CaptainAddOn

Really good overview here from a YouTuber who has access to the FSExpo Q&A session. I hadn’t seen this posted here yet, but there are some good nuggets: https://youtu.be/vZes5jSQNKE

A sim better than MSFS for less than $100. Is that all?

As someone whose day job involves working on a widely available consumer software product, the worries about “big brother” are way overblown. Almost all the software on your computer is phoning home with information about what settings you are selecting, what errors you are triggering, what features you use, etc. This is used every day by product teams to improve the product and prioritize investment. I view it as positive if they are collecting data from personal users because it means they care about understanding how we are using their product and plan to do something about it.

Has LM stated this? I think they have been silent on it.

I wouldn’t be so sure about that. Sure money coming in is nice, but they stated last weekend they have 500 developers working this. Add to that all of the streaming costs that they are shouldering, and I can’t see how it is anywhere near possible that MSFS is even breaking even. In my opinion, Microsoft HQ probably views MSFS as a tech demo for Bing and Azure, and will eventually run its course or at least be see the development team cut way back once it has served its purpose or when a belt tightening cycle hits.

I think you may be being sarcastic, but to be honest, those of us who saw Aces get shutdown know that your statement here may be prescient.

At least for my purposes, that small regression saves me $140 😊. I never felt comfortable with the academic caveat in the license.

Agreed Skywolf. My assumption here would be that LM is trying to deter their business clients from refusing to pay for the appropriate license fee. I would think most people in their homes would have an internet connection.

Obvious from Navigraph that most of the community is on MSFS 2020 (and presumably will migrate to 2024). Do you currently have a second flight simulator that you maintain and invest in? For those who do, what is your choice and why do you keep a second?

Broadly speaking, my impression from looking through all of the data is: Based on statements by LM, probably just about every add-on will work out of the box from a technical perspective unless developers have version locked them. I find this highly credible based on statements by LM, and also their insistence on clinging to ESP when we know for a fact they are also playing with Unreal in the background, BUT Some developers version lock their add-ons for two reasons: They don't want their stuff to look bad relative to the competition; and They potentially want to retain an option to charge for the upgrade All that is to say, there is probably room for optimism that the enhanced lighting and other undisclosed enhancements will make a significant enough difference to the sim to justify 3PD putting in some cycles to actually upgrade content. Developers who have seen the beta either feel the need to rework their aircraft to take advantage of new features, or even that feel it is a big enough upgrade to justify charging. All that is reason to feel good about P3Dv6. If it was just v5 all over again, then of course every developer would just add "v6" to their compatibility spec and be done with it. I caught in the FSExpo talk that Chris mentioned LM views P3D as a platform moreso than a product. We all know that P3D looks way better with third party add-ons than with just default scenery and aircraft. The P3D trailers have always been tricky, because they only show the default, in the box, content, which is really not putting the product's best foot forward. At the end of the day it is $60. I've spent a whole lot more for a whole lot less.

I assumed this was to streamline sustainment/support. Many companies use internet connected programs to harvest telemetry like error codes and crash data, etc. so that they can better understand how their software is being used and where it is breaking. Overall it results in a better product than users having to post bugs in a forum manually. Based on the P3D military market, the persistent internet connection will certainly not be required outside the lowest pricing tier, so this is probably just LM trying to ensure they can support the masses more efficiently.

Looking at the trailer, I still think that the LM team “gets” serious simmers. Microsoft is very busy looking at the ground, but holy smokes do those clouds in P3D look nice. Lots of different types, weather, haze, atmospheric conditions. We are spending all of our time in the air after all.

I would make sure to get there. There have been enough v6 breadcrumbs that this is almost certainly a facade. LM never lets the cat out of the bag early, and FSExpo posted the “product announcements” agenda way in advance.

My point is that I think if he is coming up with a 3 million number, he is not talking about the people who are on a sim or the people attending FSExpo. He is talking about some much much lower bar.

Call me a skeptic, but 3 million for what I would consider “core simmers” seems like the wrong order of magnitude. My guess is that the definition of “core simmers” follows something like this definition: - Gamers: Play multiple games on Xbox, not just MSFS, maybe with some definition of hours per week, etc. - Core simmers, have ever purchased an add-on or have ever used a peripheral other than an x-box controller - Casuals: Everyone else I worry that Joey was playing to the audience. When he says it isn’t a game, let’s be real - he also said that 75% or his audience is casuals/gamers.

What I heard is that add-ons are going to be backwards compatible, but every single one of them is going to end up giving an optional upcharge to get a version that takes advantage of the new physics engine.

You are making my point for me. The point I am making is that there is no way to capture “seasons” correctly worldwide without simply working region by region. In much of the south, winter looks a lot more like Midwest fall, and if you go far enough south you see almost no change at all between summer and winter. The Pacific Northwest is very far north, but near the oceans it is pretty rare to see snow outside of the mountains even during the winter - rather it is wet and dreary. San Diego winters look a whole lot like San Francisco spring. I could go on. It is not as simple as “select winter and now everything is snowy”.

Who all is attending FlightSim Expo next week? What sessions are you most anticipating? My first time, so looking for tips from those who have been before. Personally: - Obviously the end of day sessions for both Friday and Saturday. What new info will Microsoft reveal about 2020 roadmap and 2024 on Friday? What will P3D have to say about the future on Saturday (v6 announcement?) - What does iniBuilds have in store with their ultimate airliner? - What is the Just Light product Announcement Saturday?

People forget why seasons are so hard. It isn’t just about making trees snowy in the winter. Actual proper implementation of seasons requires an understanding of all the earth’s micro-climates to be modeled, which is a massive task. Terrain in the Caribbean doesn’t look much different season to season. Areas of the US get very colorful in the winter but don’t actually see snowfall. Trees at the top of some mountains are snow covered all year long, even in warm climates like California. It also changes numerous other systems like AI behaviors, runway conditions, etc. people will be very unhappy to see boats moving around on a frozen lake bed. That said, it certainly seems like a bait and switch to put on the 2020 roadmap and then later move behind a paywall. I suspect it will become clear that 2024 is basically just 2020 with some nice new textures, a few added “most requested” features, and a lot of gamer driven gameplay elements. I’m still not convinced it is anything but a cash grab.

To me, it seems like an overreaction on the part of developers. If many developers leave, then at least a niche market exists with much less competition. I get that developers are off chasing gamers, but ultimately that may leave a vacuum in content for serious simmers that could be profitably filled by those who remain.