Valve/Bethesda announce paid modding for Skyrim, more games to follow

[Highjones]

In response to post #24586549. #24586889, #24586954, #24587054, #24587239, #24587269, #24587399, #24587674, #24587829 are all replies on the same post.

Schmornoff wrote:

Chris1986 wrote: I agree that there are a-lot of mod authors who see it as a hobby or pastime and would not charge for their mods ever. I believe that there are people who put enough time and effort into their creations to warrant a payment if they want. There will always be lots of good mod authors willing to provide high quality free mods, but I don't think its inherently wrong to ask for payment for your work.

I think the REAL issue here is the fact that it is now in Valve and Bethesda's interest to discourage free mod sites like the Nexus. If there are awesome mods available on the Nexus for free then that will be direct competition for their income from the steam workshop. Why pay for a mod when there may be a similar one for free here?

I have a horrible feeling that the next game (Fallout or TES) will have exclusive Steam Workshop modding and will not be compatible with mods installed by 3rd party software (NMM or MO for example). If that turns out to be the case then we can expect a good number of the "essential" best mods to be behind a pay-wall.

Maybe I'm catastrophizing but I see this as a step towards a more closed and suspicious modding community where people will feel reluctant to share work or give permission for their work to be altered by patches and merged mods because of the question of payment.

It may be that we've had it too good for too long and that any type of wildly successful creative scene like this is a time bomb waiting for someone to monetize it. That is the nature of capitalism after all; see what is popular and figure out how to make money from it.

I hope I am wrong.

Schmornoff wrote: If your forecast should turn out true I can promise you this much "we" the Modders wont tollerate practices like that. I hope I can speak for everyone on this case :)
I wouldnt Mod for a game if it forces you to pay for my stuff and works with methods working against free comunitys.
This would mean the next FallOut or Tes will have basicly no mods :D or no mods worth buying and this again will conclue in the FallOut or Tes after that beeing free again. So dont worry ;)

Edit: and would mean Skyrim will probabily become one of the most modded games ever :D cause we will all just wait for the next free version to come out and continue working on skyrim. Skyrim is a great skeleton and their are grafic mods out there making it to look better then any game avalible :D

boulegue wrote: maybe nothing will change for free modders like yourself but in addition to you guys we get professional studios or new young talent that do modding as a career

Chris1986 wrote: That gives me a little hope. As I said that is my worst case scenario and I really hope that it does not come to that. As a player who regularly has 50+ mods active I would not be able to maintain that if even 1/4 of them were paid for I don't earn that much and I chop and change mods very often depending on my mood and the play-through I'm doing.

Even if only 10% of the mods I used were paid, I don't think I could afford it :(

Schmornoff wrote: thats exactly what I mean I would love to make this my fulltime job with good quality conctent equal to or better then actual dlc's. So all in all this could turn out awsome if you take your "job" on modding serious.
What I think scares the most people off is the forced method it comes around with. I think most people wont mind to pay 50cents or a Dollar or whatever for realy good quality content extending their fun ingame for hours. But they will very much mind paying a Dollar for crap. But if you upload crap and want cash for it it will result in shitstorms which nobody realy likes I can imagine and arent good for sales either ;) so this will balance itself out.

Schmornoff wrote: @chris
you probably mean mods like wet and cold at the moment charing insane 5 Dollars :D thats loco dont know whats up with that guy but he will change his mind sooner or later.
As I said I would do it like this:
- I would upload every version till the final version for free (mean already good versions with minor bugs)
- Then I would upload the final Version for 50cents - 1 Dollar
- If you dont want to pay for the final version just get the "0.99" which is basicly the same just with a few very small bugs
- If you like what I've done want to show endorsment and the final version go get if for a Dollar :D

Everyone would benifit from a moddel like that because it would encourage me to polish a mod out to perfection knowing I can make money of it.

boulegue wrote: the $5 is just a suggested price you can go as low as $1 which is the minimun on steam right now
and isnt exactly what youre describing what isoku is doing? his old wet&cold version is still avaible here and there are no major bugs as far as i know of

Schmornoff wrote: then thats a mayor mistake on steams side aswell as on isoku's. Steam for showing the 5$ as price to pay and not the 1$ and after that the higher prices.
And isoku for not explainging his methods to the comunity correctly. He should change his description text to something like "If you dont want to pay go get yourself the xxx version" with a link and done.
And I think he promoted the 2.0 for weeks or even months and everyone thought he would realse it for free. Now getting knocked infront of your head with a fee makes people very understandably angry. And angry people in crowds tend to get very aggresiv. And thats whats happening to poor isoku at the moment

That is really just all conjecture, tho, as we don't know for certain how things will play out, and we also don't know valve/bethesda's full interest in making money out of this, as enforcing workshop-only modding is clearly a very unpopular dickmove.

I guess we'll have to wait and see, I share a lot of your concerns but I am positive we are ahead of ourselves here.

[Chris1986]

In response to post #24587454. #24587604, #24587789, #24587819 are all replies on the same post.

testiger2 wrote:

zzjay wrote: it's simple if we all agree not to buy mods it'll decade soon...we just have to be united,cause we have power to decide what to buy.if beth'll remove free modding i'll not buy any of their future games.simply because its worthless without mods.they cant do their job and leave it up to us and now they make us pay

ScrollTron1c wrote: Simply not buying those mods will NEVER a change anything. Valve/Bethesda don't pay money for that, it's a 100% free income source for them. And the way how these huge companies work, every fraction of a cent additional income is worth it.

The only thing that can change Valve's behaviour is to boycot all Steam products and let them know about why you're doing that.

Wintercross wrote: Well we should do at least something. We all let DLC get as bad as it is.
Last thing we need is for modding to become the next DLC

Is it not possible that the silent majority (or at least a large percentage) of the Steam Workshop users will not have so many qualms about paying for mods? Not to make any wild assumptions but if you are exclusively using the Workshop for Skyrim modding you might be more likely to have the "Plug and Play" mentality where you want the mod to work easily without much input (this may just be conjecture on my part :P )

If this venture by Valve and Bethesda is kept afloat I doubt it will be getting the majority of its cash from Nexus users. I may be totally wrong but I'd love to know what other people think.

[ConfusionPlus]

In response to post #24561849. #24586259 is also a reply to the same post.

BobOfAllTrades wrote:

mkess wrote: Do you mean, these mods I never will see or play?

I am only willing only pay for mods, that I am not able to play without them.

For that matter, I have to play them long enough, and test, if they are compatible to other mods I won't play without it.

And I am not willing to pay 5$ for a single weapon or such nonsense. NO WAY.

If I'm no longer getting free mods to pick up the slack that the game dropped, I expect a better game to hold that slack. With mods, Skyrim is perfect, without, it's just good. If FO4 comes out, I expect much more, no more brushing problems away by saying "it can be easy fixed with modding".

[GenBloodhorn]

Ok guys, I got the mods from a friend.

 

The mods... were dissapointing. Really, the town mod is unfinished, boring and stuff.

All weapon and armor mods, Too big, no female version, bad lighting, very unfitting for the game.

 

No complaint on the features of iNeed, Alissa, and Wet&Cold.

 

tl:dr

Sange, Yasha, Butterfly: Swords are HUGE. soo op for one handed swords. I play dota 2 and I confirm they are too huge. stats are tooo OverPowered for the crafting recipes

 

Town mod: Windows are not necessary since its a town mod. no lightning at all. to be exact, it looks like its been made withing 10-20 hours. its just bland.

 

Art of the Catch: Havent tried, and wont. (Removed) (GOOD WORK FORE! :3 )

 

Castle Volikihar: Haven't tried, but looks plain, but its ok.

 

Clawheadhammer: Im not a fan of hammers, this mod seems ok. drains 5 stamina, magica, health.

 

Firelink: Armor is bad. sword is ok. armor is sooooo big! you will look like a clown in a hood

 

Gifts of akatosh: not bad.

 

Lamda Locator: not my type.

 

Midas: It's okay, I like the cool effects.

 

Purity: This mod is nice actually.

 

Raven Armor: Doesnt work with any body mod, you get flat chest separated bewbs. and you will look like a secretary (yes office secretary).

 

Ring Sword: nope

 

The Watcher's Staff: this mod is free on the nexus. the staff is really nice :3 well done

 

Ill give These mods a try: Purity, Staff, Hammer, and Butterfly.

Anything else, meh.

 

Why I did this: for all people that wants to TRY or BUY, this is a general review of the first batch.

 

Conclusion: I can say that the new mods doesnt deserve a buy (except purity) I mean really, not much effort to be sold in the workshop. would be better if they started it as a free mod, do some tests, stuff, then sell it after its been ok (exclude Gifts of akatosh). these mods could still be improved, yet there came an instant mod, instant sell, instant money -_- shouldve improved their mods to "this is a mod that I will pay for" instead of single stuff that everyone can live without.

 

FYI, I didnt buy any of these and I wont spend a single penny on mods that does not deserve it.

 

Im not here to rant more about the workshop, valve or beth. I think Ive done enough of it.

[Blazeflow]

I didn't know Dark0ne was this cool.

Dark0ne is a really awesome guy, gotto be said.

[psychocyclonus]

I would be happy to pay a small amount for the best mods and re-textures out there. Only the essential ones of course. For example, I can't play the game without amidianborn textures, such great art I would pay for these.

[enderstorm]

This wasn't that well thought out, was it?

[Schmornoff]

In response to post #24586549. #24586889, #24586954, #24587054, #24587239, #24587269, #24587399, #24587674, #24587829, #24587869 are all replies on the same post.

Schmornoff wrote:

Chris1986 wrote: I agree that there are a-lot of mod authors who see it as a hobby or pastime and would not charge for their mods ever. I believe that there are people who put enough time and effort into their creations to warrant a payment if they want. There will always be lots of good mod authors willing to provide high quality free mods, but I don't think its inherently wrong to ask for payment for your work.

I think the REAL issue here is the fact that it is now in Valve and Bethesda's interest to discourage free mod sites like the Nexus. If there are awesome mods available on the Nexus for free then that will be direct competition for their income from the steam workshop. Why pay for a mod when there may be a similar one for free here?

I have a horrible feeling that the next game (Fallout or TES) will have exclusive Steam Workshop modding and will not be compatible with mods installed by 3rd party software (NMM or MO for example). If that turns out to be the case then we can expect a good number of the "essential" best mods to be behind a pay-wall.

Maybe I'm catastrophizing but I see this as a step towards a more closed and suspicious modding community where people will feel reluctant to share work or give permission for their work to be altered by patches and merged mods because of the question of payment.

It may be that we've had it too good for too long and that any type of wildly successful creative scene like this is a time bomb waiting for someone to monetize it. That is the nature of capitalism after all; see what is popular and figure out how to make money from it.

I hope I am wrong.

Schmornoff wrote: If your forecast should turn out true I can promise you this much "we" the Modders wont tollerate practices like that. I hope I can speak for everyone on this case :)
I wouldnt Mod for a game if it forces you to pay for my stuff and works with methods working against free comunitys.
This would mean the next FallOut or Tes will have basicly no mods :D or no mods worth buying and this again will conclue in the FallOut or Tes after that beeing free again. So dont worry ;)

Edit: and would mean Skyrim will probabily become one of the most modded games ever :D cause we will all just wait for the next free version to come out and continue working on skyrim. Skyrim is a great skeleton and their are grafic mods out there making it to look better then any game avalible :D

boulegue wrote: maybe nothing will change for free modders like yourself but in addition to you guys we get professional studios or new young talent that do modding as a career

Chris1986 wrote: That gives me a little hope. As I said that is my worst case scenario and I really hope that it does not come to that. As a player who regularly has 50+ mods active I would not be able to maintain that if even 1/4 of them were paid for I don't earn that much and I chop and change mods very often depending on my mood and the play-through I'm doing.

Even if only 10% of the mods I used were paid, I don't think I could afford it :(

Schmornoff wrote: thats exactly what I mean I would love to make this my fulltime job with good quality conctent equal to or better then actual dlc's. So all in all this could turn out awsome if you take your "job" on modding serious.
What I think scares the most people off is the forced method it comes around with. I think most people wont mind to pay 50cents or a Dollar or whatever for realy good quality content extending their fun ingame for hours. But they will very much mind paying a Dollar for crap. But if you upload crap and want cash for it it will result in shitstorms which nobody realy likes I can imagine and arent good for sales either ;) so this will balance itself out.

Schmornoff wrote: @chris
you probably mean mods like wet and cold at the moment charing insane 5 Dollars :D thats loco dont know whats up with that guy but he will change his mind sooner or later.
As I said I would do it like this:
- I would upload every version till the final version for free (mean already good versions with minor bugs)
- Then I would upload the final Version for 50cents - 1 Dollar
- If you dont want to pay for the final version just get the "0.99" which is basicly the same just with a few very small bugs
- If you like what I've done want to show endorsment and the final version go get if for a Dollar :D

Everyone would benifit from a moddel like that because it would encourage me to polish a mod out to perfection knowing I can make money of it.

boulegue wrote: the $5 is just a suggested price you can go as low as $1 which is the minimun on steam right now
and isnt exactly what youre describing what isoku is doing? his old wet&cold version is still avaible here and there are no major bugs as far as i know of

Schmornoff wrote: then thats a mayor mistake on steams side aswell as on isoku's. Steam for showing the 5$ as price to pay and not the 1$ and after that the higher prices.
And isoku for not explainging his methods to the comunity correctly. He should change his description text to something like "If you dont want to pay go get yourself the xxx version" with a link and done.
And I think he promoted the 2.0 for weeks or even months and everyone thought he would realse it for free. Now getting knocked infront of your head with a fee makes people very understandably angry. And angry people in crowds tend to get very aggresiv. And thats whats happening to poor isoku at the moment

Edit: doesnt excuse the behavior of some users but I think can explain it a little.

Highjones wrote: That is really just all conjecture, tho, as we don't know for certain how things will play out, and we also don't know valve/bethesda's full interest in making money out of this, as enforcing workshop-only modding is clearly a very unpopular dickmove.

I guess we'll have to wait and see, I share a lot of your concerns but I am positive we are ahead of ourselves here.

I'm quite certain things will balance out just fine and we will come out with an even greater comunity then now. At the moment people are shocked scaed and angry but that will all setlle down. So will the prices they will balance out naturally following the marked.

If Valve and Bethesda are stupid enough to force people to pay for mods created by people enjoying their work and dont want people to be forced to anything they will cut in their own flesh the Modders won't tollerate such practices and I'm 100% certain about that.

Edit: got to go to work now not modding :( ;) Edited April 24, 2015 by Schmornoff

[alazox]

die as a hero or live long enough to see yourself become a villain

[TomSawyer]

Change.org: Remove the paid content of the Steam Workshop ^^