[07MAY17] The sorts of behaviors that cause me concern...

[CaribbeanCLANK 134]

Very interesting read. I really hope DT and PMDG can mend their relationship and both work together to improve the flight sim experience. 

I did not know that there was a conglomerate trying to acquire the FSX rights. 

 

[Manny 1,293]

18 hours ago, rsrandazzo said:

ut there wa

If PMDG could sell within Dovetail channel and outside channel, why not just increase the prices... say to 300$ via the Dovetail channel and your regular price for P3D etc.  Just take the cost of doing business with dovetail into your price. And let the users of Dovetail decide what platform they want to use..   Unless I am missing the point.  

 

In any case, so far I do not have interest in Dovetail (although I bought their training and their regular product.. I did not install either).  I am perfectly happy with P3D and if their V4 is 64bit that would be it.

I am not a big fan of this Install within their eco system crap.  I like it to be free.. Thats why I have stopped  using the new Orbx  eco system for the same reason.  

[Ted Striker 338]

38 minutes ago, Manny said:

If PMDG could sell within Dovetail channel and outside channel, why not just increase the prices... say to 300$ via the Dovetail channel and your regular price for P3D etc.  Just take the cost of doing business with dovetail into your price. And let the users of Dovetail decide what platform they want to use..   Unless I am missing the point.

I've been wondering the same thing while reading this whole thread. Why not just add the Steam and DTG "convenience fees" to the versions sold on the Steam system then let the consumer decide where they want to get it?

Ted Striker

[edpatino 1,960]

19 hours ago, rsrandazzo said:

I have always been against paid-beta testing, for example- and I took an incredible amount of criticism for coming out strongly against the trend by warning users to be wary of their investment ten years ago when the paid-beta trend took off.  Five years later, many users were sharing their horror stories and lamenting that perhaps this was indeed a bad trend in our marketplace.

I'm against this practice too, but it's even worse when the developer offers a product and is not telling you that you're actually buying a beta product. That for me is not acceptable at all, it's bad advertisement and still we're seeing this kind of conduct nowadays by certain devps that in my opinion should be banned from the business. Curiously, lots of people on the community don't pay attention to this corrupted practice and in some cases they even encourage and support those devps, probably because they've plenty of money available for that kind of support.

Cheers, Ed

[spearmint_flyer 579]

Well this makes it extremely clear. FSW will not see me come over as long the policies that are causing this unfair practice continue. PMDG and other developers should strongly support X-Plane or P3D 4 when ever it is released. Clearly Dovetail continues to want to create an arcade of our platform in the interest of profits. They seem to fail to recognize that this platform has never been about the platform developer, this platform has grown because of the 3rd party developers who have painstakingly developed new technologies to improve the platform.

 

I hope Lockheed Martin continues to have a open channel of communication because again. As long as this continues being the problem I will not support Dovetail and FSW. 

 

Thank you. 

[hypercide 97]

While PMDG's concerns are understandable given the current state of the hobby, it seems to me that DTG is in the process of resetting the bar not just with developers, but with a particular segment of the community. The truth is that, however well established providers such as PMDG are in the marketplace, they depend on a host platform into which their products can be injected. Over the years, as the FSX platform itself has gotten long in the tooth, third party developers have gradually colonized the platform and have come to be considered extremely important to maintaining its relevance.  But with that colonization has come a sense of marketplace entitlement--the curious notion that any particular sim is pointless without a carapace of sophisticated and expensive third-party add-on's (surely the IL2 and DCS franchises have served DTG as best-in-class examples of closed development communities that produce extremely high-quality work).  Wanting itself to establish its own position in the center of that marketplace, DTG has every right to put the stick about and give itself room in which to establish its own brand and to bring on board providers who will ensure the broadest possible market appeal. I expect that's why it has been so savvy about building ORBX, Carenado, and A2A right into its sim.

PMDG's main issue, as I see it, is that while PMDG is probably the developer mainly responsible for creating the very high standard of "fidelity" that preoccupies a segment of this community (I myself have owned both the 737NG and NGX), DTG's initial plans for this sim lie in another direction. I say "fidelity" because the rhetoric of accuracy around flight models, systems, terrain, mesh, atmosphere etc etc etc is a kind of gentleman's understanding of what--sitting in front of a desk in a spare room while concealing from our wives the amount of money we spend on this hobby-- "as real as it gets" actually means. In the end, the church of fidelity seems to have nudged this hobby away from the catholicity (I intend a usage of that word that is entirely relevant here; if you're unsure, please look it up) that is one of its most wonderful attributes. 

Why would DTG bend over backwards to court PMDG when DTG may not be interested in that idea of "fidelity" for some time to come? DTG is, after all, bringing another flightsim game to market, and I wonder whether they have figured out that producing a fligthsim that is simply entertaining may, in fact, be the way to go (again, the presence of ORBX and Carenado in the game seems to suggest this is so).  And if that is the case, and FSW does find its wings, then I'm sure PMDG will find a seat at the table. Maybe one not as close to the head as they think they deserve, but a seat nevertheless.

 

Tim Prior

(a PMDG customer for 10+ years)

[TurbofanDude 50]

It's sad to see it come to this. Such potential, and so far, questionable, at best, ethics and business around it. Based on the information currently available, we share your thoughts.

[YukonPete 585]

51 minutes ago, TurbofanDude said:

It's sad to see it come to this. Such potential, and so far, questionable, at best, ethics and business around it. Based on the information currently available, we share your thoughts.

You guys did a great job on the 717! Love it just as much as the PMDG birds!

[TheFlightSimGuy 514]

6 hours ago, rsrandazzo said:

Josh,

I am going to call you out here. 

In this thread thus far, I have removed 20 posts from 7 users.  So far this weekend  I have removed 30 posts from 9 users in the entire forum.  All of them except one are previous users of the PMDG forum, and all of them are expected to behave in accordance with our forum guidelines.

The poster who you are attempting to turn into a victim was not silenced for his position on any matter- his posts were simply removed in accordance with our long standing policy because he made a decision that following the forum guidelines did not apply to him.

This fiction that we "only edit out contrary opinions" is rubbish.  Look through this forum and you will find we are quite accepting of all opinions- provided that they are stated factually, respectfully, and signed by the poster.

I am sorry if you don't like that we make a modest effort to enforce our guidelines here- and I certainly know we don't catch all infractions- but if you are going to make a victim out of someone who isn't- at least do so truthfully.

 

 

There is great dialogue to have here Rob. Following a front page article on Avsim encouraging the community to come chime in, one would think it would be a mild concession to do away with the normal PMDG formalities of posting here. I appreciate full names as a way of protecting the community and your IP. But for this discussion, considering its gravity and popularity, deleting posts that were not harmful doesn't make sense. Maybe discretion was too much to ask but I don't agree with how it was handled. 

[bobb 2]

Hi Robert,

I stopped using Steam some time back. I put FSX back in my computer. I have XP11 and P3D and could not be happy er. I like new products but also like PMDG and what I have.

Bob Bazley

[SirBismuth 9]

This has been an interesting thread.

I really hope that FSW gets the success it deserves, and joins the likes of P3D and XP as a major contender.  

However, a key requirement for me is that I can buy PMDG products for it (Steam or otherwise, doesn't matter to me), as well as for other payware addons that I currently use in FSX.  As far as I understand, they are not restricting developers to Steam, but are requiring them to use that distribution channel as well.  Correct me if I misunderstand here.

The beauty I have found in the various iterations of FS I have used, but primarily FS9 and FSX, is how much you can customize them.  I can download free or payware addons as I desire, or if I want to keep the defaults, can do that as well.  That is key to the success or failure of FSW, imho.

[Boomer 1,619]

41 minutes ago, SirBismuth said:

I really hope that FSW gets the success it deserves.

As do i...though likely in the opposite manner you're thinking.

[Captain Kevin 586]

5 hours ago, TheFlightSimGuy said:

There is great dialogue to have here Rob. Following a front page article on Avsim encouraging the community to come chime in, one would think it would be a mild concession to do away with the normal PMDG formalities of posting here. I appreciate full names as a way of protecting the community and your IP. But for this discussion, considering its gravity and popularity, deleting posts that were not harmful doesn't make sense. Maybe discretion was too much to ask but I don't agree with how it was handled. 

There are two problems I see with this. The first problem is that it is entirely possible that they weren't aware that it was a front page article on AVSIM. I certainly wasn't until you pointed it out. The second problem is that if they were to start making an exception here now, people would expect an exception to be made everywhere else.

[marius scheepers 30]

I will probably evaluate FSW like i do all platforms, and see if i find it to be better or not, I am not ashamed to say that i am on a 12 year old platform, and yes i do experience the odd VAS issue, but if i look at where DTG is going with their offering, i must admit that i am a little weary, if i have to go to a new platform the cost to replicate what i currently have would inhibit me of moving over.

Do i really want birds flying around, unless i can see a bird ingested by an engine and having an engine failure , then i will look at it, will it have animated people boarding my 737 as i complete my final flightdeck checks? That is the question, it must be really one heck of a step upwards for me to even consider it.

Steam might have 13million odd users, my sons use steam and buy all their game stuff on it, so im not against steam at all. Will i pay a premium to purchase a add-on from Steam against using PMDG, Simarket, FSlabs, Aerosoft etc etc, no I wont! 

Im pretty sure that FSX is resillient enough that after 12 years it will still be good for another few.

Thanks to developers that look out for the best interest of the community at large!!

Just remember you get simmers and you get Simmers, those that just want to get into a aircraft push E to start the engines, taxi out and take off, and then their are the guys that has planning software, weather software, passenger software, EFB software, and realistic aircraft, that is the hardcore simmers, and we can be a difficult bunch!

[mongo44 29]

I, for one, do not trust anyone having any control  over my use of the internet or my own computer.  I don't have a facebook account, nor do I plan to get one; Twitter is, to me, a waste of time that could be better spent reading a good magazine or newpaper; and I have had no interest in Dovetail.  Atta boy, PMDG!  Mike Gutierrez, North Hollywood, California.