Boeing 717 and MD-90 EFD Project in the making

[UcShrek 0]

Dear Friends:

 

My name is Joseph M Leon, I live in the US, I am a family man and a very enthusiast fan of aviation, the Flight Simulator World, I am also a game and model designer. I have a very special passion for our community and I want to give a something of special value, and for that I need your help. I am starting a specific project as we speak called “Learn to Fly with the Boeing 717”, I cannot stress you enough how much I would love to finish project and that our beloved community can be happy and proud of owning another high-end quality add-on for their FSX aircraft line.

 

If any of you have not heard about a website called www.kickstarted.com, this is a new way to fund and support creativity, the way it works is: someone can show a project to the community worldwide, and for those who want to help and support that particular project, they can make a pledge and they will receive something in return, in most case is the final retail product and additional rewards depending on the pledge. You will always receive something in return for your pledge and there is a fixed deadline to obtain the funds for the project, if the project receives 100% or more of the funds, the creator of the project receives all these funds and starts to develop that particular project, but if the project does not get 100% of the funds no money exchanges hands and everyone gets protected.

 

Now a days, is very common for a lot of developers to sell pre-orders of certain product, which is a way they can help fund their new projects, and this website does something similar for so many people around the world.

 

So I want to ask for your help, at least by looking at my project and hopefully helping supporting it, or if not you can help us by spreading the word out. Either way your help will be very appreciated, thanks in advance for your helping on this process.

 

Here is the link of the project:

 

Best Regards,

 

Joseph M Leon

Salem OR USA.

 

ps.- I hope this is the right forum location to place this for the most people to read, I am sorry for not knowing and duplicating this, hopefully someone can help by keeping this post as much live as possible.

[Chock 17,769]

It is an intruiging idea, however, I think you will perhaps need to offer some more information if you are to convince people to fund it on spec. To elaborate on why I think that is so...

 

I noticed that you have mentioned a deadline of approximately one year. This sounds like a tall order to me frankly; it has generally taken companies such as SimCheck, FSL and PMDG a number of years to put together airliners for FSX with the amount of features you list, and this is with a number of experienced people all working on the project. If yours is a solo project, then it seems doubtful that you could beat their kind of timeframe, not impossible I am sure if someone had all of the requisite skills, but confidence in your ability to deliver something on that timescale would be a bit more likely to be forthcoming if we could know what your experience is, for example, have you made commercial or freeware FSX models before? Have you programmed the systems for them? Have you detailed knowledge or experience in operating a Boeing 717?

 

I also noticed that you have labeled several images on your link to the project as being 'GMax models' despite them being displayed in FSDS, and I have to say that I thought that came across as misleading, and it did not inspire confidence. I like FSDS, as indeed I do 3DSMax (since I have to train people in it for a living amongst other things), and have made some freeware models in both of them over the years, so I know you can do a lot with FSDS, but if you are making it in FSDS rather than GMax, then you ought to clarify this.

 

I don't wish to pour cold water on your enthusiasm, and I do wish you luck with the endeavour, but you need to tell us more about why we should believe it is possible for you to come through with what is promised before people are likely to pledge cash, after all, some people are reticent about doing that with Captain Sim, and they at least have a known track record of having delivered products.

 

Al

[UcShrek 0]

Thanks so much Chock for your comments, I consider them to be very valid concerns, I have added a FAQ section in the project's website, that answers all if not most of your questions, and thanks as well for making the clarification on the description notes for the pictures I have added, by no means is intended to be misleading, I hope you have a chance to read through them, unfortunately copying and pasting them would make this a large post, thanks again for you taking a look at our project.

[Shaka 2]

If any of you have not heard about a website called www.kickstarted.com, this is a new way to fund and support creativity

 

Actually, it's "kickstarter". "kickstarted" takes us to a placeholder website. Just saying.

 

I like kickstarter. there's some interesting ideas up there for sure. The format isn't as well suited for software projects, because the idea of funding most projects is to pay for manufacturing and startup costs (I'm not saying this is the only way, though). In the case of software, these may not be as significant, so it can be harder to convince people they need to cough up money to finance development. This isn't to say it won't work - I'm just saying it's harder to get backers if you don't have a working prototype. A key element to successful projects is the creator's ability to convince backers that he actually has the capability to make the thing work. That is why many of the projects have a working example. This also results in backers getting their rewards within a short period of time. These could all be reasons why your project hasn't got any backers yet.

 

But this isn't the case with a software project where all you really have is an idea with little in the way of progress. I'm not sure when you started the project, but I'm assuming it was at least a week ago. In that case, there doesn't seem to be a lot of progress. This does not inspire confidence. I would recommend that you wait until the project is much further along - maybe 50%. You could have the model almost completed, numerous example of liveries, and could be working on finishing the programming, which I assume would require the most technical expertise. This would help convince backers that you actually have the ability to finish the project. It would help to explain at that time what specific costs were involved and where the money would go (need $500 to hire an artist, need $1500 for a programmer, whatever). Also, if you have created FS add-ons in the past, providing examples of those would go a long way. Otherwise, this is quite a leap of faith that you are asking people to take.

 

You have set an ambitious goal for yourself. This is the sort of addon that would appeal to me personally. I wish you luck with your project.

[Jon 4]

I would have to agree with Shaka on this.

 

Complex, working systems have to be the hardest part to develop, or I would imagine we would have seen freeware groups such as POSKY put more effort into them given the excellent quality of the modeling and textures. To date, only iFly has really done this with their 747.

 

I suppose you face a twofold problem, however: if you start developing everything else now, you still can't know if the project will get funding in the future and those exterior models might be dated by the time you have the system programming done. On the other hand, if you have nothing to show, I don't think people will be willing to invest enough to get you to that amount. After all, why spend $50 towards a hypothetical 717 when there are products that can be had for a similar price or a bit more already? Sim add-ons are expensive, and there is an opportunity cost involved.

 

This isn't meant to be a knock against you, I just think that you're approaching this in the wrong way, especially with the timeline you've set. I don't think any simmer who would want a realistic 717 would think that you could deliver in that timeframe, and therefore give you the money you need.

 

With that said, if you manage to get this project off the ground, I could possibly help with the documentation. Best of luck.

[UcShrek 0]

Thanks to both for you comments and feedback, speaking for my self and my team all feedback is welcome. We knew, since we thought about this project, about the up and downs of kickstarter, this project of mine has been in my mind for a VERY long time, we were hoping to find among the FSX community what in other type of business we call: "angel investors", but even when there is a big chance this project is not going to get funded, we are working on different options to reach this goal and get the project off the ground, I know that one way or the other I will make this happen, I am committed to complete it, thanks one more time for your comments. Jon I like your offer about the documentation for the B717, let me know what can we do to make that hapen, thanks in advance.

[Jon 4]

Sent you a PM, just to give you a heads up.

[Flight Sim Geek 0]

Thanks to both for you comments and feedback, speaking for my self and my team all feedback is welcome. We knew, since we thought about this project, about the up and downs of kickstarter, this project of mine has been in my mind for a VERY long time, we were hoping to find among the FSX community what in other type of business we call: "angel investors", but even when there is a big chance this project is not going to get funded, we are working on different options to reach this goal and get the project off the ground, I know that one way or the other I will make this happen, I am committed to complete it, thanks one more time for your comments. Jon I like your offer about the documentation for the B717, let me know what can we do to make that hapen, thanks in advance.

 

Do you have an update on the project. Could you please PM and I could sort out some funding!

 

Aaron G.