Funding Godzone scenery in X-plane and/or Aerofly FS2

[toprob]

Ok, time to make some decisions about the new simulators. The main limitation is the same as it's been for FSX/Prepar3d development over the last five years, a combination of changes in the market for New Zealand simmers, plus my own issues, which began with my health almost 8 years ago, and included divorce and earthquakes.

Now we are poised on the brink of a whole new choice of sims, and I'd hate to see New Zealanders miss out just because we're such a tiny market. Ideally, I'd like to create new scenery for every main simulator which New Zealanders use, but there's a lot we just don't know about how some sims will work, and whether it is possible to produce and market addon scenery to the 'Real NZ' quality. And frankly, I just don't earn enough at the moment to spend the time and money on the work required to figure some of this out. When there are changes in the market, which we have in spades at the moment, people just stop buying addon scenery until they have time to evaluate the choices. So a few orders a week have become a trickle.

I am hoping to undertake some fundraising using Kickstarter. This is not a common thing for flightsim addons, and I can understand why, with the current system people are able to spend their money on finished products, so they can have a clear idea of what they are getting for their money.

However there are many reasons why I think this would work well for this particular project. Plenty of people know me, and what I've done in the past for FSX and Prepar3d (and FS2004 before that), and know that I can delivery what I promise, even if I've been far too slow and inconsistent lately. There are two ways to work as a scenery developer (well, a lot more that that, but bear with me:), either you can follow the market, and go where the money is, or you can do it for one particular little country, with heaps of appeal but not many simmers. I've made no bones about doing this, I produce New Zealand scenery, because there's a lack of it, the fact that the lack is mostly to do with poor returns is just another issue to overcome.

Just a quick intro to Kickstarter.com. Here people can put together a plan for a particular product, and seek pledges to raise the funds to fulfil these pledges. The funding part of Kickstarter normally run for a short time, one or two months being common, with a set financial goal. If this goal is met, the project is funded, if not then no money changes hands. There can be a number of pledge levels, giving different rewards.

So a rough idea of how my project would work -- the goal is to fund a project to produce some New Zealand scenery for X-plane and Aerofly FS2, in the hope of finding a suitable market to continue with these two sims, in addition to FSX and Prepar3d. Initially, this will be aimed at new versions of existing Real NZ and Godzone scenery -- in particular, Real NZ Dunedin, Nelson, and the existing photoscenery subscription areas, plus a couple of photoscenery areas currently in development.

Pledges tiers have yet to be decided, but I would imagine that there might be a NZ$25 tier, giving a single scenery release for at least one of these simulators. (Note that a normal Real NZ scenery costs NZ$35.)
Another tier might cover multiple releases, similar to the subscription, which has been renamed to a photoscenery compilation. This could be NZ$80.

And finally there's a top tier for those who want to support me, based on their experience with my scenery over the years, and are keen to show their support in a big way. I'm not sure what this would cost, but I would think that it could cover a few years of releases, and could cover all simulators, not just the new ones.

Note that projects normally have an expected time frame, but this is a guide only. If the project is funded, but fails, there is a chance that backers will not get the results they expected. This is an important consideration, which even those who know me well will have to decide -- I won't be doing this forever, but hopefully I have a good decade left in me yet. Would you put money on that?

To make this work, I would call on those who are confident I can deliver to help me promote it. I have a reach of 400+ on Facebook, and a few more here on NZFF, but really I need to reach double that to reach my target.
This thread is open to any ideas and discussions on the idea, please don't hold back if you have any thoughts you'd like to share.

Note that the inspiration for this was a couple of simmer's donations recently, one which I used to purchase X-plane, and the other the gifting of Aerofly FS2. It's this sort of support which encourages me to ask local simmers for this level of commitment -- ideally I'd love to support myself purely on sales of existing products, but this isn't currently working.

Why not Flight Simulator World? Well, this could happen, but at the moment there is no real way to produce scenery, and no idea of when a SDK will arrive. I'm less concerned about the 'early access' label, but I really need know whether making great New Zealand scenery is a possibility. Aerofly is in a similar position, but at least there is a SDK, and the promise of a new photoscenery tool. But with X-plane, I've already made a start, and things are looking promising.

So, what do you think?

[russhart]

Rob,

I have purchased all or nearly all of your products over the years and appreciate the work you have done to keep NZ "real". I for one will be happy to support you in some way to continue this work even though I have no plans to move from P3D, other than upgrades. I also wonder if VLC will be upgraded to match the work you will do, or has it reached it's full potential? I am reluctant to move to Orbx at this stage.

I think Kickstarter may be a good option, as I am sure that many simmers love flying in NZ and will do so knowing of your developments. I hope so anyway

Cheers
Russell

[NZ255]

Yep sounds good

[Charl]

I like Aerofly FS2 because it's early in the piece.
It's the short-term future VFR 64 bit sim, well suited to NZ flying environs.
Grabbing a bit of the early action and establishing NZ as a destination, could lock in a place as the thing grows.

Of course, more than anything, I would love to crowdfund a NZAA for FS2004...

[jpreou]

You know me and my current position Rob. I'm at least a year out from putting my sim back together and all money is going towards the new home; there will be little if any disposable income remaining. Even so, I'm trying to keep my options open for which sim will 'win' when I return. As you know, it is currently P3Dv3, though I did purchase v4 even though I am not installing it yet. I have promised you my support in the past, and that hasn't changed; I would certainly sign up with you, probably top-tier depending how that shapes up ... my goal when I return, as you know, is to build out the best NZ that I can; I may have ORBX bases and NZ installed (depending on platform), but I am not interested in the rest of the world at all. I'm in...

[cowpatz]

Rob I guess you really need to try and gain an understanding of what draws simmers to each platform so as to know your market. That will be difficult given the rapid changes.
Perhaps developing for the platforms that have the most commonality so that scenery can be "ported" easily and so reducing your workload.
To me the current draw of AFS2 appears to be the "out of the box" and no fuss set up experience especially for those with limited time on hand. It has great graphics and lighting and requires very little tweaking. To me this would indicate a satisfaction with what is there and really no need to buy anything extra along with the installation hassles. Of course there will be the diehards that will want to max it out but will there be enough of them to support all the devs out there?
X plane seems to be supported by 2 main factions. Those that are anti FSX (and perhaps the "evil" Microsoft association.....sort of the mac users of the FS world) and secondly those drawn to better flight modelling, graphics and perhaps 64 bit processing.
Unfortunately I don't think all of these platforms will increase the overall number of flight simmers but rather just spread them out thinly among them all. A developers nightmare.
I have not had much to do with kickstarter but I wonder how well it will go with respect to flight sim scenery. Is there anything to lose by giving it a go?

[Charl]

To me this would indicate a satisfaction with what is there and really no need to buy anything extra along with the installation hassles.

Far from it... AFS2 is in Early Access at present, and the followers are all crying out for content.
This is why ORBX are putting out a couple of early state of the art sceneries for it.
Being Steam driven, installation is painless: updates are just pushed to your account.
I see Aerofly attracting a new generation of "Flight Gamers".

[cowpatz]

Being Steam driven, installation is painless: updates are just pushed to your account.
I see Aerofly attracting a new generation of "Flight Gamers".

Possibly good for simmers but not devs.
To me ORBX and Steam are not compatible.

[buzzard2008]

I am also going to stick with Aerofly fs2 because of it's easy no fuss mind blowing scenery and my 2-300 FPS lol, cant beat that, I have Xplane 11 installed but am having trouble sorting antialiasing out, I thought they might be over that by now but I am willing to support your cause Rob, the more the merrier/cheaper count me in

[Charl]

To me ORBX and Steam are not compatible.

Why's that?

my 2-300 FPS

I'll wait and see what ORBX LOWI does before I count that chicken... at the moment there's only a barebones sim to look at.
I have a FS2004 install that can cripple any machine, when it puts its mind to it!

[cowpatz]

To me ORBX and Steam are not compatible.

Why's that?

Because ORBX has moved to retailing their own product exclusively. I just cannot see them going the steam distribution route.

[Charl]

Ah right... I am a new Steamer and have no previous experience.
Seems ORBX will indeed release their AFS2 stuff themselves
https://www.facebook.com/flightsimcon/v ... 482467083/
Presumably this will not annoy the Steamtrain.

[cowpatz]

Yeah it is one of the issues devs have with FSW.....and may be why it will fall at the first hurdle.

[toprob]

Great stuff, keep it coming! I haven't been able to sit down and analyse anything yet, as this week is 'P3D4 patch' week...

Yeah it is one of the issues devs have with FSW.....and may be why it will fall at the first hurdle.

It is certainly possible that Dovetail will end up with a more acceptable policy for FSW, they haven't really released anything definite, and the online discussions about this issue could force them to go with the flow. Some Dovetail comments from Flightsimcon --

'Not clear on the finer details of the EULA, but...'

'Taking our time to do things appropriately....'

'We're not going to force people to do anything...'

I'd think that they must understand that the fate of their sim will hinge on this issue,

[mfahey]

I'm pretty sure I have purchased every Godzone product in the past - and I will always be back for more!
I will be in on the Kickstarter top-tier!

[toprob]

[quote="mfahey"]I'm pretty sure I have purchased every Godzone product in the past - and I will always be back for more!
[quote]
I have mentioned before that there is a core group who have always been there for me, and that is my 'community', they keep me going when things get rough. At the moment I'm very nervous about all this, there is a real chance that fundraising might not work, it is an all or nothing arrangement, after all. I've been looking for part-time work here in South Canterbury, but I've had no luck at all for six months -- today I even got a 'no thanks' from the local supermarket, so my options are drying up quick.
I will just have to get stuck in and get it underway by the end of the month, if it works, great, if not then I'll do the next best thing -- panic!:)

[NZ255]

Yeah that's the thing with those campaigns... all or nothing. Remember if you hit your target you can still get more more money past the goal.

[toprob]

I have made the decision to go ahead with this project, mainly because I didn't get the supermarket job I applied for last week... so given the fact that I can't even get a minimum wage job, I'll stick with what I know I can do, and get stuck in to some new simulators.
I hope to go 'live' with the Kickstarter campaign in a couple of days, just awaiting confirmation.
I will be pushing this hard, so I'd certainly appreciate help getting the word out to places where I don't normally go -- X-plane forums etc. And of course if you have flightsim friends on Facebook etc, sharing my initial post once it's out would be a great help. It would take all my facrbook followers to meet the goal, and that isn't likely... The campaign will run for 30 days.
Here's hoping!

[toprob]

Just read this morning that Turbulent Designs, whose airports are the sort of thing I aspire to, have quit all the 'legacy' sims -- FSX, FSXse, Prepar3d v1,2,3 -- and will now only develop for Prepar3d v4 and X-plane. That's one way to go... I can understand this, but I don't really think it's an option for NZ -- too many hold-outs with older sims! And of course there are still plenty of requests for FS2004 stuff...

But it is something that I'd look at down the track, if X-plane and Aerofly take off. Then there'd be no excuse to hold onto FSX!

[emfrat]

I can think of a couple of NZ devs who made an early decision to only support FSX, and then fizzled out.

Rob, I intend to support your efforts, but I would like you to keep producing for FSX, even though your primary target is the more 'modern' sims. I have no intention of installing Win10 - I can't afford the theft of bandwidth caused by MS, and Steam, who both expect to barge into my machine whenever they feel like it by pushing "updates" which I neither need nor want and have no choice about accepting. So for the moment I will be staying with Win7, and whatever sim I can run in that. I don't think I am alone in making that choice.
Maybe MS will come to their senses, but I doubt that. Until they do, I don't intend to move to P3D or other expensive sims.
ATB
MikeW