They should dump the other models (that are better done by every other company) and only develop for the a340 variants, get it out of beta and then maybe they might be taken seriously.

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9 hours ago, 777200lrf said:

They should dump the other models (that are better done by every other company) and only develop for the a340 variants, get it out of beta and then maybe they might be taken seriously.

A big problem is, if they did dump the other variants, it would mean anyone who has bought those products would then have been abandoned (and BBS have already got a bit of a reputation in that regard). So with their reputation already not the greatest, doing something like that would hardly improve matters. A better thing would be to get their asses properly in gear, put a lid on their existing 'prologue' products in terms of features promised versus what has been completed and delivered ASAP, and then take their A340 into development overdrive so it matches other high quality Airbus products from other developers.

27 minutes ago, Chock said:

A big problem is, if they did dump the other variants, it would mean anyone who has bought those products would then have been abandoned (and BBS have already got a bit of a reputation in that regard). So with their reputation already not the greatest, doing something like that would hardly improve matters. A better thing would be to get their asses properly in gear, put a lid on their existing 'prologue' products in terms of features promised versus what has been completed and delivered ASAP, and then take their A340 into development overdrive so it matches other high quality Airbus products from other developers.

Completely agree Alan!

I was curious more than anything about the A340 (never having flown it and wanting to add her to my fleet), so I got it on sale while it was in work for the V4 release.

Having flown it now on 2 short flights (not at all it's forte, but don't have time for a long haul at the moment), I have to say it's not that bad so far.  Now, I have very limited experience in Buses and zero in the 340 series..so my ignorance about its qualities certainly influences my opinion.

Is it up to par with the other vendor's Buses?  Oh no. Will it ever? I don't believe so (but with their version numbering system, they have one thousand three hundred and five versions remaining to get it right before 1.0)

Is it a good value given its inexpensive sales price for what I got? I'd say yes so far.  Reasoning: It's the only 340 around and like we all know, is likely to be forever given she is rapidly vanishing from the real world, and no vendor would risk a high fidelity version based on forecasted sales (which I assume would be abysmal).

So... that is where the the flightsim world is for the 340.  If you want to fly one that is passable, with hopes that once it graduates past the ridiculous "Prologue" state into a full release, it will be worthy edition to our fleets.

We've been spoiled of late with all the excellent Buses that have hit the market, and since we won't be seeing the 340 from the vendors we'd love to purchase from, I choose to make due with the only choice I have and not be distraught about everything it's not as our community tends to do. 
Do I know of the BBS/PSS history?  Oh yes, had their Buses, and both Boeings back in the day.  Flew the wings off their 777 (This was before I even knew how to paint!).  I wholeheartedly agree with the community about the sad state of affairs that brought this developer to where it is now, but I wanted a 340, so here I am. 

 

Those were mostly my reasons for buying. There's no better A330 and A340 out there (and i also doubt we'll ever see a better 340) so here i am as well :P

Yup, me too. I really like the A340, since it is reminiscent of C-880s, DC-8s and B-707s, and the BBS one is the only game in town. It's not perfect by any stretch, but it works (after a fashion) and to be fair I've had a lot worse add-ons for the 28 quid it cost me.

The last versions of their A32Xs and A33Xs looked, sounded, and 'felt' like FS9 addons;  not even the best FS9 models. I've lost all faith that any product they release is ever going to match my expectations or standards (which I don't believe are excessive or unrealistic).  Sadly, I feel these developers are just past their best and not creating work that really 'fits' in 2017 flight simulation.    I get the update emails (on the infrequent occasions an update is released) but don't bother updating now.   It's history, and another expensive lesson.  (They're not the only ones who have taught me one of those lessons!).

I flew the back off their PSS A320 back in 2004'ish, in FS9, 2D panel style.  It was possibly my favourite FS9 aircraft, in that period.   But I no longer measure against that period, obviously.   It's 2017.

 

51 minutes ago, JYW said:

The last versions of their A32Xs and A33Xs looked, sounded, and 'felt' like FS9 addons;  not even the best FS9 models. I've lost all faith that any product they release is ever going to match my expectations or standards (which I don't believe are excessive or unrealistic).  Sadly, I feel these developers are just past their best and not creating work that really 'fits' in 2017 flight simulation.    I get the update emails (on the infrequent occasions an update is released) but don't bother updating now.   It's history, and another expensive lesson.  (They're not the only ones who have taught me one of those lessons!).

I flew the back off their PSS A320 back in 2004'ish, in FS9, 2D panel style.  It was possibly my favourite FS9 aircraft, in that period.   But I no longer measure against that period, obviously.   It's 2017.

 

I'd agree with you that their A320 and A330 are probably worth bypassing in their current state, particularly when there are other alternatives (at least six other A320s by different developers for various sims by my count, and soon to be a number of A330s too) but as noted, there is pretty much no A340 - certainly not for P3D V4 - other than the BBS one.

Plenty of people love the Tristar, DC-10 and the MD-11 in flight sims at least, and these were, like the A340, the right aircraft and in the case of the L-1011 an amazingly advanced one too, but at the wrong time in history from an economics standpoint. The A340 does still fit a very small niche where ETOPs precludes the use of a twin over long stretches of water and the costs of running it can be covered, and in certain hot an high applications, but the rules, engine reliability and other aeroplanes are rapidly edging the A340 out of even that niche; it isn't an economical choice for freighter conversion either sadly, even though efforts were made to try it out, which is a shame because it is such a pretty aeroplane, especially compared to the A380, which is a BUFF by anyone's standards lol. And so it probably won't be too long before no A340s are flying despite the fact that you can acquire one in good condition with plenty of life left in it for less than 10 million quid, which is peanuts for such a large capacity aeroplane, so it could conceivably become a military transport where operators are less concerned about the costs per seat, but even that is a stretch.

Fortunately for us flight simmers, we don't have to worry about the costs of fuel burn, thus we can cheerfully fly gas guzzlers like the A340, DC-10, MD-11 and L-1011 as long as we like. So ironically, because all that prologue nonsense has meant the BBS A340 has been in development for so long (right back to the time when the thing actually was reasonably viable economically lol), we can at least thank them for having created a situation, more by accident than design, where we can fly an A340 in P3D.

 

I was taught , when giving counsel, criticism to try and always precede it by positive points and encouragement. In this case its not so easy. While BBS is still a part of the flight simulation community and we need developers to continue keeping this niche hobby alive, you have to wonder what the end game is with some of these releases ....err in this case "Prologue".  aka beta or more like pre beta.  

I had a look as to when I originally bought this back in 2013 with ver 0.66 because there really was no A33x around so it was kinda neat to see one being developed. After dishing out a substantial load of money, for an unreleased product, in exchange for supporting a dev who promises a lot, its rather worn out now being that its 2017 and we are at only 0.87 and not a whole lot has changed. Going from 0.85 to .87 seemed more like a P3D V4 compatibility upgrade than anything. 

Sure the textures are better from 0.66 but relative to other addons they are kinda underwhelming. This product feels more like an appeal to eye candy simmers. Personally Id rather have complex systems than fancy slide out trays, sunglases, pens etc. The progress that is for the better is a preflight manager whereby you can load the aircraft with a decent amount of control over it. Much better than before. There is a whole slew of liveries to choose from from A332s A333s and A34x.  Great!    Setting up a quick flight felt like very much like previous builds though other than the aforementioned preflight manager which made things quite easy. But the FMC is still very simplified. Dont expect too much out of it. Suffice to say you can use Sids Stars and all waypoints so Vatsim should be ok, but you will need to double check it well. I had a ton of messy ND draws that were really wacky. Pay attention to what the aircraft does and be prepared to intervene with your own course corrections. Same with Vnav although it was better than previous builds. The FDE felt more like an A320 rather than a heavy but hey I am no pilot and the claim was made that a RW pilot said it was great.  (hard to believe)  All this was from a quick one flight first impression, but  whether 1 hour or 7 hours, you pretty much get the sense of what its going to be like in this case. Oh one more positive though.... The fuel consumption was spot on as per the simbrief flight log. It was horrendous before. 

There is no Terrain radar, didnt check WX radar, and the systems are light on simulation as some buttons didnt really do anything other than light up but did not correspond to their appropriate system like electrical. 

Bottom line is , that its flyable. You can get A to B just fine, but you will need to be on your toes for errors, and quirky things going on. My ILS didnt work quite right, so took over manually but in bad wx not sure I would be too confident with it. But hey its the A33X and A34X and there is no others right now so if you wanting to fly these widebody buses and cant wait for the AS one, then 43 Euros might be ok so long as you are aware of its current status and given the past timeline, it wont get to ver 1.00 for another 5 years. Hard to believe that version 1.00 was claimed to be study level by then. Just dont see that happening. 

Reading several posts, you see one thing in common- the same people who bash one developer, they do the same with another developer... Anything that is not developed by their "favorite developer" immediately  get's a bashing and a thumps down. All this, with many times not even owning the product. 

And, then, there are others like myself..we are open to every developer working hard so we can enjoy these add-ons. .. And I have learned to say: "Thank you" for your efforts. PSS easily had the best addon-ons (paired with Just Flight) back in FS2004. In fact, they were the only ones who developed the 777, Airbus Series, and the Concorde to a level others had no clue how to even start (Correct, PMDG didn't even existed) It was impressive to be able to fly the Airbuses and see those airplanes do an excellent/ perfect auto-land.. And some folks speak about this developer (PSS/ BSS) like they're talking about  un-experienced individuals? Ahahhaaaa (fun, fun) 

Today, (Obviously- {15 years later}) we have better technology, great training, much better tools, and software. better things can be done. Not sure how prepared- or updated- these two gentlemen are ; however, owning these fine Airbuses, I have to say that I enjoy them tremendously. Yes, they are not perfect, but they are impressive.  My only request is that the VC  be more "detailed" , and the sound-pack be re-done. System wise, pitch control and induced drag needs a bit of adjustment.

- The future (V 1.0) will bring will bring a weather radar and terrain radar- very cool.   And looking forward to it. 

 

Cheers

6 hours ago, Chock said:

A big problem is, if they did dump the other variants, it would mean anyone who has bought those products would then have been abandoned (and BBS have already got a bit of a reputation in that regard). So with their reputation already not the greatest, doing something like that would hardly improve matters. A better thing would be to get their asses properly in gear, put a lid on their existing 'prologue' products in terms of features promised versus what has been completed and delivered ASAP, and then take their A340 into development overdrive so it matches other high quality Airbus products from other developers.

give everybody an a340 license that bought the other models then. and if they bought multiple then refund the other.

5 minutes ago, joemiller said:

Reading several posts, you see one thing in common- the same people who bash one developer, they do the same with another developer... Anything that is not developed by their "favorite developer" immediately  get's a bashing and a thumps down. All this, with many times not even owning the product. 

And, then, there are others like myself..we are open to every developer working hard so we can enjoy these add-ons. .. And I have learned to say: "Thank you" for your efforts. PSS easily had the best addon-ons (paired with Just Flight) back in FS2004. In fact, they were the only ones who developed the 777, Airbus Series, and the Concorde to a level others had no clue how to even start (Correct, PMDG didn't even existed) It was impressive to be able to fly the Airbuses and see those airplanes do an excellent/ perfect auto-land.. And some folks speak about this developer (PSS/ BSS) like they're talking about  un-experienced individuals? Ahahhaaaa (fun, fun) 

Today, (Obviously- {15 years later}) we have better technology, great training, much better tools, and software. better things can be done. Not sure how prepared- or updated- these two gentlemen are ; however, owning these fine Airbuses, I have to say that I enjoy them tremendously. Yes, they are not perfect, but they are impressive.  My only request is that the VC  be more "detailed" , and the sound-pack be re-done. System wise, pitch control and induced drag needs a bit of adjustment.

- The future (V 1.0) will bring will bring a weather radar and terrain radar- very cool.   And looking forward to it. 

 

Cheers

customers could be upset at the record breaking time in beta, the lack of fixing bugs, the hostility they face if they report something (I get banned from fslabs for posting too many bugs so bbs is not the only one guilty of that), but you apparently have found the real reason bbs is not much liked around here

5 minutes ago, 777200lrf said:

customers could be upset at the record breaking time in beta, the lack of fixing bugs, the hostility they face if they report something (I get banned from fslabs for posting too many bugs so bbs is not the only one guilty of that), but you apparently have found the real reason bbs is not much liked around here

Remember, most of these developers do not have all the resources to work on these add-ons as quick and as effective as we all want. Keep in mind developers have families, jobs, illnesses, and an entire life to attend..Moreover, they are not enterprises such as Microsoft, LM, Apple, Airbus, Google, Sukoi, etc, etc.. No! These are just folks who love this hobby and decided to create these add-ons for us.  And some of these folks are elderly people- no longer the young strong, healthy folks of 10-15 years ago. So, patience is important.

As far as being banned from developer's forums..well, if you genuinely ask for help and show respect to the developer's response, and behave respectfully with your comments,  rest assured you will not be banned.

 

Take care! 

 

1 hour ago, joemiller said:

PSS easily had the best addon-ons (paired with Just Flight) back in FS2004. In fact, they were the only ones who developed the 777, Airbus Series, and the Concorde to a level others had no clue how to even start (Correct, PMDG didn't even existed)

I think you have your chronology a bit off there, I'm pretty sure the first PSS commercial airliner add-on product was a Boeing 777-200 for FS2000. PMDG went into business in 1997, so they definitely did exist and more to the point they were busily producing their Boeing 757 and 767 add-ons for Fly! prior to the release of that PSS Triple Seven.

1 hour ago, joemiller said:

Remember, most of these developers do not have all the resources to work on these add-ons as quick and as effective as we all want. Keep in mind developers have families, jobs, illnesses, and an entire life to attend..Moreover, they are not enterprises such as Microsoft, LM, Apple, Airbus, Google, Sukoi, etc, etc.. No! These are just folks who love this hobby and decided to create these add-ons for us.  And some of these folks are elderly people- no longer the young strong, healthy folks of 10-15 years ago. So, patience is important.

As far as being banned from developer's forums..well, if you genuinely ask for help and show respect to the developer's response, and behave respectfully with your comments,  rest assured you will not be banned.

 

Take care! 

 

None of us forced bbs to mass release 3 types of Airbus addons promising a full release"soon". You are sounding more and more like one of the developers yourself. people got blocked by the developers for reporting bugs and having problems often told user error or just ignoring them.