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Charging money for mods.

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  • skinnydragonskinnydragon Member Posts: 110
    Just thought what this means for the price of dlc as well.at the moment dlc competes with free mods which is controlling the price a little. If mods are paid for dlc prices will rise. They may even become so profitable that less reputable devs produce absolute skeleton games then charge nearly as much for each dlc
    [Deleted User]CrevsDaak
  • elminsterelminster Member, Developer Posts: 16,315
    Flashburn said:

    The second videogame industry crash is upon us.

    Yea...nope. If anything video games are becoming more mainstream each year. This is just a bump in the road.
    the_spyder
  • wubblewubble Member Posts: 3,156
    Time will tell whether this idea has any benefits/repercussions.
    [Deleted User]
  • iKrivetkoiKrivetko Member Posts: 934
    Flashburn said:

    Charging money for mods is absolutely ridiculous. This isn't even about the "entitlement" of gamers (hello again, 2012). Modding has always been about the passion for the hobby and the people, NOT a business venture. I am not obligated to put money in modders' pockets (nor should any of that money go to Valve or Bethesda) simply because I want to use what they make. A donation button would easily suffice, or perhaps the modders should get a certain amount of money if a certain amount of people are using their mod. Amateur work does not deserve to be put behind a pay wall. Professional work does.

    Bloody hell mate, your statements are ridiculous. I can say that football "has always been about the passion for the hobby and the people, NOT a business venture", or that esports "has always been about the passion for the hobby and the people, NOT a business venture", or that writing code "has always been about the passion for the hobby and the people, NOT a business venture". Things don't necessarily become less fun when business comes into play, it's actually often the opposite as enthusiasm is something that needs to be fed with not just inspiration, but with carbohydrates and proteins as well. You are as much obligated to pay modders for their work as they are obligated to charge for it, and if they choose to do so, it is their right to do whatever they bloody want with their product.

    And you don't choose to pay or not pay for amateur or professional work by definition. As soon as the amateur uses his skills to make a living he becomes a professional.
    booinyoureyes
  • CaloNordCaloNord Member Posts: 1,809
    I mean are there quality safe guards in place? I made a crappy little NPC mod, I don't charge for it because I couldn't write for bacon and it will probably not work anyway. :P BUT! I could write a flashy text about a grand sweeping adventure with some screenshots and you go 'Ohhh that looks good.'

    Off you go with your steam wallet until you find it won't work with another mod for example, breaks your game and you know how GENEROUS Steam is with its refunds, just ask and we'll-oh wait. . . . . .
    CrevsDaak
  • deltagodeltago Member Posts: 7,811
    CaloNord said:

    I mean are there quality safe guards in place? I made a crappy little NPC mod, I don't charge for it because I couldn't write for bacon and it will probably not work anyway. :P BUT! I could write a flashy text about a grand sweeping adventure with some screenshots and you go 'Ohhh that looks good.'

    Off you go with your steam wallet until you find it won't work with another mod for example, breaks your game and you know how GENEROUS Steam is with its refunds, just ask and we'll-oh wait. . . . . .

    24h money back guarantee from steam.
    but as TB said in his video, if the game patches and breaks the mod you are out of luck
    CaloNordCrevsDaakNonnahswriter
  • SmilingSwordSmilingSword Member Posts: 827
    For shame Bethesda, for shame and you too Valve.
    I'm sure everybody knows the recent news on whats happened to the steam version of Skyrim.
    If not, steam has decided to allow modders to add their content to the steam workshop.
    This sound amazing, but in practice it's a huge lie.
    The modds are added behind a paywall and this would be ok, but the modders only get 25% of the profit and thats not ok.
    Also they only get payed after they make a $100, so yeah.
    The problem I have with this is Skyrim doesn't stand up as game by itself, it's really kind of horrible, it's ugly, poorly modeled, the melee combat is a bunch of floaty bullshit which takes no skill to do, the story is just plain bad, the textures are low res and ugly "and the high res texture packs are kinda weak", they reuse voice actors way too much and it's glitchy as hell.
    All in all it's a pretty bad game,
    but a heavily modded Skyrim is a pleasure to play, really a properly modded Skyrim can stand up to recent games.
    Modders have in fact taken a bad game and turned it into a great game.
    I really can't even consider playing Skyrim without at least 150 mods at this point, the most iv'e had is well over 200.
    This has always been a free service and Bethesda\Valve has pretty much spat on the modding community, giving them almost nothing for their work and not even deeming it necessary to ask the permission of the creators of fores and skse, "which 90% of Skyrim mods need to work at all" i don't even know if they have a replacement for loot "loot handles mod order".
    So far skse has grudgingly said they are ok with the steam workshop mods and fores as straight up said "NO" like a true gentlemen.
    Anyway just felt the need to rant about this random money grabbing bullshit.
    Here is a link to the best place on the net to get Skyrim mods

    http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/?

    Skyrim Nexus for life!
    JuliusBorisov
  • jjstraka34jjstraka34 Member Posts: 9,850
    edited April 2015
    One has to wonder just how many mods are even worth paying for. In the past (and even to an extent today) most of them seem to be bug fixes, UI changes, and other very specific minor alterations, or toggling something with the graphics. Actual content mods that are reasonably good enough to actually add to a game are something of a rarity in my book. Neverwinter Nights 1 and 2 had (have) many quality modules, but that is hardly the same thing, as that was the main intent of the game (and come to think of it, some of the best of those WERE released at least quasi-professionally originally).

    Overall, there is nothing on Nexus Mods or ModDB that I think I would actually pay for after shelling out for the game. Most of the ones I download are simply required to make older games run in a stable way. I am immensely grateful for the multi-year (or even decade) long efforts to games like Arcanum, ToEE, Vampire, KOTOR 2, etc etc.

    Anyway, this is getting off subject, as we are probably talking about content mods. And in that case, I, personally, am content to wait for official expansions or DLC.

    On a happy sidenote, the promotion they are running for Skyrim allowed me to upgrade to the Legendary Edition for 75% off, which adds another 40 or so hours of gameplay I'll likely never get to.
  • jackjackjackjack Member Posts: 3,251
    edited April 2015
    One of my worries is that this will kill smaller potential gems from unknown modders by blocking them behind a pay wall. I always try new mods, but I never keep all of them. If I have to spend $2 a pop, there are a lot of future mods I'll never try.
    Post edited by jackjack on
    CaloNordmeaglothCrevsDaakJuliusBorisov
  • iKrivetkoiKrivetko Member Posts: 934

    I don't have a problem with modders asking money for mods. I have a problem with STEAM asking money for mods.

    Steam is capable of providing the tools necessary, so there's that.
    elminsterbooinyoureyes
  • DeeDee Member Posts: 10,447
    How does it actually break down between Steam and Bethesda? 75% seems really high for a retailer's cut, but 25% doesn't sound terrible for a primarily derivative work like a mod. You're basically paying royalties to Bethesda for using their software to make money, which is actually a really healthy concept.
    jackjackiKrivetko
  • elminsterelminster Member, Developer Posts: 16,315
    edited April 2015
    @Dee as I understand it Valve takes somewhere between 25%-30%. They say its the same that they take for any microtransaction. Bethesda then must be taking the other 45-50%.

    However, until you yourself make $100 on a mod ($400 overall since 75% goes to Valve/Bethesda) they don't hand any of the money over to you.
  • DeeDee Member Posts: 10,447
    That sounds pretty much exactly like a standard publishing agreement. The author doesn't see a penny until the publisher makes back their investment.
    elminsterjackjackbooinyoureyes
  • FlashburnFlashburn Member Posts: 1,847
    Why put it behind a paywall? A mod may break something further down the line than just 1 day, which is the refund window. If that happens, tough luck, thanks for the money though, chump! Even if you refund it within a day, you get paid back in Steam Funbucks, which can only be used to buy stuff on Steam, so Valve might as well reap even more of the lion's share.

    Why not keep mods free and make it so that you can pay money for one if you like the author's work and wish to support them? Why monetize them now when they've always been free for more than two decades?
    CrevsDaak
  • DeeDee Member Posts: 10,447
    edited April 2015
    Because not everyone works for free, I would guess. It is up to a mod author to decide what their work is worth; I imagine there will be a fair few authors now getting the compensation they feel they deserve without having to resort to the honor system.

    The distinction is about to be made between tweak mods that you might make in an afternoon, versus large scale mods that may, in fact, require hiring professionals. The players will always decide what is an appropriate price, and in the meantime the free mods remain free at their owner's discretion.

    In no world is that conceptually a bad thing. The question here is whether or not there is or will be sufficient quality content to make it worthwhile.
    mlneveseCaloNordiKrivetko
  • CaloNordCaloNord Member Posts: 1,809
    It just has a few issues as far as compatibility and quality goes. As @Flashburn said, what happens if later releases break the game outright or the Author retires or stops caring, the game gets patches and suddenly, no mod, no money, no nothing?

    It could be a fantastic idea and it could be an awful one. . .

    I suppose time will tell?
    jackjack
  • BelanosBelanos Member Posts: 968
    Well I for one will never pay for a mod. I've been burned enough times by the free ones to ever trust fan made content enough to pay for it. At least when it's free and it turns out to be buggy, or most likely unbalanced, you haven't lost anything but your time.
    Flashburnjackjack
  • elminsterelminster Member, Developer Posts: 16,315
    If anyone is interested this is the CEO of valve talking on Reddit.

    http://www.reddit.com/r/gaming/comments/33uplp/mods_and_steam/
  • jjstraka34jjstraka34 Member Posts: 9,850
    elminster said:

    If anyone is interested this is the CEO of valve talking on Reddit.

    http://www.reddit.com/r/gaming/comments/33uplp/mods_and_steam/

    I will say that just him doing that shows alot more (for lack of a better term) balls than you would get from 90% of corporate CEOs. Personally, the only problem I have with Steam is that they sometimes sell games that are completely broken without major fan made fixes. I like the interface, and I'm not exactly worried that one day I'm not going to have access to everything I've bought. It could happen, but I doubt it. I'm not sure how big of a deal this is actually going to be. I purchase from both GOG and Steam regularly. I'm not sure there are that many mods that are going to be worth actually paying for to make a difference. Hell, alot of DLC isn't worth paying for.

    jackjack
  • jackjackjackjack Member Posts: 3,251
    @jjstraka34
    A good point. In some instances, consumers might will be sold unplayable software, ala Ubisoft, and their only recourse will be fan-made fixes. Imagine being charged for being able to play a game you'd already paid to own?
    CaloNord
  • jjstraka34jjstraka34 Member Posts: 9,850
    edited April 2015
    jackjack said:

    @jjstraka34
    A good point. In some instances, consumers might will be sold unplayable software, ala Ubisoft, and their only recourse will be fan-made fixes. Imagine being charged for being able to play a game you'd already paid to own?

    Case in point, I just spent the last hour downloading and applying fixes to all 3 Gothic games which are nigh unplayable without the herculean efforts of the modding community. You simply can't run them as Steam sells them. I bought a pack of two games called Etherlords during the holiday sale ($2 for both) and I'll never install them again. Completely broken. Most of the time there are workarounds, and most of the games THIS particular community enjoys especially require tweaking in well over 50% of the cases. And I enjoy applying them to an extent. But I can imagine most people would buy something like Gothic 2, see it pop up on their screen completely off-center, get an error when starting a new game that crashes to the desktop with a massive report, and never touch the thing again.

    Post edited by jjstraka34 on
    jackjack
  • SapphireIce101SapphireIce101 Member Posts: 866
    I think another game that's completely broken on steam is...Jade Empire. Apparently, people have to jump through a lot of hoops just to try to get it to work. Meanwhile, you don't have to do any hoop jumping with the GoG version.

    As for paid mods, its kind of made mod piracy an even bigger thing, and the ball is in Valve's court when those things are reported. Though, I have seen at least one person make a "donate" version of their mod, while still keeping their mod free.
  • elminsterelminster Member, Developer Posts: 16,315
    @SmilingSword I merged your thread with this one since this one is older, larger, and the topic of discussion is Steam/Bethesda's action here.
    jackjackJuliusBorisov
  • jackjackjackjack Member Posts: 3,251
    edited April 2015
    First merge? Hehe, congrats!
    elminsterCrevsDaakJuliusBorisov
  • The user and all related content has been deleted.
  • FlashburnFlashburn Member Posts: 1,847
    Let's take a look at the quality offered by these paid mods, courtesy of Imgur.

    http://imgur.com/gallery/qFlFa

    Valve can stop playing this month-late April Fools' joke now but I suspect they are deathly serious. For those of you saying that paying for mods will increase their quality, remember:

    image
    CrevsDaakCaloNordjackjack
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