1 hour ago, mSparks said:

Steam users just upgraded to XP12 from XP11 buying direct from Laminar rather than buying it on steam.

So some fourteen hundred Steam users decided to forsake that platform…..to reward Laminar directly for XP12?

Remarkable!😍

Since this collapse in Steam numbers seems to have started during the summer of 2020 you don’t think there’s a possibility that they might have moved on to a different game entirely? Ace Combat 7 for instance?

23 minutes ago, DD_Arthur said:

So some fourteen hundred Steam users decided to forsake that platform

1400 monthly users on steam stats

is probably about 14,000 owners of X-Plane.

IIRC, XP12 was at 200,000 3 months post launch at the time of this survey wasn't it? (using MS numbers)

I mean, you can go lower or higher than than that,

But you get the MSFS 2020 number by multiplying whatever you choose by less than three, and the XBOX number by dividing by 4....

Edited June 14, 20232 yr by mSparks

1 hour ago, mSparks said:

1400 monthly users on steam stats

is probably about 14,000 owners of X-Plane.

IIRC, XP12 was at 200,000 3 months post launch at the time of this survey wasn't it? (using MS numbers)

I mean, you can go lower or higher than than that,

But you get the MSFS 2020 number by multiplying whatever you choose by less than three, and the XBOX number by dividing by 4....

S! 👍

  

2 hours ago, mSparks said:

But you get the MSFS 2020 number by multiplying whatever you choose by less than three, and the XBOX number by dividing by 4....

You should probably go to the source rather than speculating. Jorg said in a Dev Q&A stream not long ago that they still have a couple hundred thousand daily users. The navigraph survey is not representative of the entire community but rather PC/navigraph users.

19 hours ago, mSparks said:

2024 is looking like it will be an epic year for flight sim

That I can agree on. We will definitely see a lot of new users joining the hobby. Good for everyone including 3rd party developers. 

19 hours ago, mSparks said:

XP12 maturing to the point it supplants XP11

Yes but the pace of substantial updates has been so slow. I don't see this happening for another 3 years. Waiting to see what 12.06 holds though.

43 minutes ago, brinx said:

The navigraph survey is not representative of the entire community but rather PC/navigraph users.

I'd say its representative of anyone who expressed an interest in more information of flight sim in the month or two before the survey, and was willing to answer the survey.

That definitely excludes mobile users and xbox game pass users who randomly installed it while browsing, used it a few times and moved on to the next thing - I guess in equal measure, we know there has been some 50 million X-Plane mobile installs from the google play and apple store stats so...

47 minutes ago, brinx said:

Jorg said in a Dev Q&A stream not long ago that they still have a couple hundred thousand daily users.

just means there is half a million daily of those 50 million using X-Plane mobile.

Not that interesting though, because if answering a survey is to much like effort for them, buying addons more than a few dollars definitely is.

50 minutes ago, brinx said:

That I can agree on.

👍

52 minutes ago, brinx said:

Yes but the pace of substantial updates has been so slow.

how long have you been watching? I mean really watching, from the time a developer produces a tech demo, to the time it comes to mass market.

Asobo's terrain engine would probably have been in progress for more than a decade before they signed the 10 year deal/contract with MS in 2014...... Dev is slow, grinding progress, it only looks "quick" when you wake up in the morning to a release announcement you weren't expecting.

LR is now dropping/drip feeding the stuff they have all been working on in the last ~10 years since XP11 went to mass market.

Like some things are quicker than others, especially if other priorities or dependencies get in the way.

LR did just share some of the assets they have been building though, not exactly inconsequential

afaict, everything on that deck (and under it 😉) is new.

Flightsim is especially painstaking vs "simple" game development, if game development is giving a kid a pencil, flightsim is trying to create a fake mona lisa that will convince the worlds best art historian.

(and the navigraph survey captures the opinions of those art historians)

 

21 hours ago, GCBraun said:

or that the MSFS roadmap for 2023 was inexistent due to lack of budget?

The evidence then was in the fact that their roadmaps literally didn't extend that far aside from some dinky scenery updates.

The speculation came in that a massive investment firm all but bought full control of Asobo right around that time.

The educated guesses from those who've been in the industry for a while were that Asobo's promises of a decade of free updates was hot-air wind-bagging. That part has come to fruition. They're 6 years early because their promises are not sustainable. It's simply not that big of a market. That or they see the opportunity to bilk and are taking it.

But they aren't going away any time soon, that is true. Plenty of people will pony up again and the xbox repertoire will continue growing in an effort to keep that 10mil statistic increasing. That luscious roadmap will simply cost more bling.

20 minutes ago, blingthinger said:

The speculation came in that a massive investment firm all but bought full control of Asobo right around that time.

do you mean

https://www.asobostudio.com/news/asobo-studio-opens-its-capital-sagard-newgen-support-its-growth

20 minutes ago, blingthinger said:

Asobo's promises of a decade of free updates

source?

20 minutes ago, blingthinger said:

But they aren't going away any time soon

well, Microsoft, Eagle Dynamics and Laminar Research are not going away anytime soon, has Asobo commented yet, or was this as big a surprise to them as it was everyone else?

 

 

Edited June 15, 20232 yr by mSparks

 

5 minutes ago, mSparks said:

do you mean

Sagard, that's the one. Suspiciously coincident with that mysterious dirth of roadmap updates.

Did Asobo claim they'd be releasing multiple paid-for updates during the 10 years? I don't remember hearing that. Pay once and enjoy the ride.

6 minutes ago, mSparks said:

big a surprise to them

Ah, are you suggesting Asobo might not have known about 2024 being a pay-to-upgrade? I hadn't considered that. 

27 minutes ago, blingthinger said:

The speculation came in that a massive investment firm all but bought full control of Asobo right around that time.

"Bordeaux, January 28th, 2021 –  Sagard NewGen acquired a minority stake in Asobo Studio from its 12 founders"

"Sagard has experienced significant growth, with assets under management¹ increasing to over $13B, some 300 professionals joining the team and over 125 companies in the portfolio"

"Sagard NewGen fund was launched in 2020 and this is its second operation so far"

"The fund was established to make majority and minority investments of between €10 million and €50 million"

I would suggest you may need to calibrate your understanding of a) what's a 'massive investment firm', and b) what exactly 'full control' means.

Not to get in the way of your speculation circle-jerk....😅

2 minutes ago, scotchegg said:

I would suggest you may need to calibrate your understanding of a) what's a 'massive investment firm', and b) what exactly 'full control' means.

Nice try. I'm OK calling a 13B portfolio massive. And for a company the size of Asobo, up to 50million investment is significant (Sagard's supposed top end).

Nor did I declare they acquired full control, now did I?

5 minutes ago, scotchegg said:

Not to get in the way of your speculation circle-jerk

Of course you meant to. Welcome to the circle-jerk.

10 minutes ago, blingthinger said:

Did Asobo claim they'd be releasing multiple paid-for updates during the 10 years?

In this Q&A, 2019 they said

"this is a 10 year project for us"

"we started 5 years ago"

That's

start 2014

announce 2019

finish 2024

 

11 minutes ago, blingthinger said:

Ah, are you suggesting Asobo might not have known about 2024 being a pay-to-upgrade? I hadn't considered that. 

I don't like assuming anything without evidence, but it seems a pretty big announcement for them to not mention it on

https://www.asobostudio.com/news

In fact the only evidence we have is after that simply gigantic investment, is this survey, which shows they are barely competing with XP11, and XBOX was a bust.

 

4 minutes ago, blingthinger said:

Nice try. I'm OK calling a 13B portfolio massive. And for a company the size of Asobo, up to 50million investment is significant (Sagard's supposed top end).

Lol.

8 minutes ago, blingthinger said:

 

Sagard, that's the one. Suspiciously coincident with that mysterious dirth of roadmap updates.

Did Asobo claim they'd be releasing multiple paid-for updates during the 10 years? I don't remember hearing that. Pay once and enjoy the ride.

Ah, are you suggesting Asobo might not have known about 2024 being a pay-to-upgrade? I hadn't considered that. 

I don’t recall anyone from MS or Asobo ever saying at any time the the MSFS franchise would be free for the entire proposed 10-year life cycle.

And, we still don’t have any information from any official source that 2024 will be “pay to upgrade”. Certainly there will be a cost for those who never owned FS2020 previously, as with any new game purchase.

It remains to be seen what current FS2020 owners will pay. Will there be a “loyalty discount”? Will it be full price? Will it be free? Until there is an official announcement from MS, nobody is in a position to make any “factual” statements about it.

Even if it is sold at full price for everyone, so what? I have also owned every X-Plane edition going back to version 8 When XP12 came out, I had no expectation that it would be a free upgrade from XP11, (and it wasn’t).

But, I never paid anything for incremental upgrades within the XP11 series, just as nobody has paid anything additional for MSFS within the lifetime of the 2020 version. 

XP11 is no longer being actively updated, now that XP12 is out, but nobody is forced to move to 12 if they don’t want to. The same holds true for MSFS 2020 vs. 2024. If people don’t want to buy 2024, they are welcome to stay on 2020. At least in the case of 2020, MS has stated that it will continue to be updated even after 2024 launches - at least for a period of time

Round and round we go

Edited June 15, 20232 yr by GoranM

9 hours ago, JRBarrett said:

I don’t recall anyone from MS or Asobo ever saying at any time the the MSFS franchise would be free for the entire proposed 10-year life cycle.

To be fair, I don't recall anyone from MS or Asobo ever saying there will be new versions every few years, either.  

When any developer makes a mention of "supporting" a product, it's a general consensus that the product in question will be maintained at no cost to the end user.  

Jorg, himself said, the new MSFS will be supported for 10 years.  That was months before release.  

Now, we can argue semantics, but then you're opening a very large door for other developers who will say, "Yes, we plan on supporting ALL our add ons for the new version of XYZ flight sim!  Nothing to worry about", only to find a price tag attached to the updates when they're finally released.  When people scream, the developer has every right to say, "We never said the updates would be free."

Of course there are others in other forums who choose to gaslight people over the lack of communications, along with insulting a select few people in here (calling us clowns).  Some of those people were talking about how MSFS was so popular, and has sold so many copies, it would be impossible for them to go broke just on the one title.  Personally, I'm one for full, or at least as full disclosure as possible.  If a product is going to get support for 10 years, with incremental versions thrown within those 10 years, it would be preferable that this was mentioned a lot earlier.  ie.  At the time it was announced that the initial title would be supported for 10 years.  

Anyway...back on topic

Edited June 15, 20232 yr by GoranM