Sunday Review: 16th September

A week of exciting releases and previews:

It has been a very action-packed week in the X-Plane scene where users are showered with several notable aircraft releases and scenery updates. Let’s dive right into it, starting on Monday:

Andrew Masse, the face of Vertical Simulations has brought an update to the group’s first payware project, releasing version 2.1 of KPVD Providence. The update brings a multitude of new features, some of which are listed below:

  • New asphalt decals
  • More surrounding buildings around the airport
  • More ground crew
  • New HD cars, tractor-trailers & fire-trucks
  • New concrete textures
  • Weather instruments and VOR added
  • Cargo area redesigned
  • Fixed floating Skywalk
  • Wrote manual
  • Changed decal to fit better
  • Sharpened 4k orthophotos
  • Fixed downtown Providence

VFlyteAir kicked off with the first release in this week. After a few months of development, the Ikarus-Comco C42C is out. A welcome addition to GA pilots, the aircraft is based off of two real world C42Cs; D-MYSF and D-MNLN. You can purchase the aircraft on the X-Plane.org store.

Following VFlyteAir's footsteps, thursday brought news of VSkyLabs' latest release, the Guimbal Cabri G2. It's the first helicopter release in a little while and certainly doesn’t fail to impress. The heli is even approved by the original designer, Bruno Guimbal! Check out more here.

The first scenery news of the week came from Virtual Design 3D and the release of Alicante LEAL for X-Plane. This is by far their largest release, and is a first in many ways for them, the team has travelled out of their home country, Chile to Spain and their first major airport project. Despite the bigger size of the airport, the developer doesn't slip any missing details and the craftmanship on this rendition looks sensational:

More news from Aviotek this week, showing off new shots of OMDB Dubai. The scenery is nearing completion, as told by the teaser post released on their blog on Friday. The scenery will model Dubai International airport as well as numerous other landmarks such as the Burj Al Arab.

Our only plugin news came from FSFlyingSchool with the release of FS Instant Approach. FS Instant Approach allows you to spawn approaching any runway in the world at a variety of points - downwind, intersecting or short final. Essentially a beefed up version of X-Plane's default "approach" setting when selecting a new airport:

The user interface of FS Instant Approach by FSFlightSchool.

Lastly for this week, GayaSim announce that they’ve made the jump to Laminar’s sim. Gaya are the developers behind the popular Genoa X released for FSX and Prepar3D in late 2017. The announcement has just one preview screenshot, however expect more soon:


The News

Version 3.30 of the Zibo Mod released

The wildly popular Zibo Mod has received a large update. Version 3.30 brings the ability to operate doors, the addition of split scimitars and new satcoms placed on the top of the aircraft; narrowing the visual gap between the 737 Ultimate project's 737-900 and the Zibo 737-800X.

Here is the full changelog (and it's a long one!)

  • corrected texture switches
  • corrected IRS aligned time
  • corected A/T move
  • add APP geometric descent path mode (optional FULL/APP geo des)
  • corrected landing gear extend/retract times
  • A/P disconnect by input yoke
  • improved LNAV and VNAV code
  • corrected FMC (N1 takeoff thrust page,...)
  • improved EFB mac, mac zfw
  • corrected FMC SPD if drop speed during VNAV descent below 15 kts
  • corrected idle thrust after reach target speed during VNAV descent
  • hold -1000 fpm during VNAV descent (minimal descent rate, if above VNAV path)
  • new EFB with adjusting stand and toggle command hide/show
  • add FMC Boeing type
  • add annunciate FUEL USED on EICAS and Lower DU
  • add block altitude restrict on FMC (LEGS page)
  • add option IRS position entry message during align
  • add option Long LED strobes
  • add paper checklist
  • add custom eletric and manual elevator trim
  • add landing pulselite lights (optional)
  • add winglets types (none, blended, split)
  • add SatCom (none, front, rear, both)
  • add About AviTab icon
  • add LED landing lights (optional)
  • add HUD object (optional)
  • add lock LNAV/VNAV if selected prior to Takeoff mode
  • fixed flap maneuver speed during VNAV descent
  • optional retractable landing light
  • changed FMC navigation switch (graphics of switch)
  • new FMOD with new PA messages (Europe too)
  • add own speedbrake code
  • add animate in replay mode: throttle levers, speedbrake lever, landing gear lever, flap lever
  • add commands and annunciates for doors
  • corrected duct bleed pressure system
  • corrected altitude alert system

You can see where to download on our full article.

Alabeo update C177 II to v1.1

Alabeo have issued a small update to their recently released C177 Cardinal. Version 1.1 brings some new sounds and tweaks to the aircraft. The full changelog is attached below:

  • Improved sounds
  • Tweaked Elevator deflection and animations
  • Removed primer knob from RG version
  • Fixed typo in product description

To update, redownload the aircraft from the store of purchase.

More previews of Skyline Sims. Terni Airport

Lately, Skyline Simulations have been drip feeding us previews of Terni Airport - this week being no exception, with more shots of the ground work at the Italian airport. Check it out below:

Maps2XPlane release first previews of Faroes4XP

After an announcement a few weeks ago, Maps2XPlane have released the first previews of Faroes2XPlane. The project is being worked on with Albert Ràfols, developer of SpainUHD. Here are the previews:

Check out the full blog post here.


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