What would it take for LR and/or LM to win your money back?

[Nemo 1,305]

If they would implement a perfect ai engine (together with AIG flight plans and models) and a ATC that handles all of this as well as my own flight, then perhaps I would invest in a newer version. Currently, I still have P3Dv5.2 on my machine and I use it from time to time to fly the big ones. But those occasions became rare in recent times.

[Baber20 1,438]

Laminar Research can never catch up. They just dont have the resources, man power and financial capacity to compete with Microsoft. As for Lockheed Martin, I don't think they actually care about flight simming. 

[177B 730]

Don't forget that X-plane works on Macs, a pretty big market actually. And there there is not much competition, only AeroFly FS. 

And XP is used in FAA approved AATD's and BATD's.

So I think LR will be OK, just smaller.

P3D is still used in BATD's and AATD's, so they will be OK for a while.

For me personally to go back they would have to equal or surpass FS2020 in graphics, WX and FPS.

Edited September 13, 2021 by 177B

[Sigwolf 222]

12 minutes ago, ca_metal said:

Unless they start a new platform from the ground up, they can't do it. It's in the terms of their agreement with Microsoft (AFAIK). For now they have to deal with things on that "gray area" of the market.

Well, they would kind of need to start a new platform, as there is only so much you can cobble on to the FSX codebase, and they effectively hit that limit years ago.  As for the agreement with MS for the current platform, I believe that only accounts for the EULA use clause, but does not dictate the ridiculous pricing scheme.  I could be wrong on that point, however.

[abrams_tank 7,393]

11 minutes ago, bobcat999 said:

I hope some competition comes along, as it will just be MSFS or nothing at this rate.

The problem for MSFS's competitors is that MSFS has raised the bar with satellite & photogrammetry for the entire world, plus Blackshark AI converting the 2D satellite houses and buildings into 3D satellite houses and buildings.

Forget the fact that any company that tries to do what MSFS has done, has to hire a company like Blackshark AI and that in itself costs money.  The main problem for a competitor to MSFS is acquiring the satellite & photogrammetry data to use.  Ironically, LM may have that data but it's for their military or commercial customers and if LM has that data, it cannot be used for home entertainment purposes.

The only other company out there that has the satellite & photogrammetry data that could be used for home entertainment purposes is probably Google. But Google isn't going to give it away for free, and it also requires servers and bandwidth and Google isn't giving that away for free either.

Assuming there are other competitors out there that are thinking of making a modern civilian flight simulator for the home PC market, the problem of acquiring the satellite & photogrammetry data remains, if that competitor truly wants to make a product that can compete with MSFS.

Edited September 13, 2021 by abrams_tank

[Gilandred 690]

First off they need to determine where they can have a competitive advantage.  Merely getting up to par, say graphics-wise, isn’t going to be enough to win back business that went over to msfs.  Why go back if it’s not “better?”

XP has thrived on the (alleged) realism of their flight model, helicopters, and freeware community.  Well the freeware community has already exploded for msfs, so that takes that one off the table.  If it were me I’d focus big time on weather/environmental effects, keep fine tuning their flight modeling/realism, and a significant graphics update (not streaming - too expensive; probably procedural).

LM unfortunately is in a much more dire position,  Once the big boys (PMDG, Leonardo, A2A) are gone, that’s all she wrote.

[Bobsk8 12,573]

Nothing, they are as relevant as a VHS tape player now/ 

[saifs 153]

MSFS did to LM and LR what Orbx did to GEX with FTX Global. That resulted in the end of our FSX guru, Nick Needham. LM and LR will go the same way imho.

[abrams_tank 7,393]

8 minutes ago, Gilandred said:

Merely getting up to par, say graphics-wise, isn’t going to be enough to win back business that went over to msfs.  

Sadly for both P3D and X-Plane, it's not just the graphics that they have to close the gap with.  Even if they can close the gap with graphics, I have no idea how they can match MSFS in FPS. The brilliance with MSFS now is how they managed to get such high FPS off what is already stellar graphics.

[fakeflyer737 991]

Nothing.

They don’t have the partners (Blackshark, MeteorBlue etc), infrastructure or desire to support a sim anything near to what MSFS has offered. They are also about 6 years behind the curve. 

[EGLD 436]

Like others say, I think the new benchmark is global satellite imagery and photogrammetry

I would say current P3D looks almost as pretty as MSFS in some cases, but also downright ugly in certain lighting conditions

I think if anyone could bring similar satellite and photogrammetry it would be LM, but I can't see why they would want to as their primary interests are commercial

I wouldn't write off either being able to do it though, don't Google re-sell their satellite and photogrammetry data? it might just come down to the cost of building that into the sim against what they think they could re-coup in terms of licenses sold

I think the only way MS can fund our access to their data is due to XBox subs, and neither LM or LR have an equivalent

[EGLD 436]

1 minute ago, fakeflyer737 said:

Nothing.

They don’t have the partners (Blackshark, MeteorBlue etc), infrastructure or desire to support a sim anything near to what MSFS has offered. They are also about 6 years behind the curve. 

not having partners can be solved in the time it takes to sign a contract, and Blackshark won't be the only company capable of what's been done in MS

it will come down to whether the costs of those features can be covered by the revenue without the backing MS have, and I'm not sure that guy running LR will care enough to even consider it

[Bert Pieke 7,584]

I am not sure that either LM or LR are interested in competing with MSFS.. 😉

[rtodepart 761]

Nothing simple as that . 
not going to comment about the Austin side . LM from the beginning was hyping things up to gather a group of paid beta testers i was one of them and quit . Back then I would had been more than happy to continue support for LM if they would have showed that it was worth it for the price we was paying and that was not the case . 

[David Mills 4,735]

There once was a sim from Meyer

Whose future appears to be dire.

X-Plane 11

Was thought to be heaven,

Then MS raised the bar higher.