BLOG PIECE: Modding as a hobby versus modding as a career, and the position of the Nexus

[djtalks]

In response to post #24089534.

Yes, voice acting requires nice equipment.. I have seen some good voices "goar from 3d npc for example" but being payed would if nothing else help them get some studio time. At the same time though 25% of a joint work effort for a 5$ dlc mod may take quite some time to even see money for an improvment. The 25% thing just made me shutter in this post. why is the author who did the work getting payed less then the person who is just setting it on a server for download. And they say steam are advicates against piracy lmao

As the person paying for it you would expect it to get better but with 75% profits going to the person who isnt doing anything dont expect much. Edited April 6, 2015 by djtalks

[IceBox]

While I can see myself paying for a mod along the lines of Falskaar which adds quite a bit of content I'm not so certain about QoL mods like SkyUI.

Don't get me wrong I love them and I appreciate all the work that has been put into them but I consider these so mandatory that similar functionality should've been in the base game for free instead of me having to pay a third party to do their job for them.

 

Also there's the issue of pricing, how much does Frostfall cost? Or Convenient Horses? Will I get to the point where I wait for a sale in order to not have to pay ~100$ to get to the point I can fully enjoy the modded game.

I'm currently using about 80 mods on my Skyrim playthrough so even if each of them would "only" cost 50 cents I'd be paying as much as for the full game just for mods.

While I don't consider all of them "mandatory" for me (eg. high res pelts etc.) a lot of them I wouldn't want to miss.

 

Just as I'm not paying for golden guns or fancy axes I probably won't be paying for animation overhauls or glowing soulgems. Guess we'll have to wait and see :D

[callmepopy]

Paying for mods = destruction of modding community as we know (and love) it.

There's no way around that fact.

 

While it would open up new opportunities, it will completely rule out far too many.

As you pointed out, the use of other author's assets will be out of the question, meaning it will take way too long to create mods in the manner that so many great authors do, without forking out cash, or forming cliques of modders, which would alienate the masses.

 

We WANT new modders coming in constantly, as older modders move on to other things, if not, the modding community will die out, and soon after, other modding communities will follow suit.

This will lead to the eventual death of moddng altogether... that's a statistical fact.

 

Want a precedent.. look at expansions built for games in the past. Expansion packs became a new means of profit, and now they're just "the rest of the game"

Dev's learned that they can sell half of a complete game (in comparison to earlier games of the same genre), and charge extra for the remaining half of the game. It's now commonplace.

 

Profit from User Generated Content is akin to Reality Television... The devs will have no further need to create the premium content, and will simply rely on the players themselves to create the games they want to play, and much like Valve, will rake in all of the profit from it. Valve has next to nothing to do with the UGC that they gain %75 of the profit from.. that's simply robbery.

 

This wont be up to us, as gamers and modders, to decide on.. it will be based on the amount of profit generated from their tests, and we all know how people are, as soon as they see something that "looks cool", they'll buy it thinking "what's it matter, I've got an extra $1.99 to spare"...

Well, what matters is that each purchase will only serve to enforce their belief that this is ok, and eventually WILL lead to the masses having to buy their mods, which used to be free, and that's why we all loved them so much...

we could add as much content to the game as we like, limited only by our imagination, and a file size.. now we will all be further limited by how much money we make, which will create vast gaps between who can have what mods, and who can even create what mods.

 

In case I haven't been clear, Paying For Mods Goes Against The Ideals Of Our Communities, Communities Such As Nexus, And Will Destroy The Joy We Gain From Our Games On PC.... unless you just want to start playing all your games on console.... because without the freedom of modding, why bother buying a $2-$3000 machine?

Edited April 6, 2015 by callmepopy

[SoMteam]

In response to post #24107669.

I agree 100% with you. Theres nothing we can do and there will be much more to come, ingame itemshops for single player games will become standart along with pay to win mechanics and payed patches of course. I don't care if new modders are coming in, but it definately time to move on to other things. Im growing to old for it anyways. Im 26 and I do not understand the "new" gerneration of gamers, not at all. So yeah Im an old iron, but thanks beth and valve for opening my eyes how pointless this all is. Edited April 6, 2015 by SoMteam

[weandi]

In response to post #24107669. #24111784 is also a reply to the same post.

They also forget, some of us are CHEAP and buy the game when it goes to GOTY and mod because we cant afford the DLC's when they released.

They also forget some of us have been in the modding community when it started, and mod more than just STEAM games. Myself being a mod creator for Baldurs Gate, Street legal redline racing, Diablo 1, Warcraft 1 & 2, Castle of the Winds, Fallout 2, etc...

By making us pay for mods, will make most of the PC community quit being apart of the PC community, and further push people to play consoles only. I play PC because i can MOD, and make any game i own, do whatever i want. Just like everyone else.

[Maverick11]

In response to post #24107669. #24111784, #24112069 are all replies on the same post.

Well you can't make everyone happy. Lets not forget that not everyone will be qualified to be selling their mods as I am sure there will be quality control if the idea is ever implemented on a larger scale.

At the moment the modding community is rather spoiled and everyone is making money off modders hard work except the modders. There is a problem there. I mean you look at any mod and about 1% of people care to endorse these modders. All it takes is a click and even that is too much work for the "Downloading Community".

[Gormadoc]

In response to post #23904579. #23922919 is also a reply to the same post.

CearesMods, your argument is based on several fallacies. Few of us believe that Darwinism has anything to do with economic practices. Proponents of social Darwinism are eugenicists; applying it to the free market was a misapplication by detractors. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Darwinism#Origin_of_the_term . Monopoly is enforced by power and not by money, power that can't be applied within an actual free market and is applied by governments interfering in trade. Economic growth is not at all cost; otherwise, none of us would be using electronic devices and discussing whether we should pay modders instead of whether we will have food or not. Edited April 6, 2015 by Gormadoc

[PossessedLemon]

While I believe that the non-commercial spirit of modding is fascinating, I think that change is inevitable. I was listening to a virtual lecture on Active Directory Rights Management Services that really reminded me of this discussion, and inspired this thought.

 

Rights Management services essentially make it so that users can distribute different usage rights of a file to other users. In the case of modding, this already-existing system would allow modders to sell the rights to copy, improve upon, and download their created mods.

 

How will the Elder Scrolls modding community adapt when other games adopt paid-for-modding strategies? Surely these would attract some of the best modders away from this community. Paying modders for doing what they love could turn into a "brain drain", where the best modders gravitate to games that will pay them for modding.

 

I think that paid-for mods would be positive to this modding community. Modders would be rewarded for doing what they love. Players would give patronage to the people who expand their favorite games. Quality of mods would increase due to competitiveness and rewards for good mods. Rights management services would ensure that people's creative work is protected.

[PossessedLemon]

In response to post #23904579. #23922919, #24115884 are all replies on the same post.

I've been studying Neo-Liberalism as part of my Poli Sci degree, so I think I can channel some of it to make a counter-argument to some of your claims in the interests of letting logic prevail.

Response to 3. They couldn't charge whatever they want for these different-continent experiences, since people won't pay outrageous prices. The same thing will occur as happens before these continents are available for play: Somebody else will make a new one. If the price is too high, there would be a market for a competing Elsweyr.

Response to 1. The quality would increase, because there is the reward for good work. Successful modders will be encouraged to continually develop their mods, in order to maintain sales.

2. And the modding community relies on Bethesda. Bethesda makes a killing from free mods. What if the game itself cost less, and people would pay small amounts for mods, in the interest of paying the same amount as a regular game, but for a game that is more close to what they want to play?

4. That's the central ideology of capitalism, though, that the betterment of the community and personal gain are linked intrinsically. Through supporting people for doing what benefits the community, we as a modding community would not only take care of those who make our mods, but encourage them to do better work and serve the community better.

Sure, it's cool to make one of the top mods, but that doesn't pay the rent. How many mods fall by the wayside "due to personal issues"? What if we could have the best mod-makers paid directly for what they do best, and be rewarded for the good they do to this community?

[Gratus]

In response to post #23594774. #23595459, #23595604 are all replies on the same post.

Yep you asking the right question how will all this change our Societies as a whole it is not only about Modding every Average joeys talents are tried to be taken away from the purpose of sharing it for Money instead for free and Commercialize these Values.
If that become the core values and that after the big Economy Crash from 2008 (which we only survived pushing more money into it and slowly it shoots back) im not sure where this will end.

We see this Trend since years it's not only Games it's everywhere around us happening also in Real Life.

Even to the hardest point of our Personal Data getting Commercialized more then ever before.

We are all made into sellers i fear this heavily but more for the next generation then myself :(
We are already selling us at our core jobs to someone else now we should do that everywhere ?

It's like the System tries to drain out the last bit of Energy from the Resources it has available until it Collapses heavily with a big big booom, because it can't control the draining rate anymore and the power is not regenerating fast enough so the batteries are slowly not recharging anymore and they need to be replaced all the time with fresh ones fast.

Edited April 7, 2015 by Gratus