REX Airports HD and Business 101

[basementflyguy 156]

Anybody who has followed the OTG blog or YouTube channel knows I'm a huge fan of REX and their work. But as a business person and as a customer I have to say I'm disappointed in their launch day infrastructure. I get it that many sim devs are small shops and can't handle the server back-end of a large software firm. So I'm pretty forgiving on download times. BUT - if you're going to heavily promote a product, email customers to invite them to a Twitch stream that further promotes that product, and then forecast "imminent" release for several days all in the interest of spiking demand, you'd better d**n well be able to serve that demand when the launch comes. Otherwise your brand and your business will suffer, as they have today.

 

REX has my money this morning. Somebody let me know when the REX download servers and forums are able to handle the load REX so well created for them today so I can get the product I purchased.

Edited November 5, 2016 by Jim Young
removed inappropriate language

[sanh 823]

This product is available on a number of websites including simmarket and flightsimstore and the rex website. Doubt they are all struggling under load.

 

I agree with their approach and would do the same thing. I understand your frustration though.

[Pe11e 812]

This product is available on a number of websites including simmarket and flightsimstore and the rex website. Doubt they are all struggling under load.

 

I agree with their approach and would do the same thing. I understand your frustration though.

 

Yes, but I could get the price discount only via REX site.  :wink:

[TristanAbyss 1]

Hi,

 

no, if you purchased any REX product on another shop (e.g. simmarket), you get the discount there as well. So did I.

 

best regards,

 

Tris

[basementflyguy 156]

Thanks for that. I'll try the other sites. It's not an end of the world matter, clearly. Frustrating nonetheless. In the future I'll know not to even bother on release day.

[edpatino 1,960]

Yes, but I could get the price discount only via REX site.  :wink:

 

Not true. I've got it at SimMarket. The only thing if you buy through a reseller is that you should have bought a previous REX product through that same store.

Cheers, Ed

[basementflyguy 156]

Oh, and I posted this before my morning coffee. Reading it now it seems a bit intense. Apologies for that. 

[yidahoo 365]

Oh, and I posted this before my morning coffee. Reading it now it seems a bit intense. Apologies for that. 

 

No, I share your concerns. I bought this morning and have spent the best part of the daylight hours trying to download without success. Now I have blown - it would seem - all my activations without actually downloading a single kb. Problems I can understand, silence about problems I have less tolerance for. 

[rstough 523]

 

Anybody who has followed the OTG blog or YouTube channel knows I'm a huge fan of REX and their work. But as a business person and as a customer I have to say I'm disappointed in their launch day infrastructure. I get it that many sim devs are small shops and can't handle the server back-end of a large software firm. So I'm pretty forgiving on download times. BUT - if you're going to heavily promote a product, email customers to invite them to a Twitch stream that further promotes that product, and then forecast "imminent" release for several days all in the interest of spiking demand, you'd better d**n well be able to serve that demand when the launch comes. Otherwise your brand and your business will suffer, as they have today.

 

REX has my money this morning. Somebody let me know when the REX download servers and forums are able to handle the load REX so well created for them today so I can get the product I purchased.

 

 

Again, please understand that we are doing ALL we can at the moment to get this working.  There are many that are not having an issue, so we have to address each one individually.

 

I have been  posting the following solutions on other posts:

 

If you purchased from the REX store:

 

1.) If you are using the REX File Transfer Manager tool to download, start it again and under the "Download Type" option select the 2nd option "Use direct download links to download files".  This will provide individual links to download.  You can use your download manager built within your browser to control it at this time.

 

2.) If option #1 doesn't work on the bottom of the REX File Transfer/Support Manager is a link to "Submit Support Ticket".  Click that link, fill out the form, and submit it.  This will automatically generate a support ticket within our system and we directly contact you with another solution."

 

If you purchased from another store please do the following:

 

1.) Please go to our support forum:  http://www.realenvironmentxtreme.com/forums and submit your request within our forum.  If you are a first time user of our forum.  PLEASE place your order #, product, and store your purchased REX from within your signature.  This will speed up the validation process for us.

[basementflyguy 156]

Thanks for you follow up. I was eventually able to get through and the product looks good.

[Boomer 1,619]

Sigh.

 

I want it now now now.

 

What has happened to society.

[basementflyguy 156]

Sigh.

 

I want it now now now.

 

What has happened to society.

 

 

LOL Boomer ... a "kids these days" sentiment. We should start the GOS Forum for Grumpy Old Simmers. I'll be the charter member.

 

My point in the OP though wasn't that I needed it immediately. Indeed I wrote that I typically am very forgiving of delays on launch day, and I've never complained once in these forums about them before. My point was that I thought REX bruised their brand by working so hard to spike a demand that they couldn't meet. I think that's an ethical question as a business person, not a question of gratification as a consumer. If I'm going to entice my customers in my own business I need to be certain I can meet their needs. Otherwise it feels like a failed expectation.

[rstough 523]

LOL Boomer ... a "kids these days" sentiment. We should start the GOS Forum for Grumpy Old Simmers. I'll be the charter member.

 

My point in the OP though wasn't that I needed it immediately. Indeed I wrote that I typically am very forgiving of delays on launch day, and I've never complained once in these forums about them before. My point was that I thought REX bruised their brand by working so hard to spike a demand that they couldn't meet. I think that's an ethical question as a business person, not a question of gratification as a consumer. If I'm going to entice my customers in my own business I need to be certain I can meet their needs. Otherwise it feels like a failed expectation.

 

We never intended to not meet the needs of our customers.  As a 3rd party developer you really never know how a product will be received.  Even to the day of release of REX Worldwide Airports we went back in forth internally about what to expect.  We clearly under estimated the hit our servers would take.  We have learned some lessons here and things WILL be different when the next release comes.   A little humility here and there is always a good thing.

[Bobsk8 12,492]

LOL Boomer ... a "kids these days" sentiment. We should start the GOS Forum for Grumpy Old Simmers. I'll be the charter member.

 

My point in the OP though wasn't that I needed it immediately. Indeed I wrote that I typically am very forgiving of delays on launch day, and I've never complained once in these forums about them before. My point was that I thought REX bruised their brand by working so hard to spike a demand that they couldn't meet. I think that's an ethical question as a business person, not a question of gratification as a consumer. If I'm going to entice my customers in my own business I need to be certain I can meet their needs. Otherwise it feels like a failed expectation.

 

Anyone that has been into simming for more than a year or two realizes that when a new product, or upgrade is released, trying to get it on the first day is not going to go easily. Wait a day or two, and it will be trouble free. 

[PaulFWatts 100]

I think that another point here is that the download installer was showing that files were 100% downloaded but were in fact incomplete which led to all sorts of problems for people when trying to install.

 

Therefore there was some sort of bug in this software which was adding to the frustration for many people. Even trying to use the manual download links from within this software I had occasion when the files seemingly downloaded but were the incorrect size.

 

Also added to the mix is that the REX forums were unable to be accessed at the peak of the problems due to server overload.

 

Thus it is not a simple problem of "the servers are slow" and we can see that they are slow and wait, it was compounded by the bugs in the download manager as we thought it had been downloaded okay and strange problems when trying to install and then unable to access the support forums to find out what was wrong.

 

Therefore a big lesson to be learned by Rex is not to release brand new deployment software that has not been adequately user tested for a key product launch where the launch has been hyped. This is Software Release 101.

 

I say all this in the spirit of learning lessons for next time.

 

As I've previously publicly stated I believe the quality of the actual REX software is 1st class and it's a shame they have been let down by deployment issues as described above.