (or you can, as I did, install the commercial 747 panel and sounds from PSS, if you happen to have that package). As with their earlier release of the Boeing 767, the Project Open Sky's 747-400 includes fully animated parts, hanging wheel boggies, their unique 48-varible sided based fuselage (a Project Open Sky original technique), and their most unusual and highly realistic landing lights. This is a truly outstanding and very special aircraft that includes one of the very best FDE files available and to consider that they (POSKY) offer this as freeware is testimony to the growth of our fantastic hobby! ...Bear! 2-Apr-2001 Stillwater, Oklahoma (SWO) by Dale Baker swo.zip uploaded 25-Mar-2001 600Kb FS2000 scenery This is number 15 in Dale's uploads of Oklahoma small airport sceneries and like all of his prior work, Stillwater Regional is a terrific little add-on to FS2000! Stillwater Regional is non-fictional and is a default airport in FS, but Dale has added his seemly small touches that will really enhance your experience on arriving here. Stillwater has two paved runways (now with Dale's very excellent texturing), both with night-lighting and one with a working ILS, plus a VOR/DME station on the field! In addition there are trees, buildings, static aircraft, and open 3D hangers with some of the best interior texturing I've yet seen from Dale—very nice, very nice indeed! Stillwater, Oklahoma is located approximately 45 miles West of Tulsa and is home to the Oklahoma State University (just about a mile and half from the airport you can see the open stadium at the University campus). Dale's scenery—though not renderings of the large airports like O'Hara or Kennedy International—but of the small airports and more of the type you'll find me landing one of my GA aircraftaircraft I prefer to fly over the heavy jets! So, another winner to add to Dale's excellent Oklahoma GA airport series! ...Bear! 2-Apr-2001 Iditarod, Alaska by Tom Fica iditarod.zip uploaded 26-Mar-2001 2,011Kb FS2000 scenery Tom Fica is quickly adding his name to a list of very good scenery designers that have been providing some very excellent "Bush" country scenery add-ons for Alaska, Canada, and the Great Northwest. Tom's latest "Iditarod, Alaska" shows a lot of originality and offers up some unique little "easter eggs" as well. The Iditarod itself is a real event held once a year, where dog-sledders from around the world, mush their dog teams and sleds across the interior of Alaska. From Wasilia, AK (just a little north of Anchorage) all the way out to Nome, a trail distance of nearly 1,000 miles. These sledders annually battle each other, the weather, seemly impossible terrain, and unbelievable mental/physical fatigue, all for the sake of saying – we won! I've met or know a number of individuals that have competed or compete annually on this odyssey and they are a unique group of individuals to say the least! Oddly enough, my camera (Nikon) lens sacks are actual (an previously used) "dog shoes", used during the 1997 "Iditarod" by a team from Norway! No kidding, hey, they make great lens covers, they really do! Anyway, Tom has designed this fictional bush field and located it approximately half-way between Anchorage and Nome (the town of Iditarod really did exist at this location some 80 or 90 years ago and with a population of approximately 10,000 back then, but today it's merely a ghost town with only a very few remains left of the original buildings). Tom's scenery has several out-buildings, including the appropriate outhouse and down on the road, passing through this area, are several cabins or houses as well. One of the little "easter eggs" I mentioned are the placement of two camping tents hidden in a small patch of trees a couple of miles from this bush airport (Iditarod competitors I assume). Tom has also incorporated the use of those new tree macros that besides being very lifelike in appearance, also rotate, keeping their flat side toward the viewer at all times so no matter which direction you look at them from, they always appear like real trees! Very nice touch Tom! Overall, simple, yet unique in its own way—I really like this little bush scenery airport and all I can say is keep up the great work Tom! ...Bear! 2-Apr-2001 FS World 2000 - Version 1.4 by Joachim Tangemann fsw2000e.zip uploaded 26-Mar-2001 201Kb FS2000 utilities Joachim Tangemann has been providing a regularly updated scenery description/file locator utility right along, called "MS FlightSimulator World" for FS98, but his latest utility is for FS2000 only. How many times have you seen a screenshot posted by someone or seen a screenshot in a posted article, but the screenshot author has failed to list what scenery it is or where it can been found? Or simply do you wonder where there may be located an uploaded scenery add-on for your hometown airport or maybe some other possible scenery files for Bush locations in Montana, whatever! Well, here's the most comprehensive scenery/texture file locator I've ever seen or even heard of for that matter. Joachim has written this scenery listing in HTML so you simply click on the main file an it opens in your browser. From there it's simply a matter of choosing a region and then either by country or state; you can narrow down your search (in total there are over 1,200 separate listings included) to the area you wish to check for. If some 3rd party designer has uploaded his file anywhere on the web (Joachim has even included scenery files that are listed at home websites as well), it's most likely listed here! On a separate page are listed any or all commercial scenery listings for FS2000 and the links to the publisher of that scenery! Plus there are pages that list sceneries by authors, wow, this is too much! So, if you've spotted some scenery that you like and you've searched the web high and low, but haven't found it—well here's the best thing since buttered toast for locating available sceneries for your Flight Simulator! One additional thing, Joachim has included all sceneries that have become available up through 25-Mar-2001, or the day before he made this freeware utility available! ...Bear! 2-Apr-2001 DHC-2 Mk III Turbo Beaver 3 pack by Fred Banting/Yannick Lavigne tbeav4.zip; uploaded 31-Mar-2001 659Kb FS2000 aircraft Fred Banting and Yannick Lavigne gave us the DHC-2 Beaver early last year and now they have added the DHC-2 Beaver equipped with a Pratt & Whitney PT6A-6 Turbine engine. The first response would be that this is a simple and quick re-do of their prior model, but in fact this is a near ground zero build-up project from the beginning. In the putting together of the design of this aircraft, Fred & Yannick got the assistance of Steve Small for the FDE and Glenn Davey (a highly experienced real-world bush pilot with years experience in Dehavilland Beavers) with the test flights. Fred was responsible for most of the work involving the panel & gauges, whereas Yannick took care of the external texturing and interior cockpit views (all photo realistic, new, and original as to a Turbine Beaver), plus a revamping of some prior PT6A sound files by Yannick that are also included. This is a complete package—sounds, panel, and aircraft (in three versions; ski, wheel-ski, and float). My first flights with this latest from Fred and Yannick really put a smile on my face, as the FDE is right up there where we've all come to expect from Steve Small, as usual, and the sound files from Yannick are truly delicious! These aircraft are now my aircraft of choice for bush flying. Silky smooth and powerful! Included with the file is about as good a documentation on this aircraft's operation as one could ever hope for, plus the aircraft has complete start-up functions, weight & balance charts, flap speed charts, complete turbine operational guides, well—you get the picture! This is a complete package! An absolute must have for all you FS2000 users out there! ...Bear! Tell A Friend About these Reviews!   Standard Disclaimer These reviews above are a subjective assessment of the work of the authors. There is no connection between the product author and the reviewer, and we feel these reviews are unbiased and truly reflects the performance of the product in the simming environment. This disclaimer is posted here in order provide you with background information on the reviewer and connections that may exist between him/her and the contributing party. © 2001 - AVSIM Online All Rights Reserved