Orbx shot themselves in the foot imo.  requiring new versions of FTX Central just to buy/download stuff and that new version wont work with previously downloaded and backed up stuff...it just got tiring for me.  The TE GB looks great but Im not crazy about any of the US releases for XP.  Why should I buy these things?

This is a good thread so everone can put it out on the table and clear the air as there are a lot of obviously pent up view points being tabled.

I think everybody should just get it off their chest now and possibly then we can then all move forward together in a positive fasion into a new era.

To this end, I find this sense of entitlement from some developers distasteful.

MS owes them nothing but whom do they owe their financial success to in the FS market?

MS of course for providing them the base product and ask nothing in return.

But the biggie of course is the paying customer, you and I.

When was the last time you felt any appreciation or gratitude as a customer from a developer?

How about a customer appreciation sale?

I see developers who are arrogant, argumentative and sometimes insulting with their paying customers.

We can all agree that piracy is a terrible thing but a developer who installs malware into its customers computers to track a thief is beyond the pale. That’s breaking and entering as far as I’m concerned and was a criminal act in itself.

Or a third party vendor charging extortionate rates to re-download a purchased product after a year?

Or how about those that take your money and are never heard from again despite multiple attempts to contact them?

There are several whom I will not do business with as I’ve witnessed their interactions with customers over the years and one in particular I dealt with recently over a support issue- they’ll never see a dollar from me ever again no matter what they produce.

Many require some level of customer relations training- they might write good code or make pretty scenery but their customer relations stink.

I never purchase a product twice to make a move to a new or updated sim, I just do without.

It should be enough that a developers product is given a new chance at longevity in a new sim when the their current products are offered for a dying platform. They will gain untold new sales beyond compare with the new MSFS instead of greasing their current customers for nearly a full boat upgrade price.

Developer do deal with some pretty distasteful stuff day to day and I completely understand that but there’s proper and professional ways of handling things. Perhaps they could take another look on how they’re handling customer relations and the effects it’s having on their sales and the public perceptions of them as a company.

@Skully: 

The problem with your post is that it does not appear too careful that you don't tar all devs with the brush. Flight sim devs do a lot of good too.

Steve, I did say "some developers" not all and I never call out developers by name although one could be eluded to easily because of what they did to their customers.

That being said, if I have a beef with a dev, I handle it personally with them and never bash them publicly.

To be fair, here are the developers whom I hold in the highest esteem and have had nothing but the best experience with their products and support:

Flightbeam

QualityWings

REX

Leonardo

PMDG

Carenado

Reality XP

Simwest

Simsaavy- (no longer making photo sceneries)

A2A

CaptainSim

HiFi Sim 

FlyJSim

There are of course more but these come to mind off the top of my head.

Of course ALL freeware developers who share just for the love of the hobby.

 

 

Edited December 2, 20196 yr by skully

5 hours ago, skully said:

Steve, I did say "some developers" not all and I never call out developers by name although one could be eluded to easily because of what they did to their customers.

That being said, if I have a beef with a dev, I handle it personally with them and never bash them publicly.

 

 

 

You'll probably be lambasted by Mods for posting that list but could I add Steve with his transformative DX 10 Fixer - probably the biggest contribution to FSX made by a Post-Aces Dev.

Edited December 3, 20196 yr by Guest
Pruned an exceedingly long quote.

Since the announce of MSFS 2020 I just deleted everything and I’m waiting for the fantastic new sim. To 3rd party developers, x-plane and p3d i really don’t care, I payed a fortune for word not allowed and bugs. It was a nightmare CTD, FPS, software to connect, improve FPS, weather, textures...I’m a tax lawyer and I had to code in notepad??? offensive initials not allowed...if you want to move forward let go the past.

Regards,

 

João P.S.

7 minutes ago, carecajps said:

Since the announce of MSFS 2020 I just deleted everything and I’m waiting for the fantastic new sim. To 3rd party developers, x-plane and p3d i really don’t care, I payed a fortune for word not allowed and bugs. It was a nightmare CTD, FPS, software to connect, improve FPS, weather, textures...I’m a tax lawyer and I had to code in notepad??? offensive initials not allowed...if you want to move forward let go the past.

Regards,

 

João P.S.

Only 2 posts but showing terrific insight. Well done Sir.

Here's something I was thinking about this morning that might have a bearing on this whole question of our support for (or abandonment of) developers.  I spent some time this weekend running P3D sessions with a couple of high-end airliners.  And I found that, in contrast to my usual practice, I was much more willing to ratchet sliders back and trade off visuals for performance.  I've never been an all-sliders-right person, but I do like my visuals (cf. my comments about immersion in other threads), and I've always set things up so that I was right on the edge of acceptable performance - not over the line, but right up against it.  But now I seem to have reversed myself and decided that, well, no matter how hard you push, you're not going to get P3D looking like a next-generation sim, so why force the issue?  Instead, just relax and go for smooth performance for however long you keep P3D, and get back to (better) visuals once MSFS arrives.  At a gut level I've apparently concluded that P3D is in its endgame, so just let it be what it is and stop trying to torture it into being something else.  And I think that's why I've also ratcheted back on add-ons - big improvements are on the horizon so why invest in incremental ones? It's not vindictiveness and it's not buying into hype - it's a natural change in expectations, goals and practices as something new comes into focus

Anyone experiencing anything similar?

11 minutes ago, Alan_A said:

Anyone experiencing anything similar?

Yes, absolutely concur with that.

Since "the announcement" it's taken the pressure off FPS/ Sliders Right, etc in FSX/ P3D blah blah...

We've had a glimpse of what we're going to get and we'll soon be leaving Cartoon World behind to dissolve in to distant memory. It's taken the pressure of visuals totally off my current Sims.

I'm actually enjoying flying again.

 

What made FSX, P3D, X-Plane and the rest so horribly hideous was that THAT was the only choice of Sim Platforms...

What dark times we have lived through to arrive at this new juncture...this Dawning, this Gateway to a new age of sim experience...

We're veterans of the old order - able to witness the New...

 

Lucky us.

Edited December 2, 20196 yr by Guest

3 minutes ago, Alan_A said:

Here's something I was thinking about this morning that might have a bearing on this whole question of our support for (or abandonment of) developers.  I spent some time this weekend running P3D sessions with a couple of high-end airliners.  And I found that, in contrast to my usual practice, I was much more willing to ratchet sliders back and trade off visuals for performance.  I've never been an all-sliders-right person, but I do like my visuals (cf. my comments about immersion in other threads), and I've always set things up so that I was right on the edge of acceptable performance - not over the line, but right up against it.  But now I seem to have reversed myself and decided that, well, no matter how hard you push, you're not going to get P3D looking like a next-generation sim, so why force the issue?  Instead, just relax and go for smooth performance for however long you keep P3D, and get back to (better) visuals once MSFS arrives.  At a gut level I've apparently concluded that P3D is in its endgame, so just let it be what it is and stop trying to torture it into being something else.  And I think that's why I've also ratcheted back on add-ons - big improvements are on the horizon so why invest in incremental ones? It's not vindictiveness and it's not buying into hype - it's a natural change in expectations, goals and practices as something new comes into focus

Anyone experiencing anything similar?

Indeed, same here.

I am much more willing to accept all the shortcomings of P3D now that I know we will probably get something better next year. All these little issues I was bothering with for years, throwing all kinds of tweaking and addons at them, always wondering "will we have to live with that forever? why is that still an issue after all these years?" - I look at these with ease now and just let them be.

Yesterday I had an elevation issue at an addon airport. I was just about to start the usual routine: test with Orbx Vector on or off, change the order in the scenery.cfg, look for any suspect files in wrong places etc. But then - no, just let it be as it is, not worth the hassle; I will be able to stand that until MSFS comes along.

Actually it makes me enjoy P3D more than ever before.

4 hours ago, Christopher Low said:

What puzzles me is why so many flight simmers are refusing to purchase any more addons for P3D or XPlane when the release of the new Microsoft Flight Simulator is so far away.

Just from my standpoint, and maybe others, I would rather bank the money and invest it in computer upgrades for the new platform instead of buying redundant content for an older platform that I will likely retire within the next year.

7 hours ago, domkle said:

Developers or developer ?  

DeveloperS.

4 hours ago, Christopher Low said:

What puzzles me is why so many flight simmers are refusing to purchase any more addons for P3D or XPlane when the release of the new Microsoft Flight Simulator is so far away.

Don't see how that is puzzling at all, feels like the most logical thing to do when you know the platform could potentially be a dead duck in 6-8 months. I suspect most of the core active people in the flight simulation community have a well-rounded sim setup, with enough addons, planes and scenery to enjoy the remaining time it could have left without the need to buy addon #3085 and another set of cloud textures. 

15 minutes ago, Sethos said:

Don't see how that is puzzling at all, feels like the most logical thing to do when you know the platform could potentially be a dead duck in 6-8 months. I suspect most of the core active people in the flight simulation community have a well-rounded sim setup, with enough addons, planes and scenery to enjoy the remaining time it could have left without the need to buy addon #3085 and another set of cloud textures. 

Yep, absolutely this.

For those who spent thousands thinking This Was As Good As It Gets - tough luck.

You took a gamble and you lost...but as Sethos quite correctly observes; You've had a good time with it.

Now, we're ready for the new...

Personally, Ganter has spent about $500 on various A/C, addons and sceneries, etc.

That looks like quite a lot on what is essentially a video game. I know others have spent a lot more than that. Yes we're idiots, committed hobbyists, some of us are real pilots and some of us our just plain gullible...

Let's get over ourselves and move on...

Edited December 2, 20196 yr by Guest

3 hours ago, skully said:

Steve, I did say "some developers" not all and I never call out developers by name although one could be eluded to easily because of what they did to their customers.

That being said, if I have a beef with a dev, I handle it personally with them and never bash them publicly.

To be fair, here are the developers whom I hold in the highest esteem and have had nothing but the best experience with their products and support:

Flightbeam

QualityWings

REX

Leonardo

PMDG

Carenado

Reality XP

Simwest

Simsaavy- (no longer making photo sceneries)

A2A

CaptainSim

HiFi Sim 

FlyJSim

There are of course more but these come to mind off the top of my head.

Of course ALL freeware developers who share just for the love of the hobby.

 

 

It does show that on the whole you have had a very rewarding experience with addon developers which is great, that's what I found. It seems more simply that you had an unfortunate disappointment with a scenery or aircraft which appeared to be over-weighted, or disproportionate in your post.