1 hour ago, Rob_Ainscough said:

"low hanging fruit" sure seems insulting ...

You've obviously decided what I meant, and then chosen to be offended by it, despite me not mentioning anything specific at all.
Accusing me of putting down specific companies that I didn't even mention is a bit much.

I was talking about low quality, low effort utilities, badly done airports, hastily done texture replacement packs etc that people still end up buying for $20-30 as it's a mild improvement on the base FSX. I'd be happy for that to be a thing of the past.

Definitely not work by the likes of Orbx and others you mention, who I've spent plenty of money with.

The reality is that if MS wipe the slate clean with a brand new SDK (which I hope they do), everyone will have the same amount of experience in developing for MSFS, i.e. zero.

Edited August 21, 20196 yr by nickhod

53 minutes ago, MatthewS said:

Agreed, those developers, Rex, HiFi, PMDG, Orbx and many many others are absolutely top shelf!

Agreed, which is why I didn't mention those developers (or any others on that level) at all.

3 hours ago, Rob_Ainscough said:

... so experienced developer will not be starting from zero

Which is why I didn't say that an experienced developer will start from zero. Obviously their prior experience and 3D assets wont be wiped out. They will start with zero experience of developing for MSFS however, like everyone else.

 

3 hours ago, Rob_Ainscough said:

It's an open market...

Well, hold on, we don't know that for MSFS. It could very realistically be a closed market where every commercial add-on has to be approved for quality and sold through an MS portal.
Even if they don't enforce that, making it the path of least resistance, like Oculus, may have the same end result.

In fact, given how much data this thing is likely to stream, and given the expectation of continual improvements, MS wanting to take a slice of the add-on pie is entirely possible. How many other streaming services do you know that have no residual income model?

 

3 hours ago, Rob_Ainscough said:

Nothing wrong with less experienced developers coming into the market

Oculus struggled with this on the Gear and Go. Letting the market fill up with low quality, low effort content gives the end user a bad overall experience. They raised the barrier to entry with the Quest significantly,

Anyway, you're obviously hoping and expecting that the MSFS add-on market will be as open, expansive and varied as that for FSX.

My feeling at this point is that there will be fewer opportunities, it could be a semi-closed market, and the barrier entry will be much higher, which might not be a bad thing.

I guess we'll know in a year or so.

1 hour ago, nickhod said:

Well, hold on, we don't know that for MSFS. It could very realistically be a closed market where every commercial add-on has to be approved for quality and sold through an MS portal.
Even if they don't enforce that, making it the path of least resistance, like Oculus, may have the same end result.

In fact, given how much data this thing is likely to stream, and given the expectation of continual improvements, MS wanting to take a slice of the add-on pie is entirely possible. How many other streaming services do you know that have no residual income model?

 

1 hour ago, nickhod said:

My feeling at this point is that there will be fewer opportunities, it could be a semi-closed market, and the barrier entry will be much higher, which might not be a bad thing.

I guess we'll know in a year or so.

That would be the end of freeware developers, so I see your point of view as a big negative.. devs should be allowed to participate without such restrictions, it is up to end users to decide what is a good quality or not, they are the independent authority here for such not MS or anybody else.

FSX, XP and P3D has grown very well thanks to freeware developers - which eventually become payware devs over the long term-, and this is thanks to such platforms being an open market. If MS close it, it will lose momentum to expand its capabilities, given more space to other platforms at the same time.

The only thing required to provide  DLC content should be to adhere to the SDK rules, procedures and requirements, done.. you as a user have the last word..

S.

1 minute ago, simbol said:

That would be the end of freeware developers, so I see your point of view as a big negative.. devs should be allowed to participate without such restrictions, it is up to end users to decide what is a good quality or not, they are the independent authority here for such not MS or anybody else.

As a developer, I very much agree with the sentiment of what you're saying, I'm just not sure that it will play out like that given that ultimately MS are in this to make as much cash as possible.

The vast majority of casual users (not the enthusiasts here) just want to click two buttons to buy some DLC. They want that DLC to automatically update. They don't want a whack-a-mole maintenance nightmare of running installers and scripts. I find it hard to believe that MS wont service that need, especially if this ends up on XBox. 

Will they do it through Steam and let Value take their cut, or will they build the marketplace themselves and keep the cut?

As Oculus shows, you can allow 3rd party content to be installed directly, whilst still operating a profitable "two clicks and you're done" store model. There's plenty of freeware on the Oculus store, those developers are not excluded.

10 minutes ago, nickhod said:

They don't want a whack-a-mole maintenance nightmare of running installers and scripts. I find it hard to believe that MS wont service that need, especially if this ends up on XBox. 

I fully subscribe to that. The myriad of vendors, DLC systems, "hidden scripts", non-conforming methods of installation, various methods of updating is both a hassle and security risk. I hope all addons will be through an official store, but with fair % going to developers. 

23 minutes ago, simmerhead said:

I fully subscribe to that. The myriad of vendors, DLC systems, "hidden scripts", non-conforming methods of installation, various methods of updating is both a hassle and security risk. I hope all addons will be through an official store, but with fair % going to developers. 

Well... Maybe not ! I'd rather not have MS deciding which addons are good enough for me. And I don't want to even think  of how they would manage the conflict of interest between one of their DLC and a 3rd party vendor for the same product. The "hassle " is, in a way, the price to pay for some freedom of choice.

Edited August 22, 20196 yr by domkle

20 minutes ago, simmerhead said:

I fully subscribe to that. The myriad of vendors, DLC systems, "hidden scripts", non-conforming methods of installation, various methods of updating is both a hassle and security risk. I hope all addons will be through an official store, but with fair % going to developers. 

There's also the side effect that it could cut down piracy considerably, so developers may end up earning more overall.

2 minutes ago, nickhod said:

There's also the side effect that it could cut down piracy considerably, so developers may end up earning more overall.

By the contrary, regulation and certification always bring prices up.

Effectively, you would require to be a MS certified DLC content provider, that has a price tag.

Try to hire a certified Oracle developer or a certified MS DirectX developer with the same salary budget for a non certified one and see what happens..

Regards,

Simbol 

12 minutes ago, domkle said:

Well... Maybe not ! I'd rather not have MS deciding which addons is good enough for me. And I don't want to even think  of how they would manage the conflict of interest between one of their DLC and a 3rd party vendor for the same product. The "hassle " is, in a way, the price to pay for some freedom of choice.

No system is perfect, so I agree - there are several downsides. However I'm old and lazy, so I will submit to whatever MS decide is good enough for me - including a completely independent and free market. That latter might cut my spending considerably though, but maybe MS finds a good way to install addons that prevents messing up the entire system.

5 minutes ago, simbol said:

By the contrary, regulation and certification always bring prices up.

Effectively, you would require to be a MS certified DLC content provider, that has a price tag.

The bar to uploading content to the Oculus or Play store is very low, and you don't need to be certified. (Whether the content gets approved is a different story).

Piracy of DLC content for flight sims is absolutely rife and has put some smaller developers out of business. I can't remember the specifics, but I recall one developer talking about how the number of users requesting support was many times the number of units sold.

Some developers might welcome a way of tying purchases to a user's XBox account, but that can only happen with a MS managed store.

30 minutes ago, simmerhead said:

No system is perfect, so I agree - there are several downsides. However I'm old and lazy, so I will submit to whatever MS decide is good enough for me - including a completely independent and free market. That latter might cut my spending considerably though, but maybe MS finds a good way to install addons that prevents messing up the entire system.

 I am old and lazy too but, come on, we are not that old to need pre-chewed food  😄 ! Yet.  What would be interresting is kind of a certificate of  adherence to the SDK standards instead of a compulsory sale channel.  But of course that wouldn't be free.

Edited August 22, 20196 yr by domkle

1 minute ago, domkle said:

What would be interresting is kind of certificate of  adherence to the SDK standards instead of a compulsory sale channel.

This is the way to go.. If you build any solution in accordance with the SDK there is no reason to encounter issues down the line.

S.

I would like to think that Microsoft will implement an in game store or something very similar to the way orbx lets you buy and install their products. This would be massively convenient for the end user and in the long run I think improve developers sales.

There woud be no problem when updating the core sim and I think ultimately may create many impulse buys because of the simplicity.

5 minutes ago, nickhod said:

The bar to uploading content to the Oculus or Play store is very low, and you don't need to be certified. (Whether the content gets approved is a different story).

Piracy of DLC content for flight sims is absolutely rife and has put some smaller developers out of business. I can't remember the specifics, but I recall one developer talking about how the number of users requesting support was many times the number of units sold.

Some developers might welcome a way of tying purchases to a user's XBox account, but that can only happen with a MS managed store.

You should research about all the issues developers encountered with the MS store for the MS windows phone devices.

It went so bad most of them stopped developing apps for it and switched to Android and iOS, look where the MS phone ended..

Agreed on the piracy, however it is a common problem even for MS games, so nothing is written in stones that regulation will stop this.

Regulation in not the answer IMHO, users are the only ones with the right to decide what content is good or not, normally you can vote with reviews and your wallet.

S.