Ray,

From what you are saying I should have increased the price of FSUIPC and WideFS as new features were added, instead of providing those new features for free to existing users?

FSUIPC4 has been subject to continuous development since it was first introduced in late 2005, only recently being 'frozen'. The price remained the same.

I  must admit that it seems very odd to me for you to complain that the price of something has not been increased!

Pete

 

6 minutes ago, Pete Dowson said:

Ray,

From what you are saying I should have increased the price of FSUIPC and WideFS as new features were added, instead of providing those new features for free to existing users?

FSUIPC4 has been subject to continuous development since it was first introduced in late 2005, only recently being 'frozen'. The price remained the same.

I  must admit that it seems very odd to me for you to complain that the price of something has not been increased!

Pete

 

Salute.

57 minutes ago, SteveW said:

Nothing personal Ray, sorry if you happen to fall into a category I mentioned, I feel that same way, the value of these kind of products is unquestionable. Sorry to generalise.

Thanks Steve. I can understand your logic to a certain extent when I have paid a lot of a new computer. But I have yet to see a PBR-enabled airport and there isn't exacty a huge amount of discussion about how wonderful it looks so the extra charge for it seems odd. Have any of you been blown out of the water by it?

44 minutes ago, Jetset408 said:

I would suggest its up to developers to charge what they want for their projects and if we as consumers don't like the price, then we can choose not to buy it. Simple. I don't go into supermarkets complaining about the different cost of items - I simply make my own mind up on my purchasing decisions based on my own assessment of value and affordability. Im not sure why people feel that they have to behave differently for flightsim addons. Perhaps its the ease with which people can be confrontational online without having to suffer the humiliation of demonstrating just how up-tight they are in public? 🙄

Sorry, but that's the oldest defence in the world. It's not like I can buy a PBR-enabled LEBL from someone else. Well not yet at least. And I have not been confrontational. I resent that accusation. I have been polite in all my replies. I just happen to have a different opinion.

20 minutes ago, AnkH said:

Ray, just turn around your thinking and you will be fine 😉 Example: you paid 22€ last year for your copy of LEBL without PBR. Today, the airport is worth only 17€. But you can not buy it anymore without PBR, and with PBR it is again 22€. Means: 5€ more for new customers due to PBR. And 5€ as upgrade price for those who upgrade.

The "mistake" you do: you assume that the old version without PBR is still the same value. It is not. And it is everywhere like this.

Or, to come back to the JustSim scenery: why should a 2019 variant offering PBR cost more than the 2018 variant back in 2018?

The price for both the non-PBR and PBR versions is the same so your analogy doesn't apply. The PBR version should cost more because of the significant amount of work involved in adding it. It's not like adding SODE jetways which could be a free update.

https://secure.simmarket.com/justsim-barcelona-el-prat-lebl-p3d.phtml

https://secure.simmarket.com/justsim-barcelona-el-prat-lebl-v2.0-p3d-4.4.phtml

14 minutes ago, Pete Dowson said:

Ray,

From what you are saying I should have increased the price of FSUIPC and WideFS as new features were added, instead of providing those new features for free to existing users?

FSUIPC4 has been subject to continuous development since it was first introduced in late 2005, only recently being 'frozen'. The price remained the same.

I  must admit that it seems very odd to me for you to complain that the price of something has not been increased!

Pete

Pete, I suspect you may struggle to define what features in FSUIPC would qualify for a price increase. It would be a nightmare to administer surely?

I understand why you would say it seems odd to complain something hasn't incrreased in price with a new feature added. I just felt customers who bought the first version were having to pay for something customers of v2 didn't.

Somewhat like new customers for car insurance get a better deal than existing ones. It goes on all the time in business. The existing customers subsidise new ones. Don't you haggle over your car / house insurance when the new premium comes through? I've just spent 45 mins on a website and phone this morning getting my house insurance reduced from the 48% increase over last year when no claims were made. I did but otherwise they'd sting me. Not quite the same analogy but reasonable close.

I do find it curious that no one has said to me “have you seen the difference PBR makes?” Does it? Is it jaw-dropping given the work involved? You would hope so.

17 minutes ago, Ray Proudfoot said:

The price for both the non-PBR and PBR versions is the same so your analogy doesn't apply. The PBR version should cost more because of the significant amount of work involved in adding it.

It is all relative, no? You stick to the wrong logic: the PBR update should cost more, yes. But the only thing you could really accuse JustSim here is: they should now reduce the price of the non-PBR variant as it is basically outdated.

6 minutes ago, AnkH said:

It is all relative, no? You stick to the wrong logic: the PBR update should cost more, yes. But the only thing you could really accuse JustSim here is: they should now reduce the price of the non-PBR variant as it is basically outdated.

As the PBR version only works with P3D v4.4 the older version remains the latest version for P3D v3 and FSX customers. I suspect you'll see it in the sales before long.

Am With Ray here for me it's not the amount pur-say its the %, its 25% of the cost. If FSL charge 25% for PBR when they do it you all would be fine with that? What if PMDG had charged 25% or MadDog had hit you for 25%? Still happy? Them 3 would have come to £80-£90.

O... also BTW, QW gave the new 787 PBR again no charge. Good job they also did not charge another £18 for the work. All aircraft above would be over £100. If they were thinking the same way as Justsim.

Just because the sum is small in the amount your just dismissing it.

Each to their own.

I have Simwings version of this airport and it's far better imo. 

Edited April 8, 20197 yr by Nyxx

12 minutes ago, Nyxx said:

Am With Ray here for me it's not the amount pur-say its the %, its 25% of the cost. If FSL charge 25% for PBR when they do it you all would be fine with that? What if PMDG had charged 25%...

I think you'll find PMDG charge over 100%, as do FSL, to existing owners of FSX products being ported to P3D (which is essentially what we're talking about here, P3Dv4 features being added to what at it's core is an FSX product).

Edited April 8, 20197 yr by ckyliu

1 hour ago, Ray Proudfoot said:

Somewhat like new customers for car insurance get a better deal than existing ones. It goes on all the time in business. The existing customers subsidise new ones. Don't you haggle over your car / house insurance when the new premium comes through? I've just spent 45 mins on a website and phone this morning getting my house insurance reduced from the 48% increase over last year when no claims were made. I did but otherwise they'd sting me. Not quite the same analogy but reasonable close.

I think you need to find a better example as developing software cannot be compared to any insurance business. The car insurance business is based on risk, you can haggle your car insurance next year on the basis that you oppose now a lesser risk to the insurance company that you would put a claim, however I am sure that if you crashed and smashed your car to pieces you would struggle to haggle any price back, instead you would be paying almost double or might even get a refusal to be re-insured.

I still struggle to see why it cannot be appreciated that the developing of software is just not a couple of "tick boxes" called features and that we should charge on that basis, it is much more complex than this.. one single feature could take many months or years to develop in comparison to another as things are based on "technical challenges" rather than just a simple time frame sitting on a computer typing code. And it is very common for many software houses to start "from scratch" for new versions of their products as the desire is to deliver a new look and feel, were others follow an update path based on their previous code, however they change their internal core from a technical point of view which makes them become a total new product.

My point is, just because something says product A, product A V2 or product A V3, it doesn't mean they are not entirely different.. keeping a common / similar name is important for marketing as it helps people to keep familiar with your product.

PBR is huge and complex to implement, to the extend that there are still many developers (including me) that are trying to understand it and experimenting with it.

46 minutes ago, Ray Proudfoot said:

I do find it curious that no one has said to me “have you seen the difference PBR makes?” Does it? Is it jaw-dropping given the work involved? You would hope so.

Then why you don't buy one and judge by yourself? I suggest you get one of the LatinVFR products and see how it looks when it is during dawn / sunset and while it is raining. Or get an airplane using PBR and also judge by yourself.

Why is it so hard to see that Justsim released a new Barcelona airport, it will cost wherever they feel like it to charge for it (having PBR or not) previous customers have been rewarded with a 70% discount, new customers could be anyone, it could be a new user to the flightsim world, it could come from FSX, it could come from XP, etc. and therefore it will be charged the full cost of the product.

32 minutes ago, Nyxx said:

Am With Ray here for me it's not the amount pur-say its the %, its 25% of the cost. If FSL charge 25% for PBR when they do it you all would be fine with that? What if PMDG had charged 25% or MadDog had hit you for 25%? Still happy? Them 3 would have come to £80-£90. 

Well the day that airport developers start charging 70 USD per airport (PMDG prices) then perhaps you would start seeing all these updates for free, however I wonder how many people would buy an airport at such price.

In the meantime most airports range withing 20 to 25 USD and just for your information, airport developers don't get a massive amount of copies sold as you all might be thinking.. so I am pretty sure we will continue to see "upgrade fees" and full prices for new customers on these types of add-on's for many years to come.

Regards,
Simbol

Edited April 8, 20197 yr by simbol

Simbol, I accept if I made a claim on insurance my policy would rise. But reasonably, not hiked as my house insurance was for a claim that cost a few hundred pounds caused by storm damage - not negligence.

Anyway, back on topic. I think I've said a couple of times now I appreciate a lot of work goes into adding PBR to an airport. Given it's only been out a few months can we be sure that airports that now include it are making it look as good as it can possibly be? Or, as you have alluded to, will they get better with experience and as with many things the first generation is not always the best?

Looking through the screenshots of LEBL for v4.4 I don't see anything with the 'wow' factor? Why not? They're trying to sell something with a brand new feature but nothing jumps out at me. And I don't see the point of buying an aircraft with PBR just to see what it looks like. YT videos or suitable screenshots by the seller should be doing that.

I'm still waiting to hear from someone who has bought a PBR-enabled airport and is wowed by the difference it makes.

Edited April 8, 20197 yr by Ray Proudfoot

1 minute ago, Ray Proudfoot said:

Looking through the screenshots of LEBL for v4.4 I don't see anything with the 'wow' factor? Why not? They're trying to sell something with a brand new feature but nothing jumps out at me. And I don't see the point of buying an aircraft with PBR just to see what it looks like. YT videos or suitable screenshots by the seller should be doing that.

I can tell you from personal experience that seeing pictures and videos is not the same as seeing it on your simulator, and many people reading this will agree with this statement.

This is something you have to experience by yourself before placing any judgement. give it a go with something you really like.. (Airplane or scenary).

Regards,
S.

6 minutes ago, Ray Proudfoot said:

'm still waiting to hear from someone who has bought a PBR-enabled airport and is wowed by the difference it makes.

Ray, the difference is subtle but noticeable in specific lighting conditions, more particularly sunrise/sunset. The 'wow factor' is there, if it's what you are looking for.  As you may already know, PBR is the way materials reflect or react to light.

This is not for you, as I think your expectations for the extra spend will not be met. 

Edited April 8, 20197 yr by ErichB

Especially true for PBR. Same goes for those shader modification tools. Screenshots can look nice, but they never capture the stuff in motion, I suggest taking a look on the PBR promo video for the QW787 on YT. This is really something new, the plane looks far more "real" than without PBR:

 

47 minutes ago, Nyxx said:

it's not the amount pur-say its the %, its 25% of the cost.

How come things must all be relative to percentages, parts of 100?

It's just not relevant as far as I can see, unless I mis-interpret you. Anyway 5% of one might cover its value, and 10% might cover the value of another. Prices of additions and upgrades do not seem to have to have any correlation to percent of original sale cost or work involved. For a small item a 5% would not cover the cost of the point of sale, yet easily cover it with an FSL or such.

Edited April 8, 20197 yr by SteveW

3 minutes ago, ErichB said:

Ray, the difference is subtle but noticeable in specific lighting conditions, more particularly sunrise/sunset. The 'wow factor' is there, if it's what you are looking for.  As you may already know, PBR is the way materials reflect or react to light.

This is not for you, as I think your expectations for the extra spend will not be met. 

 

6 minutes ago, simbol said:

I can tell you from personal experience that seeing pictures and videos is not the same as seeing it on your simulator, and many people reading this will agree with this statement.

This is something you have to experience by yourself before placing any judgement. give it a go with something you really like.. (Airplane or scenary).

Regards,
S.

Gents. If I told you the vast majority of my flying is during daytime with only rare excursions into dawn and dusk and never night then perhaps you'll appreciate PBR may not be ideal for me. Plus, to see the effect on an aircraft you have to switch to an ouside view. I may do that a couple of times in my flights but not enough to justify buying a PBR enabled aircraft.

I think PBR effects at a rainy airport might be more worthwhile especially where rain is common. So more Manchester than California!