Overpriced Products

[ErnieAlston 33]

>>I think this is also a major shortcoming in many of the reviews we >see on different flightsim sites. First, they only tend to review >the most outstanding products while (often deliberately) keeping >silent about the not-so-good ones. It has a lot to do with the size of the review staff.Most FlightSim sites don't have enough reviewers to review everything. When I did reviews at Simflight.com, it would take like 2 to 3 weeks to do a review. Its not a full time job so your not going to get a whole lot of reviews done unless you have a very large review staff. It makes sense to focus on the products of greatest interest to your readers. For the most part those often are most outstanding products.The second issue is often if a developer doesn't believe they will get a good review, they won't give out review copies.We had that problem with TRI, when FLY!2 was first released. It wasn't ready, and they knew it. I ended up buying my own copy of FLY!2 and doing the review anyway. But you can't do that all the time.>Second, they very seldom voice any opinion about the price setting >of a product (unless they think it's great value for money). Price >has been a big taboo until now. I see no reason why it should be.The reviewers job is to tell you about the product so that you have the necessary information to make your buying decision with.You are the one who decides whether its a great value, not the reviewer.Who's paying the money here, you are the reviewer ? The reviewer in most cases is getting his copy for free.Regards.Ernie.

[Guest eko]

Speak loudly with your wallets my friends, speak loudly!They will get the message when they begin to lose money on the products.

[WAD3 0]

I am glad someone else brought this up. I couldnt believe it when I looked at the screenshots. The panel looks like the default Cessna's thats has been rearramged. It is terrible to charge money for that.Andrew

[yellow5 0]

People like me (generalizing) are into the reality of flight sim. Not all of us can get into the cockpit of a 747 or Seneca (legaly).There is only one that I can say I have been disapointed in the rest I just have not bothered to buy. The PSS Seneca was a major disapointment. My Seneca enjoyment was to be redemed by FSD's, which put out terrific products. I have not seen one that doesn't look like amature crap! Lago also gave it a good shot with their Twin Otter. In my opinion, it is a great looking airplane with some bugs, but Lago will soon fix these as they are big on customer service.I see the tides are changing, and it is up to the consumer to use this to our advantage. There are a lot of 3rd party creators out their and we have to sift through the junk until we get to something wonderful. Basially the price is going to always be justified by the consumer. If you purchase a product and you get a lot of enjoyment out of it, you will tell 10+ people that it was worth every penny. If you get no joy out of it and feel cheated you will tell 50+ people that it was an overpriced piece of junk. This is just the facts of business in a capitalistic society.....

[Guest Lizardo]

The real McCoy:

[Deaf Pilot 1]

Wow... I was really surprised to get so much feedback here... One poster mentioned the SF-260, which I forgot to mention... Theres another one right there... $25 bucks is a very hefty price but in my opinion, its a very "profitable" investment. How would one profit, you say? By having one of the most realistic flight models out there along with a top-quality visual model, inside and out. And they are charging $22.50? What I think they need to do is they need to LOOK at all the other products out there... make an HONEST judgement on how much they think that this thing is worth. That is, if it is worth paying for. I'm sure its hard to say that your own project that you spent so much time on is only worth about $5 compared to other people who are getting $20 or more for their work. But take a real good, *HONEST* look at your model and look at "theirs" and put yourself in the customer's shoes... would you spend TWENTY TWO dollars on something that is on par of a medium quality *freeware* aircraft? I appreciate the work they did on it but... they need to take another look at it and make a SERIOUS judgement on the price... dont judge it by the effort you feel you put into it... judge it by how you think customers are actually willing to pay for it. Honestly, I would charge a maximum of $10 for it, if I was a payware a/c builder. If I was a payware builder, I'd be all freeware, even if I could make SF-260 quality stuff. :)

[Guest]

Ernie, thanks for your comments; you're 'right on the money'. At AVSIM Online we do have a pretty good number of reviewers, and they all are concerned about "value for the money." The difficulty is that "one man's ceiling is another man's floor," as the saying goes. That's why we work hard to characterize each commercial product objectively -- and our numeric rating analysis helps us to get it right (usually). But price isn't one of the factors used in our numeric rating evaluation process, as we feel it's up to the individual reader to decide what's 'value' for him.Even we can't find the time to review everything that comes along; and yes, you can imagine that our staff bids on the more interesting ones first. That said, we've reviewed a number of products that we've found wanting, and we'll continue to do that (and call it as we see it).

[Guest]

Hello Todd,Converted to English Pounds $25 is around

[Deaf Pilot 1]

Well no no I meant that as if it was just a side thing... a hobby, if you will... I didnt mean to imply that it was silly to charge for a product. In fact, after re-reading it and thinking about it, I think that if I spent as much time working on something like the SF-260 as you have, perhaps I would probably turn to payware if I felt it was worthy enough to be payware, as your SF-260 surely is. At the *moment* though, *if* I had your abilities, I think that I probably would be mainly freeware. But as I understand, you have plenty or work put into freeware projects so I think that I would probably be very similar to you if I was in your shoes. Umm... The point I'm really driving at is... as you said, you charge what you feel is a modest sum for what the user gets. From what I can see in screenshots, $22.50 is NOT a modest sum at all for that S2 aircraft, especially when I compare it to something like your aircraft, which is only $2.50 more for triple the quality and service. Yes I understand it is a different aircraft but clearly the quality and the service of the company is not the same.

[Guest]

Todd, don't forget some very real sacrifices that the commercial developers make....They tend to avoid sharing insights and learning because of the nature of commercial competition, and the commercial work becomes an obligation to them, both in support and in maintaining state of the art skills. While I've been developing freeware scenery for years, and I've seen payware of quality levels I feel are beneath my own, I stay freeware because: I want my work to remain a hobby. I do it when it pleases me. I use tools that are free and I don't want to pay for commercial versions. Releasing free results is a cool way to "pay" for my tools. I want to give back to so many who taught and continue to teach me for free.When you accept money for it, its a job! Sometimes these factors are more important than quality levels, and therefore, sometimes freeware can be of better quality than payware.Cheers,Bob Bernstein

[Deaf Pilot 1]

The nature of commercial competition? If they want to stay competitive, then again, they need to rethink the price. Thats my whole point, really... at the moment, they are not competitive at all... they lose out with a price like that.

[Guest]

Ok Todd, points taken!I don't know of the S2, but no doubt people will vote on all products with their wallets, and believe me, a developer soon knows if his or her product is overpriced from the daily and hourly sales figures.Cheers,Rob

[Guest]

I just want to input my humble opinion of Perfect Flight... I haven't purchased any of their products, and don't intend to, so I can only comment on what I have seen, but from the screenshots of their various packages, It can be established that they charge WAY too much for their add-ons. Their 'Trpiple-Seven, Mad Dog, Jumbo!, United Flight Operations,' et al, seem to be comprised mostly of repaints of the default MS models (with a few thoroughly outdated models designed for FS2000 thrown in for effect), panels with cheesy bitmaps that use entirely default gauges, and a couple product pages boast of 'REAL STEREO sounds recorded in the cockpit!!' (One wonders where those came from...) Granted, you get a special adventure creator, that may be of some use, but what do you get for 20 dollars that you could get for FREE elsewhere?! What work have these developers done? Did they create these GREAT aircraft models? NO! Have they made fully functional, photorealistic 2D panels with custom, great looking gauges? NOT EVEN! I will admit I'm in no position to get so so upset over products I have not owned, but their WEBSITE shows the blatantly poor quality of their 'packages,' and their (most likely) empty boastful comments are far more numerous than ARIANE'S!BAH!:-newburn Now I'll go take a cold shower, and eat worms 'coz no one likes me and I make people mad...:-scatter

[Guest]

<>How can you say that? Do you have their sales figures? What you just said is not really defined by their product quality as you view it, rather by market performance...Of which I have no information. Do you?B

[PaulVR 0]

Rob,I don't think this thread is about price levels of payware in general. I bought the SF-260 and I agree with you: $25 is indeed a modest sum for what I got. Sure, the Marchetti isn't 'cheap' in comparison to other offerings, but its unique qualities more than justify the price.I also agree with Todd when he says developers should compare their product more carefully and honestly with the competition to set a price which reflects its qualities and limitations. I don't think it is *only* the consumers' responsability to determine which price is right. Buying something immaterial like software over the internet always involves a degree of trust. If a company overcharges a product, they risk loosing the trust of the customer. He might not come back, no matter how good the next offering might be.Maybe more addons should be sold on a 'try before you buy' basis. Then the market could really take care of determining accurate price levels.Paul