Demo Flight for Xbox

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Is in any way planned the possibility of a demo flight before release for the Xbox? Like Fifa is in a demo. Here, for example, a landing challenge with the Cessna would be cool. I think that would increase the excitement :wink:

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That would be a great idea. The last time I played a game demo before purchasing the full release was back in 1996 with the Crash Bandicoot demo for PS1.

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+1

IMO there should be 3

1 with the 172 + small runway. very simple
TBM + St-Barth
b747 +JFK

player can see great scenery + weather and touch different kind/category of planes

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+1 great idea :+1:

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It’s clearly not going to happen ahead of Tuesday’s launch, but i could see MSFS being part of “Free Play Days” in the future, where only an Xbox Live Gold account is required. :thinking:

https://support.xbox.com/en-GB/help/subscriptions-billing/buy-games-apps/free-play-days-faq

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Love the idea but I think is probably a long shot at best.

I haven’t seen anything about a demo and at this stage think it’s very unlikely we will see one. Especially given it’s included in games pass. The FIFA demo’s go back years and it already has a huge audience so as cool an idea, most games now don’t do demos because of how gaming has changed. People can pop on youtube and see a game now and with subscription based services the whole industry model has changed with advertising hence the “death” of the demo. It’s very sad and I’d love to see them return but the resources needed for them given the benefit when most games are on YouTube before even released officially just doesn’t justify it to many developers.

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Would be very nice, you downloaded it already
 but how would it be done ? MSFS is cloud driven, there is only one server version, so there is only one version running for users
 just like updates are obligatory, same reason. They have set up a second server only for the Beta-testing participants. If you want a preview
 sign in for the Beta. The rest of us will have it next week tuesday/wednesday.

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the landing challenges have fixed time of day + fixed weather.

just make it a seperate install.
Wont need the cloud at all

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A few more days. Patience dude. It won’t happen.

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For Isafjördur I see (some) download, my internet is working
you want to store your result in the ranks list, which is also in the cloud
 Maybe they could enable flying without internet ? but in that case, you would miss all the nice things that make MSFS unique. Suppose people can start things up without photogrammetry or Bing data
 would be possible, but also ugly.

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im just talking about a demo version, that might be like 10gb to download, that have full quality + fixed weather.
no need to connect it to internet for a demo

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The idea seems nice, but the developers not being distracted by any side-activities is for the best. :slightly_smiling_face:

(anyway, Demos hurt game sales, they don’t improve them, so hardly in MS’ interest,)

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I’m sorry, but this is nonsense. When a sim costs as much as FS2020 does, the ability to try it at no cost before spending anything will only improve sales, not hurt them. Many other sims have a limited freeware option for this very reason. Otherwise you end up with loads of people sitting on the fence, unwilling to take the chance. (Just like I was, before I was able to try the sim for a month with a £1 game pass.)

Also, we live in an age where most games are refundable within a certain period, so to suggest that they would make more money by people buying a sim they end up not liking is also untrue.

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I think it depends on how demos are used and how you see them. If you’re like the kind of person who just plays demos you’ll end up technically playing them and once you’re done, you’re satisfied. So you don’t end up buying it anyway. Especially when it costs as much as MSFS does. But without a demo, when you buy it and you end up satisfied, then you get your money’s worth.

But if you play demo and you don’t like it, then all good. But without demo, and you buy it and end up not liking it, you’ll apply for a refund and you get your money back too.

So I guess what @SofaJockey is trying to say is that having a demo would open the possibility of people playing for free for a short period of time, which can potentially not really improve sales at all. For a certain point of view. Different people behaves differently. I know if I have an access to a demo, I would play it until it’s over, then I just move on to other things regardless of whether I enjoy the demo game or not.

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its not an issue at all since its on the gamepass, very very few games have demoes
nowadays.
its not going to happen.

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it’s still 145gb to download to test if you like the game or not

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No, you have bought a myth (that’s not a criticism, many people fall for this idea) which is why Demos (actually ‘Betas’) tend to only happen with multiplayer or online games that have to be stress tested with a ‘live’ audience pre-launch. Often a bad or even mediocre beta can be a disaster. Seriously, If Demos actually made money, more game’s would offer them, they don’t because they don’t work.

Game Pass is slightly different because people have already paid a subscription. That’s not a Demo (even if Game Pass subscribers may treat it like one - they are actually accessing the full game on a ‘rental’ basis).

It’s many years old, but this video explains why Demos hurt publishing companies, not help them. :slightly_smiling_face:

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