SimWorks Studios' Okavanga Delta

[nayeon39]

Saw this just released and it looks fantastic. Wondering if it will be coming to Orbx Central?

[Ed Correia]

Yes it will be coming here as well very soon 

[Toto-Free]

I bought the Okavanga Delta and am really happy to say its quite refreshing to have a company like Simworks Studios  thinking outside the box. 

The BOX meaning AIRPORTS. I am tired of airports, have thousands of them, and quite frankly one looks the same as another. BORING !!!!

Take for instance Yellowstone Airport. How cool would it be to fly over and see some animated buffalo or deer near or on the runway, and have to do a low pass 

to chase them away.  I have flown over the Okavanga Delta in real life, and what one sees is flocs of birds taking flight here there and everywhere. I have flown over the Okavanga in Orbx GLOBAL, DEAD as a DOORNAIL. Looks ok, but that to can be improved, but what it needs is life!!!!! Right now the flight sim industry is boring to the max and thank you Simworks  Studio's for trying to liven it up a little. 

  

[Stillwater]

2 hours ago, Toto-Free said:

I bought the Okavanga Delta and am really happy to say its quite refreshing to have a company like Simworks Studios  thinking outside the box. 

The BOX meaning AIRPORTS. I am tired of airports, have thousands of them, and quite frankly one looks the same as another. BORING !!!!

Take for instance Yellowstone Airport. How cool would it be to fly over and see some animated buffalo or deer near or on the runway, and have to do a low pass 

to chase them away.  I have flown over the Okavanga Delta in real life, and what one sees is flocs of birds taking flight here there and everywhere. I have flown over the Okavanga in Orbx GLOBAL, DEAD as a DOORNAIL. Looks ok, but that to can be improved, but what it needs is life!!!!! Right now the flight sim industry is boring to the max and thank you Simworks  Studio's for trying to liven it up a little. 

  

I would have used more indirect words, but I support this suggestion. Bringing life to the sims, like NatureFlow, looks fascinating.

[riverreveal]

Do the animals in this package move around or are they mostly static?

[Toto-Free]

Some static, some move around. The point being it raises the bar for everyone. Hopefully with a update here and there more animated animals can be inserted into it  or a complete new package be made V2 with more animal  animation. The possibilities are endless There are literally hundreds of game reserve area's in Africa. A developer could model. One that comes to mind is the Serengeti,,  this one we have all seen on National Geographic. Wide open grasslands with migrating animals on it. Should not be to hard to do. Animated animals following waypoints over the grassy plains. If they can model planes following waypoints in the sky landing and taking off at airports at given times. why not animals following waypoints on the ground. Or birds following waypoints in the sky. THIS CAN ALL BE DONE  

[BAW9DV]

It's really good!

 

And I will be reviewing it in a video next week!

 

Lee

[ravenn22]

I've been thinking about buying this one for a little while...  Are the airstrips and lodges portrayed real or fictional?

[W2DR]

On 4/10/2021 at 8:40 AM, Toto-Free said:

One that comes to mind is the Serengeti,

Boy, would I ever like to see that. One of the things that should be on everyone's bucket list is floating over the Serengeti at dawn in a hot-air balloon.

[porsche]

I'd sure like to have a pdf map included. I'm interested but simply do not know the area geographically.

[pmb]

I bought it directly from their website, and this one has a .png map plus a brochure (okay, the latter is more a high-gloss travel guide).

 

Kind regards, Michael

[BAW9DV]

On 4/14/2021 at 3:20 PM, ravenn22 said:

I've been thinking about buying this one for a little while...  Are the airstrips and lodges portrayed real or fictional?

Hi,

 

The strips are fully real!

In 2011 (think that was the year) the DAVE TV Channel in the UK did a series called "Bush Pilots"   There are a few episodes on YouTube:-

 

Bush Pilots - Episode One

 

There were 10 episodes in all - about the 25 or so small airlines operating out of MAUN Airport in Botswana.   Before Covid, many wealthy tourists from all over the world would fly into Johannesburg, transfer to Air Botswana who would ferry them up to Maun, where upon the "Bush Planes" (Cessna 206's, 207's and "08 Caravans) would fly them into the luxury camps located in the Okavango Delta - to allow them to see the big game up close and personal.    These camps were very expensive, often costing US$1000 per night or more.   All self-contained.   Given that the Delta floods in the wet season (which draws in the animals) the only way to really get to these places is by bush plane.   And your in for some very hairy landings and takeoffs!

 

I have done an 8-video series of BUSH Videos in the new MSFS2020, on my channel, before this product was released.   It all looked really good, but obviously MSFS2020 was sadly missing the animals and the detailed lodges, although the strips are there - dozens of them.

 

Simworks Studios have more than made up for this however.   If you are interested, check out my full review of the product here:-

 

Review of the Okavango Delta Scenery by Simworks Studios

 

Hope this helps,

 

Regards,

 

Lee

 

[Rob Abernathy]

Thanks for all that Lee.  I had written down the 6 strips listed on the products page and am about to embark on the journey.  I'll watch your review first to get into the thick of it.    Probably watch a few of the Bush Pilots on UTube after that.

[ravenn22]

Awesome - thanks, Lee!

 

I'd went ahead and bought it before - I really like the dirt strips... and it's a nice short hop between them. The bush trip missions were ok - I spend more time "not missing" the checkpoints, than actually looking around for the POIs and animals, so I'll go back with something low and slow and spend some more time looking around.

 

Will check out the show as well! I'd run across a Canadian crop-dusting show ( Dust-up ) ?  which looked like it'd make a good mission pack for flight sim.

 

Additionally, found this - higher res show - Mack Air Okavango

 

and a high res version of the map from the show:

[ravenn22]

I was bored last night and edited the map so it's a bit more useful in MSFS. Added ICAO codes for the strips that are present in game. 
 

Also, updated the Mack Air 208B livery from flightsim.to and added the correct tail numbers and callsigns for 5 planes ( plus cleanup and more detail ). Msg'd the original content creator about giving him the updates and getting that out.

[BradB]

43 minutes ago, ravenn22 said:

I was bored last night and edited the map so it's a bit more useful in MSFS. Added ICAO codes for the strips that are present in game. 
 

Also, updated the Mack Air 208B livery from flightsim.to and added the correct tail numbers and callsigns for 5 planes ( plus cleanup and more detail ). Msg'd the original content creator about giving him the updates and getting that out.

I was on the fence on this product , but your efforts help me make the decision to buy it now . TY 

[ravenn22]

2 hours ago, BradB said:

I was on the fence on this product , but your efforts help me make the decision to buy it now . TY 

I don't regret it at all - but I'm also not totally blown away. The strips look good and when you see the animals moving - it looks pretty cool. The terrain looks pretty solid - although I don't remember what it looked like as default - some of the default areas away from the Okavango also look good ( Kalahari ). They spent a lot of time on detailing the camps but I've only seen one ( without deliberately looking for them ). I think you pretty much need to drone cam ( or helicopter ) over to them to see any of the detail ( which looks like a ton of effort from the trailer video ). But they're just not something you'd noticed during normal flying.

It'd be great if MSFS eventually gets wet / mud properties + VFX and make flying into the strips more challenging... also a variety of roughness to the dirt strips would be cool as well - there's not much challenge to landing there right now. It would have been cool if Simworks could have added behavior to the animals to react to your plane ( ie scatter if you fly low ) or create random wildlife hazards on the runways. ( animals crossing occasionally and forcing a go around )

Stumbling across the Mack Air stuff made it a lot more real / interesting for me. I didn't realize how close the Kalahari and Victoria Falls were to the Okavango.

This also encouraged me to start looking into Tanzania ( Serengeti / Kilimanjaro ) flights / safaris as well - Coastal Air has that covered and I'm checking out some of the areas right now.

 

 

[BAW9DV]

On 4/24/2021 at 4:44 AM, Rob Abernathy said:

Thanks for all that Lee.  I had written down the 6 strips listed on the products page and am about to embark on the journey.  I'll watch your review first to get into the thick of it.    Probably watch a few of the Bush Pilots on UTube after that.

 

Very welcome Rob!

 

Cheers,

 

Lee

[BAW9DV]

4 hours ago, ravenn22 said:

I was bored last night and edited the map so it's a bit more useful in MSFS. Added ICAO codes for the strips that are present in game. 
 

Also, updated the Mack Air 208B livery from flightsim.to and added the correct tail numbers and callsigns for 5 planes ( plus cleanup and more detail ). Msg'd the original content creator about giving him the updates and getting that out.

 

Great!   Thanks for the Map.  getting decent maps of this area is difficult.  Plus, MSFS2020 gets a lot of the code wrong!  Some strips don't even have codes!!

The Okavango Delta scenery is excellent - really spices up the bush.   It's a pity that many of the strips they have done, show grey tarmac-type runways.  They are absolutely NOT like this!   In my Review video, I show one of the real strips in a photo ....

 

Apart from that, it's a great product.

 

Next week, I will be doing a video on my channel where we take off from Maun and have a look at the three other strips that they have developed - Vumbura, Omdop and Xamaxai - sadly the strips are also grey and not as real as they could be.   But I want to see the surrounding area and check out more animals.

 

There are Lions but I can't remember where I saw them.   But also there are supposedly Crocodiles too!

 

 

I have never flown the 208.   I can't deal with TV screens in a light aircraft.   Just does not look right!  I'd love it if someone did the Caravan with the old steam guages!

 

Lovely livery!  How do you change the registration numbers?   I have found a great bush plane on Flightsim.To:-

 

C172 Cessna Bush Kit

 

But would love to change the Reg!

 

Cheers,

 

Lee

 

4 hours ago, ravenn22 said:

 

 

[ravenn22]

10 minutes ago, BAW9DV said:

 

Great!   Thanks for the Map.  getting decent maps of this area is difficult.  Plus, MSFS2020 gets a lot of the code wrong!  Some strips don't even have codes!!

The Okavango Delta scenery is excellent - really spices up the bush.   It's a pity that many of the strips they have done, show grey tarmac-type runways.  They are absolutely NOT like this!   In my Review video, I show one of the real strips in a photo ....

 

Lovely livery!  How do you change the registration numbers?   I have found a great bush plane on Flightsim.To:-

 

C172 Cessna Bush Kit

 

But would love to change the Reg!

 

Cheers,

 

Lee

 

 

 

I've been having fun with the X Cub bush mods...  floats and tundra tires. Textures could be better on the floats, but oh well...

https://www.bushleaguelegends.com/addons/msfs/msfs-aircraft

Yeah, there's a few missing strips in the pack and in the game - I was kinda thinking about adding them in - as the texture / location is there in the scenery. Matching the names to the map was a little tricky - as MSFS doesn't always have the same name either. I didn't validate the ICAO codes here, but in the area I am, currently, IRL - 70% of the MSFS ICAO codes are wrong.

Repainting:

• Basically, I downloaded someone else's Mack Air paint      Mack Air N842JT » Microsoft Flight Simulator
• opened up the:  CESSNA_208B_GRANDCARAVANEX_AIRFRAME_BODY_ALBD.PNG.DDS    file in Photoshop ( requires the nVidia developer plugin to export DDS )
• located in:   Community\Asobo_208B_GRAND_CARAVAN_EX_MACKAIR\SimObjects\Airplanes\Asobo_208B_GRAND_CARAVAN_EX-A2-OKA\TEXTURE.A2OKA
• painted out the existing tail number on a separate layer ( above the original )
• used the text tool to add the correct tail number ( with the closest font and color possible )
• flatten all the layers, then export using the DDS tool.

there are other ways, using free tools - but this is how I've been doing it...   ( just FYI - the paths and file names shown here are after I renamed the files and folder structure to what I wanted, but it's the same idea )  I did a bunch of additional cleanup and rework on the logos with sharper sources + added some decals and markings, per reference photos.

 

nVidia exporter is here:   
https://developer.nvidia.com/nvidia-texture-tools-exporter
( I think you need a free account )

This is what you'll be looking at:

  

 

[ravenn22]

Just going to throw this out there and call it a day... since this is becoming "safari flying" and not just about Okavango....  and this is more than I ever post

Kilimanjaro to Serengeti, mid-morning       HTAR > HTNF         no add-ons except the repaint.

epic flight. Kilimanjaro looked amazing w morning light, Lake Empakaai ( crater lake ) and descending into rain storms for landing at Fort Ikoma.