I fly over nothing but MegaScenery. It's an absolute necessity for me.

 

I fly mainly tubeliners on domestic US hops ... everything from short 1-1.5hr legs to transcons. While I understand that addon airports are a higher cost per area depicted, IMO they are essential for providing realism while you are moving on the ground. MSE strikes me as the cruise-phase equivalent, bringing the depiction of what you are flying over to more than just infinitely repeating generic tiles. However, since my preference for this hobby has me flying over any given point of the US ... it strikes me that the remark I quoted above from Ms. Parker would hold true for me as well. Therein lies my dilemma ... huge cost to cover the whole US with MSE. That said, the responses in this thread (and others) seem to indicate that MSE is well worth the purchase. Time to start saving up I guess.

 

Thanks for all the replies everyone!

Nice screenshot Jim! Sure makes me want to try some of the MegaScenery out. I'm just terrified i'll like it and want to purchase them all.... :lol: Might try out Georgia and work my way up the East Coast. The install method you mentioned sure does sound tedious. Seems as though they could come up with a UI that could handle it all. Of course there is the Dvd option. But that's even mo money..

Shaun,

 

based on your type of flying you might want to consider FS Altitude. You can get the entire US photoreal for a little over $100. Granted, it's resolution is 14.25m per pixel but if you are flying over the US at 30,000 feet why pay so much more for detail you won't be able to see?

 

I was just looking at their website - check a few reviews. My question is as you descend to a lower altitude will your higher res photoscenery (if you have some),take presidence over FS Altitude?

 

Update - Also, just found another company that is making photoreal scenery that will have all seasons plus night textures plus real moving cloud shadows!? Company called VERO-FS, never heard of them. Looks like they have a free sample and California for sale for 29 Euro. Mmmmm..... this is getting interesting.

Hi all,

 

Great screenshot Jim!

 

The reason for the multiple files is to split them up into about 1Gb chunks which makes it much more manageable to download. Some states are in excess of 30Gb each, so it would be very difficult to offer it as just one file. Hence you get lots of smaller files. We have found this, by far, the best way for us to deliver the product, and most customers find this way the most reliable also for downloading. Re adding scenery to the scenery library, we are working on updating files to include an installer which adds the scenery area to your scenery library for you. As for a file to install or batch each of the download files in queue for installation, I'll pitch that to the boss and see if it is possible or simple to do.

I feel many addons are over priced. Its all how you value things I guess. $25 for the FSX while a single tiny detailed airport is $30 seems nuts to me.

 

I judge value by time usually. I can spend 30+ hours learning a high end addon plane, so it may be worth $70 to me.

 

Edit: That VERO-FS stuff sure looks interesting, wow.

Hi all,

 

Great screenshot Jim!

 

The reason for the multiple files is to split them up into about 1Gb chunks which makes it much more manageable to download. Some states are in excess of 30Gb each, so it would be very difficult to offer it as just one file. Hence you get lots of smaller files. We have found this, by far, the best way for us to deliver the product, and most customers find this way the most reliable also for downloading. Re adding scenery to the scenery library, we are working on updating files to include an installer which adds the scenery area to your scenery library for you. As for a file to install or batch each of the download files in queue for installation, I'll pitch that to the boss and see if it is possible or simple to do.

 

Yes, but what he was really talking about was the installation ......... For most other software of this size, even if they have a large file, and mulitple downloads, they will have a set up where you have 1 EXE and the others are batch files (probably not the right term!), so you run 1 EXE and it 'reads' the other files and installs their content.

 

As opposed to having to physically run so many EXE files.

 

[EDIT: Guilty! ... I didn't finish reading your post, where at the end you said you'd ask the boss about doing such a thing as above.... sorry!]

Love megascenery v2 and will probably buy all states as time goes on.

I judge value by time usually. I can spend 30+ hours learning a high end addon plane, so it may be worth $70 to me.

 

That's an odd way at looking at the price/value of products ... I don't understand your value relationship - how does a product's price have any relationship to how much time you spend learning it?

 

Production of software usually involves these factors:

 

1. How much development time was needed to produce the product

2. Competitive market value from other similar quality products

3. Cost to acquire resources to make the product

4. Cost to physically produce/deploy the product

 

In the case of MSE

1. Lets say 200 hours were put in making the .bgl at a cost of $75/hr ($15,000) - area size impacts number of hours (just tossing out numbers of hours, not real numbers)

2. Average market value for same size area is $30

3. Satellite imagery costs (i.e. DigitalGlobe partners)

4. Cost to maintain servers for downloads and also production of DVDs

 

Personally, I don't know how they make a profit at $10-40 per scenery given the relatively small market - but I guess they do since they're still doing it. And this is a good thing IMHO. I think many people seem to think (or want to believe might be more accurate) that scenery developers just get an image, press a button, and viola instant scenery for FSX. It simply doesn't work like that ... if anyone thinks it does, I highly recommend they try and do their own scenery to get an idea of the amount of work involved. Good article here if you want to give it a go: http://www.flightsim...scenery-for-FSX

 

I look at some of the airports (like the FSDT ones) and can clearly see 1000's of hours being put into a single airport. The details are impressive to say the least.

 

BTW, 50cm is the most detail we're allowed (at least in the US anyway) ... if anyone claims less than 50cm then be sure to ask them how and where they got it

 

Cheers, Rob.

I have installed many (if not all) BlueSky scenery tiles for California. However, when I go into the FSX scenery library, I see the long list of installed tiles. What I can't figure out is how to be able to put them all into one folder, perhaps called BlueSkyCalifornia. Is there a trick into doing this? Where would I place this folder?

Jim

Wow! ........ that is a fantastic screenshot Jim.... If I've ever seen any screenshot of MegaScenery that demonstrates to people why some of us get so excited about these products, it's that one.

 

Thanks Helen. I see a lot of those scenes and I really get excited flying over the Blue Ridge Mountains and descending into Charlotte, NC, especially in one of the wing views (another reason I like ProATC-X as I have the co-pilot bringing my flight down to the glideslope while I enjoy the scenery from the wing views!). :lol:

 

I'll pitch that to the boss and see if it is possible or simple to do.

 

Thanks for that. I'm glad you are watching this forum and posting in these threads too as you answer a lot of our questions or clarify things. When members have issues and can't get a satisfactory answer, the product sometimes suffers in sales. I'm still tweaking my settings and doing some experimenting as my FSX load times have increased dramatically since installing all this V2 stuff. And, when I load the PMDG, it takes almost 2 minutes for it to show up. I now only activate the scenery I plan on flying over but even that has barely reduced the load times. The PMDG aircraft seems to load faster now but not much. I really think the problem is my AI program as things really startup faster with that disabled. Got to have the AI though. I'm just spoiled as FSX always started up within 10 seconds until I started adding all the commercial scenery and MyTrafficX. Thanks for the great V2 scenery so far. Really enjoying it.

 

Best regards,

Jim

Done photoreal scenery myself for fsx and MSEv2 worth it to me because some states like Minnesota would be impossible to mask every pond. Michigan and Wisconsin have lots of lakes and masking them a lot of work. All pay 40 dollars to use free time for better things. Like to see Canadian provinces Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta in MSE2. with Montana, North and South Dakota also. Got instant scenery 2 they have wheat farm buildings could be put to good use there. May not buy all states, but all everything in midsection and interior west. Build some landmarks and improve some airports look real good.

I could only dream that one day we'd see MegaScenery 2.0 for Newfoundland... I doubt much existing aerial photography exists for it. By maybe one day!

I have purchased all of the eastern states and it is absolutely worth it. I love the look of seeing the real landscape.

There is a big difference when you are looking out of the cockpit and seeing what is really there or seeing some computer-generated generalization.

With MSEv.2, each state is clearly and beautifully done and familiar landmarks are easily found. Real highways are easily followed and take you to true destinations.

They process the scenery so that every building, tree and house looks like it is in 3D when you are above 1500 ft.

Even on the ground, if you are in an area with hills, they look real.

There is NO comparison between freeware or do-it-yourself scenery and MegaSceneryEarth v.2.

I'm mainly interested in everything from the Mississippi eastward. Maybe I will get a few western states, but I have some of the regular MegaScenery for California and Arizona. I think I might have some for Washington too.

 

I have almost all of the V2 stuff and I'm totally impressed. It's going to be difficult for me to stop buying them all. I like the State of Illinois the best as I usually fly the Chicago to St Louis flight. North Carolina looks impressive too and I now can do MegaScenery Earth V2 scenery flights from Reagan National to Charlotte. So far, PC Aviator has offered me several discounts and I received a 25% discount for most of January that I could use as many times as I wanted. I took advantage of this discount and it was like buying two and getting one free. I think it looks great without autogen and I would leave autogen with flying in the PNW with Orbx/FTX scenery. There are a lot of buildings in the Chicago area that came with the scenery. I swear, coming down for a landing and looking out the pilot window or a wing-view looks very realistic even at 1000 feet.

 

The biggest downside of this scenery IMHO is the installation. Everything must be done manually so that, if you download 16 1GB plus files, you have to first extract each one then manually run 16 setup programs. Once completed, you have to manually place it in the Scenery Library. It would be nice if they had a setup program that would install all 16 files at once and then place an entry into the Scenery Library. Once totally installed, I then delete all of the extracted setup programs and leave the zipped files to save space.

 

If you have the FSDT KORD and run the default weather program with a PMDG aircraft, you will have 12-25 fps while on KORD. After takeoff, the fps increase and I get 45-46 fps flying to KSTL (St Louis). I have payware scenery at St Louis but the fps usually stay above 20. I'm completely happy with this as the sim appears to be fluid and I see little or no stuttering. I also have ProATC-X, XPAX, GSX, AES, and AI Smooth running in the background. I had AS2012 running but saw some freezes and they went away whenever AS2012 was not running. Think it was a simconnect issue or a conflict with ProATC-X. In any case, it's great stuff and I'll probably be buying the rest as it is released.

 

Here I am over Springfield, Illinois (at FL240) making a turn for catching the STAR into St Louis....

 

 

Best regards,

Jim

 

Absolutely my experience too. Now, I fly around going Wow!...Oh My!...Gees!!...Look at that!!...There's Walmart!!

 

I think many people seem to think (or want to believe might be more accurate) that scenery developers just get an image, press a button, and viola instant scenery for FSX.

 

Also I think people assume that they are getting this scenery free from Google Earth. That's not the case at all. This scenery is much higher resolution than Google Earth and they have to pay a considerable amount of money to get it.

Absolutely my experience too. Now, I fly around going Wow!...Oh My!...Gees!!...Look at that!!...There's Walmart!!

 

LOL! That was funny! I thought I was the only one who saw the Wal-Marts... Thanks for putting a smile on my face!

 

Best regards,

Jim

You can get a lot of the western states in photoreal from Blue Sky Scenery. It doesn't cost anything, although if you like the product a donation would be appropriate. I can't speak to the quality, but the website looks good and there are youtube vids to look at. Download an area and give it a try. Post your results here and/or the fabulous screen shot gallery.

 

http://www.blueskyscenery.com/

 

Are those downloads the entire state or is it only a very small area in certain states?