Would you like an “unofficial” mod from Beamdog that adds to the original content?
Sirick
Member Posts: 92
I think I have yet to see a thread that looks favourably on the no change to original content ruling that Beamdog have to follow. Knowing that post-release content is already planned and expected I hope that whichever company forced the no changes contract overturns their decision, after all I know I would pay for DLC that improves and adds to pre-existing content and I am sure the same is true for many others.
However as much as I hope the preceding happens, I doubt it will. So what I instead ask is the following. Is there anything to stop a number of Beamdog employees from creating an “unofficial” mod? Unaffiliated with anything to do with their company, they just happen to work for Beamdog and made a mod in their own time.
Hells, I would happily donate money to such a worthy cause.
Know what, I will make that into a poll. Why not?
Who would like to see an “unofficial” mod created by those who worked on the game that adds in all the things we know the original content needs, but will lack on release?
However as much as I hope the preceding happens, I doubt it will. So what I instead ask is the following. Is there anything to stop a number of Beamdog employees from creating an “unofficial” mod? Unaffiliated with anything to do with their company, they just happen to work for Beamdog and made a mod in their own time.
Hells, I would happily donate money to such a worthy cause.
Know what, I will make that into a poll. Why not?
Who would like to see an “unofficial” mod created by those who worked on the game that adds in all the things we know the original content needs, but will lack on release?
- Would you like an “unofficial” mod from Beamdog that adds to the original content?99 votes
- Yes, and I would donate towards such a goal.51.52%
- Yes.18.18%
- No and yes, I want it but only as “official” content.22.22%
- No.8.08%
3
Comments
For the past decade there have been a bunch of people running around modding Infinity Engine games and saying "It's kind of a shame there's nobody with access to the source code who can make low-level improvements, modernizations, and bugfixes to things we can't touch. Oh well, why don't we just focus on adding a bunch of content to the game instead?"
Now there's a group of people who *do* have access to the source code and *can* make low-level improvements, modernizations, and bugfixes. And instead of focusing on that, you want to turn them into content modders.
That's not to say that the developers aren't free to create mods if they want to.
since they have to release a "canon" version first, i hope they have all those creative ideas in store to release as a later "unofficial" pack.
and i strongly disagree with the notion of developers/modders. if that would be true, overhaul would only need to release new codes and let the community make a game out of it. i hope they will modify some content and provide us with professional-level modifications.
i'm not talking about "nude mods, sex mods, pigeons in city that crap on your equipment" mods, those are customizations that modders provide. i'm talking about them doing all that they would do, had they not the "no modifying original content" crap above their head.
Just after the game was released the developer pretty much shut down, however the game was very buggy. A fair number of employees returned and spent weeks without pay to try their best to patch the game as well as they could.
Another example is found within a game series much closer to home.
Throne of Bhaal is pretty much held up as the runt of the litter, in an effort to improve it one of the designers for the game released some mods of his own in an effort to restore some cut content, add playtime and increase difficulty.
If Beamdogs hands are tied by contract an unofficial mod would allow them to improve and add upon the games core content.
And I would like to make clear I am in no way bashing modders. Every reinstall of Baldur’s Gate I have played since my first time has been modded in some way, sometimes very heavily. I have even contributed in a small way to some mods.
There are some fantastic mods made by a very passionate community, but I don’t think any of them are done to the level of professionalism that Enhanced Edition will be.
I think Beamdog are in the very unique position of being able to deliver some of the best modifications to the core game we could hope to see.
Which is not to say that I do not endorse the idea...
-Trent
Whilst saddened that we may never see Beamdog tackling the expansion of the core content I will except the Overlords ruling.
If comes from Beamdog and is made for BG EE, It's official no matter what.
You can't lauch unnoficially something that belongs to you. It's impossible.
What you probally mean, raised only for the sake of debate, is an unnoficial mod/patch/DLC made by the devs without the support of Beamdog BUT MAYBE using the source code to clean the projects codes, cos the devs have acess to it..., so tell me if i hit the point, is that what you want?
"Edit"
The objective of this:
As unnoficial mods we can break every single rule made by Atari and WotC in terms of content change, and with acess to the source code we can do this in the proper manner, making modded DLCs clean from bugs.
I'm not going to vote, but lemme answer the pool: No, i would not make an monetary invest if they make something like that, cos it would be unjust with other modders, if the BG team want to make this, that gonna be a huge advance to BG legend, they gonna have my respect as all the others modders that make they work free, i would feel more confortable in buy other EE products as the devs of the company truly care about their fans, but no, i would not make an direct remuneration for many reasons.
Lawyers don't tend to take kindly to lines like 'Of course our company didn't modify your copyrighted content outside the scope of our contract! It was just some of our employees that decided on a whim to do it on their own for no reason whatsoever'.
Something like that could endanger the creation of BG2EE, BG3 etc and nothing, NOTHING is worth that risk.
They can at the maximum try to proof that Beamdog supported the act, IF beamdog support an act like that, what not gonna happen.
Unnoficial mods are accepted for a long time, chose one person to sue because a non profitable work after years of tolerance? Doesn't seems a very good move for me.
Besides even if they could do something unofficial as a team it could mean taking development time from other things. Like polishing up the game, finding bugs etc and possibly less DLC later on.