Stephen Posted June 5, 2018 Report Share Posted June 5, 2018 Scenery Review - Updated : UUWW - Moscow Vnukovo v1.2 by JustSim As X-Plane sceneries go, then Moscow is currently one of the best areas to fly into. That is because Moscow got the full city treatment by Drzewiecki Design with their very extensive Moscow City XP scenery. To a point Moscow went from the very bottom of a wasteland of any desirable destination to the very top with this excellent cityscape and it looked incredible then in X-Plane10, but it is even now more amazing in X-Plane11, Fly into the area at dawn or dusk and be prepared to be overwhelmed... it is that good. The first scenery for Moscow was also a Drzewiecki Design scenery for UUEE Sheremetyevo Airport XP back in 2015. In reality it was a brilliant island of a scenery in the middle of absolutely nowhere, but with the release of DD's Moscow City XP that changed the landscape (excuse the pun) as UUEE Sheremetyevo was merged into the Moscow City scenery to create one large cityscape. With Moscow City XP you also did get a lite version of all the other major airports around the Moscow environments, one was UUWW in Moscow Vnukovo, and even for a lite version it was pretty good. Now here is another UUWW - Vnukovo from JustSim and not Drzewiecki Design, but it has been created with the Moscow City XP scenery in mind, and it does fit in into that specific scenery as well (installation details are important as noted below), so can a completely different scenery style developer fit their scenery into another major layout, so that point alone is interesting here as it has major consequences in building up larger scale X-Plane scenery vistas. This review is created with both the Drzewiecki Design Moscow City XP and their UUEE Sheremetyevo scenery as part of the process and to get the full picture of all the sceneries working together... JustSim If one thing over the last few years in X-Plane that has made me slightly annoyed is the overall reception towards scenery. For years X-Plane was devoid of any decent scenery at all, we had a few nice developers and a lot of FlightSim scenery converted over to X-Plane, but mostly it was crap, not at all authentic and you had to use a lot of your imagination to sorta vision the place you departed or arrived at, so we complained and moaned about that aspect for years. Certainly in the last few years the scenery that has been delivered is finally a more realistic depiction of the real area. Many users note they are only in the simulator to fly aircraft, and good for them... and "yay hooo". But many users (myself included) also want the full block to block simulation experience as well, in that the airport I fly out of is then as good as the airport or destination I arrive at, personally only in the last year or so has that X-Plane experience finally been fully realised. The trick is to pick the right scenery and not waste your money on average scenery, and certainly Aerosoft (when they do deliver a quality scenery) is usually one to use as is GloballArt, and ShortFinal is another. But a team of developers that are really delivering in this area for X-Plane is JustSim. I admit JustSim's scenery is created to a price, but you get a lot of scenery for that price and certainly no other developers have used the X-Plane11 features more in their work than JustSim. Their work is slowly building the backbone of a great simulation, EDDF - Dusseldorf I used constantly in the last year, along with LFMN - Nice. LCLK - Laranca is now another regular and their LOWI - Innsbruck and ELLX - Luxembourg Findel are always worth a visit, and I have almost lived at their LEBL _ Barcelona for the last twelve months. So are you starting to get the point... The really annoying thing is X-Plane users are not buying this quality work even at these exceptional prices, or are just then waiting for the cheap sale option? So while you are processing through this review, then just keep one other thought in your mind... If you don't support them or only give them just your tit-bits of cash then this sort of quality work will stop coming to X-Plane, we will then get zero of this sort of quality scenery in the future and not much more other great scenery from any other developer either as well... v1.02 I noted in the original review that JustSim were doing an update to the release version, so here in this updated review the changes are now noted with the newer v1.2 version and the update points are shown. UUWW - Moscow Vnukovo All the major airports servicing Moscow are all in a ring around the outskirts of the city. UUEE - Sheremetyevo is to the far north, and UUEE - Vnukovo at 17mi is far to the south-west from central Moscow. (Google Maps) Vnukovo International AirportМеждународный аэропорт ВнуковоMezhdunarodnyĭ aėroport Vnukovo IATA: VKO - ICAO: UUWW - LID: ВНК 06/24 - 3,060m (10,039ft) Concrete 01/19 - 3,060m (10,039ft) Concrete Elevation AMSL 209 m/686 ft First point to make on UUWW - Vnukovo is that the JustSim version replaces the DD lite version of the same airport, so your scenery loading has to be in the correct order or you will not see the JustSim version. As the Drzewiecki Design UUWW had their own modeling around the airport then also so does the JustSim UUWW. So this does make it hard in working out which scenery is which as JustSim are also very well known on filling out their off airport boundaries as well as the internal airport areas. The combined results are however extraordinary as it all becomes one large expanse of scenery and not just a patch work of one here and another set out in there. So that brings us now to another question on if you are running or loading all the three Moscow elements, then how good will it all run together, and this is no matter on how good each area is in their separate refinements. First on that is the JustSim UUWW is very good on its own and is very refined scenery framerate wise. But when combined together then no matter how powerful your computer is then there is still a going to be a compromise... I am however seeing a pattern with these extensive city sceneries and Moscow as is Drzewiecki Design's New York City scenery that was the same in context, and here you again have the same solution to the same issue. On arriving in Moscow and the loading of all this extensive scenery I started to get the framerate stutters. In most cases you usually reduce your objects (count) to relieve the processors, but that like with NYC didn't fix the stutters... The issue again is texture quality, and I found that at the Maximum setting (not the no compression setting) I was overloading my graphic card at 10,300mb were as my graphic card could only process 8K (7680mb) and hence the stutters. So I needed to go a notch down in Texture Quality to High, and that fixed my stutter issues, but did I lose too much in quality... overall no, but the textures are a little if now slightly blurry. All the images here are at the high texture setting so what you see here is what you get. I don't doubt that in a few years and another round of computer speed upgrades then you will be able to easily go back up a marker in the texture quality setting, but currently this is your current choice, if you only have a 4K Graphic Card you will just slide though, but you will still have however to make a few more compromises to get it under that 4K marker. The overall view of Vnukovo is that everything is simply perfect in the intergation in both the sceneries and then into X-Plane itself, it is all natural and totally absolutely realistic. My approach visuals tell the complete story... Arrival is via RWY01 from ESSA - Arlanda, Stockholm Notably the Moscow City XP scenery is mixed in with the X-Plane native autogen. The full Moscow city skyline is significant on the eastern horizon. One thing I look for in city sceneries is that I can't actually see the airport? If it really stands out then it is not doing its job in being realistic, here at a distance your only guide into RWY01 is the RAIL lighting far off into the distance. Closer in and Vnukovo finally takes on it's unique shape, this vista is a far, far cry from the crappy approach to Moscow of even a few years ago, then there was virtually no airports (or what there was, then just stuck out badly in a flat landscape) and there was not even much in the way back then of any waypoints either? The Kiev Highway M3 dominates the approach to the runway and the RAIL approach lighting is situated as part of the road, all approach lighting is excellent and detailed as is the main runway and taxiway lighting. There has to be the awareness that both major runways here in 06/24 and 01/19 as they crossover each other, and that both 01 and 06 are both shallow in a low X, and so that if the wind is coming in your direction then both runways are usually highly active. At the runway crossover point the runway textures are excellent in their wear, tear and the different types of complex surfaces, you are highly impressed. The grass is very welcome, realistic and dense as well. The full visual of the combined main terminal and the large cargo terminal greets you on arrival... and it is very impressive, and even that statement is an understatement of the impact the airport makes on you. ... all ground textures are reflective, and are beautifully created, they have the new built in wet surface capabilities as well in either if X-Plane uses that feature or if you use the xEnviro "wet" version (not yet functional). All ground markings, navigation and lineage is excellent. The aprons are simply huge and can be complex, so here so a ground chart is helpful in finding the right line around the terminal, as there is both an inner and outer taxiway line to follow. The aircraft bays are visually full of airport equipment and aircraft service gear, but they don't hinder you either when entering the bay or using any ground services. I particularly liked the Russian airbridge advertising and the extra large gate numbers that were very helpful in finding your correct bay. Animated traffic is heavy, but not overwhelming or too fast... Terminal glass is exceptional and reflective. Internal design of the terminal is also well done, but only in parts, as the main interior is still blank, but it works very well in the overall balance. V1.02: In the update the airbridges are now active! There isn't the mounted auto DGS system, but the ramp marshaller is now here to guide you in. The airbridge does work very well, but you have to pick the right gate for your aircraft. Even on taxi approach gate 22 looked like a single boarding airbridge, when it was actually a double, and once in the bay the A319 then felt a bit tight.... Some gates like 23 are a triple gate. Justsim have left Gate 30 not working as it is too tight, even a medium sized B737/A320 would be too big in this bay. Airbridge design even with the animation is just perfection. WorldTraffic and ATC ground routes are all completed, but more so JustSim supplies the corrected WT3 Grounds done and ready (in a folder) for install directly into the WT3 folders. So there is no need to generate your ground routes... more so the ground routes and all the WT3 actions are already tested and run absolutely perfectly from the moment you start up the airport, five stars and a big show of hands of applause from me for that. Brilliant. My arrival overall was simply one of the best I have experienced for a long time, and it was very highly realistic... Terminals There are Three Passenger Terminals at Vnukovo and one Cargo Terminal. Terminal A is the largest and futuristic the most modern dominates and the new design was opened December 2010. Modeling and the design is extraordinary in being both a clever combination of see through glass and images that creates a wonderful effect, and all the glass is reflective. Certainly up close the differences at this texture setting is certainly slightly noticeable, but your not going to complain at all about it one little bit... Terminal A night lighting is in the oh! .... level of amazing... stunning and the ramps are excellent to work on in the night turnarounds. Terminal A has airbridge stands 8 to 31A - Stands 38 to 66 are all remote stands spread out on all sides of the Terminal A complex. Terminal B Terminal B is the old Vnukovo original terminal that has been modernised. It consists now of both Terminal B and the Terminal D joined together although as noted then Ter D as domestic and Ter B as International.... in reality this terminal is the domestic arm of the airport. A concourse protrudes out of the front of the old Terminal that has six airbridges, 1 to 6 and there is a single stand in 7 in front of the old Terminal D. V1.02: here at Terminal B the airbridges are now also animated... very highly realistic and in the same tone as the original airbridges. Design is again excellent of the concourse that was competed in 2004 with the redevelopment of Terminal B. Night lighting here is again excellent, and beautiful. There is the DoubleTree Hilton hotel and carparking behind Terminal B... and a nice forecourt leading into Terminal A. But the hotel is dark at night with no lit textures, which is disappointing and I thought that in the v.1.2 update that Justsim would have corrected that, but no the Hilton is still dark? Mail and Cargo Terminal To the west of Terminal A is the huge Cargo terminal building. More a huge administration building the cargo hub is impressive, the forecourt is full of equipment and ready cargo. Stands 22 to 35A is a great cargo parking area. Back out from the Cargo Terminal there are various support buildings and parking areas for vehicles, it is all well done, but you would notice the compromise. The under laying ground textures are not photographic and there isn't a lot of detail in there, it works in an efficiency point of view, but not in a detailed photo aspect. These areas are all landside and there is no comprise on the airside, but it is noticeable if you like the full detail and walk-around realism. Russian apartment housing extends a fair way back from the Terminals, they are basic, but fine in context. Cargo Terminal lighting is again very, very good, and looks nice from the landside, but the well lit for working on the ramps at night on the airside is... first rate. Eastern Boundary The entrance to Vnukovo has a Tu104 Russian Jet on display. There are two main aprons over on the east side. One called Vnukovo 2 is a double building VIP reception center, with one (guess who) for the President... there is a waiting IL-96 sitting ready on the ramp. It is a perfect area to arrive by personal private jet, although you may not get the full uniform reception, the airport's miniature palace is however well done. There is a support and administration building for the same ramp that is very well presented.... Far north-east is apron Vnukovo 5 with stands 501 to 510 and a maintenance hangar. There is also a very good HS1 Helicopter landing zone. Western Boundary Most of the engineering and maintenance areas for Vnukovo is situated on the western side and along runway 01/19. There is a huge amount of infrastructure here in mostly huge hangars and maintenance workshops. The Vnukovo Gas Power Station also dominates the area. On the threshold of RWY19 is the UUWW airport's main fuel depot, and some warehousing. Then an apron area which I will guess as military. There are a lot of these sort of aprons that are not officially listed but mostly front large maintenance hangars, some could be for airlines, or for just general maintenance companies. Here all the buildings and hangars have been very well reproduced to reflect the area and there are quite a few if a lot custom created buildings located in this complex area. Using taxiway M which is alongside RWY06/24 you will pass most of this long and extensive area if arriving or departing from RWY06 Centre west is Vnukovo 3 the only officially noted stands on this western side and that area is split into four aprons. Apron 1 has a Small (LCC- Low Cost Carrier?) Terminal and the darker front apron with stands 32 to 34. The lighter larger apron is the inner Apron 2 with stands 1 to 11 and the outer Apron 3 with stands 12 to 31. Adjoining is the larger Apron 4 with stands 35 right through to 78, stands 90 to 98 front the large line of maintenance hangars far west. Lighting on Vnukovo 3 is like the rest of the airport in being sensational, nicely lit aprons and some lovely hangar lighting. Control Tower and Fire Station The Control Tower Is buried alongside RWY06/24, it is very modern, distinctive tower and it is well modeled and very nicely reproduced here. V1.02: Tower view was out in the release version, but now corrected and very good in the update, all the runways are now well covered... ... here is my approach (upper right) to RWY01. Fire Station is bright blue, and is close to the Control Tower but it is situated just across from the RWY hot spot of the crossing of both the active runways. The airport's navigation aids and radar towers are all very well represented and detailed, small stuff but it makes up part of a great vista when moving around the taxiways and using the runways... There are several off airport receiving freight/cargo depots and JustSim have created a lot of very good and realistic hi-rise buildings to fill out the landscape, overall the whole area is complex and highly realistic. Summary This scenery in the review is made up of three separate components, of which this UUWW - Vnukovo Airport is only one, the others are Drzewiecki Design's Moscow City XP and Drzewiecki Design's earlier UUEE Sheremetyevo scenery. Obviously you don't need all three to enjoy this excellent UUWW - Vnukovo by JustSim, but the three combined together is certainly the best option, if tight for cash then at least opt for the Moscow City XP component as JustSim has made a considerable effort to make sure that both sceneries work not only visually but also efficiently together. This opens up the prospect of more than one scenery developer contributing to an area in to then creating a single whole. Here is works brilliantly, but in other city areas some different styles of developers have clashed and the results of that has had been the very opposite impact than what you have here in Moscow. If using the full three Moscow sceneries then a compromise in texture quality is required, "High" is fine and workable, but the Maximum setting will certainly overload your Graphic Card. Design wise then JustSim have been extraordinary here at UUWW in the Terminals design and lighting, the airport layouts with excellent textures and dense grass. X-Plane11 features have also been used to the absolute full, and in v1.2 the airbridges have been also animated with active ramp marshallers. The provided WT3 ground routes and airport text gets your airport up and running instantly and perfectly. Visually it is excellent, but the noted landside ground textures not very detailed, detailed and in parts the roadways are not visible or join up correctly either, if you want ultimate photo ground detail then you won't find it here, okay from the air but grainy at ground level, but that is the compromise for efficiency and in the main areas you will not usually notice this or use them. In only a very few areas do you feel that JustSim missed something like the Hilton hotel lit textures Overall UUWW - Vnukovo Airport by JustSim is just simply amazing scenery for this cost factor, it is an extremely high quality scenery for a fair price, full of X-Plane11 active features and Vnukovo will give you years of enjoyment in that anytime you fly to Moscow, then you will have an excellent destination waiting ready for you... impressed, yes... very highly recommended. _____________________________________ Yes! UUWW - Moscow Vnukovo by JustSim is available from the X-Plane.Org Store here : UUWW - Moscow Vnukovo Price is US$20.90 Highly recommended with this scenery is Drzewiecki Design: Moscow City XP - XPR Review Moscow City XP Drzewiecki Design: Sheremetyevo Airport XP - XPR Review Sheremetyevo Airport XP Features: Detailed airport objects and vehicles Custom textured taxiways, runways and apron Custom surroundings Custom airport lights Compatible with X-Plane 11 features Shading and occlusion (texture baking) effects on terminal and other airport buildings High resolution ground textures / Custom runway textures High resolution building textures Excellent night effects Realistic reflections on glass Animated Airport World Traffic compatible Animated ground vehicles (X-Plane 11 only) Animated Jetways (plugin by Marginal) X-Life traffic compatible Optimized for excellent performance New exclusive feature: Rain effects on ground. Effect will be controlled by xEnviro v1.08 (and higher) plugin. Requirements: X-Plane 11+ Windows, Mac, Linux 2Gb VRAM Video Card Minimum, 4Gb+ VRAM Video Card Recommended If running also Moscow City XP then a 6gb or 8gb Graphic Video Card is highly recommended Current Version : 1.2 (1st June 2018) Installation Download scenery file size is 875mb. With the full installation installed package is 1.90gb in your custom scenery folder. If using the above Moscow City XP/Sheremetyevo XP scenery then there is a priority order to be created to avoid conflict: - 1_UUWW_JustSim_v1.0 - DD UUEE Moscow Sheremetyevo XP - DD Z Moscow City XP - DD Z Moscow City XP Layer 2 ... - ZZZ DD UUEE Moscow Sheremetyevo XP Terrain - ZZZ DD Z Moscow City XP Terrain Note the 1_ on the UUWW_JustSim folder, make sure you keep this intact, it is complicated, but worthwhile to list in the .INI. Documents Description and Installation txt provided, also included is completed WorldTraffic 3 ground routes and airport data. ______________________________________________________________________ Scenery Review by Stephen Dutton 12th May 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) Review System Specifications: Computer System: Windows - Intel Core i7 6700K CPU 4.00GHz / 64bit - 16 Gb single 1067 Mhz DDR4 2133 - ASUS GeForce GTX 1080 8Gb - Samsung Evo 512gb SSD Software: - Windows 10 - X-Plane 11.20 Addons: Saitek x56 Rhino Pro system Joystick and Throttle : Sound - Bose Soundlink Mini Plugins: Environment Engine by xEnviro v1.09 US$69.90 : XPRealistic Pro v1.0.9 effects US$19.95 : WorldTraffic 3.0 Plugin - US$29.95 Scenery or Aircraft - ToLiSS319 (A319) by ToLiSS (X-Plane.OrgStore) - US$69.00 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pylon101 Posted August 14, 2023 Report Share Posted August 14, 2023 An excellent scenery. I've been living in Virginia and used to visit my family every year or so. The obvious choice to fly from KIAD/IAD to Moscow is Turkish Airlines. It flies from LTFM/IST to UUWW/VKO. The scenery feels so authentic. I felt homesick. AutoGate works well. If only we had UUDD/DME of this quality! Thank you, JustSim! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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