In PC Pilot MS claims they wanted it to have theperformance range to provide continued improvements as computersdevelop. Can any of you software and i.t market experts explainsimply why this unpopular policy was more important to MS than currentuser satisfaction? More shelf life on users computer? Do theaero-engines wear out after 5000 flying hours? Does the softwarewear out? Of course not! Would I be delighted if the software gave“a fantastic experience out of the box” so I do not have to wait5 years and spend more? Yes please. Would I ever buy softwareknowing it is really primarily designed for hardware 10 years fromnow? No way. So why is forcing hardware upgrades so important? Therehas never been any other software on my computer that has behavedlike this. Or made me do so :rolleyes:I have no expertise here. Only gut feeling. So I suspect this claim to be disingenuous. There seems a covert motive I don't understand. I have used most old FS versions back to the first one. The only reason I ever wanted to upgrade hardware was to make FS run better. And at my level of knowledge upgrading is a pain. I would be happy running Lotus Symphony with DOS 6 now and would not have wasted all that learning if it were not for FS. Maybe the long shelf life will bite them on the bum. By the time flight takes off we will all be running FSX well enoughon our over clocked whatsits that we will be satisfied andenlightened enough to ignore the consumer rat race. After all FSX on current hardware gives me a greatexperience (at last) and I get a lot of fun out of it.

"I have used most old FS versions back to the first one."You have proven MS to be correct in their policy by your own admission/addiction!The policy is a little different with FSX because the hardware map during the programming of FSX changed drasticly and it was too late to start programming over. The SPs helped a bit, but it is just now that the hardware is catching up.FS has always been hardware driven and once Flight is released and you start to see the shots and read the posts you will continue your upgrade cycle. Yep, everyone always says "this is it, no more, I am not doing it", but in the end it always happens. You are hooked and MS knows it!

Rhha, I think you’ve put your finger on it with this good comment.Maybe every PC game designer should read it.But it says to me that a lot of us users do not understand this idea of scalability.I think the biggest flaw in FSX (Sp2) was the settings UI didn’t explain this better – it’s that simple.It’s natural to overestimate the capabilities of our systems and attempt to run with settings designed for advanced PC’s - machines that way not become common for a few years to come.MS wants us to use default display settings…and then reduce them as we add more complex add-ons.That’s the only way to get FSX to run well.It’s difficult to judge the load art content will put on FSX and there are no caps or limits.If FSX is running smoothly your at or below the limit. But the question is do we want MS to be restricting our max display settings and add-on detail to some arbitrary average machine - when hardware advances so quickly.IMO user config tweaking is basically hot-rodding, it takes a lot of skillAnd we don't have the in-house style diagnostics to understand its effects.

Future proofing is fine so long as they deliver good performance on current hardware. That's where the developers really dropped the ball with FSX. It took a lot of tweaking and testing, far more than I think the user should be reasonably expected to do, to get FSX to run acceptably -- meaning 20 frames per second -- on my (at the time) mid-range PC, and this was on a system that pretty much doubled the minimum requirements.If they do their job right with Flight then it should run well on current hardware using default settings. We'll see.

Future proofing is fine so long as they deliver good performance on current hardware.

+1!Performance is a moving target. Just as in shooting clay pidgeons (originally I wrote s.k.e.e.t (an Olympic sport!) but the forum software turned that into a series of crosshatches! What? Why? That's what shooting clay pidgeons is called! It's even an Olympic sport!) where you lead with the gun or else you miss, game/sim developpers all design their software to perform best with the hardware that will be available in the future.The reason is if you design for current software and you release a new version every four years, then your game/sim will underperform right off the bat WRT other games/sims released from competitors 1,2 3 and 4 years later until you release a new version. In year 3 and especially 4 and 5 your software will perform with great frame rate but will be visually pretty dull compared to other gaming alternatives (simming and otherwise) and you as a customer will be dissatisfied that the flight sim software you bought had such a short shelf life.If, OTOH, your lead into the future is excessive, you will have disgruntled gamers because your software will perform poorly when released and until the hardware catches up (as happened with FSX).The other problem with leading too far into the future is you never know exactly know how that hardware will develop, and you might miss new hardware developments you would not have envisioned when you designed your software. Again this happened with FSX WRT single vs. multi-CPU, single vs. multi-GPU and shader model 2 vs. 3 vs 4 "bets": FSX went for the former while the market went for the latter.A final consideration is hardcore gamers have tweaked PCs and tend to be very vocal on forums, thus are important opinion makers to have on-board from a marketing standpoint to ensure the success of the released title. Again a sim/game that does not fully eploit the capabilities of hard-core gaming PCs would disappoint, the gemaers woud post about this and the game sales would not take-off.So there is evidently a seet spot here that maximizes sales and user satisfaction and IMHO is about one Moore cycle (18 months) into the future WRT release date and 2 years or more WRT to the date the designed is finalized and code writing begins.Finally, when a title is released, it takes time for the information to spread, potential buyers to make-up their minds to buy (especially those whanting to buy or build a new rig specifically or the game), so again you need to take that time lead into account and aim for your title to require the performance that will be available not at release date but at the date the new PC is operational in the simmer's home.Cheers,- jahman.

MS clearly knew what FS9 performance was on the then current hardware when it started to develop FSX. At that time, a decision was made to upgrade the visual quality in a number of ways. MS must have known that this will reduce frame rates on the then current hardware to unplayable levels, but they were relying on Moore's Law to save them by the time FSX were to be released.I am sure they realized, too late, that Moore's Law failed them and they were not willing to delay the release to implement the necessary changes to improve performance via efficiencies gained by rewriting parts of the code.MS released FSX knowing that it will create a lot of negative feedback, but they chose the money up-front and user opinion be damned.The sliders are not there to future proof the game. They are there to allow a wider range of computers to use the game and allow a wider range of customization to make the most people happy - at the time of release.

The slider system IS there to future proof any release. As hardware evolves it allows users to adjust according to their new hardware. It also allows users to customize their software to what they feel is important. Some like water, some like mesh, some like auto-gen, some like road traffic, some like AI traffic. The sliders allow for that freedom from the user instead of MS making those decisions. Some of you don't even remember FS before any sliders!

I don't mean to make a big argument about this, but you used four lines to describe the use of the sliders for customization. Future proofing is a side-effect, not a design goal. MS couldn't care less about us using FSX four years after its release. In fact, I dare say that they would be far happier if we were no longer happy with FSX and could hardly wait for Flight to be released.

For FS/MS, future proofing has always been a design goal and that has been publicly discussed before at these very forums. MS does care about long term purchases, so much in fact that they even had to generate a SECOND set of license keys for FSX not too long ago. They were pleasantly surprised that FSX was still selling that well, 4 years after its release and were more than willing to generate and register those keys.

For FS/MS, future proofing has always been a design goal and that has been publicly discussed before at these very forums. MS does care about long term purchases, so much in fact that they even had to generate a SECOND set of license keys for FSX not too long ago. They were pleasantly surprised that FSX was still selling that well, 4 years after its release and were more than willing to generate and register those keys.

All this talk about future proofing being a good thing is a total nonsense. What the majority of people on this forum want is to be able to fly their favourite aircraft into any area of the sim world without being dissapointed by performance issues.This sim has longevity not because it is a great product, but becuase of the skill and ability of developers who have pushed it far beyond what it was when released.Bryan.

What the majority of people on this forum want is to be able to fly their favourite aircraft into any area of the sim world without being dissapointed by performance issues.

What percentage do you think "the majority of people on this forum" is of the total sales for FSX?

Bryan, it is very sad that you have no idea what you are talking about. How did FS4 run on your Apple or early IBM computer?

What percentage do you think "the majority of people on this forum" is of the total sales for FSX?

flight sim sells 200K - 250k copies per year .... first two years after release of new version.

What percentage do you think "the majority of people on this forum" is of the total sales for FSX?

Why don't you do a poll and find out?Fact is when you go to any of the major online add on stores it's products like REX and FTX and such like which are consistently the top sellers, these are the products which led to MS having to do a second run, not because the sim had some inherent longevity built in.Bryan.

Bryan, it is very sad that you have no idea what you are talking about. How did FS4 run on your Apple or early IBM computer?

Never used it, but I don't follow your reasoning.Bryan.

Fact is when you go to any of the major online add on stores it's products like REX and FTX and such like which are consistently the top sellers, these are the products which led to MS having to do a second run, not because the sim had some inherent longevity built in.Bryan.

Hehe, my kind of post, so who do you know from the inside....justy kidding...To all others reading this post, follow me here...MS is opening a store right....now will the store be use to sell MS addons or 3rd party addons....yes you got it right...3rd party addons so starting from there do you think MS is gambling by opening a store just to see if developers will contact them to sell sell in their store OR by opening a store does MS already know who will sell in their store...hummm...yep you got it right again MS and some developers are holding hands since the beginning and even before Flight was announced THAT IS WHY MS is building Flight and opening a store, for the money resulting from the sale of Flight and addons sold from the store.New simulator without FSX addons compatibility + developers selling addons in their store = BIG time money for MS and the developers.