Spyro's Spread returns after a long time (with a new and fairly basic header image
)!When it comes to taking a screenshot, a vital part of the image will be the scenery, whether it be a range of mountains to a simple, blue sky. One such subject is the area that an aircraft departs or arrives - the airport. This Scottish package blew me away when I found it. It is...
Edinburgh Intl Airport
Date reviewed - 26th / 27th May 2007
System Specs
- 64mb nVidia GeForce FX 5200 (for laptop)
- 768mb RAM
- Pentium IV 2.8GHz Processor
To review the airport, I'll be splitting it up into different categories and awarding them a score. I'll talk about the quality of the buildings, the general "airport feel" (e.g. ground vehicles, ground detail etc) and a quick note about the effect the airport has on framrates. I'll award each category a score out of 10 (other than the framerates - this will be awarded 5) to give the airport a total score out of 25.
Quality of Buildings
The quality of the buildings in this package are very good indeed. As you can see from the image above, a lot of work has gone into modelling and texturing the buildings.
The terminal building is fantastic - it has gates (although not animated, but if you park anything from a 737 to a 757 next to them, they should line up with the door) which even say "Welcome To Edinburgh" on them and floodlights to illuminate the ramp in the dark.
However, the terminal buildings aren't the only buildings - there are literally hundreds! At the smaller GA parking area there are a few warehouses and hangars, by the airport entrance is the multi-storey car park and tower, near the threshold of RWY 24 are a few houses and a few more warehouses / hangars near these houses on the airport premesis. By the terminal parking area, you can find the fire station and a few fuel storage tanks.
The texturing on the buildings is also very realistic - take a look at the bank of pictures at the end of this review!
Overall, the building quality gets a good 7 out of 10 from me, the buildings are of a very good quality and they make for good screenshots.
Airport "Feel"
When we download an airport, we want it to feel like an airport! We want an atmosphere; a feeling that this is an airport dealing with movements of aircraft - and we want it to look like it. This is why downloads have such an advantage over default airports - they create an atmosphere. This package does just that. There are a whole host of ground vehicles (unfortunately static - most of those you see in the picture above come with the AI Royal Mail 737). The tug at the front of the parking space and the small tug on the aircraft's starboard side come with the scenery.
I was driving the bus. You may think it odd that I drive a bus around an airport, but this scenery has roads marked out on it! Ground vehicles, like airport buses and baggage vehicles, now have somewhere to follow. You can see the airport from a whole new perspective - that's what I was doing with the bus.
At the parking areas are what seem to be photorealistic textures of real parking / ramp areas. These are great, and help to add to the airport feel, but unfortunately there are no photorealistic taxiways to cover the entire airport. (see the second image in this post for an example).
Outside of the airport, the designer of this package has modelled in a whole road system which leads out to the default road! This is very fun to drive around on - simulate your own arrival to the airport. (Click below to see the terminal area.)
http://www.simviation.com/yabbuploads/ced7.jpg
Overall, the airport feel gets a fantastic 9 out of 10 from me - had those photorealistic apron textures been applied to the entire airport I probably would have awarded a 10.
Effect on framerates
Whenever I fly with clouds, my frames drop quite badly to around 9-15 FPS. As you can see, the screenshots were taken with overcast skies, yet my frames were around 14 FPS - fantastic!
I award this category 5 out of 5 - seemingly no framerate hit at all.
Overall, Edinburgh has scored a very good 21 out of 25. I would strongly reccommend it to anyone who enjoys the "airport feel" and wants somewhere to fly out of or into.
Thanks for reading!
Airport - here
Update (adds tower and multistorey car park) - here
Picture Bank
Landing on RWY 24 with the terminal in sight
At the end of the road which follows the terminal
Two easyJet 737s taxi to takeoff as a BA 737 lands
The first easyJet 737 departs
