Will Flight Hurt FSX Addon Vendors?

[RicardoNY1 2]

Remember what ORBX said about the number of buyers of add-ons. If FSX relied on those 40,000 sales it wasn't really viablle .

I understand...........the point I am trying to make is that most people who have been using MSFS are used to the idea that they can expand the simulator based on add-ons, both freeware and payware. For an example, take a look at free water replacement textures for FS2004 or other freeware options offered for free here and elsewhere. You'll see the download figures in the millions. People know and have been expecting to be able to customize FS at the very least through freeware add-ons. My second point is that because there are that many more options and resources available for MSFS, that it is the more attractive sim to use. I don't know if everyone understands that conecpt. I've seen some very nice simulation pieces out there, one in particular is the World of Subways series, like the "PATH". As nice as it looks, it gets boring quickly because you can't add or do anything else with it. Same few routes, same limited car selection. MS Train Sim is older than heck and people are still using it over many new sims of that genre. Why? Because of the devleopment around it. And if MS released a new version with an SDK, people would jump on it. Edited January 17, 2012 by RicardoNY1

[dmaher 0]

Not for all or for most, but it certainly IS for some...

Not as far as I know J, many pay a wage - yes...but the OP implied people get rich.But I didn’t mean it as a sob story :( ; if the post had said “There are people earning a wage without paying MS a royalty” I’d agree. And as you might expect that wage is well less than mainstream gaming…but no regrets it’s just a choice.FSX add-ons can also be seen as a massive externalized cost for MS; that view is why MS has supported add-ons. IMO

[nudata 10]

If Flight is a "weak" simulator it will take time for non-gamers to dump it and give something else a try or return to FSX. Yes some will regain their disk space in 30 minutes. Others will take longer looking for some indication that it replaces the broad-based FSX. Let's hope it is an obvious failure or FSX addon purchases may be delayed while customer's examine its potential. Addon vendors could become concerned if sales drop off for more than a month.I have several FSX addons on my list but will hold-off until I have a good "look" at flight.

[n4gix 4,947]

Why are some folks thinking that there's some sort of dichotomous choice being demanded?I've currently got FS98, FS2000, FS2002, FS2004 (FS9), FSX+A, and Flight (beta) all happily cohabitating my flightsim test computers......and I can load and enjoy any of them whenever I wish with a simple click on the desired Icon on my Desktop! :(

[Guest]

If Flight is a "weak" simulator it will take time for non-gamers to dump it and give something else a try or return to FSX. Yes some will regain their disk space in 30 minutes. Others will take longer looking for some indication that it replaces the broad-based FSX. Let's hope it is an obvious failure or FSX addon purchases may be delayed while customer's examine its potential. Addon vendors could become concerned if sales drop off for more than a month.I have several FSX addons on my list but will hold-off until I have a good "look" at flight.

Same here. I am definitely not buying anything anymore until I've tried MS Flight AND until I know which direction DLC is going to bring us. I already spend way too much money last year on FSX, so... this hold is a healthy one. :( I was going to cut on FSX addons anyway...

[ahuimanu 50]

a pmdg-level addon from Microsoft for flight seems HIGHLY unliklely. If they plan on "listening to their market," then market will demand skydrift.

[drumsonly2002 3]

Can this be ported over to Flight? http://www.msxbox-world.com/xbox360/xboxlive/marketplace/games/59204/skydrift/addons/page1.html Just kidding! I would prefer this: http://www.dodosim.com/ and this: http://www.rainman.tv/index_files/rainman_helisim.htm If that doesn't happen looking forwards to Prepar 3D Version 2.

a pmdg-level addon from Microsoft for flight seems HIGHLY unliklely. If they plan on "listening to their market," then market will demand skydrift.

[drumsonly2002 3]

I went off topic, Will MS Flight hurt vendors, No. If the graphics engine is better than FSX, (I suspect it is) they will have a hit on their hands. I now put my asbestos suit on, and get my marshmallows ready for action. Hopefully they will not get over cooked.

[SpiritFlyer 987]

I went off topic, Will MS Flight hurt vendors, No. If the graphics engine is better than FSX, (I suspect it is) they will have a hit on their hands. I now put my asbestos suit on, and get my marshmallows ready for action. Hopefully they will not get over cooked.

Dan, you are the best standup comedian in AVSIM! I imagine you will have a few dragons breathe on you.Kind regards,

[Attila 2]

I went off topic, Will MS Flight hurt vendors, No. If the graphics engine is better than FSX, (I suspect it is) they will have a hit on their hands. I now put my asbestos suit on, and get my marshmallows ready for action. Hopefully they will not get over cooked.

It is debatable if Flight will hurt vendors. We'll see, but fragmenting the community further isn't likely to help.As for Flight being a hit, sure it could be, though I see no signs of that anywhere. Curiously, the target market does not yet know about Flight, because all I see is people on established FS sites discussing how Flight does not satisfy their requirements.

[alainneedle1 97]

It is hurting vendors already....who's not buying addons until they have a definite answer about what Flight will be,.(please don't start the crap about Flight beta been all it is).If you were a 3PD right now will you say that Flight is the future.....naaaa you would not, do you remember when Orbx started pushing Prepar3D and Aerosoft started pushing XP-10......they did that because Flight is crap or because they can't sell addons for it (so far)....So, if you take JV statement here, http://forum.avsim.n...out-of-the-bag/ , read what I've highlighted in red and tell me that they did all that for a coin game...come on guys stop that nonsense with Flight been a coin game only....JV is not that stupid.Now read the rest of his post and tell me why he's pushing Prepar3D....can it be because Flight is a coin game and not worth their sceneries or because they can't make money selling their addons (in-game app store).....so their sceneries were to be made for a coin game....HELLO!!!So Flight is only a coin game??Quote: We've had Flight alpha code running in-house for well over a year; about 25 of our team installed a few builds. We've been talking to MS for over two years about Flight.I have to apologise to this whole forum because I sent Alain Needle a PM about a year ago since he was pestering me so much. And I let him know a little too much info. Oops, you guys have suffered for that lapse, sorry.Long story short, we spent a lot of time working with MS on white papers and looked at the code, gave them copies of all our products, told them how to do it right. They even used screenshots of our 1S2 Darrington in their mission dialog boxes, so they must have installed our scenery into Flight at some point, LOL!About March 2010 everything went quiet despite promises of new builds. Later in 2010 we were told to go away, no SDK will be shipped.Thanks MS, for all the fish.I've been a good NDA citizen and kept my lip zipped as best I can, although I saw there were some leaks last year from other disgruntled devs.Bottom line for us is that a closed environment with an in-game app store does not appeal to us since we cannot generate income from such a proprietary arrangement. I doubt that a belated SDK will arrive quickly enough for us to hold any interest now. The studio IMHO should not have stopped talking to third party developers but a decision at VP level must have been made to internalize the project.As for Orbx FSX will remain our core platform for at least 5-10 years and we will run Prepar3D as a parallel platform. We're porting all our stuff to P3D over the coming months. P3D V2.0 looks crazy cool, although I am under NDA with LM. We will release about 30+ products for FSX/P3D this year alone, including about 5-6 new regions including some in Europe. We're doubling our regions team and investing in FSX/P3D R&D as quickly as we can. We see no reason why anyone would walk away from 5 years of FSX addons investment to a new simulator. The future from our perspective is very bright. : end of quote.

Edited January 23, 2012 by alainneedle1

[simmerhead 885]

Well, I've stopped buying addons, but I guess that isn't going to hurt anyone. One of the reasons is Flight, but the main reason is the lack of quality addons. I've got what I need and the few things I desire are sadly accompanied by some usability and/or quality issues that keeps my wallet firmly closed.

[alainneedle1 97]

Well, I've stopped buying addons, but I guess that isn't going to hurt anyone.One of the reasons is Flight, but the main reason is the lack of quality addons. I've got what I need and the few things I desire are sadly accompanied by some usability and/or quality issues that keeps my wallet firmly closed.

The good thing (for me) about the store is that all patches or upgrade (if any... lol) will be automatically downloaded, I've you tried to keep up with all patches and stuff if you (for what ever reason) have to reinstall FSX.... what a pain in the a$$, you have to keep up with all your 3PD addons to see if they have a new patch all the time, new airport = new patch after install (when ever the patch is ready) there is always something new to download.Now don't download this patch as the new one will take care of the other one, install this patch first, this one second..... and on and on and on....at least two to three straigh days of installation if you have as many addons as I have........

[Guest]

The good thing (for me) about the store is that all patches or upgrade (if any... lol) will be automatically downloaded, I've you tried to keep up with all patches and stuff if you (for what ever reason) have to reinstall FSX.... what a pain in the a$$, you have to keep up with all your 3PD addons to see if they have a new patch all the time, new airport = new patch after install (when ever the patch is ready) there is always something new to download.Now don't download this patch as the new one will take care of the other one, install this patch first, this one second..... and on and on and on....at least two to three straigh days of installation if you have as many addons as I have........

Hear hear! It's a pita to install some addons... Not only because of all the needed codes, serials, key files, etc. etc. but also because all of the upgrades and updates. Some addons. like UTX, need to prepare an update before you can run it, a lot of updates don't include previous ones so you have to install a few in the right order. And it's already a pita to figure out if you have all updates or not. Like on the Orbx site you have to compare the numbers of the updates with the files you have: there are no handy dates (why not?!? )that show you if it's a new update or old or whatever. And you have to take care if you have to have FTX active or not or you screw everything up. And don't forget about the libs...! Then you have to go spend a lot of time installing for instance REX even when you only use ONE specific set of textures: install the 1.0 version, install the update to 2.0 and then the update to whatever number (did you ever see the update page on their forum? You get nuts figuring out all possible version numbers). And on and on and on... Every 3PD has another way of downloading and installing and verifying things. It sucks big time.In my dreams I see MSFlight. I just bought a new PC. I log into the MS Flight store (only once login needed) and everything I bought is there. Updated and all. I select what I want to install, click on OK and after some time I can fly. Period. Wouldn't that be great? (Don't know if it will be like this... but it's a dream that might come true). Edited January 23, 2012 by J van E

[simmerhead 885]

The good thing (for me) about the store is that all patches or upgrade (if any... lol) will be automatically downloaded, I've you tried to keep up with all patches and stuff if you (for what ever reason) have to reinstall FSX.... what a pain in the a$$, you have to keep up with all your 3PD addons to see if they have a new patch all the time, new airport = new patch after install (when ever the patch is ready) there is always something new to download.Now don't download this patch as the new one will take care of the other one, install this patch first, this one second..... and on and on and on....at least two to three straigh days of installation if you have as many addons as I have........

Yep, it sure is a pain, and on top of that some 3PDs find the need to reinvent the wheel and make their own installers etc... Even more ###### to install and update/patch. If MS succeed in making a simple addon store for FLIGHT I will applaud it. With the iPad and iPhone I have become quite spoild in terms of how easy it is to buy, install and update apps. I fear though that like the Appstore, the FLIGHT store will have little of substance to offer.