Look, a pissed off Nick asking why Steve laid off the Flight Sim team
As some of you know, Flight Simulator and I have a long history…. Which included a break up right around the time Microsoft axed the team and I had a “bit of a rant” at Steve Ballmer at the MVP summit.
Some of the team that remained on after, worked hard to try and build within the limits of the Microsoft Live online delivery system… a huge mistake in my opinion, because Valve’s Steam delivery system would have at least given what was a good (but different) flight product a chance… all came too late and a product that needed more time and chance was once again killed off. Some of the stuff I saw coming down the line for Flight at my NDA visit that year would have been awesome. But anyway…..
Earlier this month, it was announced that Dovetail Games have a licensing deal with Microsoft to sell the existing Flight Simulator X: Gold Edition via the Valve Steam system and that “The company is currently investigating new concepts in this area and is expecting to bring a release to market in 2015”
So, with that in mind. I hope that someone from the Dovetail Games crew come across my blog and note my own personal request that they do actually go back to a full blown simulation system, and not just a game. (Hey, mission building and playing is great, don’t get me wrong, but this system needs both to make it a true success). Multiplayer out of the box… hey actually pick up the phone to Joel in Hothead Games and get his views on how difficult it was to build Squawkbox! Improve the API updates, make them more frequent… some of the tools I saw the team using in Microsoft were just so amazing I could only imagine what third party developers could have done with them. More people makes easy work right? 😉
Anyway.. here is another fan hoping that Dovetail do the right thing….