you still don't understand do you?He stated that it can take several years for someone to actually produce enough to have earned back the money the company invested in him in the first place.That's not just because of training, but getting to know the environment, learning to work together, etc. etc. etc.If the team gets larger that period gets longer. And not only that, but the average productivity of productive people on large teams is lower.I was involved in one huge project, probably larger than the MSFS team.It was 70 people by the time I left on that one project alone. About half of these actually contributed directly to the product we delivered, the rest were support staff (testers, network admins, quality managers, secretaries, that kind of people). They helped us work more efficiently but they themselves aren't visible in the productivity data.If the MSFS team is 50 people there's at most 30 people doing design, artwork, and code. The rest are support staff.The cost of producing a version of FS is many millions. Running a 50 man team costs Microsoft probably around $10-$20 million a year. With a 2 year release cycle that's roughly $30 million dollars.To that you can add the cost of research that needs to be done, special software and hardware that needs to be purchased, outside consultants that are brought in. That makes the total cost over 2 years to produce a new version about $35 million (the mentioned cost is usually only that research part and doesn't include salaries, therefore is a lot lower).The direct cost of each unit that is shipped is further composed of marketing cost (several million, maybe tens of millions with a release like FS2004 which saw a lot of extra things from previous releases), production and shipping of the actual CD sets ($10-$20 per unit depending on where it is going to go), cost of running the shop that sells it (the shop needs to pay rent, taxes on property, heating, electricity, staff, etc. etc. as well), salestax, and whatnot.In the end Microsoft gets maybe $10-$20 out of one fullpriced copy of the product during the first 2 years (a bit more from early adopters as the introduction price is higher than the normal retail price but most of that goes towards the stores).At a running cost for the project of $30 million over the life of the product even with no new development going on that means they need to sell about 1.5 million copies to break even.At an estimated sales figure (this was for FS2002, FS2004 may break it because of the higher marketing cost and increased interest in aviation with the COF celebrations) of 2 million that's not a very high margin at all.In fact it's darn close to being unprofitable to keep the team operating.

>"given the (maybe only "perceived") problems in FS9.">>I think you owe your fellow simmers more respect than slipping>that one in there. The seasonal CTD issue was repeatable and>proven and acknowledged by Microsoft in the patch. >>In general, I never had any negative effects with the 9.1>patch and the only repeatable problem I ever had with 9.0 was>the seasonal CTD scenario that was posted by one of the users.> The 9.1 patch did fix that, so it fixes something.>That one was but it certainly wasn't release critical.That's what he was probably referring to.This update release wasn't a patch at all (and Microsoft themselves quite correctly never used the word, only amateur hobby sites like Avsim and fs.com (nothing against them, but they're not professionals in the software industry and therefore amateurs in that regard) call it that).A patch is an emergency fix for release critical problems. This was not, this was in effect a service pack (that's why the version number jumped to 9.1, which indicates a major upgrade and not a minor bugfix which would have yielded a 9.0.1 or less significant number).

Microsoft didn't update FS2002 because it wasn't needed. They updated FS2004 to get rid of some common annoyances and found ways to improve performance a bit in the process (maybe as a consequence even).FS2002 was the ONLY version of the last decade which didn't see an intermediate update release. so "because MS hasn't released a patch in how many years" (in which I'll assume you mean "patch" to be any update to the product at all) stretched just 2 years, not the decades you seem to have wanted people to believe.And who knows, the updated code for FS2004 might well have been a side effect of development towards a new release. Such things do happen you know.

Have you heard that MS just sold the Links (Golf) game?I think if we assume the worst, that MS is going to get out of the FS business, it will sell the code and the rights to another developer.

Maybe a hypothetical FS-10 might include a Train and CFS module in it...for "value added" to sell more units. :D

Who knows. It may also be released for XBox to boost sales of that. I'd guess quite a few of us would buy an XBox is FS were available only on that...

Rallisport challenge games, Rise of Nations, Links (though they say MS sold it probably because EA has gobbled the right to use the correct names like they did with NASCAR and NFL among others). That is only a guess though but if I know EA...Microsoft is quite big in games nowadays and have no intention to get out of it. Games is bigger than the movie business you know and Microsoft sure as hell wants to be part of it. Not only by making sure directx is being used but also directly in publishing games.As mentioned CFS 3 and train simulator wasn

Ahhh... now i understand it. Even though FS is expensive to make, and they may not make all their money back, i just hope they give up their games like "Zoo Tycoon" befor flight sim. I really dont think it will happen, MS would of informed us earlier last year or after the decision was made. They did with MSTS and CFS, i just dont think FS would be a exception. But lets hope alot of people are wrong, and we will see a new version this summer. :-roll

im thinking the same way about it as you. If its always been a big success, and always done well, there is no need to drop it.

Just a rumour running rampant at this point.... If they had dropped Flight Sim, I'm almost positive they would make it public at some point, and that hasn't happened yet. Until they make an official announcement of FS's demise, or start their PR campaign to promote the next FlightSim, it will just continue to be rumours running rampant.....I personally wouldn't mind to see FS10 wait another whole year to make a 3-year development cycle. FS9.1 is running very well, 3rd party addons aplenty to keep it going. The very fact that they released a patch to fix those problems is a slight hint at a longer production cycle. As for the rumour of the FS10 Beta being released, I wouldn't doubt it at all, but if Microsoft figures out who leaked that information, that person could be in a bit of trouble very soon......

>This update release wasn't a patch at all (and Microsoft>themselves quite correctly never used the word, only amateur>hobby sites like Avsim and fs.com (nothing against them, but>they're not professionals in the software industry and>therefore amateurs in that regard) call it that).I seem to remember the word "patch" was shown on the photos of the MS presentation boards when they annouced the update at the Avsim conference.Victor

Yes they used the name patch. But for me patch update it

I think the patch came in part because of some programming improvements discovered during the development of FS10, some subroutines that are more efficient, that they could merge into the old engine. Some estimates of sales of FS2002 (Bear Cartwright) at around 2 million, and I'm guessing FS10 a few more. $30 x 2 million is $60,000,000+ and that buys alot of programming hours, expecially since much of the code is known and already developed. Be very odd for MS to stop on this, though it's small potatoes compared to their OS and productivity software. Noel

>But can someone explain why making flight sims would be more>expensive then other type of games???A number of reasons off the top of my head:1. Consider the large number of aspects of the real world that must be simulated or accurately depicted (topology, meteorology, flight dynamics, artificial intelligence, air traffic control, navigation aids, procedures, etc). Each of these areas require domain experts which increases the size of the team. 2. Consider the amount of research that's required to obtain accurate data and reference materials, any or all of which may require licensing fees. There may also be licensing issues and fees involved in depicting some aerospace companies' products or using their names. 3. Volume of data. There are huge amounts of data to be processed, any or all of which may need to be cleaned before it can be used. This also requires domain experts, consultants or third-party collaboration.4. Consider the amount of testing that must be carried out to ensure accuracy.

It was, but the context made sure they were playing a joke on everyone. If I recall the word was explicitly quoted to show it was what people would call it while being something else.There's a difference between: we're going to release an update, a "patch", which includes blah blah blah.and: we're going to release a patch.