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A glass of wine and mildly vindictive ponderings


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  • Aerosoft

I felt rather unhappy about some of the discussions on our forums (and the accusations made) in the last week, so I decided to have a glass of wine and reflect on them.

 

First, we do not remove a discussion from view without a lot of internal discussions. We only do so when we feel the discussion is unjust, contains incorrect information or simply violates our idea of what is right and wrong. Our forums are NOT ‘public’ forums like on other sites. We decide what is welcome and what is not. Now there are very few forums without commercial links (if a website has a shop you will see not everything) but you can still find them and you should be free to post about Aerosoft what you want there. But you will find a LOT of posts on our forums that start with “I expect this to be removed very soon” that are still public. In fact, we are very lenient on these things compared to other forums. If we remove something from view you can almost always find it in Avsim in minutes. 

 

Secondly, we are willing to discuss almost anything and willing to defend the decisions we make. But there is Aerosoft’s own productions and Aerosoft’s product where we just sell what we get delivered. Of course, we only sell what we feel is correct. But if you want to know why a developer decided to do something in a certain way, we can only forward the question.  We agreed it was suitable to sell (and feel free to discuss that) but the decisions are not made by us.

 

Thirdly, these are exciting times. A lot is changing. If you see a person posting a rather serious complaint about Aerosoft, do check if they have commercial interests that might conflict with ours. If you see somebody complaining about our focus on MFS, check if they have commercial interests in P3D add-ons.  Ask them if they might have been refused higher levels of MFS development support. Check their (ex) role on P3D forums. It might show things in a quite different light.

 

Fourth, Aerosoft is a commercial company. We are with some margin the largest flight simulator add-on company. We have over 50 employees and a lot more people we depend on us in other ways. My own departments (support and internal aircraft development) got 5 new full-time employees in the last 9 months.  That is a shit load of money to be paid to these people every month. So, while we still love that FSX customer who wants an update for a 16-year-old sim and a 12-year-old product, it is just not going to happen. If you feel your 27-euro purchase in 2009 entitles you to an update to make the airport look like it does right now, sorry. Everything we sell is without ANY promise of new features.  Name me any company that does that differently.

 

Fifth, (I should stop counting). We like P3D V5. Honestly. It has some fantastic new features, but when we see that the same files produce different brightness levels in EVERY update or hotfix and to correct all of that for every update takes us 2 weeks to match the new sim standards, we say that we rather wait for Lockheed to make up their minds. Most lights in P3D are 1999 standards, we must calculate how a light source works with a surface. So that is why our Airbuses work well on some airports where PMDG aircraft do not and there are airports where the opposite is true. In MFS we just define the light, modern standards.

 

Again, we love P3D V5. We just do not love the fact it is changing its mind all the time.  Now I am not blaming Lockheed. They always made it clear their professional customers come first. They loved the fact a few tens of thousands of simmers bought the sim and tested it. They also made an add-on market possible and to be honest, we got to correct a lot of professional users every month who believe a 40-euro purchase allows them to use the add-on on multiple stations. The basic fact is that Lockheed lost thousands of testers and dozens of developers. Because just check most developers who worked on P3d v4 addons might have release version that that ‘work’ in P3D v5 but very few actually spend serious time on P3D v5 features. New P3D releases are like hens’ teeth at this moment, exceedingly rare. And if there are any, they are not overly exciting. 

 

If people honestly believe that my comments about the open issues in P3D v5 affect developments I am seriously honored. But it is laughable. The dev companies who use us as publishers are smart. Most have been doing add-ons for a few decades.  They know where the money is. Just as we do.

 

And the money is in MFS. All these people got to pay invoices, just as we do. We do not ‘decide’ what platform to make add-ons for, we go where the customers are.  If you get me five thousand FS2002 users willing to buy add-ons we gladly make add-ons for that platform. We will make serious money as making add-ons for FS2002 is super simple at this moment. But these customers are not there. Just as FSX customers are not there and as P3D customers are not there. Even serious P3D users who do not even think about looking at MFS are not buying add-ons right now. There still are a huge amount of FSX users. But for us, they are non-existing as they stopped being commercially interesting in late 2017. There is a serious amount of users of P3D and they were all very willing to buy add-ons, but they stopped buying add-ons in early 2020. X-Plane users are still remarkably interesting as they keep on buying add-ons. Do not be surprised to see X-Plane add-ons being made, they simply sell.

 

--------------------------

 

Aerosoft does not ‘make’ the market, we follow. For sure we have commercial interests in X-Plane 11 and MFS and will promote these platforms. Openly. We are co-publisher for MFS (as we did the boxed version) and we have been co-publisher for X-Plane for the same reason and we still hold a lot of the Steam rights for that sim.  We are proud of that.  We invested hundreds of thousands of Euro's in those products.  But we sell what customers want. 

 

I realize this message might sound vindictive. And to a certain degree, it is. I am upset about comments posted that have a hidden agenda. We do not delete them because that only boosts the ‘Aerosoft deletes all negative post’ idea. Which, again, is simply nonsense. If people claim that, ask them, what posts are deleted, the internet does not forget right? But again, if you see something posted that is rather negative, search Google for the poster. If the poster is not man enough to use his own name, that should tell you something.  If he/she does us his own name, good for them, I respect that a lot. But check if they are selling P3D scenery (or tried to). I can understand they are upset if a business venture fails, been there. I do not understand how speaking bad about a competitor that is successful helps in any way. 

 

My name is Mathijs Kok and my work email, mathijs.kok@aerosoft.com, and my personal email, mathijs.kok@gmail.com are in no way hidden. You can find me on Skype, Discord, WhatsApp. Open visor. If you have a problem, let's talk. 

 

Now I will have another glass of wine.  A good evening to all.

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Great writing @Mathijs KokKok! There are just people will keep fight for their position, the best just ignore and carry on. Sooner or later , they will accept it and will move on as well.

Regarding P3D, I'm honeslty predicting that it will be more and more only for the professional license. That what they actually made it for , isn't?

However I am predicting the future of the real competition will be between MSFS and X-Plane. Very hard because I love both 😉.

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11 hours ago, Mathijs Kok said:

Just as FSX customers are not there and as P3D customers are not there. Even serious P3D users who do not even think about looking at MFS are not buying add-ons right now.

 

Agreed on FSX customers, but P3D customers? I find that hard to believe.

 

I'm one of those P3D customers (still on P3D v4 and no intention to switch any time soon) and I'm still buying add-ons. My latest purchase was MK-Studios Helsinki. Agreed, this is not an Aerosoft product but for me as a customer there is little difference. I's a great scenery that is worth buying, so I bought it. My latest Aerosoft purchase was Hamburg Professional.

 

So as you can see, I buy what is being released that is of interest to me. All you got to do is release and you got at least one customer for it.

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  • Aerosoft
2 hours ago, PatrickZ said:

 

Agreed on FSX customers, but P3D customers? I find that hard to believe.

 

FSX users stopped buying 3 years ago (there are still a huge amount of FSX pilots, they simply do not invest in the hobby much), P3D users stopped buying when MFS was seen for the first time in its full glory (not when it was announced surprising enough). Of course it does not mean all sales stopped but if you lose 25% sales it becomes really hard to make money.  If you loose 50% you are making a loss on most new projects. 

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Personally I stayed too long with FS9. I used FSX for a few years and when LM dropped P3Dv4 I moved. Then MSFS was announced and I was invited to participate in the alpha. I decided to take the plunge and leave P3D behind. MSFS is the future and after a few months I am completely used to it and do not want to go back. Do I want a PMDG NG3? Sure! An Aerosoft Airbus? Absolutely! 

 

I started in MSFS taking the flying lessons in the C152. In this way you not only learn to fly, but also the controls of the new sim. After that I explored the world, and my house of course. Now I am using the A320 mainly, together with the FlyByWire mod. It gives you a good immersion and development is in a good pace. Together with some nice sceneries, real weather, on-line AI and my recently deliverd TCA Office Pack I am a happy camper. 

 

Is it a game or a sim? I don't care, I have fun! Is it realistic? Don't know. And for the first time in my FS history I did not spend more time on tweaking settings than flying. FPS counter? Did not use it... My old i7-4790k with 16GB RAM and a 1080ti with 11GB runs just fine (high settings) on 1080p.

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Very intersting post but from my point of view it's a confession of failure of parts of the flightsim community that Mathijs has to write such a post. It makes me meditative in which direction our hobby is evolving! I'd never try to explain people like Mathijs how their business should work and that he is wrong. Why are people, who are totally persuaded that another business model would be way more effective not starting their own business to prove it?

In former times I was rather active in communities like Hovercontrol but these days it's sometimes frustrating and therefor I've converted to a "most of the time silent listener".  I still hope that the positive spirit will succeed over the "I'm right and be gratefulfor my money" attitude. Having said this I think I'll join the path of Mathijs and get a glass of wine. Stay positive!!!

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I agree the community is become more violent, but you see this everywhere at the internet... MSFS vs. P3D vs. X-Plane. Xbox vs. Playstation, FIFA vs. PES... Just to name a few... I fully understand simmers on other platforms. Many different reasons to fly on other platforms. Maybe you like soaring planes, or helicopters. Or just enjoying your fully customized P3D or X-Plane. As long as everyone enjoys it :) And that's where the hobby is all about in the end!

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Awesome post Mathijs as usual. Gotta love how candid you are about things, and I really appreciate your insight.

 

Quite simply, fans of certain sims are panicking hard because they see developers jumping ship, while I'm guessing a few devs have gotten way too comfortable with simulators that never brought or required innovation, and feel like they have to attack MSFS because it requires new work instead of recycling the same assets over and over. The level of trolling, vitriol, and pettiness has become pretty literally crazy and on the official MSFS forums it's even worse. 

 

Just today the CEO of another company (who I won't name, but conveniently, they work a lot on P3D) spammed a bunch of unprofessional vitriol against MSFS and the SDK on a thread dedicated to... Christmas.🤔  and got himself (rightfully) flagged. Suffice to say, I won't be doing business with them from now on. There's plenty of professional, constructive, and balanced devs out there, and my money is better spent supporting them, instead of wasting it on products made by the toxic ones. 

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  • Aerosoft
2 hours ago, helialpin said:

Very intersting post but from my point of view it's a confession of failure of parts of the flightsim community that Mathijs has to write such a post.

 

I might have been a tad vindictive, but you are pessimistic, lol. 99% of people on this forum are just normal people. If they are unhappy they will let us know, if they are happy they might left us know. And that is fine. 

 

My issue was that in our forums, that we clearly position as company forums, not 'public',  we have seen a lot of attempts to influence people with less than honest arguments. People complaining about things we do not support in P3D V5 while their own products barely support basic P3D V4 standards. People who talk down MFS wile we know the have been refused access to MFS beta programs (Microsoft is pretty strict, if you have a history of piracy, malware etc you won't get in). I understand these people are not happy about MFS, but just say why. Saying it is just a 'game' is something people will remind you about in 18 months. 

 

The basic fact is that every company who is not fully on board with MFS has a reason for that. Some because they feel P3D still has a bright future, others because they simply do not have the resources. Some other companies might be locked on developments that are not future proof, some other because they have made update promises that are hard to keep.  Most of these things are not hard to guess or hard to find. If you see a commercial negative comment about MFS, just check. If the company has problems updating to new version (or even a hotfix) of P3D it is clear they are hardcore outside the SDK and will have a seriously hard time in MFS.  That might lead to very cool P3D products but it means the development is very locked to P3D.

 

 

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13 minutes ago, Abriael said:

Just today the CEO of another company (who I won't name, but conveniently, they work a lot on P3D) spammed a bunch of unprofessional vitriol against MSFS and the SDK on a thread dedicated to... Christmas.🤔  and got himself (rightfully) flagged. 

 

Well yes, that is exactly what I mean.  If you can't make money, a logic reply is to attack the platform when your money has gone.  But basically that is telling your (potential) customers they are crazy.  Not a solid business model. If you have a business you sell what your customers want to buy.

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Mathijs,

 

You Sir are the da man.  I am a business owner myself (I run 2 businesses), everything you said is 100% correct.  Thank you for saying your thoughts.  I mean you are taking the risk with every project and have the responsibility to pay your staff, bills etc all the things which come as being a business owner.

 

Thank you

 

 

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1 hour ago, Abriael said:

Just today the CEO of another company (who I won't name, but conveniently, they work a lot on P3D) spammed a bunch of unprofessional vitriol against MSFS and the SDK on a thread dedicated to... Christmas.🤔  and got himself (rightfully) flagged. Suffice to say, I won't be doing business with them from now on. There's plenty of professional, constructive, and balanced devs out there, and my money is better spent supporting them, instead of wasting it on products made by the toxic ones. 

Kind of curious to know who this was now...

 

To me none of what was said by Mathijs is new. In fact, a long, long time ago I was told by a mutual acquaintance exactly that - that Mathijs is first and foremost a business man and a salesman. And I'm not sure what else would have been expected. The company is supposed to not only survive, but thrive, correct? That said, me and with me many other P3D users are rightfully saddened to see these shifts in focus, not only from Aerosoft but other companies as well. And part of it feels like something of a rip-off: a quick buck to be gained by what sometimes seems like slap-dash conversions, in part because the MSFS SDK does not seem to necessarily support the full breadth of features to make any kind of addon look its best in MSFS. Plus, with every update that comes out for MSFS, it seems much stuff gets broken. Thus this idea of P3D being a moving target... MSFS seems to also be a moving target. Perhaps not for Aerosoft as much as for other companies? Perhaps the lighting doesn't need to be fixed, but the likes of Carenado certainly seem frustrated that their planes get broken every other update. So there's that side to the story as well. I think this is what makes some (or many) P3D users feel somewhat irritated. I know that's the kind of thing that irks me. So if I ever do post anything negative, it's because the logic used doesn't really add up. I tend to think that it ultimately comes down to my lack of knowledge with regards to P3D vs MSFS development, so it would be nice, sometimes, if a little context was given to explain why P3D is considered a moving target and MSFS is not.

 

As for me - of course I feel sad to see less addons come out for P3D. At the same time I fully understand why companies such as Aerosoft make these decisions, and wish them the best of luck. Frankly, it's more than likely that in another year or two, when and if MSFS has indeed risen to the challenge of becoming to go-to sim for both GA and jetliner simulation, I will exclusively use MSFS as well.

 

Bottom line, as long as people remain civil and constructive, I don't think people ought to be too bothered by these different (negative) sentiments among different user groups. In that sense I cna only agree with Mathijs and I commend him for writing this post. Do I agree with all of it? Perhaps not. Does that matter? No, not at all.

 

Happy thanksgiving to those in the US :) 

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18 minutes ago, Thralni said:

Kind of curious to know who this was now...

 

I won't name names, but it was a public post, so not hard to find. You just need to look for a thread on Christmas and check the posts flagged by the mods (you can still read them by clicking on the dedicated option). 

 

1 hour ago, Mathijs Kok said:

The basic fact is that every company who is not fully on board with MFS has a reason for that. Some because they feel P3D still has a bright future, others because they simply do not have the resources. Some other companies might be locked on developments that are not future proof, some other because they have made update promises that are hard to keep.  Most of these things are not hard to guess or hard to find. If you see a commercial negative comment about MFS, just check. If the company has problems updating to new version (or even a hotfix) of P3D it is clear they are hardcore outside the SDK and will have a seriously hard time in MFS.  That might lead to very cool P3D products but it means the development is very locked to P3D.

 

At times I feel people have very short memory. I remember the times of launch of P3D and X-Plane. We saw exactly the same problems. It took a long time to get complex products (probably longer than MSFS will ever take) because the tools had tons of issues. That's obvious because flight sims are massively complex products. I'm baffled to see people who behave like bugs, problems, and SDK issues are a new thing at a sim's release.

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1 hour ago, Mathijs Kok said:

If you have a business you sell what your customers want to buy.


As a customer, I want to buy new P3D products for at least the next year or so.
You say P3D is moving all the time, yet that's exactly what XP11 and especially MSFS are also both doing. Some notable developers seem happy enough to start new projects for a moving P3D.

However, I understand that Aerosoft is a business. I also understand that there's an opportunity cost to your production decisions and you feel that MSFS is the more valuable platform to devote your resources to.

To give you one customer's perspective, I won't be buying any further MSFS add-ons until the sim matures.
But then I recognise that I'm only one person among possibly tens of thousands who are buying.

As for the tone of comments and accusations made on forums, that is sadly a sign of the times. No-one should have to deal with it, though you aren't the only organisation that has to deal with let's call them 'exuberant' posters. Here's Xbox's Phil Spencer on fan wars over entertainment (instead of Xbox vs. PlayStation, read MSFS vs. P3D vs. XP) products:

Quote

Finally, on console gaming tribalism, it was refreshing to hear Spencer talk plainly about the kind of toxic discussions which take place between obsessive fans of specific consoles and companies.

"Especially in the console space, there's like a core of the core, that have, I think, taken it to a destructive level of, 'I really want that to fail so the thing that I bought succeeds,'" Spencer said. "I'm saying on both sides. I'm not saying that it's all people crushing Xboxes and everybody that loves Xbox is always completely inviting to all the PlayStation stuff. I've said before, that I find it distasteful, but maybe that is too light. I just really despise it. I don't think we have to see others fail in order for us to achieve the goals. That's not some kind of 'kumbaya' thing. It's actually real. We're in the entertainment business. The biggest competitor we have is apathy over the products and services [and] games that we build.

"We see that today. Everybody is doing well in the industry right now for the most part with the stay-at-home and the surge. That's what we should be focused on as an industry. We've done it with things like cross-play and other things that we focused on breaking some of those tropes. But there is a core that just really hates the other consumer product. Man, that's just so off-putting to me. Again, maybe that word is probably too light. To me, it's one of the worst things about our industry."

Source: https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2020-11-24-microsoft-and-sony-bosses-both-lamented-how-next-gen-console-pre-orders-went


 

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I'm a P3D user only.

I haven't purchased many P3D scenery addons for hours. 

I don't expect any product to be updated for free in perpetuity.

I am happy to pay for updates as necessary.

But for me to purchase an addon, it has to be for me either; a location that I like so much I don't care too much about the feature set, or a location that utilises the latest functionality in P3D.

So the fact that I haven't bought scenery from Aerosoft in a while is down to the lack of supply, not a lack of demand on my part.

 

What I would really pay good money for are updates to your OV10 Bronco and Twotter a/c to include PBR and Trueglass (or some other windshield effects) please!

Cheers K

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I'm on the same boat as Kevin, and while as a business owner myself I perfectly understand and empathize with Mr. Kok, I feel Aerosoft could be doing more a lot more to keep P3D relevant.

 

The Twotter, the F-14 Tomcat, the DC-8? Not even willing to make them work for Prepar3D v5 for a fee? I think it is kind of a chicken and egg dilemma.

 

 Cheers

-E

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On 11/25/2020 at 11:37 AM, Mathijs Kok said:

If you see a person posting a rather serious complaint about Aerosoft, do check if they have commercial interests that might conflict with ours. If you see somebody complaining about our focus on MFS, check if they have commercial interests in P3D add-ons.  Ask them if they might have been refused higher levels of MFS development support. Check their (ex) role on P3D forums. It might show things in a quite different light.

 

I have no commercial conflicts with Aerosoft, these days Aerosoft is primarily a publisher.  What I'm currently working on is "freeware" for MSFS.  If you're bothered by some comments then there is a reason.

 

On 11/25/2020 at 11:37 AM, Mathijs Kok said:

We like P3D V5. Honestly.

 

You seem to be contradicting yourself.

 

 

Here is the 0.8.0.0 MSFS SDK I'm working ... not exactly "complete":

 

Please login to display this image.

 

 

Please login to display this image.

 

Please login to display this image.

 

I agree that P3D V5.x is not where it should be and it's changes in lighting and atmospherics is causing issues ... still.  It has some great moments, but yikes, night flights can be pretty horrid visually with EA on.    

 

But MSFS is just as much a moving target if not even more of a moving target, plenty of issues from floating lights to elevation problems to incomplete SDK, etc.  Right now I would NOT do airport development for MSFS especially with recent announcement of MS/Asobo providing UK airports for free ... the writing is on the wall.

 

Absolutely agree with you that one goes where the money is, where I take issue is the your good cop bad cop approach to P3D Vx.x.  Is making statements about how "P3D has flatlined" good for you or those developers publishing P3D content under Aerosoft?  Perhaps you are pushing for ONE platform (a noble quest and one I would have liked to seen many years ago) because it's easier to manage, but even if casual simmers were 20:1 over serious simmers, then P3D and XP would be irrelevant in your financial desires so why push to announce they are "flatlined"?  I can only assume you are doing it to push users away from other platforms and towards MSFS ... a marketing strategy perhaps?  I know many that aren't dropping P3D/XP as they have reported a return of sales since MSFS is NOT currently providing "everything" they want/desire.

 

But what I've detected over the years is the "the most amount of money for the least amount of work possible" ... how much of that is out of your hands as a publisher I don't know?  I don't sell product to publishers as they take 25-50% of the top.

 

Myself and many others have repeatedly indicated we're willing to pay for updates to existing airports to bring them up to full feature compliance with P3D, some of your developers did, some did not.  So if money is the driving concern, you have customers willing to pay.

 

Like I said, I'm doing freeware for MSFS right now because I want to learn the SDK and get my feet wet with MSFS.  I have no idea where MS/Asobo will go with MSFS and I'm not going "all in" as MS have burned me a few times before with "latest and greatest" and I'm not just talking Flight Simulation ... stay diversified is an IMPORTANT part of operating a business.  

 

Cheers, Rob.

 

 

 

 

 

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On 11/25/2020 at 11:37 AM, Mathijs Kok said:

We are with some margin the largest flight simulator add-on company

 

On 11/25/2020 at 11:37 AM, Mathijs Kok said:

Aerosoft does not ‘make’ the market, we follow.


Mathijs you are one of if not the most respected individual who's practically synonymous with flight simulation,
i can attest from first hand experience Aerosoft as a company is as good and as professional as it gets!

with all due respects... some of your points simply don't connect,
"the largest flight simulator add-on company" should follow up with proper responsibility/ownership to match,
 

On 11/25/2020 at 11:37 AM, Mathijs Kok said:

I realize this message might sound vindictive.

 

you think?
the real question is where does that come from, why, and who draws the line and where? 

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52 minutes ago, Rob Ainscough said:

I have no commercial conflicts with Aerosoft, these days Aerosoft is primarily a publisher.  What I'm currently working on is "freeware" for MSFS.  If you're bothered by some comments then there is a reason.

 

The reason is likely because they're ludicrous. Incidentally, a simple google search on your name brings up a website with two P3D airports for sale. 

 

52 minutes ago, Rob Ainscough said:

But MSFS is just as much a moving target if not even more of a moving target, plenty of issues from floating lights to elevation problems to incomplete SDK, etc.  Right now I would NOT do airport development for MSFS especially with recent announcement of MS/Asobo providing UK airports for free ... the writing is on the wall.

 

Luckily, what airports you would or wouldn't do doesn't seem to be very relevant to many other companies considering that the overwhelming majority seems to have jumped into creating really nice airports for MSFS, with quantity and variety that completely (and understandably) dwarfs anything in development for P3D. 

 

The only writing I see on the wall is that third party support for P3D is going to continue to dwindle until it's almost zero. The fact that Asobo provides a handful of airports for free every two months isn't even a drop in the ocean compared to the room that's still available for third parties. Japan received five free airports with World Update 1 and there's still a gazillion available for third parties to make. The same goes for the US with World Update 2, and the same will go for the UK with World Update 3. 

 

52 minutes ago, Rob Ainscough said:

Is making statements about how "P3D has flatlined" good for you or those developers publishing P3D content under Aerosoft?  Perhaps you are pushing for ONE platform (a noble quest and one I would have liked to seen many years ago) because it's easier to manage, but even if casual simmers were 20:1 over serious simmers, then P3D and XP would be irrelevant in your financial desires so why push to announce they are "flatlined"?  I can only assume you are doing it to push users away from other platforms and towards MSFS ... a marketing strategy perhaps?  I know many that aren't dropping P3D/XP as they have reported a return of sales since MSFS is NOT currently providing "everything" they want/desire.

 

Sounds like paranoia. Not everyone is out to get your beloved P3D. Mathijs is simply describing a situation that pretty much everyone with eyes can see, and he certainly has a lot more visibility on that situation that you (or I) do. Contrary to popular belief, some people actually like to hold a frank and honest dialogue with their customers, and Mathijs has always hit me as someone who belongs to that group. "This is how things are" doesn't necessarily need to be driven by a marketing strategy.

 

52 minutes ago, Rob Ainscough said:

Myself and many others have repeatedly indicated we're willing to pay for updates to existing airports to bring them up to full feature compliance with P3D, some of your developers did, some did not.  So if money is the driving concern, you have customers willing to pay.

 

You don't seem to understand what the issue is. You and the small, hemorrhaging circle of chosen P3D users may be willing to pay, but you're few. Serving an extremely niche market isn't a good way to address the "driving concern" of money, regardless of the fact that the few within that market are willing to pay. MSFS users are willing to pay as well, and there's a ton more of them. 

 

As I already mentioned on the other thread, this is not Aerosoft's fault. It's not MSFS's fault. You can blame only Lockheed Martin, their ludicrous pricing policies and the fact that they don't market their product almost at all. They have made an extremely niche product and they're content for it to stay that extremely niche. As such, they have not created a thriving industry for third-party developers to thrive in turn. 

 

52 minutes ago, Rob Ainscough said:

stay diversified is an IMPORTANT part of operating a business.  

 

Aerosoft's product range is very diversified. They're so diversified that they publish even stuff that has nothing to do with flight simulators. The fact that they don't make what you want doesn't mean their product lineup is not diversified. Incidentally, another important part of operating a business is focusing resources (which are not infinite) where they generate a return on investment, which Aerosoft is doing quite efficiently in this case. 

 

50 minutes ago, Chris Bell said:

"the largest flight simulator add-on company" should follow up with proper responsibility/ownership to match,

 

Companies, large of small, create products enough customers want to buy. It's not Aerosoft's responsibility to make P3D popular. It isn't popular because LM doesn't bother to push it in that direction, so addons sell peanuts because the market is small. There's nothing Aerosoft can do about that. They may be one of the biggest companies in this industry, but this isn't an industry of big companies. They're not by any means a giant corporation that can afford wasting money and resources willy-nilly.

 

1 hour ago, evaamo said:

I'm on the same boat as Kevin, and while as a business owner myself I perfectly understand and empathize with Mr. Kok, I feel Aerosoft could be doing more a lot more to keep P3D relevant.

 

To be honest, I really don't understand where this idea comes from that a third-party add-on developer should do anything at all to keep a platform relevant. That's not the third-party developer's job. It's the first-party's job to keep their platform relevant, and they are not. 

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20 minutes ago, Abriael said:

To be honest, I really don't understand where this idea comes from that a third-party add-on developer should do anything at all to keep a platform relevant. That's not the third-party developer's job. It's the first-party's job to keep their platform relevant, and they are not. 

 

Perhaps I worded that poorly:   let's change my original phrase "Aerosoft could be doing more a lot more to keep P3D relevant" into "Aerosoft could be doing more to keep their P3D products' sales from flatlining". We may be "few" as you said above, but we're still the same "few" who supported Aerosoft during the years they were happy to develop for P3D, who btw are saying we are willing to part with our money to buy upgrades to Aerosoft products to keep them working with the latest iteration of P3D. Maybe Aerosoft could set up some sort of "Kickstarter" for us legacy/niche P3D customers. 

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28 minutes ago, Abriael said:

 

The reason is likely because they're ludicrous. Incidentally, a simple google search on your name brings up a website with two P3D airports for sale. 

 

 

Luckily, what airports you would or wouldn't do doesn't seem to be very relevant to many other companies considering that the overwhelming majority seems to have jumped into creating really nice airports for MSFS, with quantity and variety that completely (and understandably) dwarfs anything in development for P3D. 

 

The only writing I see on the wall is that third party support for P3D is going to continue to dwindle until it's almost zero. The fact that Asobo provides a handful of airports for free every two months isn't even a drop in the ocean compared to the room that's still available for third parties. Japan received five free airports with World Update 1 and there's still a gazillion available for third parties to make. The same goes for the US with World Update 2, and the same will go for the UK with World Update 3. 

 

 

Sounds like paranoia. Not everyone is out to get your beloved P3D. Mathijs is simply describing a situation that pretty much everyone with eyes can see, and he certainly has a lot more visibility on that situation that you (or I) do. Contrary to popular belief, some people actually like to hold a frank and honest dialogue with their customers, and Mathijs has always hit me as someone who belongs to that group. "This is how things are" doesn't necessarily need to be driven by a marketing strategy.

 

 

You don't seem to understand what the issue is. You and the small, hemorrhaging circle of chosen P3D users may be willing to pay, but you're few. Serving an extremely niche market isn't a good way to address the "driving concern" of money, regardless of the fact that the few within that market are willing to pay. MSFS users are willing to pay as well, and there's a ton more of them. 

 

As I already mentioned on the other thread, this is not Aerosoft's fault. It's not MSFS's fault. You can blame only Lockheed Martin, their ludicrous pricing policies and the fact that they don't market their product almost at all. They have made an extremely niche product and they're content for it to stay that extremely niche. As such, they have not created a thriving industry for third-party developers to thrive in turn. 

 

 

Aerosoft's product range is very diversified. They're so diversified that they publish even stuff that has nothing to do with flight simulators. The fact that they don't make what you want doesn't mean their product lineup is not diversified. Incidentally, another important part of operating a business is focusing resources (which are not infinite) where they generate a return on investment, which Aerosoft is doing quite efficiently in this case. 

 

 

Companies, large of small, create products enough customers want to buy. It's not Aerosoft's responsibility to make P3D popular. It isn't popular because LM doesn't bother to push it in that direction, so addons sell peanuts because the market is small. There's nothing Aerosoft can do about that. They may be one of the biggest companies in this industry, but this isn't an industry of big companies. They're not by any means a giant corporation that can afford wasting money and resources willy-nilly.

 

 

To be honest, I really don't understand where this idea comes from that a third-party add-on developer should do anything at all to keep a platform relevant. That's not the third-party developer's job. It's the first-party's job to keep their platform relevant, and they are not. 


Here I have both P3Dv5 and MSFS.

 

You are trying your best to be the lawyer of Mathijs but you do not see what is happening.


Mathijs is honest about his opinion : sales and making money.

That does not need to mean that you openly declare another platform for almost dead.

On the other hand : P3D has features that almost no developer uses in their products.

If a company like AS would encourage addon developers to use them then people would be prepared to re-buy them.

Only adjusting the installer so it can be installed in an updated P3D version will not make any new money.....

 

MSFS was one big hype and all publicity was loved by many.

Now several updates later : regions are improved but most ac are a mess. If you have the PdL version those extra ac are unflyable. 
First the AP would be fixed in november, then in december and now in februari..

 

The SDK in its current State is far from good enough for complex ac as most features still in ToDo state.

 

Therefore PMDG has stated that there won’t be an ac from then for at least a year.

 

We see airports being released with jetways. With what ac are you going to park there ? Only the 320 mod ...

Or are people using a GA ac for that ?

 

As far as zo see it MS/Asobo have chew off more than they can handle. As VFR game it is very nice . As a IFR sim it has a long way to go and it might not be reached at all. 
If you manage to get a jetliner airborne look at the stuttering outside view. 
A GC + fast flying = outside view stutters

It is all about balance : you simply cannot have the best eyecandy, the best car traffic , the best weather and also the smoothest FPS with complex ac .

 

There are more Xbox users that have tried MSFS than pc users.
MSFS can never be so enhanced and complicated as P3D or XP.

Why ? Then you are better of with an Xbox that costs a few hundred than a pc where a graphics.card is most of the time more expensive.

 

And many Xbox users also play other games and move on to try new games.

Therefore the MSFS works will also be niche...

 

Imho AS is better of supporting multiple platforms and demanding from addon developers to use new features which will lead to new sales.

Being negatively about a platform you supported for years while raving about another out of commercial interest is not the way.

 

”Never spit in the well you drunk from..”

 

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1 hour ago, evaamo said:

 

Perhaps I worded that poorly:   let's change my original phrase "Aerosoft could be doing more a lot more to keep P3D relevant" into "Aerosoft could be doing more to keep their P3D products' sales from flatlining". We may be "few" as you said above, but we're still the same "few" who supported Aerosoft during the years they were happy to develop for P3D, who btw are saying we are willing to part with our money to buy upgrades to Aerosoft products to keep them working with the latest iteration of P3D. Maybe Aerosoft could set up some sort of "Kickstarter" for us legacy/niche P3D customers. 

 

The problem is that sales are flatlining (and I'm fairly positive they've never been great) for reasons external to Aerosoft's actions. It's simply because the developer of P3D isn't doing much at all (and I'm being charitable, "nothing" would be more appropriate) to make the platform actually popular. 

 

49 minutes ago, GSalden said:

ere I have both P3Dv5 and MSFS.

 

You are trying your best to be the lawyer of Mathijs but you do not see what is happening.


Mathijs is honest about his opinion : sales and making money.

That does not need to mean that you openly declare another platform for almost dead.

On the other hand : P3D has features that almost no developer uses in their products.

If a company like AS would encourage addon developers to use them then people would be prepared to re-buy them.

Only adjusting the installer so it can be installed in an updated P3D version will not make any new money.....

 

MSFS was one big hype and all publicity was loved by many.

Now several updates later : regions are improved but most ac are a mess. If you have the PdL version those extra ac are unflyable. 
First the AP would be fixed in november, then in december and now in februari..

 

The SDK in its current State is far from good enough for complex ac as most features still in ToDo state.

 

Therefore PMDG has stated that there won’t be an ac from then for at least a year.

 

We see airports being released with jetways. With what ac are you going to park there ? Only the 320 mod ...

Or are people using a GA ac for that ?

 

As far as zo see it MS/Asobo have chew off more than they can handle. As VFR game it is very nice . As a IFR sim it has a long way to go and it might not be reached at all. 
If you manage to get a jetliner airborne look at the stuttering outside view. 
A GC + fast flying = outside view stutters

It is all about balance : you simply cannot have the best eyecandy, the best car traffic , the best weather and also the smoothest FPS with complex ac .

 

There are more Xbox users that have tried MSFS than pc users.
MSFS can never be so enhanced and complicated as P3D or XP.

Why ? Then you are better of with an Xbox that costs a few hundred than a pc where a graphics.card is most of the time more expensive.

 

And many Xbox users also play other games and move on to try new games.

Therefore the MSFS works will also be niche...

 

Imho AS is better of supporting multiple platforms and demanding from addon developers to use new features which will lead to new sales.

Being negatively about a platform you supported for years while raving about another out of commercial interest is not the way.

 

”Never spit in the well you drunk from..”

 

First of all, your description of the issues in MSFS is massively overblown and hyperbolic. They're no more serious than any previous flight simulator out there had at launch, and Asobo is actually being faster than most at gradually solving them. 

 

The sole fact that you use the word "unflyable" means that either you don't know what you're talking about, or you're abusing hyperbole to a point that it deprives what you say of any meaningful discussion value. 

 

Incidentally, I'm fairly sure Aerosoft is going to prove quite soon that the SDK is good enough for complex AC, much faster than any other sumulator out there. You may have short memory, but I don't. It took MULTIPLE years for aircraft of complexity comparable to PMDG to become available in competing simulators. This is nothing new. The likely truth is that the folks at PMDG naively made promises about release windows without really knowing how much work would be required to port their product over, nor when the SDK would have supported it. That's a very bad idea in any product development field.

 

MSFS is already a massively superior product than any competitor was in a comparable timeframe in their lifetime. 

 

49 minutes ago, GSalden said:

Imho AS is better of supporting multiple platforms and demanding from addon developers to use new features which will lead to new sales.

 

Aerosoft is better off supporting platforms that make them money, and "demanding" never works very well in this kind of industry. 

 

49 minutes ago, GSalden said:

Therefore the MSFS works will also be niche...

 

Are you talking about that simulator that sold a million units in its first week? Forgive me if I have a hot fat laugh. There's nothing niche about Microsoft Flight Simulator. It's a full-fledged AAA platform with the full weight of one of the biggest software corporations in the world behind it with a 10-year development plan. 

 

It's pretty much the only hope for this hobby to get away from being ultra-niche, since competitors utterly failed at that in the period Microsoft wasn't in the market. 

 

If Aerosoft's estimate is correct (and I have no reason to disbelieve it) P3D sold 20-30K copies. If a Sim that sold over a million copies is your idea of "Niche," what would you define one that sold less than 30K? A complete commercial disaster?

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9 minutes ago, Abriael said:

 

The problem is that sales are flatlining (and I'm fairly positive they've never been great) for reasons external to Aerosoft's actions. It's simply because the developer of P3D isn't doing much at all (and I'm being charitable, "nothing" would be more appropriate) to make the platform actually popular. 

 

 

First of all, your description of the issues in MSFS is massively overblown and hyperbolic. They're no more serious than any previous flight simulator out there had at launch, and Asobo is actually being faster than most at gradually solving them. 

 

The sole fact that you use the word "unflyable" means that either you don't know what you're talking about, or you're abusing hyperbole to a point that it deprives what you say of any meaningful discussion value. 

 

Incidentally, I'm fairly sure Aerosoft is going to prove quite soon that the SDK is good enough for complex AC, much faster than any other sumulator out there. You may have short memory, but I don't. It took MULTIPLE years for aircraft of complexity comparable to PMDG to become available in competing simulators. This is nothing new. The likely truth is that the folks at PMDG naively made promises about release windows without really knowing how much work would be required to port their product over, nor when the SDK would have supported it. That's a very bad idea in any product development field.

 

MSFS is already a massively superior product than any competitor was in a comparable timeframe in their lifetime. 

 

 

Aerosoft is better off supporting platforms that make them money, and "demanding" never works very well in this kind of industry. 

 

 

Are you talking about that simulator that sold a million units in its first week? Forgive me if I have a hot fat laugh. There's nothing niche about Microsoft Flight Simulator. It's a full-fledged AAA platform with the full weight of one of the biggest software corporations in the world behind it with a 10-year development plan. 

 

It's pretty much the only hope for this hobby to get away from being ultra-niche, since competitors utterly failed at that in the period Microsoft wasn't in the market. 

 

If Aerosoft's estimate is correct (and I have no reason to disbelieve it) P3D sold 20-30K copies. If a Sim that sold over a million copies is your idea of "Niche," what would you define one that sold less than 30K? A complete commercial disaster?


You seem not have any idea what you are talking about.

 

Go read the MSFS forums at Avsim and the official MSFS site. Then come back.

 

Flightsim software will always be a niche market. Compare the sales to real Xbox / PD  games. 
 

Also with the MSFS sales you are incorrect :  most users were the  $ 1 dollar game pass testers  and the $ 5 users for month 2 and 3. Regular users have declined a lot now, which is normal in this way. Many uses tried MSFS for fun and now moved on to the next gave to try for $ 1 pm.

 

MS has dropped FSX in an instant without looking back. MS has stopped Flight in an instant without looking back.

 

Asobo stated that the SDK will never be as enhanced as the P3D SDK. So you will NEVER have the same features.

That is allright as the main focus lies on the eyecandy. 

 

Take off your pink glasses, read yourself into what really happens and then come back.

 

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I own MSFS since day one and I'm using it for GA only. But I did not purchase any MSFS add-ons except four small ORBX airports. I've purchased/upgraded many many Aerosoft titles for P3Dv4/v5 and I would continue to do so ... But unfortunately, I'm part of the minority, and minority does not count for Aerosoft.

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