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Active Sky Cloud Art (ASCA) is a new kind of graphics add-on for Flight Simulator X (Boxed or SE) and Prepar3D that incorporates brand new technologies and content types to transform your skies and significantly increase realism, variation and dynamics.
The technology behind ASCA includes optional tight integration with Active Sky 2016 to enable features such as Real-Time Texture Dynamics, which allow you to manually change or have your textures automatically changed multiple times throughout a flight without needed to shut-down and restart your simulator! The variation experienced throughout a flight with AS16 + ASCA is unprecedented, especially when flying through areas of varying weather conditions and severity. In addition, in ASCA’s Full Dynamics theme, simultaneous variation of up to 8 different texture sets (128 cloud textures total) are provided including simultaneous texture resolution to provide increased performance for certain cloud types that don’t require high resolution (such as overcast layers).
ASCA’s graphical content includes replacements/enhancements for everything above the horizon: Cirrus clouds, Cumulus clouds, Stratus clouds, Thunderstorm clouds, Sky colors and Lighting. But in addition to the graphical textures, ASCA also includes something very different: Brand New 3D Cloud Structures, which replace and/or enhance nearly every aspect of the cloud scene within the simulator! Thunderstorms are bigger, overcast is more full, light “few” humilis-type clouds are more visually appealing, and all cloud scenes are specifically tuned to match the ASCA texture content and provide maximum realism.
A primary design focus for ASCA was performance. From solid overcast, to towering cumulonimbus, everything was designed for the best visuals with minimal performance sacrifice. Careful 3D modeling of cloud structures and textures enables this, while creating realistic and unique variants of the real-world cloud types including stratus, nimbostratus, altocumulus, altostratus, cumulus humilis, cumulus mediocris, cumulus congestus, towering cumulus, stratocumulus, cirrostratus, cirrocumulus, cumulonimbus incus, cumulonimbus calvus and more.
While ASCA and AS16 work great together, they are also fully compatible (either alone or together) with any other graphics add-on and weather add-on. You have full flexibility to mix and match any aspect and selectable feature set within these add-ons.
Review it now!
And than, the pricetag; horrible. You basically pay €33 for a set of clouds. That's all, and oh, you want live weather? Here you go, pay €60 more for AS16/P4. If you look at pricing, I find HiFi a joke, you basically pay nearly €100 for weather. I do appreciate what they did with their gorgeous addons, but the pricing is terrible.
Overall, I would definitelly recommend this to you if you have some money to spend on your sim!
- THE INTEGRATION WITH AS16
- THE SKY IS REALLY GOOD
- THE SUN
- THE FOG, IT IS ALMOST REAL
- GOING THROW DE CLOUDS HAS A COOL EFFECT.
- YOU WILL HAVE A GREEN INFO LINE WITH THE UPDATE OF THE WEATHER AND MSGS WHEN ASCA LOADS/RENEW OTHER THEME.
THE BAD :
- YOU NEED TO SET "CLOUD COVERAGE" AT MAXIMUM AND IF IT IS CLOUDY.. GOOD LUCK WITH THE FPS.
- THE CLOUDS... LOOKS LIKE OIL PAINTING BY A MONKEY +_+
(YOU DECIDE IF USE AS16+REX4 SOFT CLOUDS OR NOT)
- IT IS EXPENSIVE EVEN WITH A 30% OFF.
I really liked the idea of having my clouds and weather program integrated and dynamic.
Unfortunately, the visuals produced by ASCA are no where close to what I was using with REX TD and Soft Clouds. The options for cloud types and skies are far less than what I had before and I get some truly awful looking and unrealistic looking clouds. http://prntscr.com/br5mex
I'm also getting new clouds popping in from nowhere, and some sky color changes that make me feel like my sim experience is going backwards in technology rather than forward.
They have a long way to go before I re-install.
The concept is great, but the program isn't filling my expectations compared to other options I already own.
The new cloud models are nice and surely something different from what we have been used too earlier.
Togeather with AS16 this definately makes up a nice experience and the possibility to change textures on the fly is something the competition has always been lacking so far for sure!
I can not give the full rating though as the textures themselves are not as good as some of the competitions textures - from products that are quite some years old by now already.
The VAS usage also seems rather high since it seems that ASCA is simply loading all the textures into the sim right away and then just chooses which set to display. This of course costs VAS and gave me some 300-400mb additional VAS usage compared to my previous setup (REX4).
All in all, if you got the VAS to spare and don't have any texture addon yet I'd recommend to give this a try. It is certainly worth the 22€ it costs right now.
Microsoft Flight Simulator X with SP2 or Acceleration OR FSX:Steam Edition OR Prepar3D v3 or v4+
ASCA works with both FSX and P3D platforms on a single license
2GHZ processor or better
2GB RAM or better
1GB available hard drive space for standard resolution content
2GB available hard drive space for optional HD resolution content
Minimum monitor resolution to access all user interface features: 1280×800
Requires an online internet connection for normal usage. Online activation is mandatory. License is valid for one computer/installation only. Moving software to another computer will deactivate the previous computer. 10 automatic reactivations are permitted. Multiple-computer installations will require an individual ASCA license for each computer that it is installed on.
Recommended
3.0GHZ Processor or better
4GB RAM or better
5GB available hard drive space
Broadband high-speed internet connection
1440×900 or better resolution
