From Randazzo at the PMDG forums:

Quote

Captains,

We are happy to announce that our first product for Microsoft Flight Simulator has completed development and is now pending for release.

The PMDG Douglas DC-6 for Microsoft Flight Simulator represents the first of a number of products that PMDG has planned for Microsoft Flight Simulator, and marries our penchant for creating "study level" simulations with Microsoft's magnificent new, high technology flight simulation engine. Never before have we had the ability to model an airplane with such detail, and we are very excited to bring this product to market this week.

PMDG_DC6_announcement.jpg
Throwing superlatives around is an easy thing to do when you are working with a new generation of simulation platform that is as visually stunning as thew new Microsoft Flight Simulator. We tend to shy away from such behavior when showing a soon-to-be released product, but in this case it is hard to avoid. MSFS is a modern engine that does a magnificent job of capturing the beauty of the DC-6, allowing us to turn out a highly detailed, robust simulation of one of the world's great, classic airliners.

The PMDG Douglas DC-6 for Microsoft Flight Simulator is a ground up build that was designed from the beginning to capitalize on the advanced features of MSFS. From lighting to flight handling to systems behaviors, we have created a detail-rich simulation that is sure to deliver weeks and months and years of enjoyable simulation experience to PMDG customers new and old. No effort has been spared to make this the most detailed simulation in our product line, while simultaneously giving new simmers all of the tools that they need to succeed in opreating this highly detailed simulation.

Understanding that not all PMDG customers have radial engine experience in their background, we have added the Automated Flight Engineer to the product specifically to unburden you, the pilot, by handling most all of the complex tasks and checklists while you focus on flying the airplane. Just like a real-world captain, you can easily delegate complex processes to your Automatic Flight Engineer with the simple click of a button.

The PMDG Douglas DC-6 will be available on Friday, 18JUN21 directly from www.pmdg.com.

We will have more video and information available for you later in the day on Wednesday, and we hope that you will take a few moments to tune in to our friends Chewwy and TheFlyingFabio on Twitch throughout the day today as they showcase our new product and attempt to learn to fly the airplane in real-time with all of you watching.

Pricing and time-of-day availability is still pending, and will be announced shortly before product release.

We are very excited to finally be bringing you a product compatible with Microsoft Flight Simulator. We are very excited about what we have created, and we hope it will bring you many years of simulator enjoyment.

On behalf of all of us at PMDG, thank you for your continued support during the past 24 years!

https://forum.pmdg.com/forum/main-forum/general-discussion-news-and-announcements/129736-16jun21-pmdg-dc-6-for-microsoft-flight-simulator-release-date-announcement

Edited June 16, 20214 yr by abrams_tank

Cool! Will be hard not to buy at once!

Any ideas on pricing?

4 minutes ago, Adamski_NZ said:

Any ideas on pricing?

Nope - "Pricing and time-of-day availability is still pending, and will be announced shortly before product release."

 

So just rumours and speculation on pricing at the moment. 

6 minutes ago, Adamski_NZ said:

Any ideas on pricing?

X-Plane version was $74.95.  And that was for X-Plane 10.

Doubtful it'll be lower for the MSFS version.

3 minutes ago, GoranM said:

X-Plane version was $74.95.  And that was for X-Plane 10.

Doubtful it'll be lower for the MSFS version.

To me it would be a bad idea to not lower it given the much wider market in MSFS. $50 for instance would attract a lot more customers and probably make them a higher profit margin.. Just my opinion.

Edited June 16, 20214 yr by Carts85

I really hope they bring out the 777 next!

5 minutes ago, Carts85 said:

To me it would be a bad idea to not lower it given the much wider market in MSFS. $50 for instance would attract a lot more customers and probably make them a higher profit margin.. Just my opinion.

All the more reason to hike up the price.  Higher demand.  Wider audience.  

And if they lower it, X-Plane DC6 owners will go mental.

9 minutes ago, captain420 said:

I really hope they bring out the 777 next!

737 is next. Actually the NG3 was supposed to be their first product released, but they had to change it. The 737 is still scheduled for this year though.

There’s a small chance the 777 is still coming this year. Followed by the 747 on 2022.

Edited June 16, 20214 yr by ca_metal

19 minutes ago, Carts85 said:

To me it would be a bad idea to not lower it given the much wider market in MSFS. $50 for instance would attract a lot more customers and probably make them a higher profit margin.. Just my opinion.

From what I understand, the CRJ by Aerosoft is equally as complex, if not more complex than the DC-6.  And I think the CRJ is priced at around $50 USD.

However, I think PMDG want to establish their brand as the "Rolls Royce" or "Louis Vutton" of flight sim developers. In other words, they want to position themselves as a "premium" brand.  So even if the amount of complexity and work is not more than the CRJ, PMDG may still refuse to budge on their pricing, if they price the DC-6 at over $70 USD.

In economics, for a general demand curve for a normal product, the higher the price of the product, the lower the demand.  However, there are some weird situations for premium products where the demand increases when the company raises the price of the product.  This applies especially for fashion products where some companies will not lower the price of the fashion product too much if they are targeting the premium market (ie. dresses, jeans, etc).

I can't say how much the demand behavior in the fashion industry applies to the flight sim industry.  But I get the feeling that PMDG is kind of following the path of some fashion companies where they know their product is a premium product, they want to protect their brand recognition, so they also deliberately price the product at a premium too (despite like I said, the DC-6 may not be more complex than the Aerosoft CRJ but the CRJ is about $50 USD).

Edited June 16, 20214 yr by abrams_tank

19 minutes ago, GoranM said:

X-Plane version was $74.95.  And that was for X-Plane 10.

Doubtful it'll be lower for the MSFS version.

For that price I pass and enjoy a complete game for the same price.

5 minutes ago, hansb57 said:

For that price I pass and enjoy a complete game for the same price.

FYI, I think PMDG said in the past that they would price the 737 for MSFS at around $140 USD (I think Randazzo said it in the PMDG forums some time ago, you can search for it).  You can technically buy 2 copies of the standard version of MSFS ($60 for each copy) for the price of the future 737 for MSFS and still have $20 USD left over to buy a 3rd party airport scenery.  Having said that, PMDG is known for quality so a lot of simmers who want a high fidelity, "study level" airliner, are gonna pay that price for the 737.

Edited June 16, 20214 yr by abrams_tank

2 minutes ago, abrams_tank said:

 

Good post. I think your right.. In regards to demand to the DC-6 I just can’t see it being on anywhere near the same scale as the 737/777/747 where they probably can go down that Rolls Royce pricing route

I think pricing in the MSFS payware market so far has been pretty sensible, I don’t want to see any over inflated ego pricing occurring potentially pushing other future products up.

If it cost 90 then in a 5 years time frame it comes down to 1,5 per month. Not too bad!

Karl