I have bought outside of Market Place and had a weapons option for military aircraft, I’ve bought military aircraft on market place that if bought outside of market place would have weapon options. Everyone of the aircraft purchased on Market place has the weights for weapons but when you select them they never show up on the outside of the aircraft. Is this a liberal directed policy?
MSFS 2020 is rated E for everyone. No weapons allowed for that rating. Only aircraft purchased outside the Marketplace can load weapons.
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It only has to do with that E rating which is remarkably restrictive, but you kinda have to commit to it once you have been rated… even with all future content.
Both the F-18 and the aircraft carrier are weapons themselves because their only purpose is war. Not displaying bombs or guns on them does not turn them into a passenger jet or a ferry. This is like bringing your kids to a firing range, let them play with a rifle that has no magazine and explain that the rifle is only a magic wand in their game.
Anyway I don´t know where this interpretation comes from, but E rating only states the following: “Titles rated E (Everyone) have content that may be suitable for persons ages 6 and older. Titles in this category may contain minimal cartoon, fantasy or mild violence and/or infrequent use of mild language”.
At the same time mild violence stands for: “Mild scenes depicting characters in unsafe and/or violent situations”.
However intense violence stands for: “Graphic and realistic-looking depictions of physical conflict. May involve extreme and/or realistic blood, gore, weapons, and depictions of human injury and death”
So you could still land on a carrier with a fully loaded F-18 or fly over a city because the situation would still not involve any character on a violent situation. You could even drop bombs on an empty firing range because there no characters would still exist. Indeed the only characters existing in game so far are the fauna, the pilots, the marshallers/ground services, some passengers/fans at some airports and the Reno races spectators (well, and the guys pushing the gliders in the following months 
)
Cheers
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Its a flight sim, not a combat flight game. Nice to have something that doesnt promote violence and death at every turn I say.
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you can drive through the marshallers and pretent to shred them with your propellers. That’s more violent than having fake bombs and guns mounted that you can neither drop nor fire on most planes.
But those ratings seldom make complete sense
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Totally agree!
This is ridiculous, when I was a child our whole house was full with rifles 
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If you are on PC the simple option is to buy directly from the developer rather than through the market place. Or if you really want weapons something like DCS is a better option, noted that there’s a limitation of locations to fly in. The position MS/Asobo have taken on this is reasonably logical to ensure they meet even the most stringent interpretation of the rating.
Look, this is one of those arguments without any real sense but that looks fine on the paper, even if I could agree with you in your message. A hammer can be used to build a house of to hit somebody. In Mario Bros game you see how they use it to hit. Indeed they are constantly hitting the characters with things there. Do you think that Mario Bros is promoting violence? Well, it has the E-Rating as well.
Even if MSFS is not a combat simulator a F-18 is still a combat jet. Having it in game without fuel tanks of its loadout is like having a Cessna without seats: it´s an incomplete version of the aircraft. That won´t be still promoting violence and that will be even less violent than what E-Rating allows, as E-Rating still involves scenes of mild damage on the game characters, as you could read above.
Cheers
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Actually the hammer argument is why the F18, etc are even available on the Marketplace. They can be used as a ferry or something nonviolent. But the ordnance has only one purpose, which is why it’s not allowed.
There are a lot of military planes without weapons around in the real world, e.g. the Blue Angels, Frecce Tricolore, Red Arrows to name a few, so no need for weaponised planes in MSFS. I agree with CargoPilot48, it is just nice to fly without violence (there is already enough violence/war around us), and there are plenty of alternatives available such as DCS if you really ‘want some action’.
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Again… E-Rating does not say that weapons are not allowed. You can read that on the Xbox page I shared or on wikipedia. This interpretation of the rating is completely wrong and has been always wrong. And let´s use common sense a bit. The F-18 is having a combat paint scheme, the pilot is wearing a combat uniform, the carrier is loaded with other combat aircraft and helicopters, the addon itself is based on an action movie. I don´t see any civilian use of all that in game, to be honest.
Cheers
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Totally agree
The Marketplace’s policy is what it is, just buy your military planes from third-party sellers.
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It’s not going to change. Buy military planes somewhere else if it bothers you. Arguing about it is a waste of energy.
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Thats clever said. Really? With such argument’s you can justifiy anything.
But whilst an hammer primarily is made to nail and a knife to cut and although they can be abused the only use for an military part is to kill. Absolutely nothing else. No human can build a house with an F18 nor does it satisfy anyones hunger or quench their thirst, except those after power and destruction.
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Hello All:
As MSFS currently stands, weapons will not be added to the base game or marketplace to keep the current game rating. This discussion has been brought up before.
To my knowledge, there has been no discission for the rating to be changed. If you wish, you may supply feedback through Zendesk using the feedback drop down.
Thank you!