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Open Letter to Microsoft Games Studios

Thanks for the effort...I agree with everything you wrote. Will it make a diffference with MS's decision to axe Flight Simulator? I think not. It is all about money. Will it bring in dollars...if not the hell with it.
 
Thanks Francois, very professional letter. Hopefully someone will take notice and consider the impact their decision has made for their customers.

Much appreciated, Tom
 
Thank you Francois for taking the time to write such a wouderfull letter on behalf of all of us who love the FS sim world.

Jim
 
Well written Francois, Thanks alot. I have to agree with NickC.
And Lifejogger. We should all send this letter.
I hope developement continues, with a new(?) and lean team, to make a fresh start, as on the flightsim forum.

Cheers, R.
 
Francois,
Well constructed and crafted letter.
But will it make it past this person's secretary ......?
:kilroy:
 
wombat666 said:
But will it make it past this person's secretary ......?
:kilroy:
Click to expand...


No idea.... that's why I am posting it all over the Internet too.....

Don't know if it will help any, but I can't just sit back and do nothing, not after 30 years tinkering with PC flightsims !!!
 
Francois,
I fully support your (our) position, althogh I believe that a change of direction is very unlikely to happen...

Good trying, anyway. :applause:

Ezio
 
sblzei said:
Francois,
I fully support your (our) position, althogh I believe that a change of direction is very unlikely to happen...

Good trying, anyway. :applause:

Ezio
Click to expand...

that would involve someone using the "m" word. no one, regardless of the cost, will admit to making one of those.
 
wombat666 said:
Francois,
Well constructed and crafted letter.
But will it make it past this person's secretary ......?
:kilroy:
Click to expand...


Even if it does, will he make it past the first paragraph? I don't think I would.

I'm really sorry but at the likelihood of causing great offence, I just don't see the point of sending letters like this. It has all the aggressive 'it's not fair' tone of an angry teenager who has had his Gameboy confiscated. It would in no way make me reconsider my decision. Quite the opposite.

And where is the evidence that hundreds of thousands of simmers are 'hurt'? How many people have signed your petition Francois? 2000? Seriously - 2000!!! That's just embarassing. How is that going to persuade Microsoft to think again. If I was a Microsoft executive that would be all the evidence I need that canning the whole program was justified.

In all the general and developer FS forums on the web you see the same 30 or 40 people posting every day. The same people have been posting in these dwindling forums for years and years day after day. Half of them have a vested interest in the continuing success of Flight Simulator and have something to sell, some of them are sad frustrated fighter pilots who think they can now fly an F-16 because using FS has 'taught them how' and of course some, myself included just want to keep an occasional eye on new developments and addons. But it's the same people, the same few people. Very rarely somebody new turns up, rarer still they become a regular. In general I think the interest is much much smaller than you think. They might sell a lot of copies initially, relatively speaking but most people who buy Flight Simulator treat it like any other game (sorry, Simulator game), they load it up, play it for a few weeks, get bored and move on to something else. Or they play with it for ten or fifteen minutes a couple of times a week while waiting for the dinner to cook. Very very few get as obsessed with it or take it as seriously or will be as emotionally damaged as a result of the desicion by Microsoft as your letter implies.

The ultimate insult to a simmer is Get a Life but the twaddle that has been written since the Aces announcement is making me come as close to using it as I ever have before. I am truly not bothered that there will not be an FSXI for five years, ten years or ever at all. FSX will continue to be an occasional diversion for me and now and again I will be blown away by an occasion addon but my god, and ban me forever for saying this if you like, there are more important things to write letters about these days than the demise of a simulator game!

:banghead:
 
I must agree with Francois with this one. While the realist in me has to agree with with others that in the end it probably won't help, I am glad he wrote the letter. Why?

Because Francois is passionate over flight simming. It is good to see people who are passionate expressing there passion. Nothing was ever accomplished by naysayers and herd mentality acceptance. Which, BTW I have to include myself in the herd mentality. I have done nothing but shrug my shoulders and continue on my business.

I also did not see an "angry teenager who has had his Gameboy confiscated" tone in the letter. I saw disappointment, yes. I also saw a listing of items Francois thought were not in MS's best interest and they should consider.

I would be willing to co-sign the letter and or a petition.

Who knows? It just may help. It certainly can't hurt.
 
I'm a bit older than the previous writer and upon consideraion of his rather mean letter would only say this;
Like Mayor Daley's heartless and thoughtless desecrating of Meigs Field. the closing of Aces studio hurts a lot of people. But not as much as it hurts Microsoft.
It is just another sign that this all powerful company is headed for self destruction. This guy Spencer is merely a tool in it's ruin. I feel very sorry for him.
Flight Simulator will go on. It's too strong a force. It's just too bad that Microsoft will not be sharing a part of it.
 
Well stated...the letter didn't sound angry to me. When one looks at the number of hardware and software companies involved with this one program, plus all the hobbyists and users, there are a lot of people who share the statements you made.
 
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