Any possibility of someone else taking over the consumer rights to the ESP platform and code?

[G-RFRY 1,712]

6 hours ago, chelmo said:

In theory anything is possible. However, as things stand after 24 May Dovetail will not be able to sell the product as their licence will have expired and after that date what you will essentially have is a core technology owned by Microsoft and a sort of "extra" technology owned by Dovetail. Each of which then is pretty useless without the other.

So someone, again in theory, could step in....but good luck to them.

From what I read Microsoft has no interest in Flight sim that`s why they sold it to DTG, what DTG do with it now is up to them.

[Air1 136]

Once again for MS Flight you can get all aircraft, the entire world if you want for FREE including 3 additional aircraft. You just need to download the Flight toolkit.  Everything except multiplayer. And you do not need to go through Steam.

 

 

 

[chelmo 42]

9 hours ago, rjfry said:

From what I read Microsoft has no interest in Flight sim that`s why they sold it to DTG, what DTG do with it now is up to them.

At the risk of repeating it for the umpteenth time it's got nothing to do with Dovetail; they bought from Microsoft a licence to use the technology but it doesn't become their property to sell on until they paid in full. And as they have not the licence reverts back to Microsoft after 24 May.

Microsoft may well have no interest in flight sims but they do have considerable interest in technology which has some value. So who knows.... It would certainly be a great shame to let this simply fester and die.

[G-RFRY 1,712]

43 minutes ago, chelmo said:

At the risk of repeating it for the umpteenth time it's got nothing to do with Dovetail; they bought from Microsoft a licence to use the technology but it doesn't become their property to sell on until they paid in full. And as they have not the licence reverts back to Microsoft after 24 May.

Microsoft may well have no interest in flight sims but they do have considerable interest in technology which has some value. So who knows.... It would certainly be a great shame to let this simply fester and die.

Bad news then for FSX:SE if you are correct they loose the right to market MSFS products, that would be odd as Microsoft are working with dovetail and have an interest in them porting products to the XBOX, dovetail also have the UNREAL4 engine to work with, we will have to wait and see. 

[pmb 5,137]

36 minutes ago, chelmo said:

At the risk of repeating it for the umpteenth time it's got nothing to do with Dovetail; they bought from Microsoft a licence to use the technology but it doesn't become their property to sell on until they paid in full. And as they have not the licence reverts back to Microsoft after 24 May.

Finally a valid answer. No one among us knows the contract, but I am absolutely sure Dovetail cannot "sell" the license as it does not belong to them.

DT probably wants to continue distributing FSX:SE. I don't even know if they can return just the license for FSW alone but keep that for FSX:SE. In the initial press releases this was mentioned as one package. But who knows, perhaps they can find a deal.

36 minutes ago, chelmo said:

Microsoft may well have no interest in flight sims but they do have considerable interest in technology which has some value. So who knows.... It would certainly be a great shame to let this simply fester and die.

MS may have lost interest in flight sims indeed, but they certainly didn't loose interest in money-making. If they see a chance to squeeze some more $$$s out of their flight technology by finding a more able partner for the consumer license they will certainly do so.

Kind regards, Michael

[Murmur 3,941]

41 minutes ago, chelmo said:

At the risk of repeating it for the umpteenth time it's got nothing to do with Dovetail; they bought from Microsoft a licence to use the technology but it doesn't become their property to sell on until they paid in full. And as they have not the licence reverts back to Microsoft after 24 May.

Yes, but in theory another company could buy the reverted licence from Microsoft, and the FSW code from Dovetail.

Of course, given what happened, FSW would need a new vision and a new path if it wants to be more successful. In any case, I find all of this unlikely, but you never know.

Who knows, maybe FSW code will leak and it will become a community effort development (like it happened with Falcon 4). Ok, 99% unlikely, I know...

[G-RFRY 1,712]

Given how welcoming the sim community was to a new developer DTG pre launch and after, someone needs a thick skin and a hard hat and deep pockets to develop a new platform in a niche market. 

[pmb 5,137]

2 minutes ago, rjfry said:

Given how welcoming the sim community was to a new developer DTG pre launch and after, someone needs a thick skin and a hard hat and deep pockets to develop a new platform in a niche market. 

Deep pockets yes, but otherwise I don't think so if he gives the community as well as 3rd party developers the impression of taking them seriously and honestly cooperating with them. That's what I have been missing from Dovetail from the very beginning.

Kind regards, Michael

[chelmo 42]

37 minutes ago, pmb said:

DT probably wants to continue distributing FSX:SE. I don't even know if they can return just the license for FSW alone but keep that for FSX:SE. In the initial press releases this was mentioned as one package. But who knows, perhaps they can find a deal.

Check the original announcement (still on Dovetail's website) from July 2014. They are separate licences. FSX Steam is totally unaffected by all this and will remain as is.

[G-RFRY 1,712]

Yes the harden long term simmer will sometimes understand but we are approaching an age when they want it all NOW, and X is better than Y and you of all people no that, the I use Y and it will be the only go to sim in the future is often seen on the forums.

[chelmo 42]

42 minutes ago, Murmur said:

Yes, but in theory another company could buy the reverted licence from Microsoft, and the FSW code from Dovetail.

Which is what I said on the previous page.....

[G-RFRY 1,712]

7 minutes ago, chelmo said:

Check the original announcement (still on Dovetail's website) from July 2014. They are separate licences. FSX Steam is totally unaffected by all this and will remain as is.

Yes if you check more into it you will also find.

( Dovetail Games has signed a global licensing deal with Microsoft, granting exclusive rights to develop and publish all-new flight simulation products based on Microsoft’s genre-defining technology. )

Copy and pasted from the DTG website which I posted early in this thread , so not just FSW.

[HighTowers 1,434]

Whatever the license details are specifically, and whatever status it is in, or becomes, is now sort of irrelevant. Deep pocket investors is the issue.  There are plenty of multi millionaires and billionaires around but this now has a track record with MS flight, and now FSW big fail. No investor will be interested in forking over that kind of money for such a high risk of return given the track record that now exists.  I dont see how much can come of it now. Its lived out its useful life within FSX but no more juice can be squeezed out of it for it to be worth anyones time and resources.  It now lives within its bigger brother in ESP and LM.   IMHO

[Murmur 3,941]

41 minutes ago, chelmo said:

Check the original announcement (still on Dovetail's website) from July 2014. They are separate licences. FSX Steam is totally unaffected by all this and will remain as is.

I wonder what the terms are for the DTG/MS licence for FSX. It is described as a licence to distribute FSX, so seemingly without the possibility to modify it.

But FSX:SE code is technically already modified compared to boxed FSX, although mainly it's bugfixes.

What does the license allow DTG to do with FSX? Can they use different textures? Can they add features? It's already done with FSX Steam addons (Accu-feel, light mods, scenery mods, etc.). Does their license allow them to embed these changes/new features in the base product?

Does it allow DTG to modify FSX shaders? Today, more and more graphical effects are done via shaders, and in theory new shaders could completely transform the visual engine of FSX.

FSX:SE is still outselling XP11 + FSW + AeroflyFS2 combined. What if DTG turns towards improving FSX:SE instead?

 

[Wobbie 938]

FSX:SE will not be further 'tweaked", & further development is frozen...So nothing will be added!

from  https://fsxinsider.com/fsx-steam-edition-and-boxed-fsx-what-is-the-difference/ 

What is FSX: Steam Edition?

Essentially, FSX: Steam Edition is a re-release  of the FSX Gold Edition (including Service Packs 1 & 2) which in turn is comprised of FSX: Deluxe Edition and the Acceleration Expansion Pack.

Post-Release Optimization

Since the initial release of FSX: Steam Edition, Dovetail Games have released several updates consisting of stability improvements, bug fixes, and optimization for the Steam platform. The complete change logs for these can be found below:

Version 62615 (current)

Version 62613

Version 62608

Dovetail Games currently have no plans to release any further updates, but will continue to support FSX: Steam Edition and its community so if it becomes necessary to release any more updates.

Bottom Line:

If you want any improvements to FSX:SE.. you have to buy them from 3rd party vendors!