I've been flying the freeware Antilles 2004 by the FS Antilles Group - I think its great. I'm wondering if any of the payware products for the region represent a huge improvement in mesh and airport accuracy? The two that I'm looking at are Flightsim Brazil's "Fly to Caribe" series and Flight1's "West Indies" series. The two represent a significant expendature to get full coverage of the area, so I'm looking for opinions...Thanks for any input!Best,sg

"FLy to Caribe" is awesome and well worth the money. I don't think there's an improvement in the mesh department (FS2k4 really doesn't need that much improvement with most of it's islands in this region) but the airports are well done. I wouldn't even look at Flight1's "West Indies"... When it was first released the only way to get it to work in FS2k2/4 was to disable the whole Central American region or you would suffer scenery conflicts. The scenery not only changed the mesh but the author covered the islands with his own textures that made the area look more like an FS2000/98 environment. I say if it ain't broke don't fix it, the default textures in both FS2k2/4 are acceptable. All that's was needed (at least as far as FS2k2 goes) was updated mesh. In the case of FS2k4 like I said above most islands have acceptable mesh except for the case of Saba Island. I don't know about the later versions of "West Indies" but after the horror most of us had to endure with this scenery when it first came out (waiting for a patch only to be told in the end you had to disable the Central American area totally to get this scenery to work)... I would stay far away from this title but that's just my opinion. Anytime an author can't figure out how to get his scenery to properly integrate with the surrounding area something

Thanks Dillon!With regards to the mesh - does anyone know what resolution the mesh is in the FS Antilles group's "antilles 2004" package? It seems excellent for some islands...Best,sg

The FS2004 version of Islands of the West Indies are completely new products which now integrate seemlessly with the default scenery.The textures are custom still, as is the landclass, and make the area look a lot more true to life than the default.Airports look a lot better than those in Fly 2 Caribe.

The Flight1 IWI series had some problems for FS2k2. However, with this present release for FS2k4, as well as the OFFICIAL upgrades of the previous versions for FS2k4, all of these problems have been solved. Some of the airports are not as accurate as they could be, but all are much better than the default offerings. The mesh is also quite nice.I have also used the Antilles version, and I liked it as well. However the IWI series gives you many more airports. Personally, I think the mesh for the freeware Antilles version is better, but the mesh for IWI is also quite good. I have FLyTOCaribe airports as well and I have been unable to find good afcacds for them. I'm sure that the Afcads are there somewhere. Again, the IWI series gives you many more airports for a comparable price.Personally, I'd go with the IWI series.

Hello Dillon,The new altitude mesh that Microsoft has provided for the Caribbean is a LOD8 mesh that seems to be based on the recently-released NASA SRTM data. But, in spite of what most people seem to think, there are serious problems with it.Unfortunately, it is seriously mis-aligned. Or rather, it is placed in the right location, but ALL the default islands of the Caribbean are: - the wrong shape; - the wrong size; - have an incorrect orientation, and; - are in the wrong place.Here are some examples of this problem - St. Bart showing the default island and the corrected land mass:http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/67446.gifAnd here is the same for Antigua:http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/67447.gifThis results in the mesh not lying correctly on the islands, and therefore they all show sharp sea-side cliffs where the mesh is cut off by the sea. If you fly anywhere in the Caribbean, and have seen these cliffs, please be advised that they do not exist and are rather ugly.Here is an image showing the displaced mesh in the case of Virgin Gorda. The background is the default island with an SRTM mesh overlaid on it:http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/67449.jpgThis is the case with all the islands, so, as you can see, the new altitude mesh is really not very good as a result.It is hard to say which is worse, the flat islands of FS2002 or the mis-aligned mesh of the latest version with the ugly cliffs. Of course, most people have never been to the Caribbean, so do not realize the problem.Chris Wilkes' Islands of the West Indies is an extraordinary rendition of the area, not so much scenery as a work of art. Well worth the price and highly recommended for those who can appreciate it.Best regards.Luis

>>It is hard to say which is worse, the flat islands of FS2002>or the mis-aligned mesh of the latest version with the ugly>cliffs. Of course, most people have never been to the>Caribbean, so do not realize the problem.>Luis, After visiting numerous Caribbean Islands (St.Thomas to Barbados) back in 1997, I certainly did not care for the rather flat islands of FS2002. I thought FS2004 was a huge improvment; but that's because I don't remember any exact topography that well. So naturally my vote goes for FS2004, but it's good to know of the error. And these animated maps really help out!L.Adamson

Thanks Luis for all this info, I may have to take a second look at IWI...Looking at the pictures and knowing how this scenery looks once downloaded is what I have a problem with. The mesh may be correct and the airports may be top notch, but I can't get past the choice of textures used in this package. The ground looks washed over versus Microsoft's ground textures. If there was a way to keep Microsoft's textures and use IWI's mesh and airports, I would be more than happy with this package. I can't see how others are fine with this. Looks like FS2000's default ground/mountain texture.

Luis, I really respect your opinion on this and want to try the IWI scenery, but from the pics I have seen the textures look very washed out and with no detail to them, which I cannot accept, can you confirm please? It would not be avantageous to design any scenery for the caribbean if the IWI scenery is installed it seems, as it would really be misaligned with the default if others installed, hmmm, guess I'll have to think about this for a bit.Regards, MichaelKDFWhttp://www.calvirair.com/mcpics/PBTMCa.jpgCalVirAir International VACougar Mountain Helicopters & Aviation[link:www.cgrmthelos.com]Cougar Mountain Helicopters

I have to admit that I'm not too thrilled with the textures either. But once you get accustomed to them, they're not so bad. But they do take much longer to load. When starting FS, after the setup screen when you click "fly now", you can see the progress bar stopping at the textures for quite a while. I prefer the default textures though. If there was a way to get the default back but keep the mesh, landclass and airports, I'd be the first one to do so.Why don't you just get one of them.....try it out and see. I'd recommend the Version3 because if you have UT installed, then you can get extra airplanes and flightplans for them. Plus you get a few airports that's not in the default FS scenery. And with that special UT update, every airport has traffic, including the new ones.And remember, textures aside, IWI is still the best deal you'll find in terms of the number of airports you get for the price.

I own the first version of this scenery and as far the pictures attest, nothing has changed (speaking of textures that is). Believe me once this scenery is on your machine the scenery looks exactly like the pictures you see on flight one website, very unacceptable. Like I said in my above post if one could use the mesh but not the textures, this scenery would be great.I asked Flight1 some time ago about this and they told me using the default textures is not an option...

Hi everyone,This is an interesting discussion--and I'm keen to learn more.I have been exporing, in some detail, the freeware Antilles 2004 by Cyril Bourdon, Christian Delblond, Jean-Gabriel Laurent, Benoit Loyez and Alex Valere. They have reshaped the islands to fit reality, they've crafted a special landclass, and they have built a good detailed mesh (though I'm not sure how detailed). Further, the airports look very good. Several are stunningly-photo-realistic versions of the actual airports. (Of the nine that I've been able to check, eight are exact replicas.) All capture the true spirit of the area.The islands use the default MS textures (or whatever you've done to replace them) and produce an aerial view that is strikingly similar to the aerial photos on the web.Has anyone done a direct comparison between the Antilles 2004 rendition and the Islands of the West Indies version? Chris Wilkes does, of course, offer a few more islands and several more airports. But from the commercial screenshots at least, Chis's choice of island textures seems more artistic than realistic.What do you think?Best,Mike

Hi guys,Let's see... Larry, never knew you had been down here before. Please come down when your airplane is finished. Just rent the requisite life raft anywhere in Miami before the flight over water. Would love to see the RV and will treat you to a rum punch in return! http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/67737.gifHello Michael, you are absolutely correct about the ground textures. Chris Wilkes is an artist and he has hand-painted all the textures. They are based on extensive research and documentation and are extremely "realistic" in a pointilist way. I personally love them and he has put a lot of work into them, as well as the other aspects of the scenery. For anyone that can appreciate a work of art in Flight Simulator, this is an outstanding package. But, it certainly looks very different from the rest of the default ground textures.Dillon, it is quite possible to use just the parts of Islands of the West Indies that you want - all you have to do is disable the undesired bgls. However, it is perhaps better to try the new French scenery that is in the AvSim library. I have not tried it myself because I do not trust executable files (and this one seems to have created some problems). From what I understand, they have re-drawn the islands in the right place, placed a correct altitude mesh on top, and, most important, they disable the default Microsoft file that cuts off the mesh at the edge of the sea, so everything looks great.I myself am working on the islands - at the moment, I am re-doing St. Martin, St. Bart, Barbuda and Antigua. They will have correct terrain and altitude mesh, modified land and water class, reefs, plus all landmarks, resorts, correct buildings and vegetation. This requires a lot of research (just like Chris Wilkes) so will not be ready anytime soon. Also, as a general rule, I do not release to the public. But, I do like to share with friends.Best regards.LuisHey, Larry, I redid the island of Virgin Gorda pretty completely. Just let me know if you want it.

Howdy Luis,Are you still wanting me to beta test your Virgin Gorda scenery? Just haven't heard from you for some time, that's all.

Hello Dorian,How is everything down in your beautiful land? I had sent you the scenery before, but perhaps there was some problem in the transmission. Our infrastructure here is not very reliable, unfortunately.No matter, I shall send it again.Best regards.Luis