F/A-18C donations

[sobek]

It's the same, it's paying for something that you've got no guarantee to get in any reasonable time. This is good for small studios, some passionate guys who creates some indie stuff after full time job, not a goddamn full grown commercial company with government top secret contracts. Stop behave like children.

 

Calm down please. We understand you don't share the OPs opinion, but that doesn't free you from having to adhere to the forum rules.

[ishtmail]

It's the same, it's paying for something that you've got no guarantee to get in any reasonable time. This is good for small studios, some passionate guys who creates some indie stuff after full time job, not a goddamn full grown commercial company with government top secret contracts. Stop behave like children.

 

That's very funny.

 

A moderate size developer like ED is actually considerably more likely to fulfil their promises, than a small one.

ED as a company also generates a lot more trust with the possible pledgers.

 

I'll give you a real life example of how this really works:

 

Chris Roberts started a Kickstarter project for his upcoming Star Citizen space game. He raised over 9.500.000 dollars, all on a promise to deliver something.

Behind Chris Roberts is a large group of developers that are now working on Star Citizen, thanks to the successful crowdfunding.

'Roberts Space Industries', as the company is called, is as big as ED, or even larger.

 

 

On the other side of the coin, Michael Juliano made a Kickstarter project for Rogue System, a space sim not dissimilar to Star Citizen. Michael Juliano is, in contrast with Chris Roberts and his large company, a one-man-band, an 'indie' developer. He set a goal of 300.000, and only raised 50.000 dollars.

 

 

As you can see from this example, a moderate size company with some past behind it (Chris Roberts, or ED in our case) is extremely more likely to generate trust with people who would donate/pledge/prepurchase, than an indie developer noone ever heard from.

 

In that regard, ED would very likely have a successful Kickstarter fundraiser, and is at the same time very likely to fulfil their promises.

[112th_Rossi]

Basically this thread stems from the fact the some users are being impatient (no disrespect). If ED required funding, donations would only cover the coffee machine refills. I'm certain ED/TFC investors and shareholders have this sorted.

 

I want the F18 asap too but I've resigned to the fact I'm going to have to wait.

 

We'll get the F18 when it's done.

[howie87]

It's not a matter of swaying sales figures: Rather, it provides a steady monthly cash flow that might ensure less reliance on med-fid modules to fund development of the hi-fid F-18, ie F-18 gets here faster.

 

OK, time for an analogy to demonstrate my point.

 

If a pharmaceutical company was developing a drug to cure cancer, would you go out and buy a load of their paracetamol to show your support?

[winz]

OK, time for an analogy to demonstrate my point.

 

If a pharmaceutical company was developing a drug to cure cancer, would you go out and buy a load of their paracetamol to show your support?

Newflash, pharmaceutical companies are trying to develop a cure for cancer all the time. Do you see any crowdfunding for these companies? "Donate money for Bayer, or else...."

 

ED is a established company, having a functionall business model (if they hadn't they would follow the rest of sim developers going bankrupt). They should focus on improving that business model - and they are doing that by opening dcs to 3rd parties.

 

Relying on charity (what crowdfunding for such company is) for paying their employes wage is just bad. And a planing nightmare from a financial standpoint. You just have no way to estimate your income in advance.

 

And worse, what if, after a year or two, those money will not be sufficient? You go bankcrupt while having obligation to people who already funded your development.

 

No-one is forbidding you from buying multiple licenses of EDs products, if you want to support them extensively.

Edited May 10, 2013 by winz

[112th_Rossi]

I can't believe we are arguing on how to give ED money. This is bordering on the absurd!

[howie87]

All I want to do is put my money towards a product that I want to see developed. Why is that so hard to comprehend?

 

We can argue about it all day but it's extremely simple to me. Donating is not the same as crowd funding. I do not expect a return on my investment.

[112th_Rossi]

I think paying for beta is as close as we are going to get.

 

Kickstarter is also problematic since you need to define what the customer/investor is paying for before it's even in development or is a very basic prototype. In the world of flight sims where information about the sim you propose developing can be scarce of even impossible to obtain, it's better to leave the development until at such point the customer can make a decision where the level of detail is appropriate for them.

 

If ED did a kickstarter for a particular aircraft but in the end could not implement a feature because of lack info or other restriction a lot of players might be a tad annoyed, especially since being a simulator, by its definition, is a replica of the real thing to the highest degree possible, otherwise it would be called an approximator.

 

I would rather wait until theres a feasable demo or beta until I part my cash.

[Yellonet]

All I want to do is put my money towards a product that I want to see developed. Why is that so hard to comprehend?

 

We can argue about it all day but it's extremely simple to me. Donating is not the same as crowd funding. I do not expect a return on my investment.

I understand completely, but I strongly believe that donations towards such an expensive to produce product as a F/A-18C module is pointless.

There's just not going to be very many that are willing to just give away their money like that, and thus the sum of money will be insignificant compared to the cost of development. You'd just end up buying ED a proverbial lunch, will that really benefit development?

 

A crowd funding project would likely gather much more money.

It's not that I think ED lacks the funding for the project, but if they created a kickstarter they could secure the funding for F/A-18C with the kickstarter and use the rest of their income for different projects.

Also, for me personally it would feel good to have my F/A-18C module payed for with a rough release date.

[Yellonet]

I think paying for beta is as close as we are going to get.

 

Kickstarter is also problematic since you need to define what the customer/investor is paying for before it's even in development or is a very basic prototype. In the world of flight sims where information about the sim you propose developing can be scarce of even impossible to obtain, it's better to leave the development until at such point the customer can make a decision where the level of detail is appropriate for them.

 

If ED did a kickstarter for a particular aircraft but in the end could not implement a feature because of lack info or other restriction a lot of players might be a tad annoyed, especially since being a simulator, by its definition, is a replica of the real thing to the highest degree possible, otherwise it would be called an approximator.

 

I would rather wait until theres a feasable demo or beta until I part my cash.

I doubt any of that would be a problem with ED, it's not like they will just guess at what systems they can get info on. There's also no reason to exactly specify what systems will be modelled to what degree in a hypothetical kickstarter.

[Irregular programming]

I can't believe we are arguing on how to give ED money. This is bordering on the absurd!

 

What's absurd is people so angry at the concept of crowd funding that they chose to post against it in this thread. :music_whistling:

[howie87]

I understand completely, but I strongly believe that donations towards such an expensive to produce product as a F/A-18C module is pointless.

There's just not going to be very many that are willing to just give away their money like that, and thus the sum of money will be insignificant compared to the cost of development. You'd just end up buying ED a proverbial lunch, will that really benefit development?

 

A crowd funding project would likely gather much more money.

It's not that I think ED lacks the funding for the project, but if they created a kickstarter they could secure the funding for F/A-18C with the kickstarter and use the rest of their income for different projects.

Also, for me personally it would feel good to have my F/A-18C module payed for with a rough release date.

 

Yeah, I guess you're right. I can see the attraction of crowd funding from the consumers point of view but I doubt ED would want to go down that route.

 

Don't see why they'd say no to a free lunch though.

Edited May 10, 2013 by howie87

[GodsPrototype]

I actually agree with this donation idea. I would rather pay more money to get a high fidelity aircraft instead of a mid fidelity aircraft. In fact, I won't even purchase the F/A-18C from ED if it's not high fidelity, as in A-10C quality. I was extremely exited about the F/A-18C when they announced it, but they crushed my dreams when I heard it might be mid fidelity. Does anyone know if it is confirmed that the F/A-18C will be mid fidelity?

 

Anyhow, we are sure that the F/A-18E from Cortex is going to be high fidelity, so I will definitely go for that one.

[112th_Rossi]

FA18 is their next DCS module so it wont be mid-fi. Only the Su27 and F15 will be mid-fi in the short term. Long term they will also be DCS level.

 

It's in Wags post.

[howie87]

What's absurd is people so angry at the concept of crowd funding that they chose to post against it in this thread. :music_whistling:

 

NEW PLAN!

 

I'm gonna start selling T-shirts that say "crowd funding stole my girlfriend" and give the profits to ED. :megalol:

[112th_Rossi]

Whats a girlfriend?

[GodsPrototype]

Whats a girlfriend?

 

It's like your favorite plane, but in a form of a human. Yeah, I don't know how that works either...

[Rusty_M]

I already have the wife "upgrade"

[howie87]

Whats a girlfriend?

 

A quicker way of getting into an argument than posting on ED forums.

[skouras]

I think this was brought up before and if I recall correctly ED have said they do not wish to setup any new accounts etc for something like this (donations) and that instead if you wish to support them more simply buy one (or more) of their products

 

PS: I do understand your idea though, people thought of it before and if ED ever decided to setup donation page, I would gladly chip something in.

what this guy said;)

[Lucas_From_Hell]

The logic behind the donations is correct and everything works fairly, except we're forgetting that ED already has enough money to develop an F/A-18C module.

 

The only so-called "problem" about it is that development of a hi-fi model takes time, and people don't like waiting. But you can give ED all the money in the world, they'd still take around the same awfully long time to develop a a module. Even if they could pay extra-hours for their employees, the day only has 24 hours. Hiring more people wouldn't help much either, as assigning tasks all over the place in the end would make more of a mess than help, and I'm failry sure they're running at a near-optimal number of employees already.

 

While it's great (really, it is) that we're all so excited to get this thing going, just donating a pile of money to them won't do much at all. ED is going fairly well in business. We're not the only ones to fund it, as well. They have contracts with the Russian Air Force, the USAF - that's someone funding a module fully, but the difference is, we're talking about a single costumer with very well-defined needs, not an An-225 full of loonies with all sorts of opinions, aka, us lads and lassies down here.

 

Throwing money, donating or funding, however you call it, won't help much.

 

If you really want to make a difference, think about this: everyone get a fund together, and pick some kids, boys and girls, with a passion for flying and/or who want to join the Air Force or Army/Naval aviation, but don't have enough money to get a computer that can run DCS together, or to get a decent HOTAS, or to buy the modules themselves, or whose parents simply don't want to help (a problem most girls will find more often than boys, under that cheap old excuse that it isn't a "girl thing"). Find some of those kids, get the money you can spare, make a fund and give them whatever you need. Get them a GPU, or give them that old one you have which is still pretty good, hand down your old HOTAS set, and buy them a copy of a DCS aircraft depending on what they intend to fly for a living (attack heli, attack a/c, utility, fighter whenver an ED one or 3rd party comes out...), and give them a printed manual and a book about that aircraft with it too, both to be their bedside read.

 

This way you're funding a pilot for the future, you're funding Eagle Dynamics and showing them you want high-fidelity modules, and you're also funding the future of flight simulators, because odds are this kid will surely buy future ED modules not only for themselves, but for their kids, friends, or another kid who's in the same place they once were.

 

ED has the present under control, we can help with the future though - and it's much better than buying modules for yourself which you never use at all :)

Edited May 10, 2013 by Lucas_From_Hell

[Davis0079]

the problem with buying low fidelity stuff like FC3 just to "support the company" in hopes that they will make a DCS:f-18c is a bad idea because now they have "record sales" and think that we are all satisfied with this low level crap....

 

 

Now that FC3 is there top seller they are putting stupid energy into it instead of the cool shit we all are begging for.....thz for your support guys....now the company is moving in the wrong direction (mabey not wrong direction....but we just got set back another 3-5 years over low fidelity shit)

Edited May 10, 2013 by Davis0079

[NineLine]

I think ED should have a bake sale fundraiser, I bet c0ff makes a mean chocolate chip cookie...

[Rusty_M]

Brilliantly put Lucas. No way you're from hell :)

[ericoh]

Some of the people here are talking shocking nonsense....