Marketplace: "Buy and Download" vs "Buy"

[JYW 2,985]

9 hours ago, Tierborn said:

 It is not clear to me why anyone would want to avoid the marketplace.

One reason is that aircraft bought on the Marketplace come encrypted, with access to some key files (that some of us like to make corrections of) blocked.   When the same product is bought from any other vendor, those files are accessible.

The Marketplace is my preferred vendor for all scenery I buy.  No hassle and all my scenery is integrated into MSFS, rather than packing out my Community folder.

However, for addon aircraft, I try to avoid buying from the Marketplace as much as is humanly possible! (I only buy aircraft that I really want, that aren't available elsewhere, like FS Reborn and the FFX Visionjet), due to the encryption point above.

 

Edited April 11 by JYW

[bofhlusr 458]

49 minutes ago, JYW said:

I try to avoid buying from the Marketplace as much as is humanly possible! (I only buy aircraft that I really want, that aren't available elsewhere, like FS Reborn and the FFX Visionjet), due to the encryption point above.

Same here except that in this case the Mustang was heavily discounted at 63% off.

[bofhlusr 458]

23 hours ago, bofhlusr said:

I'll give it time. IF I have to open a ticket, since I have MSFS on Steam, do I go to Steam or Microsoft support? Thanks in advance.

Just circling back to say the issue was resolved. I submitted a ticket to Steam.  I don't know what they did or if they did anything but the plane became available in the Marketplace as a download when I looked again after waiting about 12 hours.

[Tierborn 188]

14 hours ago, JYW said:

One reason is that aircraft bought on the Marketplace come encrypted, with access to some key files (that some of us like to make corrections of) blocked.   When the same product is bought from any other vendor, those files are accessible.

The Marketplace is my preferred vendor for all scenery I buy.  No hassle and all my scenery is integrated into MSFS, rather than packing out my Community folder.

However, for addon aircraft, I try to avoid buying from the Marketplace as much as is humanly possible! (I only buy aircraft that I really want, that aren't available elsewhere, like FS Reborn and the FFX Visionjet), due to the encryption point above.

 

What modifications are you making to those "encrypted files?   I am confident that the majority of folks saying that they do buy from the marketplace it is not for the same reason as you have.  They do not buy from the marketplace because they read or viewed content from someone who didn't like it. As a result, now they think they don't like it either.

[JYW 2,985]

3 hours ago, Tierborn said:

What modifications are you making to those "encrypted files?   I am confident that the majority of folks saying that they do buy from the marketplace it is not for the same reason as you have.  They do not buy from the marketplace because they read or viewed content from someone who didn't like it. As a result, now they think they don't like it either.

I guess it just depends on level to which people get into the (slightly more) technical side of the sim.  The modifications that I'm referring to (that are not possible when bought from the Marketplace) are fixes 90% of the time.  Take Carenado;  there were 3 excellent new lines of code that can (should) be added to all autopilots in MSFS.  They make engagement more realistic and get rid of the 'jerk' that sometimes occurs, without them.  Carenado do not add those lines to any aircraft.   Neither do many others devs, but as long as the addon is not bought from the Marketplace, it is a 30 second job to add them to the aircraft's systems.cfg file.  The aircraft is then hugely more enjoyable.   That's just one example.

There are quite a crowd of us on here who make such improvements via the CFG files. 

There probably are some people who just don't buy from the Marletplace because some others have said it's no good.  But I like to think that most here can think for themselves and make their own decisions on what addons and vendors they will use.

[arkob145 4]

On 4/12/2024 at 12:14 AM, JYW said:

One reason is that aircraft bought on the Marketplace come encrypted, with access to some key files (that some of us like to make corrections of) blocked

Not sure that is the case anymore. Earlier, if you bought airports from the marketplace, external apps like LNM, GSX etc would have trouble reading those files due to the encryption, but I've had no such issues so far. On the GSX discord, someone mentioned that the encryption hasn't been a problem for few months at the least. Not sure about aircraft or other types of products.

[Tierborn 188]

21 hours ago, JYW said:

I guess it just depends on level to which people get into the (slightly more) technical side of the sim.  The modifications that I'm referring to (that are not possible when bought from the Marketplace) are fixes 90% of the time.  Take Carenado;  there were 3 excellent new lines of code that can (should) be added to all autopilots in MSFS.  They make engagement more realistic and get rid of the 'jerk' that sometimes occurs, without them.  Carenado do not add those lines to any aircraft.   Neither do many others devs, but as long as the addon is not bought from the Marketplace, it is a 30 second job to add them to the aircraft's systems.cfg file.  The aircraft is then hugely more enjoyable.   That's just one example.

There are quite a crowd of us on here who make such improvements via the CFG files. 

There probably are some people who just don't buy from the Marletplace because some others have said it's no good.  But I like to think that most here can think for themselves and make their own decisions on what addons and vendors they will use.

I don't believe that most think for themselves.  I see in this community, and other gaming communities, people just jumping on what they think everyone else is doing.   In this case, someone is upset because Microsoft has the store, and writes their opinion on why the store is bad.   Some simmer reads this person's opinion, and now they adopt the OP view of the store.  This happens all the time.   It happens in the positive as well.   With early positive reviews, people in the community will adopt that view as well, and that's before they have even tried it for themselves.  

[JYW 2,985]

13 hours ago, arkob145 said:

Not sure that is the case anymore. Earlier, if you bought airports from the marketplace, external apps like LNM, GSX etc would have trouble reading those files due to the encryption, but I've had no such issues so far. On the GSX discord, someone mentioned that the encryption hasn't been a problem for few months at the least. Not sure about aircraft or other types of products.

Short answer;  nope, MP-purchased aircraft are still fully encrypted.

The default aircraft were unencrypted some time ago (a welcome move) but all Marketplace-purchased aircraft are still fully encrypted, with no access to aircraft.cfg, engine.cfg, systems.cfg and flightmodel.cfg.

Edited April 13 by JYW

[Bigmack 30]

On 4/11/2024 at 2:07 AM, Tierborn said:

If it's on the marketplace, that is the best place to purchase the item.  It is a worry-free purchase. It is not clear to me why anyone would want to avoid the marketplace.

The biggest issue I have purchasing anything from the marketplace is they don't give you a receipt showing what you purchased. I always get some encrypted receipt not knowing what I purchased. How hard is it to generate a receipt stating what was brought and when, instead of encrypted emails.