The point is that companies like PMDG are now producing products that have almost eclipsed the simulator they are running on. It's easy to see that simmers are going to stick with their favourite 3rd party developers regardless of the platform. If PMDG support FSX / P3D then so will the PMDG owners in the sim community.I simply can't imagine MS producing an aircraft like the NGX or an airport like UK2000 EGKK for Flight.

Lockheed Martin came calling us, quite persistently over a period of 12 months before we had spare cycles to install their code. We did not approach them.Perhaps Robert should be talking to John Nicol who is the P3D program manager? I suspect their commercial division folks may not have understood the history behind PMDG and their stellar reputation in the Microsoft FS world.We also have not discounted XPX completely, but we're just not cashed up enough for a complete retooling exercise to a completely new platform. It's not a port, it's a relearning, redevelopment, retraining, and ultimately, a very expensive exercise to move away from the FSX/P3D engine. We're too small and risk averse to begin throwing money around like that. We've invested about 8 years and countless man hours in the Microsoft platform; you just don't jump ship overnight, does not happen.

JV, why don't you put one or two guys on XPX ? Do one lil PNW airport to test the waters !You have to admit that the 3D clouds are amazing ! And the global lighting is unreal ! The plausible world not so good, but thats where your company comes in cleans it up and make tons of money !

Edited January 7, 201214 yr by strider1

Buckster the problem is, is that MS originally had in mind the "Flight Sim Community" towards development. If they took that approach, then with MS resources available to them, they could afford to put together a 3rd party team like a "PMDG" and make their own add ons. Instead greed and corporate sales idiots got in the way of what is basically a whole platform and genre of simulation gaming much in whole as an xbox or PS3. They saw hey these guys are making money when we only sell 1 copy of 1 product, they are selling several thousands of copies of various smaller projects. The sad thing is that this is no surprise. This completely falls in line with corporate greed. FSX is where its gonna be at for the forseeable future and thats that.

The sad thing is that this is no surprise. This completely falls in line with corporate greed.

Jason,This is where the allure of X-Plane stands. It offers everything the FS franchise was, which is to say, developers are free to make addons and keep the profits. I'm more than happy to see that ORBX are willing to keep an open mind about X-Plane.

I am completely open to the X plane platform. I am impressed by some aspects of xplane and upset at others which certainly could be said for most anything.I am no marketing or small business genius either and I appreciate the fact that PMDG , ORBX and others will take a look at Xplane.But as John stated , while they will take a look at a transition or a joint venue into both platforms , common sense tells me that it would be a very risky move that could in fact make or break years of effort and not to forget about being profitable for such a small group of dedicated individuals. I guess at this point we should be happy with what we have and hope for the best. I don't see to much changing even after flight is released, but my whole attitude is one of thanks to companies like PMDG and ORBX (And several others) and thats where my loyalty lies. As Rob said once PMDG was involved with inputting on FLIGHT and PMDG stuck to its guns MS dropped them like a hot potato. That just tells me 1 thing and it's all I need to know. MS will never be in the simmers corner, I understand they need to make profit but look at this blustering community of people willing to spend their money on add ons. And MS saw an avenue of missed revenue and went about it completely the wrong way IMO.

I guess that somebody at Microsoft suggested that they could make more money by shutting out external developers, produced a few powerpoint presentations backing up his theory and they went with it. I doubt the software engineers were consulted because their honest opinions normally conflict with the blue sky thinking mentality of the boardroom types - read the Dilbert cartoon strip for humourous examples of this.Maybe one day, when somebody else shows that simmers are moving to different sims or sticking with FSX, MS might realise that they're losing revenue from this section of the market and reconsider their position regarding 3rd party developers.

I simply can't imagine MS producing an aircraft like the NGX or an airport like UK2000 EGKK for Flight.

Well, I could, but it would cost $300 and require 6 patches just to get it running properly on a Cray Supercomputer...

Buckster the problem is, is that MS originally had in mind the "Flight Sim Community" towards development. If they took that approach, then with MS resources available to them, they could afford to put together a 3rd party team like a "PMDG" and make their own add ons. Instead greed and corporate sales idiots got in the way of what is basically a whole platform and genre of simulation gaming much in whole as an xbox or PS3. They saw hey these guys are making money when we only sell 1 copy of 1 product, they are selling several thousands of copies of various smaller projects.The sad thing is that this is no surprise. This completely falls in line with corporate greed. FSX is where its gonna be at for the forseeable future and thats that.

Corporations exist to make money to survive and prosper. They are not a charity, nor do they cater to a very small, albeit very loud sub-section of the FS community. They have every right to make FS whatever they wish it to be. They created the franchise, remember?? They do not owe anyone anything. With all the bi*ching and demands I'm surprised they didn't shut it down long ago. So now they would like to make more money and produce content in-house. And from what I've seen so far, good for them. They have given us years of enjoyment, and a great deal I might add, including the whole friggin world in the sim. I am really getting sick of this whole "corporate greed" nonsense. If all of them operated the way you wish, they wouldn't be here, period. And then what? No FS. No Windows. No Apple. No IBM. No gas for your car, etc. You get the idea. And no I don't work for MS nor wish to.

Corporations exist to make money to survive and prosper. They are not a charity, nor do they cater to a very small, albeit very loud sub-section of the FS community. They have every right to make FS whatever they wish it to be. They created the franchise, remember?? They do not owe anyone anything. With all the bi*ching and demands I'm surprised they didn't shut it down long ago. So now they would like to make more money and produce content in-house. And from what I've seen so far, good for them. They have given us years of enjoyment, and a great deal I might add, including the whole friggin world in the sim. I am really getting sick of this whole "corporate greed" nonsense. If all of them operated the way you wish, they wouldn't be here, period. And then what? No FS. No Windows. No Apple. No IBM. No gas for your car, etc. You get the idea. And no I don't work for MS nor wish to.

I don't think so. In fact many corporations do just that in order to sell to a large audience. Just look at the gaming computer model. Years ago gaming rigs were for 17 year old high school students who were not afraid to build custom rigs for a their hardcore needs. As the trend became popular the large computer distributors jumped on board with gaming rigs of their own. A small segment of the population ultimately drove the development of gaming rigs. People who would never dream of building their own extreme rig could now order one up and have it delivered in a few days. In the end these corporation need to be aware of these trends in order to stay ahead of the curves in the market. They have even adapted the concept of hardcore in their marketing strategy. The idea was to appeal to the elite extreme who demanded the best and most out of their machines. It happens all the time in the corporate world. For corporations to take their finger off this pulse is foolish.

Edited January 8, 201214 yr by phoenixphire

rsrandazzo, on 06 January 2012 - 10:16 PM, saidThe folks at Lockheed Martin have been the polar opposite. Our Commercial Division has been reaching out to them for a year without any reply back.I'm really not inclined to start shelling out money to buy their over-priced, dressed up FSX for every member of the development team without knowing for certain where they plan on taking the platform.

One has to wonder who they have been trying to email, at what email address, and why they just did not pick up a phone and talk directly to the Program Manager of Prepar3d. ( as others have done without any difficulty)Can't justify the License cost to develope for P3D. ? 6 Licenses @ 9.85 / month = ONE PMDG 737NGX sale a month.Just does not make any sense at all ...

Edited January 8, 201214 yr by FSMP

Perhaps the reason for Lockheed Martin's different approach was that it could see commercial advantages in having high-quality scenery available for its core customers, but did not see such an advantage in having high-quality aircraft. Details of scenery are unlkely to be critical to such customers: details of specific aircraft could well be.PMDG aircraft are supreme examples of their kind but how many of those core customers would actually want them?

A different approach maybe, but that should not result in a total lack of Communications

Edited January 8, 201214 yr by FSMP

Maybe one day, when somebody else shows that simmers are moving to different sims or sticking with FSX, MS might realise that they're losing revenue from this section of the market and reconsider their position regarding 3rd party developers.

I doubt it. The same people who thought that they could make more money by freezing out third-party developers will be the same ones who will pull the plug on the entire operation when they don't see the projected revenues coming their way and decide that there is no viable flight simulator market on the PC.

Edited January 8, 201214 yr by Mountain Man

The truth is, people will go where their favorite 3rd party developers will go. If orbx would go with xplane, then i would go there. For the moment orbx goes with p3d, so because i like scenery and all that orbx does, i will propably go with p3d. But... for the moment the fs community is divided, and that is what is troubling. And still, we don't even know how to use p3d, i mean it is supposed to be for private use and all that, but you can still purchase it, and it is all very complicated at that department. It is like we will be using it but hiding at the same time, if you know what i mean.With the Ms Flight fail, one thing came apparent. The lack of something else that would be as good, and open to the whole world, and basically... inexpensive. Xplane is an option, but i tried it too, and didn't like it that much, and basically the thing that i don't like at all with it is that i can't even asign the hat switch for looking around as with fsx and other games, do you have to be a nuclear scientist to do it??? If people at Laminar research simplify some of these things, then xplane would be more worthwhile. Right now it is loosing customers just for the whole customization mess alone. That plus th e default planes are not that good, and there aren't many other options, 3rd party aircrafts for xplane are very few.

Edited January 8, 201214 yr by Stathis Mexias

I am disturbed at the model that Microsoft has chosen for the upcoming FLIGHT platform. They obviously want to promote online Gaming ("Windows Live!") and have declined (from what I can see thus far) to produce a truly cutting edge, quantum leap in eye-candy AND frame-rate, BRAND NEW simulator.Why? Clearly the "overall market" of potential buyers they're aiming at are the same folks that focus groups in the motion picture business aim for - "Joe Average" not "Joe the 787 Pilot". While no game can be all things to all people, FSX at least offers a pathway to complex scenery and aircraft (FlightBeam KSFO, ORBX PNW, PMDG (all)) to tempt those who want to do more at a much deeper immersion level. Sort of like the model railroading enthusiasts... one guy has a circular track, 1 locomotive, 3 cars and a caboose and goes around and around... the other fellow destroyed his basement and bult a multi-level series of railbeds, rivers, bridges, buildings, switchyards, turntables, yada yada yada.I had tremendously high expectations for the new "FLIGHT", but I am reluctantly starting to worry that the product has been 'dumbed down' to meet the expectations of "Joe Average" instead of those of us to whom flying is more than just sightseeing and flying some kind of structured 'missions'. The cost in development dollars to truly 'do this right' was probably something that Microsoft felt would produce limited returns (because of the 'small' market of flying enthusiasts compared to the much larger market in FPS 'shoot-em-up' and Racing/Driving ("Dirt" "GTA" etc) games. Crysis indeed.It seems likely that we in the flying community would pay dearly for a new gaming platform with smoother and much more "photo-realistic" scenery that doesn't stutter or mis-match colors, or have moving AI automobiles disappearing instead of continuing down the highway...but candidly, this would be a monumentally-expensive and time consuming effort, even if a 3000-lb gorilla like Microsoft threw everything in their powerl into developing such a game.The tell-tale reality is that there are only a handful of "alternatives" to FS platforms, XPlaneX comes to mind and it's not even close in many ways (but shines when flying near the ground especially near roads and freeways). If companys like E/A got into it, you might well see the multi-million dollar development of an all-new fully-multi-threaded 64-bit native gaming platform that requies 8GB min ram and uses it ALL.I fly on a system with 16GB of ram and a SSD 500GB drive, and I'm still pretty miffed that the autogen insists and popping up more details as I fly closer to an area, instead of having the entire screen pre-populated out to the effective IFR horizon. Clearly if I'm flying Mach 2 this is a more difficult programming and rendering task than if I'm flying 300 knots.My point is that each of us has an "internal vision" or 'dream' for what we 'wish' FS did... better ATC, better real-time maps, eye-popping graphics that rival CGI effects in motion pictures nowadays, and of course the real feel of a heavy jet felt coming back through the control surfaces.Sadly, while our computers can make up to 5 billion decisions per second, and our graphics cards can draw megaflops of pixels, this dream remains elusive, hard to achieve, and distant.Robert

Edited January 8, 201214 yr by rsm