So Andrew Wilson from FSLabs just made a very interesting comment:

Quote

Our customers who have since migrated to MSFS (a significant proportion) could equally put forward a similar argument. Our business decisions are not engineered around customer loyalty - they are built upon market research and ROI. Like it or not, the community base using P3D is reducing rapidly and this latest release from LM will not alter this trajectory.

My interpretation of this comment is that FSLabs will likely focus on MSFS going forward, although I understand that other people will derive a different interpretation from this statement.  Some of you will say this is not news, but it actually is news to me, because FSLabs has not been on the record saying anything like this before. Last year, Leftaris said he would bring the A320 and Concorde to MSFS, but Leftaris never said that FSLabs would focus on MSFS going forward, nor did Leftaris mention anything about FSLab's opinion about the current market situation.  So IMO, what Andrew Wilson is saying is news to me.  And of course, some of you may say it's pretty obvious so it's not news, but FSLabs has been pretty guarded with what they say, so this is a pretty significant acknowledgement from them to say this.

PS. To the mods, I wanted to post this in the FSLabs thread from last year, but unfortunately, that thread was locked. There is another FSLabs thread from 4 years ago where I could have posted this updated news but I felt that it's better to start a new thread on this, rather than necroing a thread from 4 years ago. Mods, if you feel differently, you can put my comment in either of these two threads and lock this thread, if you feel that it's more appropriate to do so. Thank you.

 

He's a bit late to the party...  

Good morning FSLabs. 

Edited June 26, 20232 yr by Jeeeno

40 minutes ago, KL Oo said:

He's a bit late to the party...  

Yes, they are. But at the same time, FSLabs is pretty conservative. They announced the Concorde back in 2020 for P3D version 4 and 5 after MSFS was released, which IMO, takes a lot of guts to do, because of the uncertainty with the market when MSFS was released. FSLabs is just a conservative company, IMO. It takes time for them to switch, so if they are finally acknowledging this, it's worth noting, IMO.

Edit: FSLabs announced for P3D version 4 and 5 back in 2020 after MSFS was released.

Edited June 26, 20232 yr by abrams_tank

10 minutes ago, abrams_tank said:

Yes, they are. But at the same time, FSLabs is pretty conservative. They announced the Concorde back in 2020 for P3D after MSFS was released, which IMO, takes a lot of guts to do, because of the uncertainty with the market when MSFS was released. FSLabs is just a conservative company, IMO. It takes time for them to switch, so if they are finally acknowledging this, it's worth noting, IMO.

Conservative is an under statement! Not sure what they've been waiting for. Id have thought the things Andrew mentioned in that post (market research and ROI) have been pretty obvious for years.

 

Given their lead time to release things I expect to them release an add on for FS2020 just in time for the release of FS2028. Pending market research and ROI of course....

31 minutes ago, abrams_tank said:

Yes, they are. But at the same time, FSLabs is pretty conservative. They announced the Concorde back in 2020 for P3D after MSFS was released

The FSL Concorde for P3D was announced over 5 years ago for P3Dv4 was the main platform for that sim. They wanted to convert it to 64 bit platform from the 32 bit of FSX/P3Dv3. and had to do a total rework (5 years going). This thing will release for P3D before it releases for MSFS.

Edited June 26, 20232 yr by JBDB-MD80

5 minutes ago, JBDB-MD80 said:

The FSL Concorde for P3D was announced over 5 years ago for P3Dv4 was the main platform for that sim.

I mean, the announcement of the Concorde for P3D version 4 and 5 back in 2020:

I will edit my previous comment.

@abrams_tank, your new post is fine. 👍 Regarding the unpaused announcement, development for a 64-bit Concorde had already started when MSFS appeared on the scene in summer 2020.

That caused extreme frustration for me because there was no indication how long they would take to resume development even assuming it would.

Anyway, they’ve always said this would be the last iteration of Concorde they would ever do for P3D. I’m happy with that as I have no intention of moving from that sim for the foreseeable future.

It seems to be true that FSL has a working development model of Concorde flying in MSFS2020,

with some development team members appraising it in MSFS,

this could get exciting! 🙂

years ago, let the FSL team know that I would possibly be interested in P3D version,

but now we are in mid-2023, an FSL Concorde for MSFS would be extremely tempting to $purchase ASAP!

to fully appreciate the aviation wonder that is Concorde…

Honestly, that boat has sailed.  How could you possibly want to bring a payware A320 to MSFS now?

1 minute ago, ErichB said:

Honestly, that boat has sailed.  How could you possibly want to bring a payware A320 to MSFS now?

They have mentioned that the next Airbus will have a lot more range (alluding to the A330).
An A330 from FSLabs will have much more interest amongst people here than the Aerosoft version.

I think FSL will be fine.

1 minute ago, F737MAX said:

An A330 from FSLabs will have much more interest amongst people here than the Aerosoft version.

I hope it is an A330.  

2 hours ago, KL Oo said:

Conservative is an under statement! Not sure what they've been waiting for. Id have thought the things Andrew mentioned in that post (market research and ROI) have been pretty obvious for years.

 

Given their lead time to release things I expect to them release an add on for FS2020 just in time for the release of FS2028. Pending market research and ROI of course....

Maybe they weren't convinced about MSFS before (remember FSL ignored MSFS existence for a long time). Now is obvious for them, moving forward they should focus on MSFS franchise since it is now super dominating the sim market. 

3 minutes ago, omarsmak30 said:

Maybe they weren't convinced about MSFS before (remember FSL ignored MSFS existence for a long time). Now is obvious for them, moving forward they should focus on MSFS franchise since it is now super dominating the sim market. 

I'm pretty sure FSLabs wasn't convinced about MSFS before.  I can only guess by Andrew Wilson's comment about "market research" is that FSLabs went around and asked some other 3rd party developers how their sales in P3D were doing, and how their sales in MSFS were doing.  I'm sure FSLabs was watching data about their own sales of products in P3D, but I think they were really slow to realize what was going on, and they probably got a clearer picture when they looked at more data (ie. asking other 3rd party devs about their sales, checking the Navigraph survey, listening to more of their customers, etc).

At the same time, it takes time for a 3rd party developer to get to know a new API and a new flight simulator. Perhaps it took FSLabs longer to get acquainted with the MSFS API and to study MSFS more.  So maybe this delayed FSLabs from moving to MSFS. But at the same time, there were other companies out there, such as Aerosoft, Fenix, and PMDG, that learned the MSFS API and figured out how MSFS worked, much faster than FSLabs.

FSLabs don't say much, but I would hazard to guess that in the first half of 2021, they were probably still focusing on P3D and were probably still tepid about MSFS.  I can only assume that changed in 2022 when Fenix finally released their A320, that Leftaris finally had to come out and make a public statement, and that signaled publicly at least, a change in thinking at FSLabs. Almost 7 months into 2023, FSLabs is finally acknowledging that they will focus on MSFS moving forward.

 

47 minutes ago, ErichB said:

I hope it is an A330.  

They have confirmed that the mystery (longer range) aircraft is in fact the A330. It's no longer a secret. And yes, an A330 from them is going to be amazing.

Edited June 26, 20232 yr by Bigt