If anyone wants to know why I started this - (microsoft in particular)
I would like better protection for customers from bad 3rd party developers
More visibility about who the companies are who clutter the Markeplace with 2nd rate products
An easier way to contact said hidden companies to solve faults with products from the Markeplace
How lovely it would be if developers could speak on these forums to us the consumer, to iron out issues with products or purchases from their internet companies. These prompts would help everyone to stop scratching around to find answers.
A list of standards for all developers to adhere to.
Strict adherence to the SDK
Please feel free to add to this list to make our lives easier.
We all would but it seems making commission is more important than the integrity of what they sell, sadly. We are left to refer to the laws of our own individual countries â great for me in the UK, but some countries have very few laws to protect buyers from shady dealers.
I agree with much of this thread, however I donât want Microsoft to be the arbiter of what can and can go into the marketplace unless there is a standard of quality that can be universally agreed upon that Microsoft can abide by in making a determination of whether something should or shouldnât be in the marketplace.
I feel like MScenery is slop as well, but if you get Microsoft to police the marketplace, who determines what is quality and what isnât, and who determines what the standard is and isnât? Microsoft already has issues getting updates to the marketplace in a timely manner even without doing that.
Therefore, Microsoft needs to come up with ways to allow customers to make more informed decisions about how to vote with their wallet.
Perhaps a review section that allows for written reviews, not just stars. This is in addition to what @Pilotfirst9999 said in their last post.
Give the customer more tools to make an informed decision, without directly telling them what they can and canât spend their money on.
That is indeed why bad DLC is such a big problem for the whole industry. Joe Average buys a rendering of his local airport and his favorite aircraft, and they are both substandard. How does he know this is not the norm? He will most likely not buy anything else.
Looking at it from another side⊠the Marketplace made the DLC market explode and made it possible for small, single-person companies to start selling. Microsoft does check products before they are put up for sale, and we are often asked to change things (even though these are not always correct comments). But we are not aware of any measurable âstandardsâ. Thatâs something that surprised me a lot. Not even things like working according to the SDK is required (even though it is the only way to get seriously good performance). It is clear Microsoft sees itself as the provider and not taking any stance on what is good or bad. They rely on customer reviews. Iâm overall pretty happy with those btw. A friend of mine has five products on sale and all have a 5 star rating for very good reasons.
I have bought some UAVs only for formation flying with Airshow Assistant. I am Okay with that. But all over sudden its not possible to retract the gear of the x-47, Mq-28 and the Barracuda lol.
I will add something you have said to my list of requests above because it is a very, very good idea and that is a list of measurable standards.
It is often the single-person developer who is very good and well done your friend for their 5 stars.
Yes unfortunately MS check that the product functions on a basic level without breaching contractual clauses but no actual âstandardsâ of content.
Also someone mentioned DreamScenery and VA Systems. Donât shoot them down chaps, they are just providing content for the Virtual Airline groups which are a very large portion of the sim community. Thr night scenery add alot of immersion to regular routes, and after buying a few its NOT poor quality. Once their catalogue is converted to 24 the amount each week will subside.
But yeah, MScenery with their 1 flight model fits all are majorly responsible for a lack of consumer confidence especially in the new 24 customer base.
Thank you for comments on this topic! It is reassuring to learn there are very small companies among the current providers. As you state, is is quite surprising there are no measurable standards. Hope this will be considered for the future.
Great thread how do we know we arenât funding some front with Panama bank accounts?
Anyway, what amazes me is that the so called strenuous testing ingestion phase letâs these guys release something like their latest A340 professional where the landing gears are black rubber and donât have wheels nor tyres textures and they donât move either, they just slide along the tarmac sometimes buried in the tarmac
How does this pass the ingestion test?
This is just one example from the myriad of flaws from the myriad of their entire broken fleet which stems over 100 aircraft for sale
This is alot worse than the current state of the 2024 Sim. This is selling something that is not fit for sale, fails any quality controls on a platform that also is not fit for sale. Talk about an over reach and a complete lack of respect for its customer base. Thanks Jorg and whoever allowed this and fostered this type of situation to eventuate
Please, can someone create a setting to exclude or hide this developer from the Marketplace?
Every time I enter the marketplace, it appears on the main screen.
This developer is also diligent, so even if you change the sorting settings to recommended or latest, they will be exposed at the top.
The worst is, are Microsoft colluding in an illegal sale of goods in many countries without any contact details for the customer? As Mathijs suggests, are companies hiding something? They are certainly being âprotectedâ by Microsoft and that is just plain wrong!
Jorg has spoken about the option to rent a plane. I think thatâs a great solution to eliminate these kinds of malpractices. And yes, a review section added to that. But the latter can also be provided by this forum. There are many threads on specific aircraft where people discuss the quality.
So user 1 rents a shovelware plane, itâs not satisfied, and opens a thread about this plane if it doesnât exist yet. This user stops the rent, and wise other potentially interested simmers first look for info on this plane, and decide not to buy it.
Shovelware developer out of business in no time. Problem solved.
I just googled them and itâs nothing bad but news all around and since as early as 2020, so they havenât even tried to improve
Just 2 days ago, 2 YouTube uploads from swiss001 and fast time Vero showing the completely farcical A340, so many broken things, this aircraft no matter how much you try and spin for simple Xbox gamers, that apparantly donât seek study level aircraft, IS NOT FIT FOR SALE
Itâs a joke, itâs way worse than Captain Sim and that is saying alot. Mscenery is without a doubt the worst developer in MSFS and unfortunately they make up close to 80% of the content on MSFS2024
Jorg said in the Dev stream he wasnât happy with whats happening on the marketplace wanted easier ingestion process but so far all we are seeing is MScenery.
I donât know aboout you but I certainly do not want to trawl through mountains of crud in the Marketplace. I certainly donât like the idea that folk are purchasing what appears to be an illegal marketing strategy - lease or no lease. I assume Asobo is trying to react by doing this lease thing and Microsoft should be attending to this but a pretending to be blind to Marketing laws in many countries.
Isnât there a star system in place already? I never buy a 3,2 for example.
Impossible to tackle. Itâs a free market and that wonât change. Itâs up to every individual simmer to make wise decisions about where to put their money.
And as I havenât been in the MP for a while. Is it already possible to hide a specific developersâ products?
Exactly - seriously poor quality. If you read the articles online MScenery has been banned from certain game sites and to top it all they also suggest they have copied others work or plagiarised it. Perhaps this is why they leave stuff unfinished - I suppose you canât say it is an exact copy then!
Someone is giving them 4 and 5 stars, itâs probably them, or someone linked to them. Once you see more reviews the average tanks naturally because itâs complete junk
Thatâs why I suggested a thread per plane. Here. On this forum. Why hasnât anybody started those for these planes (so it seems)? Why do we expect a safeguard from MS ( whose income it is) while we can do it ourselves? To protect the other simmer?
Besides, a 4 or 5 can easily be given by a âcasual simmerâ who only flies in external view and doesnât bother about the depth of the total implementation (which is of course flat as a pancake).