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You've got to Kidding

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pbearsailor said:
That is a good question.

For me, if a payware is around $20 and there are some issues, then I'm not bothered too much. As price hits $30ish, then a poor model or inaccurate flight model starts to bug me. There have been a couple like that lately, they haven't been fixed and I'll never buy from them again. The few I've bought above that price have all been really good like Flight 1's Citation Mustang and A2A's Strat and for that quality, I'm ok with paying a higher price.

I love homebuilts since I built one and Dan's Long EZ will always be very very special to me. It's easily the best homebuilt plane I've got, I think it was $30, but quite awhile ago. The Glassair III is nice, but not as good as the Long. I think it was on sale when I got it for a little over $20, not sure. Can't remember what other homebuilt paywares there are for FSX.

To me, quality is more important than price. That is, if the plane is really well done, like I'm sure your Thorp will be, price isn't that big an issue. I'm a lot more picky in what I buy lately, but if it's really good, I've no problem with a little more cost. I'm thinking there's no way you'll ever recover all the hours you've put into it (I know that's not why you've done it). If you build it, we will come. :ernae:

cheers,
steve :wave:
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I would go allong with you on that Steve :applause: Over 20 and I get grumpy about the poor quality.
 
I have it. I downloaded the 7 day trial from Abacus a few hours ago. It would be a great first add-on for someone who knows a bit about Garmin glass panels, and isn't otherwise too picky. I won't slam the product. Since there are only a handful of real C162 pilots on earth, all Cessna test pilots, all I can say about the flight model is that it is believable - it feels good. As we already know, Bill has spun his usual magic on that panel - it's beautiful and puts quite a performance load on the airplane so having the remainder of the texture work a bit off the high end is not a bad thing. Sound is aliased from the default C172. There are a couple issues with the panel that I have sent to Abacus. Nothing really earth shattering but the perfectionists would be all over it.

Bottom line - I'll pay for it for three reasons: The web site says they paid all the required licence fees. I feel a need to reward that. Bill's panel, and the just plane (I've done it again) fun factor. It won't set any texture highs, but it flies well. I haven't bought anything from Abacus in a long time. This is a best for them. Is it a Carenado level airplane? - no, but I don't think its meant to be.

OK, my neck's out there. Who has the ax?

Glenn
 
Well, you guys know me. I don't pull punches, and I really don't think this model is that bad. It's a far better deal than some aircraft of similar quality that are sold by liars for 50 dollars.

I wouldn't call the interior 'outstanding' like some people have here, but I would say overall this aircraft is a pass.

Let me ask this: why is it only okay to bash abacus? The fanboys strike again. I've seen horrible/expensive aircraft priased to no end here, and passable abacus products just trashed.

Robert: you're looking at this pricing thing the right way. I think it's a great model, and I think 20 dollars is a good price for a high quality GA aircraft such as yours. I know the rest of the MSFS addon market may be a little higher, but I have no doubt that at 20 dollars you will make the most money. Alphasim's Rutan was one of their best selling aircraft, unless I'm wrong, and it was priced in the 20's.
 
N2056 said:
Here's an interesting question...for those that have been following my project. What would you think is a fair price?
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Haven't been following though I just checked your posts on it. If I were selling that plane I'd charge $17 or $18. You could get away with $20, but staying a couple bucks below that is a positive gesture.

Seems to me you can sell nearly anything in the <$20 bucket and still be fair by common perception, but when you get to the $30 mark professional level texturing/modeling as well as accuracy in programming and flight characteristics are expected, and when going upwards of $40 the product should be an attempt at pefection in all regards, an attempt to equal or better the best, in my view anyway.

Since puchase decisions are ussually based on a visual inspection of product screenshots and personal interpretation of developer claims I have certainly had the experience of dropping about $35 for the newest sexy beast on the market only to be left with the feeling I was duped into somebodies money making scheme, where they bought a stunning model, had some programming done by the lowest bidder, threw the rest of it together, and then began taking people's money.

I'll buy from nearly any developer that appears to be making a RealAir/A2A level product so I can see how their flight models feel, and how polished their products are. I'm likely to judge their entire product line on the one purchase, because the guys that have left me with the best impression are in fact totally consistent with every release. So if I buy a good looking plane with a premium price tag of $35, I will of course expect a premium product in all regards, and if for example the relative performance at a given RPM/MP setting isn't correct and accurate to the level that A2A has achieved on even their $18 Solo line, I'm not likely to allow them to have another $35 in order to see if they have improved on their next release.
 
.. as well as the need to sell twice as many in order to get the same sort of profit or payback.

The idea of having a product price and selling loads more is cute, but doesn't ever seem to work in practice. At least not every time I've been privy to the idea.

A lot of the time, if not all the time, price is set for a reason- not to make people unhappy or upset, but to cover costs. If the price is not liked- great, don't buy the product. Vote with your wallet.
 
As someone who's experimented with scenery pricing, I'll let you in on a counter-intuitive truism in FS add-on sales: pricing doesn't matter all that much. For any product, there seems to be a built-in base of fans who either love the place/plane/developer and will buy it at any price (within reason, that is). In the opposite corner are those who just aren't interested and won't budge no matter how low you go. The group in the middle - impulse buyers who can be swayed by discount pricing - is vanishingly small lately. Maybe it's the economy and maybe some other factor(s), but that's how it seems to be. So a developer is left wondering if I'm going to sell to the same group regardless, how much can they bear to spend?

I wish it were different, because I really wanted to believe that there was a magic price below which we'd attract a whole boatload of new customers. Sadly, that doesn't seem to be the case. So the next time you slag on a publisher for his high prices, remember that it's the market that sets them, and the market seems to have spoken.
 
Personally i think Abacus makes junk...
Would i get their products if they were freeware?... maybe, Payware? definatley out of the question.
In all my years as a simmer the one payware addon i have always regretted spending hard earned money on is Abacus WWII Carrier Ops. The aircraft and scenery of that set were so substandard its unbelievable.

I think Abacus really needs to take a page from A2A and RealFlight who really make outstanding quality aircraft.
 
Price certainly does matter for a segment of the audience.

I kind of wanted the Iris Vulcan... It was close enough to $25 that I bought it. I'd LOVE the WOP P-47, but it's so pricey I'm passing for now. At under $20, I bought the updated AlphaSim A-3 without even doing enough research to discover that it wasn't usable under DX10--it was an impulse purchase. Spotlope, I think your pricing theory may be true for scenery, but not so much for aircraft--scenery is much more "niche" than well-known planes.

Also, you guys could be more diplomatic about your choice of words when posting "critiques." We have a lot of designers hanging out on S-O, but with "you've got to be kidding" and "makes junk" the choice of criticism, instead of something a bit more constructive and polite in tone, we won't have designers hanging around much longer.
 
DennyA said:
Also, you guys could be more diplomatic about your choice of words when posting "critiques." We have a lot of designers hanging out on S-O, but with "you've got to be kidding" and "makes junk" the choice of criticism, instead of something a bit more constructive and polite in tone, we won't have designers hanging around much longer.
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Thank You.. I was just about to enter my 2 cents with the same thing...

If you don't like something..Fine..Thats your right...

But, lets not go out of our way to beat and bash anything we feel is unworthy please..

Be kind to others.Even if they are not kind to you....
 
Panther_99FS said:
For what it's worth,
Most of the time, Abacus sells products made by independent designers - to include those made by a couple of Sim-Outhouse members...
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Like me....

And every one of my models for sale over there is at least 3 years old if not older.

Need to keep that in mind as well.

That's all I will say on the matter.


Brian
 
Bingo !, and its been like that for the ten years I've been involved, theres those that are going to buy, those that never and as you say a small group in the middle that may or may not.

There is always a place in this business for entry level payware, what many people forget is that this business is not full of people who want everty switch and stitch to be present and working. For payware to be balanced and sustainable there needs to be products at the top of the tree, the middle and the bottom.

Its kinda grating to see people knocking the bottom end products, didn't we all start there once ?, I know I did.

Abacus have a reputation for the lower end and entry level models, they do it very well and despite the many anti Abacus bash fests, they are doing bloody well at it !, if your in the business to make money then there's few better business models than Abacus to emulate. If however your in the business of high fidelity and low volumes then Abacus is something to steer clear of.

Pricing has always been subjective, personally I think models should all be between $15-45, more than that and it has to be something exceptional, but hey I dont run a business so talk is cheap :).

Kindest

Michael

spotlope said:
As someone who's experimented with scenery pricing, I'll let you in on a counter-intuitive truism in FS add-on sales: pricing doesn't matter all that much. For any product, there seems to be a built-in base of fans who either love the place/plane/developer and will buy it at any price (within reason, that is). In the opposite corner are those who just aren't interested and won't budge no matter how low you go. The group in the middle - impulse buyers who can be swayed by discount pricing - is vanishingly small lately. Maybe it's the economy and maybe some other factor(s), but that's how it seems to be. So a developer is left wondering if I'm going to sell to the same group regardless, how much can they bear to spend?

I wish it were different, because I really wanted to believe that there was a magic price below which we'd attract a whole boatload of new customers. Sadly, that doesn't seem to be the case. So the next time you slag on a publisher for his high prices, remember that it's the market that sets them, and the market seems to have spoken.
Click to expand...
 
Panther_99FS said:
For what it's worth,
Most of the time, Abacus sells products made by independent designers - to include those made by a couple of Sim-Outhouse members...
Click to expand...

Thank you for that! It's also important to keep in mind that what "we developers" send to Abacus as a "finished product" is subject to revisions by them prior to release, so...

...inadequacies aren't always the actual developer's fault... :gossip:

As a case in point, the really nice emissive lightmaps I made for the VC were left out of the release... :faint:

BTW, thanks to everyone's kind words regarding the 2d/vc panel & gauges. I had a lot of fun creating it... :ernae:
 
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