And as Sonny and Cher sang....the beat goes on and on and .....

FSX was the way it was because the developers of FSX made it that way. They provided an SDK and allowed for others to expand on it. They also included third party developers in Acceleration.So they seam to have had a changed in direction. As of now they have not provided in SDK for flight and maybe they won't. Probably they pulled the plug in the old concept because it's business model doesn't match that of XBOX.MSFS Third Pary Developers have never paid licencing fees to Microsoft like XBOX developers do. They talk about a Games for Windows Live market so that may be some indications of the way things are going.Cheers

Why did MS hire someone to develop the SDK then?Of course no SDK is available for Flight because Flight isn't even finished yet. The SDK is the last thing that gets programmed.What does XBOX have to do with any of this?

The arguement is fruitless. If MS wishes to abandon or prohibit 3rd Party FS Development they certianly can and will.We suspect the MS has enjoyed a lucrative product cycle based on free and commercial development enhancements to its base product.If they wish to funnel free or commercial 3rd Party Flight Development through a soda straw then we all shall reap the results of their decisions.In any case there is little to be overly concerned about. At the end of the day they have a record of doing what they wish to do and we suspect that will continue.

What if I create something new in your universe?If you add to the game universe or expand on the story told in the game with “lost chapters” or back story or anything like that, distribution of your Item in any form constitutes a grant by you of a royalty-free, non-exclusive, transferable, worldwide, license to Microsoft and any of Microsoft’s partners to use and distribute that Item (and derivatives of that Item) for any purpose and without obligation to pay you anything or credit you. This means that your story or idea may appear in a future game without any compensation to you. (Sorry, but our lawyers tell us we need to do this in order to avoid frivolous lawsuits getting in the way of making more great games.)

That's the least threatening legal statement I've ever read. I've reread it a few times, and I still get this: if we use a similar idea to yours, or even based on your idea, you can't sue us. I said before, the original post's email was an oddity, with absolutely no relevance to what we do here. So, no, I don't think that any developers are worried about this. However it does have a bit of amusement value...

What if I create something new in your universe?If you add to the game universe or expand on the story told in the game with “lost chapters” or back story or anything like that, distribution of your Item in any form constitutes a grant by you of a royalty-free, non-exclusive, transferable, worldwide, license to Microsoft and any of Microsoft’s partners to use and distribute that Item (and derivatives of that Item) for any purpose and without obligation to pay you anything or credit you. This means that your story or idea may appear in a future game without any compensation to you. (Sorry, but our lawyers tell us we need to do this in order to avoid frivolous lawsuits getting in the way of making more great games.)This is standard game-developer boilerplate, as I think I indicated in an earlier post. It doesn't follow that it would actually be used to harass small-scale 3rd party developers making weather-improvers, better ground meshes and so forth. It wouldn't be worth the loss of goodwill. The bracketed sentence at the end is probably the truth -- they don't want some nobody attempting to sue them on spurious grounds of 'Microsoft stole my idea'.EDIT: posted before I saw toprob's post ;)

Why did MS hire someone to develop the SDK then?Of course no SDK is available for Flight because Flight isn't even finished yet. The SDK is the last thing that gets programmed.What does XBOX have to do with any of this?

Well there is no SDK and many would like to see one alreadyWhat XBOX has to do with this is when EA or whoever else makes a game for XBOX then MS gets a percentage of sales. When a MSFS developer sells a product for FSX or FS2004 them MS gets nothing.

This is a bit OT but folks seem to be confused about MS XBox Live and MS Games for Windows Live and how that relates to MS Flight...

This is a bit OT but folks seem to be confused about MS XBox Live and MS Games for Windows Live and how that relates to MS Flight...

There is no connection it is just that I wouldn't be too surprised if they setup some sort of market in Games for Windows Live. This has worked on other platforms like Steam. It is an opportunity for Microsoft to get a percentage of sales from third party developers.Not saying that will happen as I don't know foresure. Just saying I could see something like that happening.

There is no connection it is just that I wouldn't be too surprised if they setup some sort of market in Games for Windows Live. This has worked on other platforms like Steam. It is an opportunity for Microsoft to get a percentage of sales from third party developers.Not saying that will happen as I don't know foresure. Just saying I could see something like that happening.

We will not be surprised if your conjecture turns out to be true.

Well there is no SDK and many would like to see one already

Do you understand that the base product isn't finished yet and so you cannot have an SDK yet?

Do you understand that the base product isn't finished yet and so you cannot have an SDK yet?

Forum Sociopath...STOP STALKING ME

PUT ME ON YOUR IGNORE LIST.

PUT ME ON YOUR IGNORE LIST.

Nope....the amount of time it took for a response from you was confirmation enough. JUST STOPCheers