I watched Froogle's video last evening on the demise of FSW and the possible impact it might have on Lockheed-Martin's P3D. You can watch the video below but the pertinent bit starts at 16m where he suggests Dovetail could sue LM for damage to their product by offering the Academic licence of P3D at a similar price to FSW.

One result of this could be LM either withdrawing the Academic licence or hiking its price. Froogle has never supported the Academic licence and believes serious simmers should buy the Pro Licence.

What's your take on how things might pan out? Would Dovetail have a reasonable case against LM? Should we be concerned about which licence to purchase? I know there are rules here about talking about the licences and I don't want to break those but this is more about whether Dovetail might sue LM and whether we should be concerned about the outcome of that.

As far as FSX is concerned it is unlikely that they can remove your copy from steam although they could stop it being sold to new customers.  

As far as hassling LM is concerned they would be total fools to do so.  

Selling the right to another entity is probably quite possible and I would not be surprised if the deal has already been done and we will hear about it in June.

I really can't see that happening. I saw it as an attempt to push X-Plane.

Would a loose change company really try and take on a multi-billion dollar outfit?

 

Harry,

Sales of FSX:Steam won't be significant now. I think most new pilots would buy P3D. I also agree they would be daft to sue LM but they have lost a lot of money and may see the chance to claw some of it back albeit not without risk.

My main concern is not with FSX - it's 11 years old - but with P3D. But I'd also like to hear other 'professional' opinions on the situation. Froogle's is just one.

1 minute ago, uncle_adolph said:

Would a loose change company really try and take on a multi-billion dollar outfit?

 

If they believe they had a plausible case. What would work against them is the 60% cut (30% to Steam and 30% to Dovetail) of 3rd party addons. IMO, that is pure greed and the reason why so many serious developers have not embraced FSW.

16 minutes ago, Ray Proudfoot said:

If they believe they had a plausible case. What would work against them is the 60% cut (30% to Steam and 30% to Dovetail) of 3rd party addons. IMO, that is pure greed and the reason why so many serious developers have not embraced FSW.

Wouldn't it come down to their being able to prove that they have lost profits as a result of a "mis-sold licence" as it were?

I think they would have the greatest difficulty in proving that their was any real potential amongst serious simmers for their product. And the more casual market, the Steam audience which was clearly their intended target, was simply not interested in a product where all you could fly was a few GA planes. They would choose FSX (particularly in the regular sales) for their "jet fix".

All in all, I'm at a loss to understand how Dovetail ever thought they could turn this into a profit.

Geoffrey,

FSW would have to be head and shoulders above its rivals to make a breakthrough in the congested market and with so little 3rd party support they were always going to struggle. Serious simmers want addons and FSW had few if any.

Froogle flies combat and GA so he prefers other sims anyway. Thinking about this more I can’t see Dovetail pursuing this claim. It could well finish them off. 

Even if they were to succeed and P3D was only available via a Pro licence how would that help Dovetail? Would they relaunch FSW? I doubt it.

34 minutes ago, uncle_adolph said:

Wouldn't it come down to their being able to prove that they have lost profits as a result of a "mis-sold licence" as it were?

I don't think anyone can argue that the academic license was mis-sold.  The terms on which you purchase the academic license were/are quite transparent and clear.  What Froogle was saying is that because they didn't enforce the purchase terms (nearly impossible),  DTG could argue that it hurt them.   

But again, this is a chalk and cheese situation.  Lockheed Martin is not an entertainment company, so DTG could't reasonably argue  that LM disadvantaged them by not enforcing the terms of their academic (non-entertainment) licence.  Their market segments are completely different - on paper

It is an interesting argument though, and I'd be keen to see how this plays out

Edited April 30, 20188 yr by ErichB

Did LM start to offer academic license after DTG acquired the rights? I thought they knew about the academic license and its conditions when they were buying the rights from Microsoft?

49 minutes ago, costamesa said:

Did LM start to offer academic license after DTG acquired the rights? I thought they knew about the academic license and its conditions when they were buying the rights from Microsoft?

A far as I can remember LM have always offered different licence types for P3D.  P3DV1 was in 2011/2012  IIRC?

It's a complete nonsense.

I do not understand why a youtuber said that.

I cant see them going after LM. This would be a court case spanning a few years against a multi billion dollar company who would obviously have the very best lawyers. The cost in court fees would kill DTG. All that for very high risk and small chance that they might get something back minus the legal fees. Their only recourse might be to sell it to the consortium of developers who were bidding on it a few years back depending on all the fine print of course of the license. Even at that, it would have to be at a significantly reduced price. The whole thing is a mess with a lot of bitter parties. 

I dont see anything coming of it. 3PDs have quite the strong relationship with LM given some of the comments from devs that LM are a pleasure to work with and are very helpful in solving problems and fullfilling requests.  It is the addons developed for P3D that have really pushed it on. Something DTG didnt seem to care about or recognize spelling their own demise.  Blaming another company for your flawed business model ends up being very cost prohibitive.  Look at the Samsung vs Apple fiasco. Years and years of each on blaming another for failings and or accusations that cost hundreds of millions

I honestly think LM have themselves well covered in the wording of their EULA. They lean towards letting the simmer use their own discretion when purchasing a licence, and don't allow such issues to be discussed publicly. I think DTG would be fools to go down the legal route. DTG have no one to blame but themselves for their demise. Bad all round management on their part.

9 minutes ago, Ce_Zeta said:

I do not understand why a youtuber said that.

It is a plausible but unlikely scenario. Nothing outrageous about the commentary.