The reason MS stopped making flight sims is that most people find them boring or too hard to understand so they play games where they run around shooting things (Which I do aswell)

The reason MS stopped making flight sims is that most people find them boring or too hard to understand so they play games where they run around shooting things (Which I do aswell)

 

No, it wasn't.

 

Would you like to venture a guess as to the FS version that sold the most copies?

The reason MS stopped making flight sims is that most people find them boring or too hard to understand so they play games where they run around shooting things (Which I do aswell)

 

It's more likely to be that Microsoft decided it wasn't worth its while continuing development.

Look at mw2 millions of sales and players then there's flight Sims with thousands of players I love flight Sim but unless your interested in aviation they mean nothing to you

Wrong again.

Same here dude! The main reason I am waiting for P3D V2 is all the incompatible FSX addons on fleabay :Money Eyes:

Umm - and what makes you think that P3D V2.0 will change ANY of that. If the addon is incompatible with V1.4, it will most likely be incompatible with V2.0.

 

I respect your decision but your reason makes absolutely no sense at all.

Umm - and what makes you think that P3D V2.0 will change ANY of that. If the addon is incompatible with V1.4, it will most likely be incompatible with V2.0.

 

I respect your decision but your reason makes absolutely no sense at all.

 

Perhaps the question should be will existing FSX add-ons be compatible with V2.0?

Does anyone know? What were Flight Simulator's peak yearly sales numbers? Total? Sell-thru, not just sell-in?

 

What matters  in investment decisions is future revenue compared with future costs - past events are largely irrelevant - let bygones be bygones is a sound principle.

Does anyone know? What were Flight Simulator's peak yearly sales numbers? Total? Sell-thru, not just sell-in?

I think it would be interesting to know their sales numbers..

 

 

That will severely limit its sales and revenue. ORBX's opinion is that there are about 40,000 enthusiasts worldwide. 

 

Certainly inside-the-box thinking won't bring about anything significant in this arena.  Depending on how ORBX defines 'enthusiast' (how many smart phone enthusiasts were there before iPhone?), at $500/copy for the killer engine and GUI comes in at $20,000,000.   And when the word gets out amongst aviation enthusiasts worldwide that number could jump up considerably.   I wouldn't gauge market based on FSX w/ its poor performance w/o serious inside knowledge and computer experience, at least for most of its 8 year service life.  The world has tons on excellent engineers, many in lesser affluent areas of the world.   It will happen eventually if not sooner.  I'm hopeful XPlane 64 may already be the simulator that could fill this bill, or who knows maybe P3D, but if they don't eventually a much better simulator will develop, and with it a whole sustained livelihood, just as FSX spawned for the likes of...ORBX.

[quote name='Noel' timestamp='1365746223' post='2641575]

Depending on how ORBX defines 'enthusiast' (how many smart phone enthusiasts were there before iPhone?), at $500/copy for the killer engine and GUI comes in at $20,000,000.

 

That’s a heroic assumption! A handful of posters say they’d pay $500 for a “bare-bones” simulator and you extrapolate that to revenue of $20 M. Any market researcher will tell you that people always claim they’re prepared to pay more that they actually will. Also, if this is a “bare-bones” simulation it would be necessary to buy add-ons to make it useable how much will they add to the initial price for aircraft, scenery, AI ATC, weather, sound etc – double it?

 

Revenue is like the crock of gold at the end of the rainbow – it may not actually exist in reality. On the other hand development costs, which you gloss over, are real and have to be spent before a single penny of revenue is earned.  So who’s going to put up that money?

 

Because a “bare-bones” simulator is no use without add-ons, the developer’s revenue would be dependent on 3PDs delivering an attractive range of acceptably priced add-ons. Conversely, the revenue of a 3PD who developed in advance would be dependent on the simulator being completed.

 

 It’s most unlikely that everyone involved will enter into enforceable agreements to fund and support development. I can’t see the simulation developer or any 3PD agreeing to deliver anything.

 

As well as funding issues, there are technical ones. The simulation’s functionality, structure and interfaces need to be outlined before a single line of code can be written. Similarly an SDK needs to be drafted before 3PDs can begin development. This will  require continuous management to cope with the inevitable changes as development proceeds.  

 

Although anything is possible in principle I believe the practicalities will prevent this. Of course, you could prove me wrong by raising the initial funding organising development yourself.

Umm - and what makes you think that P3D V2.0 will change ANY of that. If the addon is incompatible with V1.4, it will most likely be incompatible with V2.0.

 

I respect your decision but your reason makes absolutely no sense at all.

It’s Ok that you didn't read my previous post; if you did you might have understood my point. Which is that I am perfectly happy with FSX and if P3D V2 turns out to be the big improvement it is expected to be I will buy in so long as, as a minimum the compatible versions of the addon’s that I already own are sold to me at significant discount and by that I mean 75% off. Better still if my current FSX Addon's are Compatible with P3D V2.

 

On the other hand if they are not and I am expected to pay full price for the P3D V2 versions of addon's that I already own I will stick with FSX and scoop up plenty of the Addon's that I want but don't  yet have on ebay for very little, since they will be obsolete.

 

I don't own or have any interest in P3D V1.4! It offers nothing that I don't already have with FSX. The point is if FSX 11 or 12 is $500 I will buy it so long as it doesn't involve me entirely abandoning the hundreds (not including the hardware) I already have invested in FSX.

 

If it does, given the choice between starting all over again spending hundreds or perhaps thousands, I would prefer to continue with FSX and since many would not make the same decision they would be selling their FSX addon's on ebay, i.e. once the dream FS comes along (assuming it is not backwards compatible) FSX is suddenly going to get a lot cheaper! Have you seen the price of FS9 addon’s on ebay? It’s all about opportunity cost.

 

And another thing if there is a dream FS in the next couple of years it will have to be virtually identical to FSX except without the technical problems. Sure it will have improved graphics and more realistic weather and curved runways etc. but the general feel and in flight look will have to be nearly identical to FSX. Why? Because FSX has its Fans, and X-plane has its fans. I tried the X-Plane 10 demo and I didn’t like it. As far as I can tell that’s a common experience and it works the other way around too. If FS 11 or 12 is as different from FSX as FSX is different from X-plane 10 then I imagine many would not like it regardless of how well it worked.