The State of FS: Some Positive Thoughts

[Fr. Bill]

Even this latest PR "spin" doesn't really bring any satisfaction:

http://www.fsinsider.com/news/Pages/AMe ... mAces.aspx

[Keep It Simple]

I think that MS simply wants everything on Xbox, and MS Games for Windows will soon be but a fond memory...

That is also my take on this.
It's no secrete that MS is forever promoting its X-Box.

Also, they contiuue to reference ""flying games" with absolutly no refences to any future "Flight simulator".

Personally, viewing from a marketing standpoint, I  strongly think that any future  MSFS as we now know it is a dead horse.

I sincerly hope I am wrong but, we all have to face realities as we go throught life.

[Formula_1]

Grand Theft Aircraft :-?

Well one thing we can be thankful of, is that FSX is moddable. So, if it does turn out to be the last, it can still last a long time down the road through 3rd party add-ons. I'm sure the engine will become dated, but maybe not for a while yet.

[NickN]

Grand Theft Aircraft :-?

Ahhhhh

hat would be their secret project called:

INTERNATIONAL HIJACKER

[raptorx]

It's really cruel and wrong.  Again, not in the grand scheme of things going on today, but greed has caused this.  It's the reason the world is in financial crisis, it's the reason Microsoft won't sell the IP to those who would use it.

FS is a product with so much potential and Microsoft has the rights to all this code and research into this simulation.  Do they offer to allow the community to enjoy its continued development?  No, they lock it up in a box for NO ONE to use.  They know they can make a killing on it if it ever comes back.  

Complete corporate BS.  I feel really bad for all the folks who are losing jobs right now.  I don't mean to make a big deal of a relatively small small loss for us as simmers.  But so much creativity and potential just locked up as IP.  Useless.  

-Jim

[-sam-]

Well, I could have understand the step at least a little, if FSX wouldn

[macca22au]

I treat Micosoft as neutral, that is it will maintain any product line that will make a profit.

Flight simulator was never to my knowledge run by a specialised development arm like ACES before, but nonetheless it continued.

However it will be up to Microsoft to tell us whether the franchise will be continued or not.  Or whether the franchise will be sold (after all they bought it from a developer in the first place).

If they take it to XBox they will have to turn it into a first person shooter type game to meet the needs of that audience, my grandson!

Which means they lose a massive international group of devotees who spend a disproportionate amount of money on hard and soft ware.  What will Intel and Nvidia think when a core group of their markets drops out?  Lets face it, FSX has driven us all to the point of distraction, until the latest tranche of hardware turned up.

So for me, with say, one more hardware upgrade in say a year's time, some two to three years should see me out of FSX.  If no FS11 then I guess I try to work out X-Plane (I cant get it to fill even a single screen), or even turn googles pathetic sim into something real using their global comprehensive scenery base.

[macca22au]

Oh and Bill Gates remains close to the top of the list of the world's richest people.

wealth-envy must be a sin!

[Keep It Simple]

[quote]Well, I could have understand the step at least a little, if FSX wouldn

[Fr. Bill]

Suppose we had never been told about the closing of ACES and the cancellation of a never-officially-announced FSvNext?

Would we really be in any different position that we are now?

[JBaymore]

And to verge toward the edge of "good taste" here........ to Fr. Bill's comments above I just have to say.........

[size=16]Amen.

[macca22au]

Bill you are right, but on the other hand a lot of noise from users/consumers will remind Microsoft that there still is a market for the product and some very passionate support.

[RIC_BARKER]

The end of an era.

I've been out of the FS game for a long time, I think my last log in to these forums was in 2004, life kinda got in the way. I've still been simming, but I've gotten out of developing payware, and I left IFDG after many years. For me FS is stale, old and bloated.

If any FS developers are reading this, please don't think I'm trashing your product, I'm really not, but it's time to move on. What better opportunity than now to shift gears and create something new. FSX is overcomplicated and not well designed. It does not run well on modern hardware. I'm sure the developers of FS have always had their own ideas of how they would have made it had they not inherited a lame duck from MS, well, why not go and make it, you have the skills.

I think we all have to face the fact that there may never be another FS. Is that such a bad thing? I'm betting the gap left will be filled by a new and exciting sim that's more in tune with the community. Most top-end FS addons up until now seem to share the same trait, you have to go to extraordinary lengths to achieve the most simple of tasks within FS, it's creaking architecture just isn't up to the job, how could it be? Some of these add-ons could never have been imagined when the original FS core was developed.

So, while I mourn the passing of a great game, it's just that, a game. It's not my hobby. My hobby is flight sim, and that will carry on in whatever platform replaces FS.

Ric B.