I will not now buy Marketplace items.
I bought the London pack before the UK Update, it is now useless as it now causes stutters and system lock ups.
My advice is only buy add ons after you check what if any impacts there will be on your system
How could you possibly know that without trying it first? Reading on the forums is all you would have, and opinion differs so wildly you could never know for sure without trying it on your own computer first, then of course it is too late.
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You do not need to try an add on, you search to see if others have had issues.
I would never have bought the Long Eze if there had been reviews that said it was an unstable, twitchy aircraft to fly.
I would not have bought London City Airport if I knew it would screw up my system once the UK update was installed.
Yes, best avoid add ons
Well one specific example: FSimStudios recently released a Vancouver scenery and yesterday I tried to find out whether it is something I would buy.
Itâs not in the marketplace yet (again: delays!) but still is an exampleâŠ
In this forum I found one thread telling that they have huge performance issues and some weird workaround which is not clear why it should work.
So how would I know now if I will enjoy the scenery or - despite quite recent hardware - would avoid or even uninstall it just because itâs not a joy to fly there?
Itâs not just an MSFS Marketplace issue, itâs an industry issue that there is currently no way to try before you buy.
BUT: The Marketplace has the best tools in hand to offer such a trial period since they are in full control about the contents downloaded by MSFS to simply block access to the content once the trial is over.
So yeah, we could say it is the way we did it for decades now.
But we could also think about whether there are more consumer-friendly ways with modern tools nowadays. And currently I donât see that happening with the Marketplace, it even introduced more downsides (encryption, slow updates, later releases, download-issues,âŠ) without offering a real benefit to counterweight that.
Iâm also not sure about a quality control by Asobo/MS, but Iâd love to have a review system where people can write their comments, maybe even state their system specs to be able to compare performance etc.
Also it would benefit people who are not that aware of forums and reviews and just want to enjoy the sim by buying some addons from the Marketplace.
Check out flightsim.to - it has a proper rating system with direct contact and responses by the creators, has a proper changelog system, FAQs in case of known issues, etc. Why is it so hard to have such non-destructive features in the Marketplace even if the creators would like to use them?
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The customer decides what is acceptable. Exactly why it should be more transparent. Of course everyone here knows about all the ins and outs of the addons but I think the audience is way bigger than that.
At least a weblink to the addon section in this forum would help in the meantime!
Saying that itâs not their job to curate the marketplace and that only players must know what to buy and what to not,is the equivalent of a Ferrari dealership selling used 1,1cc fiat Unos with no responsibility if it is garbage.
With one huge difference that is. FERRARI WOULD NEVER SELL GARBAGE.
Furthermore SHOWCASE them.
MODERATOR EDIT: 30 posts merged into this topic.
Ok, so I have bought several items on the market place, I really try to be careful and so far really happy, especially the LVFR Miami International as the devs put a ton of work in upgrading that scenery. But I just bought some other dev scenery and it is just an FSX port. Looked ok in the images on the marketplace, but was really disappointed with the buy, and felt a bit ripped off, this is MSFS 2020, and the quality should be checked.
The textures were shockingly bad, the modeling sub par (course ok for FSX 5 years ago) but not now and official Marketplace developers should not be allowed to sell their sub par ports, especially as thereâs no way to contact them. (these particular devs cannot be contacted) they donât exist.
I wonât name them here, but hey, I got burned and wonât get burned again with an FSX port from them guys. However, Microsoft have a duty to care, and should vet the quality of the addons on the OFFICIAL Marketplace, clearly some of these sceneries shouldnât be there.
I hope the 3rd party devs responsible for the shockingly bad FSX ports upgrade their addons I really do, but I donât hold out any hope.
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Why? Asobo, Microsoft, and the third party that took your money arenât going to consider the suggestions in this thread, or even read it. Theyâre not going to vet the add-ons. The Marketplace is like the mall. Corporate mall management doesnât care what junk trinkets the kiosks are peddling as long as they pay their rent.
But one of the things that actually makes this forum a valuable place to visit is that the rest of us can get honest criticism of products thatâs free of manipulation from these third parties. Youâre helping the rest of us not get suckered when you name names.
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Canât see a reason why you canât name the mod youâre not happy with. Plenty of threads and posts on here do so with both positive and negative comments.
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Agree entirely. MS wonât be employing anyone any time soon to vet content on the Marketplace, so our best hope for early warning against poor quality and possible cash grabs is this community.
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I think they addressed this at Q&A before, people wanted them to remove the Bredok planes, and they didnât seem too warm to the idea.
no, ms is not responsible for 3 rd party quality, you need to do more research yourself.
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This is the main reason I wonât get any add-ons through the Marketplace. Too slow to update, no come back if you donât feel to have gotten value.
I use flightsim.to for most of my add-ons as there are reviews and comments, can contact authors directly etc.
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As long as there is no possibility to try out addons, I am not buying much.
I bought four planes, only two of them are ok, the other two I would call â â â â .
Iâll be back in the business of buying anything when one can try the stuff out for like two hours or so or give t back within a certain timeframe.
There is so much freeware, so I donât really need to buy stuff anyhow.
Iâll buy from wherever is the best price and the easiest download/install/update proposition. At the moment, for me, that tends to be MSFS 2020 Marketplace. This way I know, rather like with Steam, that if thereâs an update for a product Iâve purchased through Marketplace it will find me (and not the other way around).
Iâve just learned as a customer in this flight sim malarkey: before you lay out any cash for anything, go read a few reviews, check these forums, watch a few YT videos. It doesnât take long to get the picture, and your wallet will thank you.
Interesting. I found that I can get almost any addon at the same price or cheaper than the Marketplace. Also updates are often weeks behind on the marketplace. So for me itâs Orbx, Flightsim.com, JustFlight or Simmarket or of course directly from the devs if I can. No intermediaries means more money for the devs.
About vetting the quality: unrealistic proposal. MS/Asobo make tons of money from trash like the 737Max or the Typhoon or mediocre FSX ports. And as long as the stuff doesnât break the sim, why would they care? Also the whole thing is highly subjective. What I consider trash, many people seem to be sufficiently content with.
Thatâs what the rating system is for. If only the rating system worked. Also it would be nice to be able to see comments/reviews for things on the markeplace. That in an of itself is a form of quality control.
Itâs like buying something on amazon. You can look at how many stars it has and what the reviews say. You wouldnt buy headphones that are two stars and have reviews that say âfell apart in 2 daysâ. Youâd recognize that it isnt a good product and move on.
We need a FUNCTIONING review system in place.
Having asobo vet 3rd party stuff means more beurocracy/paperwork and workload. In a year or two when the 3rd party market hits its stride, a system like this would develop an insane backlog and as a result things would take forever to be approved for sale. Plus thstâs a lot of hours of work that could be used in other areas and it might require employing one or more individuals to handle it as the market grows.
Just let the rating/review system handle it. The free market will guide itself at that point and weed out the scammy products and devs.
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The marketplace isnât fit for purpose.
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Screenshots dudeâŠand of course,name them.But with screenshots of your flight there,in contrast with the marketplace ones