News! : On Approach Scenery : KRAL Riverside by RD Studios

[Stephen]

News! : On Approach Scenery : KRAL Riverside and LA Pack by RD Studios

 

New scenery developers for X-Plane can be a real mixed bunch. Some can be very good but very, very rough around the edges and have not yet really understood the full range of areas you have to cover or learn enough to deliver quality scenery. This is okay if they learn quickly and a...  fix up their average efforts, and b... show that learning curve that delivers better and better work as they go along, I mean not everyone is absolutely totally perfect at the start of their developer career and that is even with the best of them.

 

But some developers come very complete straight out of the box, and in this case it is RD Studios or Rising Dawn Studios. His excellent KHAF - Half Moon Bay was exceptional, and I have used the scenery in a half a dozen reviews.

 

So over the last year RD Studios have noted that their next scenery is to be KRAL - Riverside Municipal Airport in the Jurupa Valley east of central Los Angeles. There is a lot of similarities to the first RD Designs KHAF - Half Moon Bay scenery, as in the same type and style of airport, but that is also the main attraction to this new scenery as well...  it also comes with a huge bonus as well in that the scenery also delivers an excellent Los Angeles city (downtown) and major iconic landmarks of the this of all famous Californian city, that aspect is worth the purchase alone... So as RD Designs have published over the last year a vast collection of images on the KRAL - Riverside scenery it was worth collecting them all together to see how excellent in detail and ideas this scenery already is.

 

KRAL is certainly a Americana style general aviation airport, but that is a big part of it's charm...

 

 

Detail is very...  well detailed as noted by the real clock.

 

 

The main terminal is more like a steakhouse, but very authentic and you can see the huge amount of research that has gone into this work, to make it all as authentic as possible.

 

 

Highlight of the scenery is the freestanding Hangar, there was two hangars originally like this, but the other one has been dismantled.

 

 

In the KHAF - Half Moon scenery you also had a working hangar, but this one is far more larger and far more easier to work in, perfect actually.

 

Other hangars are also very well and even excessively detailed, and again almost perfect, and again like with KHAF there is a lot of GA hangar parking.

 

 

Fueling up the tanks at KHAF was excellent and so it is here at Riverside as well, highly realistic.

 

 

Ground textures were also a highlight at KHAF and so again here they are the same worn surfaces and excellent. Reflective surfaces are a given here as well as KHAF has them already.

 

 

Verges and desert aridisols are very realistic, realism 101. I loved the signage at KHAF and again here it is top notch stuff, perfect detail with even the labels on the equipment.

 

 

A joke? No seriously would would be amazed on how many pilots actually forget to lower the gear, this warning is on the approach to RWY27.

 

 

There is the note from RD Design's that are including a scenario of the airport in that Riverside had a very active role during the Californian Gold Rush in the 1800's. So there is an idea of recreating the airport in that period. But X-Plane can't be used in a historical sense (time shifting which is very "Back to the Future") The idea is to use the FlywithLua script to do the changeover. If this feature makes into the scenery is still very debatable, but it interesting.

 

 

One of the big features of this scenery is the addon factor of the Los Angeles downtown buildings and major LA iconic landmarks called the "Los Angeles Landmark Pack"...

 

 

All the major LA Downtown buildings are included, and what a difference this will make to your LA skyline, certainly if you have a LAX running nearby.

 

 

Griffith Observatory and Capital Records buildings are noted, as is the famous "Hollywood" sign...

 

 

So this new scenery from RD Design's has all the makings of another brilliant scenery release, as good and even better than KHAF - Half Moon Bay with not only the actual airport but the LA landmark package...  No notes yet on a release date from RD Design's but certainly before the middle of the year, this is certainly a must have for any Californian flyer.

 

______________________________________________________________________

 

All images are courtesy of RD Designs

 

News by Stephen Dutton

30th April 2018

Copyright©2018: X-Plane Reviews

 

(Disclaimer. All images and text in this review are the work and property of X-PlaneReviews, no sharing or copy of the content is allowed without consent from the author as per copyright conditions)