Available now AuraScenery Aberdeen (EGPD) for MSFS – iniBuilds Store
I was just looking at this. Looks nice, but as far as I can tell (with no images to suggest otherwise) no interiors? IMO the video seems to focus a lot on (3rd party) aircraft arriving & departing perhaps to divert away from the lack of interiors. Also I couldn’t see any helis or other static aircraft about. Just lots of … cars. I’ve not bought it yet as I have the freeware EGPD that does much the same but with some statics like helis included. I’ve been waiting last 2 years for a good EGPD to arrive. This one looks nice but may be lacking certain aspects. Please correct me if my assumptions are wrong. It is reasonably priced though.
Oh definitely picking this up later, from the video the externals look good!
Looks pretty basic to me,if it was less than a tenner it might be worth it. I’ll probably just wait for a better rendition or for this to appear in the sales.
Yeah for this price and a rather small airport, opaque window textures isn’t okay in my book for a scenery released in 2024.
For the price I definitely would require some interior to consider it a buy, even a more simple interior makes a big difference and also the night lightning is so much better that opaque textures.
Having said that EGPD isn’t renowned for big glass frontages at their gate areas I don’t think. At least the last time I was there, (which was admittedly a while ago).
However, I agree. Some interiors and a few idle helis would have made it an instant buy for me. For now I think I’ll wait and see if any other devs do it.
Even the trailer doesn’t involve helis which makes me wonder if they even know it’s a major centre for oil rig trips.
I live just round the corner from this airport and while they are right about the Loganair ATRs and KLM Embraer 190, most of the airport traffic is helis. Internally, it’s a tiny airport with very little to look at so shouldn’t have been that hard to do an interior
I’d have expected they could have used that to market it as a heli centre too for rig ops. Makes me wonder if they don’t know.
It looks like a on the side 3rd party project anyway just marketed by Ini. It’s too bad as the externals aren’t bad at all. I do hope Pyreegue do it though, I thought they were meant to at some stage.
I picked up Ini’s EGNM recently and it really is very nice. Top quality exterior & a chunk of very detailed interior, which set the bar for me as to where I hoped this one would be.
Yeah there was an add-on for North sea rigs not all that long ago so was expecting a fully fledged EGPD to compliment it and let people do those flights. Close but not quite
Yes I have the Aerosoft north sea add on and that was what I was thinking. They could have made the heli part a much bigger focus/feature. I’m going to stick with the freeware for now. I flew EGPD → EGLL this morning just to compare and it really is quite good already.
As much as exterior entrance ways and car parks are nice I’d really prefer to have more detail and glass and if it exists (with some interiors) around the gates.
To be honest I would be surprised if someone else does it commercially, a nice surprise if they do. Previously Gary at UK2000 has done it for FSX/P3D, the fact he hasn’t for MSFS maybe gives an idea of the sales volume (though he has recently done Carlisle…).
Interiors are a nice to have, far from a necessity for me.
I live not too far from EGPD and it has just finished downloading, it’s not an expensive buy so expectations are moderate.
I’m an Aberdonian but have been away for a long time. I remember in my teens watching Concorde doing touch and goes at the airshow (mid 80s?). So I know the area well.
Post some pics later from interiors ( if any exist)
and details around the gates. They weren’t selling it for me in the official video.
It’s not good…
If you want a superficial visual external view from a distance then object placing and shapes are okay, go closer and the detail is poor.
Topography is wrong, all the inclines in taxiway/runway have disappeared.
Parking locations don’t match real life and AI traffic routing is bad.
I’ll write that off to experience and hope for an update.
Thanks for taking the plunge and reporting back. Think I’ll stick with Scotflight’s version for now which is excellent for freeware.
Yeah sorry I’m also very disappointed with this better off sticking with the freeware version
In the interests of revisiting initial impression to see if I was being overcritical I have just spent an hour with the Scotflight (freeware) and iniBuilds (AuraScenery payware) versions of EGPD, flights taken at low level in the Cabri G2 helicopter.
The Scotflight version feels more realistic with relevant static aircraft parked where it makes sense (Bristow heliport) and AI parking in relevant spots. Wideroe on Stand 1 for example, Ezy on 5 or 6 and BA on 7 or 8. There was also an exercise going on at the fire training area
Adjacent buildings are modelled well and logos are present on some. The parking area at the South East corner is modelled well and TECA plus environmental plant too.
What does Aura bring that’s not in the freeware version? The large inverted egg whisk at the entrance roundabout is there, the landside area in front of the terminal is a bit more detailed. There is more signage on adjacent buildings, it is very bright though, sunglasses required. For static aircraft you do get G-SAJB the ERJ 135 which has been sitting outside the Loganair maintenance (Hawk?) hangar without engines for many months… The initial comments about topography/taxy routing still apply.
I flew in to the Scotflight freeware version of EGPD last night and was pleasantly surprised by the night lighting too. Hadn’t seen it at night before. He’s put a lot of work into it including a recent update. I think there’s also flying club? detail too. No glass or interiors, but it’s otherwise very good I think.
Re interior modelling, I know it’s not everyone’s cup of tea but a scenery covering an area the size of EGPD should feature it as standard in 2024, since complex interiors have proven not to destabilise similarly sized fields (Ini’s own EHGI, for example).
Why not model it if it causes no performance issues? If you don’t want it, you’ve no need to go peering inside.
I suspect it’s a tight budget produced EGPF. Interior would take too much dev time for the sales reward so they went to a small 3rd party dev to produce one minus an interior to quickly fill a obvious gap in the market and priced it competitively and ran a flashy marketing video which was heavily laden with 3rd party aircraft, minus helis. Just conjecture though.
I can personally live without a terminal interior if the modelling is generally good and there’s a bit of the surroundings included too. I’m surprised UK2000 never did EGPD as it’s been conspicuous by its absence since the sim’s release.