Public API for community developed aircraft

[FalcoGer]

I don't understand why DCS is locking their API for the public and allowing only select module developers access to it. Things like a targeting pod are impossible to be added by mods at the moment. Why is that?

I understand that ED wants to keep things high quality and realistic, but at the same time people can still make aircraft and make them as ridiculous as they want. Sure things like the C130 mod aren't visually as high quality as a professionally developed model, and they may not be 100% accurate, but they're still good fun and reasonably good. And at the end of the day people know that they download mods and bugs and inaccuracies are expected.

If the community A4-E is any indication it also proves that the community can produce amazing results. So why then are they held back? Why not release all the tools? It can only make DCS better. And if something like the A4 is of a really good standard, ED can adopt it into the core, perhaps either free or at the developers choosing priced. Yes the bomb drop tables aren't a perfect match to the real world, but in the end it's a great model with great textures and the procedures seem realistic. Not that I could say, because I never flew the thing, but I'm sure a lot of effort went into it. And yet development of such aircraft are held back by not providing the tools needed to perfect them.

[Buzzer1977]

On 10/18/2021 at 8:33 AM, FalcoGer said:

I don't understand why DCS is locking their API for the public and allowing only select module developers access to it. Things like a targeting pod are impossible to be added by mods at the moment. Why is that?

The point is: Somebody has to pay the bills at ED. ED is making money by selling DLCs, not by selling the game which comes for free as you might know. Who would pay for a module, if you can have competitive modules like a A-4 for free ?
But it would be great to have at least a 'authorized by ED' model, where you pay ED to have one of the better community modules authorized in the game, like the Hercules, A-4 or the T-45.

Edited November 14, 2021 by Buzzer1977

[Mars Exulte]

This is an oldish topic, but still :

 

This ain't magic. Anybody that wants to may submit their work to ED. As I understand it, some community members already help with AI models, etc.

 

  In short, their product, their choice how it's conducted. People who want to contribute can do so... via the provided channels. The end. Furthermore, there are only a relative few number of people who can even attempt to make use of what you're requesting and most of them have traditionally ended up becoming 3rd parties. People wanting to churn out simplistic mods can already do so, those people aren't magically going to be able to make use a development SDK, which I suspect you don't get what that actually means. It's not a password that unlocks hidden features, it's access to source code and internal resources, thus it being carefully guarded.