Focus on fixing bugs in weapons/sensors/models, or continue to develop more features and content?

[Silver_Dragon]

2 hours ago, Irisz said:

In 2018, the J-11A Flanker and the MFI-55 display were announced for the J-11A, and I returned. However, there was no 50% sale on FC3, so I bought it at full price because I felt it was a significant update that would finally provide an advanced Flanker, giving me what I had expected from ED after 9 years. In 2021, I left DCS World again delete account and uninstalled the game because the more modern J-11A still had not been released.

Someone remember the J-11A has a project by Dekka Ironwork 3rd party, no ED?, and the Chinnese military stament has more restrictive? (the J-8BB case).

Edited June 12 by Silver_Dragon

[darkman222]

I would not already call it: "Thread successully derailed" but how about a separate thread for the J11 and FC3 russian fighters?

We are talking about products that are currently developed by ED (yes, early access) that get new features added while existing features break more and more, not getting fixed for months or even years.

Especially if it is a really obvious bug that gets pushed out into a patch. It would not even be a big deal if whats broken did break on purpose thus it gets mentioned as "known issues"

If ED does not want their devs to spend the time with in depth testing, there are enough people here in the forums that do so. And who are willing to give bug reports tracks and spend a lot of time doing that. Me included. But if the thread goes to "reported" gets locked and stays like that, together with the bug for a year. Thats not the kind of motivation these people need. They simply help because they want the product they purchased to work again.

 

Edited June 12 by darkman222

[Exorcet]

This is difficult to pose as a yes/no question. The thing with product development is that it depends on a lot of factors. It's not realistic to ask ED to drop everything and work purely on bug fixes. Asking for a greater focus on them is something that might make sense however.

3 hours ago, cfrag said:

Since you are (like me) an experienced and accomplished project manager, I'm surprised that you have to ask that question. Because DCS is entirely on a one-off sales model. Fixing bugs are difficult to monetize because unlike selling new modules, fixing bugs does not directly generate new sales; it merely can reinforce potential additional purchases from the same customer. If you purchased the F/A-18, fixing ground AI will not sell you another F/A-18, while you may be willing to overlook that ground AI bug if there was a shiny new XYZ for you to purchase.

I'm not sure if it's that straight forward. People already hesitate to buy modules because of bugs. Fixing the core doesn't bring in revenue directly because it doesn't have a sales price, but it does influence DCS sales. Not to mention stuff like smart AI is easily marketable, not only by ED directly but also through DCS content generated by users.

[cfrag]

10 minutes ago, Exorcet said:

I'm not sure if it's that straight forward.

It is and it is not: Unfortunately pesky humans are involved, and that always messes things up. Luckily, though, to get the general gist, an 80/20 approach usually works well in planning. And 80% of all the use cases work that way; most DCS customer's purchase decisions aren't complex to understand. Most purchase one, at most two modules, and their purchase decision is mostly influenced by the model's "coolness" and novelty factor, not by DCS arcana like "AI quality" or an obscure weapons bug. Customers usually want to fly an iconic plane and blow stuff up with it. They'll buy the Bug, Falcon or Hog, (Mudhen, ahem) maybe FC because it has many planes. Repeat purchases are rare with this group (Warning: pure assertion, no data to back up my above claims!).

Only the edge case customers take a closer look, learn about the minutiae of DCS shortcomings - and those are all part of the 20%.  I'm another edge case: I simply get anything ED and their partners offer up, and ignore the glaring bugs and near-atrocious state some models are in. And I - much like the other edge cases - don't count when business cases are drawn up and funds are allocated. Only those 'normal' 80% do. How can you tell if you are part of the 20% edge cases? Easy: you are reading this.   

[SharpeXB]

54 minutes ago, cfrag said:

How can you tell if you are part of the 20% edge cases? Easy: you are reading this.

Well said

[AndrewDCS2005]

On 6/12/2024 at 11:44 AM, BIGNEWY said:

... our project managers priorities may not always align with what you or I would like to have fixed...

So what are the priorities of ED project managers please? @Wags is this something you would be willing to share with the community here (or in upcoming interviews if any)?

And I am not even remotely suggesting using few personal opinions to drive the business. Look at the poll results, heck run the ongoing poll yourself every month/quarter, to know what makes your paying customers happy.

[AndrewDCS2005]

On 6/12/2024 at 11:35 AM, cfrag said:

Since you are (like me) an experienced and accomplished project manager, I'm surprised that you have to ask that question. Because DCS is entirely on a one-off sales model. Fixing bugs are difficult to monetize because unlike selling new modules, fixing bugs does not directly generate new sales; it merely can reinforce potential additional purchases from the same customer. If you purchased the F/A-18, fixing ground AI will not sell you another F/A-18, while you may be willing to overlook that ground AI bug if there was a shiny new XYZ for you to purchase. DCS Management/Project Management is entirely (and rightly so) sales-focused. There is no secondary income stream, and only those one-off sales make money. Fixing what has been sold takes backseat (unless a bug is so glaring that people start talking about it so much that it can impact sales to customers who have not yet purchased) to developing/selling new modules. There is no ill will involved, and this is not criticism from my part -- it's just the result of simple market dynamics: low incentive to invest (fix) into what is deemed 'not broken enough', high incentive to invest (develop) into more products to generate income.

I don't think ED is entirely sales-driven - and I have this opinion being part of community since my early LOMAC days nearly 20 years ago.

It seems ED has got its core priorities right, driven by passion and vision for the best combat flight simulation. Maybe vision needs an update as DCS has arguably reached total market leadership and has no real competition in this segment (yes there are few other good WWI/WWII/modern sims but nothing comes close to DCS). 

And quality always beats quantity and IS the primary driver of sales. High-quality product which works like Swiss clock every day always outsells nebulous has-it-all bells-and-whistles. 

[cfrag]

20 minutes ago, AndrewDCS2005 said:

I don't think ED is entirely sales-driven - and I have this opinion being part of community since my early LOMAC days nearly 20 years ago.

Perhaps. On the other hand, if they aren't they are neglecting their duties to the owners. 

21 minutes ago, AndrewDCS2005 said:

And quality always beats quantity and IS the primary driver of sales. High-quality product which works like Swiss clock every day

My apologies, I did not detect your strong sarcasm in time.

[BIGNEWY]

1 hour ago, AndrewDCS2005 said:

So what are the priorities of ED project managers please? @Wags is this something you would be willing to share with the community here (or in upcoming interviews if any)?

And I am not even remotely suggesting using few personal opinions to drive the business. Look at the poll results, heck run the ongoing poll yourself every month/quarter, to know what makes your paying customers happy.

We share our work in our newsletters and change logs. You are not going to get a minute by minute run down of every task our team works on sorry.

thank you 

[tflash]

For me, not every bug is worth fixing, as long as it are no showstoppers. There's plenty enough that works very well in DCS to enjoy. What certainly needs to be avoided is endless tweaking of missile and weapon performance parameters (which are by nature confidential) based on hearsay and community opinion. 

[AndrewDCS2005]

On 6/16/2024 at 11:15 AM, cfrag said:

My apologies, I did not detect your strong sarcasm in time.

Not sure what is the sarcasm you refer to - I had none in my messages. Quality beats quantity - I've seen enough success stories and compete studies to say this.

Swiss clock was a fun reference to cultural context ED currently operates in, based in Switzerland

 

On 6/16/2024 at 11:31 AM, BIGNEWY said:

We share our work in our newsletters and change logs. You are not going to get a minute by minute run down of every task our team works on sorry.

thank you 

I am curious about ED business goals and priorities, not daily task breakdown.

What are the things that Nick Grey and ED owners (whoever they are) prioritize above all in everything ED does? Users NSAT/NPS? MAU/DAU? Profit margin? Revenue growth?

I have my assumptions but would be awesome to somehow understand what ED is driven by.

[draconus]

10 hours ago, AndrewDCS2005 said:

What are the things that Nick Grey and ED owners (whoever they are) prioritize above all in everything ED does?

They won't tell you. It'd be PR suicide. All you can get is "Thank you for your passion and support". Please stop trying to know better when they successfully run the company for over 30 years, 15 years of DCS alone and still growing.

[BIGNEWY]

10 hours ago, AndrewDCS2005 said:

I am curious about ED business goals and priorities, not daily task breakdown.

What are the things that Nick Grey and ED owners (whoever they are) prioritize above all in everything ED does? Users NSAT/NPS? MAU/DAU? Profit margin? Revenue growth?

I have my assumptions but would be awesome to somehow understand what ED is driven by.

Sorry we will not share our internal information or data. 

I get you are frustrated but the people who know best are making the choices that need to be made. That may not align with what you want, and probably never will, but we all work hard and any features, new products, fixes, and any progress is shared in our change logs and newsletters when we are ready to share them. 

Thank you 

[cfrag]

11 hours ago, AndrewDCS2005 said:

Not sure what is the sarcasm you refer to - I had none in my messages. Quality beats quantity

Well, that explains the confusion, I guess. ED's current business model is that of quantity: a factory that must crank out new products to sell (a one-off sales model). Unlike an artisan's workshop that depends on quality, ED depends on one-off sales quantity, quality is once-removed from sales: it impacts reputation. Quality issues in past products is what gave rise to this thread; hence my (incorrect) assumption of heavy sarcasm when you referred to ED's modus operandi. I'm not saying that ED's products are bad - after all, I own each and every module they and their partners have put out - and it seems obvious to me that 'quality over quantity' is not how they are set up right now. If that was true, there wouldn't be this thread.

11 hours ago, AndrewDCS2005 said:

Swiss clock was a fun reference to cultural context ED currently operates in, based in Switzerland

Ahem. *I* am based in Switzerland. So is ED's official PO box and some managerial offices. Knowing Switzerland's cost structure and ED's history, I'd be very surprised if any significant development is done here. Their servers are all operated in Russia, for example. But that's beside the point  - I like their products, I'm looking forward to the Hook and 'Stan that hopefully will be released soon. And I wish that they'd fix more of the many outstanding bugs of existing, flawed, products. 

Edited yesterday at 08:06 AM by cfrag

[darkman222]

I dont want to understand how ED operates and how they make money. Thats their business. If you guys here are smarter, and want to help ED, apply to the respective position at ED.

I just want to emphasize from a customer point of view, and what this thread is about: If I purchase a product even one that is labelled as "early access" and this product has certain features at the time I purchase, even if it is worked on, I expect the features to go on working. And not that it gets broken and stays broken for a year or longer.

Edited 23 hours ago by darkman222

[cfrag]

3 hours ago, darkman222 said:

I expect the features to go on working

Oh, you sweet, sweet summer child

May I guide your weary eyes to ED's EULA that you agreed to when you purchased; specifically section 3.2 which states: 

You acknowledge that the Program has not been developed to meet your individual requirements and that it is 
therefore your responsibility to ensure that the facilities and functions of the Program as described in 
the Documentation meet your requirements.

That is boilerplate software disclaimer, of course, not specific to ED. In short any software agreement will tell you that any fault is yours if what was sold doesn't work for you. Yeah, that's quite pitiful, if an unfortunately a requirement for software companies to survive. It's an unfortunate fact of The Digital Life that we lead. So, you  may wish that stuff that you paid for works, and it's on you to make sure that it does and continues to work. At the point of sale, ED theoretically gave you the opportunity to verify that it does work (free trial), and after that there are no guarantees that the software's fitness to work for you is kept. It's a truly sorry state for customers like you and I to be in, and that's where reputation comes in. It's in ED's interest to not let their reputation sink below a threshold that becomes detrimental to their sales. It's how we, their customers, as a large group respond to overall quality and what we let ED get away with that sets this threshold. So from that standpoint, this thread appears to be quite helpful: it allows us to voice our hopes and expectations so ED can gauge what a (very selective) part of their customers feel. 

So, to guide this into a constructive direction: once you purchased a module or map - for how long do you expect it to work? Personally, I'd prefer 'a couple of years'. No module ever has hit 100% for me, some significantly less; on average I'd say that all modules (except two) exceed the 60% mark today. What's your mileage?

 

 

[darkman222]

You overlooked one major point. We might have an EULA stating what you say. But on the other hand nobody forces the users to stay with DCS and play DCS. You could also use products from competitors. And thats the other major point. There isnt a serious alternative.

So its in EDs hands and in EDs responsibilty how good they want to maintain their modules, also during EA. And this is why people feel so disappointed with bugged modules. Whatever the EULA says, losing trust in ED in the long run will be visible in sales, I agree.

Do you want to know things look like with competition, even while both are for free? DCS Voice Chat vs SRS. If you are not forced to use a bugged product, and have an alternative, people just dont use it, including me, although I would love to.

Edited 20 hours ago by darkman222