My experience with updates for airport addons on the MS Marketplace is that they take months to be released, and sometimes never at all. That is totally unacceptable.

Buy from the developer; quick support and quick update when available; painless transactions.

3 hours ago, JRBarrett said:

One big problem is how long it takes for 3rd party developers’ updates to appear in the MP. PMDG releases regular updates to their products, which are immediately available to download and install via OC3. The same updates for the MP version of their aircraft might take days or even weeks to show up. That is not something that PMDG (or any other developer) has any control over. Once they submit a product update to the Marketplace, they are at the mercy of Microsoft to make it available.

Some developers eg, Mike Johnson, seem to have no problem getting updates posted on the MP quickly. Other developers claim that their updates are being held up for some mysterious reason. 

I only have MP and direct from developer purchases so far. The problem with third party addon sellers is there are about 6 of them and some developers use some but not others. I don't want to manage multiple reseller platforms and accounts all handling files in different ways.

One advantage to very small developers is that Microsoft handle all the international tax complications, which for UK developers at least can be very time consuming.

 

The only add-on I've bought recently via the marketplace is the A340 because there's no other option.

The lack of updates to marketplace versions really annoys me. The A2A Comanche for example hasn't been updated for more than a year on there, despite quite a few updates for those who bought it direct. A2A blame MS, MS blame A2A..

all one has to do is peruse the PMDG discord to hear about people who are deeply regretful they bought a plane from marketplace instead of PMDG direct to point out some of the perils of marketplace.  

1 hour ago, Tom Wright said:

The only add-on I've bought recently via the marketplace is the A340 because there's no other option.

The lack of updates to marketplace versions really annoys me. The A2A Comanche for example hasn't been updated for more than a year on there, despite quite a few updates for those who bought it direct. A2A blame MS, MS blame A2A..

I blame MS, because they are clearly not updating multiple products.

1 hour ago, micstatic said:

all one has to do is peruse the PMDG discord to hear about people who are deeply regretful they bought a plane from marketplace instead of PMDG direct to point out some of the perils of marketplace.  

Yeah...but; for all PMDG's moaning and groaning about the marketplace I do wonder why some devs are able to submit and push updates out through the marketplace within days (Raul at FSReborn is a really good example of this) whilst it takes PMDG weeks?

You might notice from the MSFS dev forums that Raul has a really good, active relationship with the devs there whilst PMDG seem to have none whatsoever...🤔

 

Interesting to revisit this discussion. I have basically settled on purchasing airports from the Marketplace but aircraft I always purchase directly from the developer.  I always check the prices on the various stores before purchasing scenery/airports and have found that the majority of times the Marketplace is the cheapest option for me; that I suspect can differ for people depending on the country you live in, but for me it is usually the cheapest option. I also do not like downloading and installing scenery. Having it streamed is so much nicer. It takes me about 2 minutes to activate the four or five dozen airports I have purchased from the Marketplace and about 2 to 3 hours to do so for the two dozen scenery products I have purchased from stores. I am not a fan of the way the store is designed but I find it convenient to keep track of the purchases, it works for me. As someone else said, I tire of the dance between a half dozen stores. Scenery does not generally need a lot of ongoing updates and so my desire for them to update quickly is much less; but aircraft really need to be updated quickly. I can always switch and fly out of a different airport for a while. I do not purchase a lot of aircraft as I tend to fly a few extensively. So far the approach is working well for me. 

 

31 minutes ago, DD_Arthur said:

Yeah...but; for all PMDG's moaning and groaning about the marketplace I do wonder why some devs are able to submit and push updates out through the marketplace within days (Raul at FSReborn is a really good example of this) whilst it takes PMDG weeks?

You might notice from the MSFS dev forums that Raul has a really good, active relationship with the devs there whilst PMDG seem to have none whatsoever...🤔

 

yeah but it's not just update timing release timing in marketplace vs store.  There are other marketplace limitations that have been discussed here and elsewhere.