Why scenery developers focus on MSFS instead of P3D?

[chapstick 2,757]

1 hour ago, simbol said:

I am not yet convinced of the size of the market for MSFS over the long run.. it will be interesting to see the reactions when P3D release an update.. that alongside with more time allowing users and gamer's to use MSFS will reveal if the numbers are there or not..

Gamer always move on to the next title.. it is about living a fantasy, achieve goals and explore something new.. simulation is not about that, simulation is about replicating real life.. and most gamers are looking to "escape" the real world.

S.

In the "long run," the SDK will be fleshed out enough for complex add-on aircraft to be brought to MSFS. In that scenario, it doesn't matter what "the gamers" do because MSFS will be siphoning off P3D users. In any case, I don't see a scenario in which the MSFS market is smaller than P3D's. I wouldn't be surprised if MSFS has sold more copies since its release than P3D has in its entire lifetime since 1.0.

[lambourne 211]

I think if MSFS lives up to its own marketing hype it'll suck demand out of the P3D consumer/"real simmer" market. Right now it's about 12-18 months away from that: a very premature release, noticeably light on promised features, an SDK that hasn't been written let alone documented... but the whole game has the makings of something great.

The P3D market will come across to MSFS once there are complex airliners released. For that to happen there needs to be a useful SDK. I have a feeling that many third party devs are going to look at ways of porting existing outside-the-sim processes across to MSFS rather than building 100% native aircraft, though, and that's going to have unpredictable consequences.

Already Orbx are putting new MSFS releases onto their own addon management product instead of the MSFS Marketplace, cutting MS/Asobo out of the revenue picture. I can't see MS reacting well to not getting a cut of the third party pie given that execs there forced the premature release of a product that wasn't ready, at least for a significant chunk of its intended market. When Microsoft sees the kind of profits PMDG's 737 drives off the back of MSFS, with sky-high prices for a product with no default equivalent, we might see core sim functions deliberately broken in later updates (say, removal of the Community folder) to force 3PDs back onto the Marketplace. In turn that might send a handful back to P3D.

But who knows? A lot rests on how moddable MSFS turns out to be. The open architecture of FS9/FSX/P3D is what kept it alive for so long whereas MSFS seems fairly locked down in comparison.

[OzWhitey 3,353]

2 hours ago, simbol said:

I am not yet convinced of the size of the market for MSFS over the long run.. it will be interesting to see the reactions when P3D release an update.. that alongside with more time allowing users and gamer's to use MSFS will reveal if the numbers are there or not..

Gamer always move on to the next title.. it is about living a fantasy, achieve goals and explore something new.. simulation is not about that, simulation is about replicating real life.. and most gamers are looking to "escape" the real world.

S.

One interesting thing about MSFS is the almost complete lack of mission content and achievements. Asobo put very little work into this aspect, which is exactly what I imagine casual players would want.

Open world is popular, but open world games usually still have a primary quest to follow if you want to.

 

[simbol 5,819]

33 minutes ago, Chapstick said:

In the "long run," the SDK will be fleshed out enough for complex add-on aircraft to be brought to MSFS. In that scenario, it doesn't matter what "the gamers" do because MSFS will be siphoning off P3D users. In any case, I don't see a scenario in which the MSFS market is smaller than P3D's. I wouldn't be surprised if MSFS has sold more copies since its release than P3D has in its entire lifetime since 1.0.

Totally, but the question is about "Active users".. that is the real market size.. it is not use to me to know how many copies MS could have sold or it will ever sell.

It is all about what is the amount of active users, people might buy the product but ditch it later or just stop using it for any reasons.. Gamers because they want to play now the new COD or simmers because they keep waiting for something that is not there. In my view the Xbox market is not really promising, those are the type of users that move from game title to other titles very easy, sometimes measured in "weeks or days", also their expenditure behaviour might be totally different from simmers and needs, meaning different type of content is what will appeal to them or perhaps none at all.

So how many copies MS sells is not the stats that I am measuring because it is irrelevant, that doesn't determine the market size for DLC providers, all it indicates is how much money MS could do.. good for them.. the question that matters to me is how many of those copies sold will remain using the platform.. all Facebook groups are full of people disappointed, removing it, etc.with others totally happy with it. so for now the waters still remain muddy..... as I said I am really happy for the fortunate scenery developers and selected few 3rd party developers that are able to provide add-on's now.. 

From my own add-on's stats.. sales are starting to pickup again for P3D with many users asking me to re-activate their old keys due to them re-formatting their PCs to re-install P3D V5. Which indicates a considerable amount of users are returning to P3D.

Regarding your comment for the MS SDK, I was promised it would have been completed way before release.. here I am still waiting.. so I am not holding my breath to any promises from MS anymore.. I will be happy to use when it is really delivered, but I don't believe in any dates anymore. 

S.

 

[GSalden 4,656]

2 hours ago, simbol said:

I am not yet convinced of the size of the market for MSFS over the long run.. it will be interesting to see the reactions when P3D release an update.. that alongside with more time allowing users and gamer's to use MSFS will reveal if the numbers are there or not..

Gamer always move on to the next title.. it is about living a fantasy, achieve goals and explore something new.. simulation is not about that, simulation is about replicating real life.. and most gamers are looking to "escape" the real world.

S.

MSFS does not have a fisheye fix for NVSURROUND as P3D has and there are no 2D panels to drag to another display.

As Umberto stated P3D will always have more features as it is a training software. For me with a home cockpit + Prosim I need a very enhanced SDK before I can use all functions...

Up to now MSFS is MS Flight Scenery which is good but I need much more.

[OzWhitey 3,353]

20 minutes ago, simbol said:

with many users asking me to re-activate their old keys due to them re-formatting their PCs to re-install P3D V5.

We warned them, many times. I vote you charge them $50 for the service, and post their names here so they can be publicly shamed by the P3D true believers for an appropriate period of time, prior to be readmitted into the community. 😉

 

[OzWhitey 3,353]

11 minutes ago, GSalden said:

For me with a home cockpit + Prosim I need a very enhanced SDK before I can use all functions...

Being devils advocate here a bit...but i’m also a Prosim user, and last i checked they were planning to support MSFS as soon as that was possible, no idea about their current projected timeline, though. As you mentioned, proper view control would also be needed. I’m also not sure how performance would fare with triple screens.

[GSalden 4,656]

13 minutes ago, OzWhitey said:

Being devils advocate here a bit...but i’m also a Prosim user, and last i checked they were planning to support MSFS as soon as that was possible, no idea about their current projected timeline, though. As you mentioned, proper view control would also be needed. I’m also not sure how performance would fare with triple screens.

There is a post at the PS forum about MSFS where they explain this.

AS is helping Asobo with a more enhanced SDK. According to Mathijs that would take at least 4 months.

WidevieW is partially compatible at this moment : no weather syncing but for that I use FSGRW ( don’t know if they plan an update )...

[Juliett Alfa Romeo 530]

On 9/20/2020 at 12:59 PM, LarsA said:

The answer is very easy: MSFS is a huge market and this platform will be the future of flight simulation - if you like it or not.... 

[pmb 5,137]

1 hour ago, GSalden said:

MSFS does not have a fisheye fix for NVSURROUND as P3D has and there are no 2D panels to drag to another display.

I think there are more important criteria than this, as annoying as the fisheye-effect may be for you (and, btw., for me). Nor would I take a mega-advanced setup as criterion for MSFS to hit or miss. You are certainly better served to continue with Prepar3d, which is a good simulator, but in my mind this is not at all representative for the average user.

Kind regards, Michael 

[shivers9 1,174]

2 hours ago, Chapstick said:

I wouldn't be surprised if MSFS has sold more copies since its release than P3D has in its entire lifetime since 1.0.

Point taken but I don't really know if that means a whole lot in the big picture. LM has never tried to market to the gaming world per say and they most surely are not after "little Johnny's lunch money. They are much more involved in the commercial side of the issue. The money they collect from us flight simmers will not even fully fund their snack bars and coffee funds.

[d.tsakiris 417]

“In the long run“...“12-18 months“...sure, MSFS will probably be more useful than today, but P3D will probably be prettier than now. What I'm saying: When talking about the possible future, don't forget P3D also still being developed.

[GSalden 4,656]

At this moment MSFS has more than 1 million users. I guess more than P3D.

However many are using the Gamer pass so they can try it the first month for € 1.- and the following 2 months for € 5,- each month. So from the 4th month and further we will know how it really is developing itself.  
Already people are asking a refund....

Hopefully Asobo is able to fix all the issues, even if it means that it will be a VFR game.

[ShezA 176]

On 9/20/2020 at 4:30 PM, micstatic said:

I think most developers realize so many of us have already bought the products they make. So in order for new sales they have put most of their focus on msfs. P3dv5 is still my primary sim. The only airport scenery missing that I really want is Indianapolis. Shocking that hasn’t been made. But we still have new scenery and airplanes coming.  The tfdi md-11 will be fantastic 

Your wish is my command...KIND.

https://www.fsdeveloper.com/forum/threads/kind-indianapolis-international-airport.448174/

[ShezA 176]

On 9/20/2020 at 4:40 PM, virtuali said:

What you are seeing, is likely the visual disconnection between the sim, which has a 100% PBR graphic engine, and ground polygons made with Projected Meshes ( which is a feature that allows for a faster conversion of ground lines of existing sceneries ), which didn't supported PBR before the current patch. So, the non-PBR ground polygons looked a bit of of place compared with the rest of the sim. This is history now, since starting from the current patch, Projected Mesh support PBR but, of course, in order to see the effect, the scenery must be updated. I cannot speak about other sceneries, but our Chicago O'Hare was converted to support full PBR on ground the day after the patch was released, and now it looks perfectly integrated with the rest of the scenery, because the 3d modeling was already 100% PBR, even in P3D4, that's why it converted so well in MSFS.

 

It's fairly fast ( if you know what you are doing ) and cost efficient, and the scenery will look good and even better if it was born as a full PBR scenery.

It's also fairly fast ( if you know what you are doing ) and cost efficient, and the scenery will look plain or even bad, if the scenery wasn't designed for PBR.

 

To do a QUALITY airport, it takes about a year, possibly more. Some quality airliners will surely be out by that date, and the airports won't go anywhere. It would be a mistake to "wait" for those, unless we could magically conjure an airport of of thin air.

And of course, you are assuming scenery developers are "deciding" things and try to convince you to do something. It's the OTHER way around. USERS drive developer's choice, and users means only one thing: SALES.

If your stance of not buying airports for MSFS because there are no airliners, translated into buying MORE airports for P3D in the meantime, and the majority of users shared this attitude, we would should have seen an INCREASE of sales of P3D-only products. Or, at least, not a drop.

What do you think it happened, instead ?

That's the reply to your answers. Users buy ( or not ). Sales drives development choices. Users are always right. Developers only follow.

Amazing numbers Umberto! Did not realise that this new sim is such a blockbuster already!

Personally, I have not purchased it yet (been busy) but in alpha/beta form I loved it. I actually find P3D a bit boring now except of course for the payware aircraft and sceneries.