Steam and Bethesda remove paid modding from Skyrim Workshop

[MrDave]

In response to post #24771999. #24772144, #24772774, #24772924, #24773434, #24776364, #24776744, #24777839, #24777939, #24793649, #24794624, #24795194, #24796354, #24796489, #24796534 are all replies on the same post.

zanity wrote:

Nidhoegger wrote: Because some of us are old enough to still remember when we actually owned our games.

macintroll wrote: People do not want to pay for mods = they are right
Modders would like to get some $ from their work = they are right too

Why not use the same concept as youtube ?

Ads are paying the youtubber, not the users.
Why not doing the same for mods ?

- Modder get some $ depending on mod popularity / page views / ads clicked
- player can download for free all mods.
- A moderation, a rating system and users reviews to keep things in the right way like it is already in place here.

So only Advertisers pay like everywhere else on the internet...
It's not the mod itself which is rewarded, it's popularity and audience like any youtube video.

Sound too simple or ?

phantompally76 wrote: This.

It will be a cold day in Hell before I pay a monthly subscription for the privilege of serving as quality control for mods of varying quality and value that may or may not even work.

The complete and utter lack of common sense among proponents of amateur mod monetization is frightening.

CyrusFyre wrote: I will give you a very good reason why I won't be and will strongly and loudly discourage others from paying a monthly subscription to getting mods. Because when you pay to play a game with a monthly subscription the game developer is obligated to continue providing updates, patches and so forth to their game. Now (and this is actually a big factor in my paid vs free considerations as well) mod authors are under no such obligation. In my opinion if you are charging money for your mod then you are now providing a service and as such should be subjected to upholding certain obligations. How many mods have been made that started good but then get abandoned because the author loses interests, their PC has issues, Real Life starts kicking their A$$, etc.?

Just what protects the mod users from this? We pay for something we don’t necessarily receive, quality. And for older games like Skyirm that isn’t such a big deal because no new patches will be coming out but with a game like Fallout 4 they will be patching and modding right alongside each other. How many mods get broken by patches? Who will enforce that these mod authors have to fix the broken mods you’ve paid for? It is expected that if Bethesda released a DLC and then a patch that broke the DLC that they would immediately get to fixing that DLC. Mod authors have no such obligation.

And for a measly 25% maybe they shouldn’t have such an obligation. I agree with macintroll suggests and use ads to pay for things and have a donation button so that people can reward those who are truly amazing. And for those who just hate ads go the way of YouTube and Premium Nexus and TSR and pay a subscription to remove the frigging ads.

user134 wrote: @Cyrus: Exactly! Modders don't have resources (namely engineers, time and money) at their disposal to make everything public ready. And surely, like you touched on, a company like Bethesda would be in much deeper s#*! if their game didn't work, than some lowly modder.
That said, I don't think ads are the solution. That's why even people who aren't tech savvy know how to write obscure adblock+ rules. :-P In all seriousness, people are already tired of being bombarded with (usually) irrelevant and/or intrusive ads.

macintroll wrote: @user134 : Ads are a (little) annoyance till they don't block everything on the page,
But It's ads who are keeping free sites like nexus alive, ads that permit you to use at no cost facebook, google tools and all major free-content websites.
when there's no ads you have to pay. And simply if you want to support free content sites, just click on their ads they will have more incomes that way than any lifetime subscription.. and it's still free for you.

user134 wrote: I understand the implications. But my point is modders must acknowledge they're volunteering, not attempting to make a career off of a game, with a team of beta testers and engineers on their payroll. This is how its always been. I also question the legality of your idea, because wouldn't this require reverse engineering Skyrim itself (surely the CK has its limitations)?
Personally, I'm fine with a donate button. It means I don't need to test a mod as intensely to ensure proper functionality, or worry about being provided with something of low quality at an unfair price. I'm not against paying modders and I will acknowledge when something's good, but I'm sorry.. simply releasing a mod doesn't necessitate payment.

Edit: wording.

arxerisdam wrote: Why not use the same concept as youtube ?

Ads are paying the youtubber, not the users.
Why not doing the same for mods ?

Thats a good idea.

Still i wonder how many people will be willing to pay for a mod.

For a game you already have to pay $60+ and still give 75% of the mod price to the game developer, better they start making free to play games and sell stuff like sword of power $10 for a week of use

Is just crazy.

and there is the problem with bugs in bethesta games that are left for modders to fix is just not logical.

And what guarantee we have such mods are compatible and will be in full working and bug free, even developers release games with lots of bugs and people still buy them, mod makers can just stop developing the mods in any stage with no repercution or responsability.

Quality control!!!!

Thats another issue, who will watch for the quality of the mods.

Compatibility between mods.

Thats a big problem, a lot of mods arent compatible with each other, all mods need to be standardized, because if you install any mod you need to do a lot of stuff to keep it compatible with other mods.


And finally, maybe a lot of modders think been an user is a priviledge, well im sorry but i think the more important thing than anything else if yuo want to start selling your mods is that you please and respect the customers, because in the end its they who are spending their money in your mod.

And rigth now modders can have the liberty to send to hell users who use the mod for free but once you start charging money for them it will only give you bad name.

so for paid mods be a reality there is a long path ahead.

macintroll wrote: @ arxerisdam
Not sure to understand your points ?

If advertising pay the modder, the mod is still 100% free for users.
It's exactly the same as here currently : a mod page, people read, check and download. Done

Some ads are shown on the page, those ads give money to the "content provider" aka the modder account, exactly like the youtube concept. (google adsense do this very well ^^)

The more popular is the mod (pages view, clicks), the more advertising is giving money to the modder.
No payment, no price for mod, no more difference for the end user.
free mods, and retribution for the "content maker" like everywhere else.

Phychosis wrote: Yeah won't happen, If they tried making a monthly subscription for people to use mods the game won't sell, I wouldn't buy it and a lot of others wouldn't. Mods is one of the reason I play these games if I had to buy a $60 game then pay monthly to keep the mods I play with in it no matter how low it is I would be paying them for the rest of my life as I still play mirrowind with mods in it after 12 years of owning it, as well as oblivion, Fallout 3 and New Vegas, and of course Skyrim. I still play all of them, now if fallout 4 had a monthly subscription and I did buy it do you think I would still play it 12 years later if when I went back to play it I couldn't use the mods I had in my save game. The company would lose money, lose fans, because we know how great the monthly subscription work for playing ESO and how many people kept playing it after they beat it.

UnitedStrafes wrote: It won't be optimal because I still won't pay for it, neither will the majority of anyone else. I don't need to be subscribing or being nickle and dimed by every game I buy, and I won't be, they can DO it sure, but they won't be seeing any of my money.

I just wouldn't buy or play that game....lotsa other games out there.

Grandsome wrote: I'll copy part of a post I did on the steam forum yesterday on how that thing could work:


"With that out of the way, I think it's time to bring back the era of the Demo. Either have a say XX hours of *game-play* (not that clock crap origin uses) to test the mod and see if it's okay. Or modders, that are now developers at this point, make a functioning un-crippled alternate lite/free [mandatory] version of their mod. This would also ensure that nobody is stealing anybody's work because during those XX hours a community curator/savy user would have access to the assets. The alternate lite version should also share all their assets with the paid version.

As for prices, valve should just copy the pay-what-you-want of Humble Bundle, with average paid price and all, and maybe a non-in-game related bonus if you pay more than average like a donation or something. (for #humblebragging)

To split the revenues, not lower than 33.3333333333333...% for the modder, you know, splitting the price equally in three for modder/dev/valve. I think that's the less offensive split they can make, but ideally, modders should get more, maybe relative to the size of the mod. And a possibility for modders to renegotiate any time, they should also have complete control over their *original* content, valve shouldn't have the right to retain a mod even if the author retired it.

For support, both the devs and valve should be part of the process, both get a cut it's also their responsibility. Partial refund (50%?) should be emitted with no question asked if a mod stops working after a game update or a major update from the author. Well, I said no question, I meant that if it is still broken after human support has failed. And if support is not given within the 48hrs of the demand then it should be an automatic refund. If it stops working soon after-purchase it should be in full (the grace period should be still at least >24hrs), no matter if the game or the mod just updated."

macintroll wrote: But WHY do you all want to pay mods ??? this was just done 2 days ago .. remember ?

Mr. Dave wrote: "1) don't charge for mods- make the mods available via a MONTHLY SUBSCRIPTION SERVICE. "

You should be BANNED for even posting this.

"The complete and utter lack of common sense among proponents of amateur mod monetization is frightening."
- phantompally76

Quote of the century right there.

The moment mods become commercial is the day I stop sending DMCA notices and start filing 110,000 dollar lawsuits per infraction as current law allows.
That would have been 330,000 dollars in suits just from last night and this morning. Is this what you want the future of illegal mod punishment to be? because it is exactly where it will end up due to the sheer number of non original content mods.

[iXenite]

In response to post #24794924. #24795654 is also a reply to the same post.

greggorypeccary wrote:

macintroll wrote: Very well done resume of the situation.
This fit so well with my idea of a "youtube-like ads solution" to keep the free mods for all and also give some retribution to the content providers aka the modders.

How is unfair that the Nexus gets to make money from memberships and ad revenue? Do they charge everyone who walks in the door? No. Does the Nexus charge people to upload mods to their site? No. Are all of the servers and other excess costs non-existent for the Nexus? No. According to Dark0ne it costs $500,000 a year in order to pay for the servers, the CDN, the bandwidth, the database cluster, the firewalls, the legal counsel, the accountants and the programmers to keep the Nexus running.

Last time I checked, things like GIMP, NifSkope, the Creation Kit/Geck, etc. were free to use. Does this mean modders do not deserve compliments and endorsements if they provided a quality mod? Of course not, everyone deserves a pat on the back for a job well done. But not everyone remembers do that, some just never realize they should. At the same time, modders, and everyone for that matter, shouldn't feel entitled to thank yous and pats on the back. Nobody is entitled to anything. Many a genius goes unnoticed throughout their lifetime, but they never stopped their work.

When it comes to money however, I do feel that modders do deserve Patreon like support should users feel they wish to contribute. But in no way do I feel that adding pay walls to mods is fair. Getting donations is something many modders have earned, but it is also something no modder or anybody is entitled to. A donation is a show of support and appreciation. It's a marvellous gift that I think those capable and willing should do more often. But I don't feel anyone should feel entitled to getting donations or payment for something that they didn't have to do.

While it is certainly true that time is money, it is also time you chose to spend. You shouldn't hold people responsible for not satisfying you the way you had hoped, regardless of how much time you spent trying to satisfy them. Life is disappointment. If you expect people to commit money to mods, then perhaps you should also learn that much like time, money is something not all of us have a lot of, and many are not willing to spend it so easily/casually. To expect users of mods to hand money out of respect and appreciation for the modder it would first require the modder to respect the user, and by looking at your post, it doesn't seem that you have a lot of it.

Source for Dark0nes comment about the costs of running the Nexus:
http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/news/12459/?

[greggorypeccary]

In response to post #24794924. #24795654, #24797254, #24797884 are all replies on the same post.

greggorypeccary wrote:

macintroll wrote: Very well done resume of the situation.
This fit so well with my idea of a "youtube-like ads solution" to keep the free mods for all and also give some retribution to the content providers aka the modders.

DaddyDirection wrote: How is unfair that the Nexus gets to make money from memberships and ad revenue? Do they charge everyone who walks in the door? No. Does the Nexus charge people to upload mods to their site? No. Are all of the servers and other excess costs non-existent for the Nexus? No. According to Dark0ne it costs $500,000 a year in order to pay for the servers, the CDN, the bandwidth, the database cluster, the firewalls, the legal counsel, the accountants and the programmers to keep the Nexus running.

Last time I checked, things like GIMP, NifSkope, the Creation Kit/Geck, etc. were free to use. Does this mean modders do not deserve compliments and endorsements if they provided a quality mod? Of course not, everyone deserves a pat on the back for a job well done. But not everyone remembers do that, some just never realize they should. At the same time, modders, and everyone for that matter, shouldn't feel entitled to thank yous and pats on the back. Nobody is entitled to anything. Many a genius goes unnoticed throughout their lifetime, but they never stopped their work.

When it comes to money however, I do feel that modders do deserve Patreon like support should users feel they wish to contribute. But in no way do I feel that adding pay walls to mods is fair. Getting donations is something many modders have earned, but it is also something no modder or anybody is entitled to. A donation is a show of support and appreciation. It's a marvellous gift that I think those capable and willing should do more often. But I don't feel anyone should feel entitled to getting donations or payment for something that they didn't have to do.

While it is certainly true that time is money, it is also time you chose to spend. You shouldn't hold people responsible for not satisfying you the way you had hoped, regardless of how much time you spent trying to satisfy them. Life is disappointment. If you expect people to commit money to mods, then perhaps you should also learn that much like time, money is something not all of us have a lot of, and many are not willing to spend it so easily/casually. To expect users of mods to hand money out of respect and appreciation for the modder it would first require the modder to respect the user, and by looking at your post, it doesn't seem that you have a lot of it.

Source for Dark0nes comment about the costs of running the Nexus:
http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/news/12459/?

blackasm wrote: I couldn't agree more, The sad truth is that the reason there are starving artists is that they do s#*! for free. It is a poor catch 22 that artists fall into because of this illusion of "exposure" which is an utter croc. No artists simply does art, gets "exposure" and then gets a job, sorry but it really doesn't work like that. You have to put time into but most importantly VALUE on your artwork and find a market niche that you can earn from, and of those too few exist for creative people to utilize.

Just ask the thousands of graphic designers working at Starbucks, just ask all of the illustrators whose art probably decorates your desktop background, they are unemployed messes either living with mom chasing a dream or basically working some other job wishing there was a way to be paid for their god given talent and passion. A perfect example of this trap that any illustrator will tell you, is drawing book covers and sometimes even whole comic books for the promise that once it is published they will reap the benefit. Of course publishers have their own artists and most writers know that, effectively getting a really good pitch to a publisher being hand drawn for free. Artists are taken advantage of all the time but more often than not they deserve it because they put zero value on their own work and as a result devalued a lot of art as a whole.

I love modding but like every modder knows, after a point you just cant justify putting time in it, I have had a number of armors that I had been working on in my free time for years, but had never had the incentive to actually finish them, I can honestly say now I never will. This choice isn't just because of my disgust with the worst of the modding community, but because quite literally my armor designs are worth more to me to as an asset that I can use to create real sellable artwork and I do lose a the ability to do that when I upload my designs for free to an army of ungrateful trolls. I have learned the hard way as a starving artist that used to do s#*! for free that by doing so, I was devaluing my own life and that simply cant be maintained.

The nexus can do whatever it wants. It always has. I benefited from the nexus community and freely admit it. It also benefited from me. My point is that the Nexus is not a charity that exists for providing a place for modders. Nor is it giving mods away for free. That is an illusion. It is a business. If it wants to continue to be profitable it will have to adapt. People will move to a place where they feel their work is being appreciated. One sure way to feel appreciated is to be paid. If the Nexus wishes to continue to profit from modders they will have to give something tangible back. If they do that modders will stay. and you can still get free mods. If the nexus keep pretending that modders are not the soil that grows their crop of mods that they are allowed to make money from. They will lose their business.

p.s I respect the user who appreciates the work not the low hanging fruit picker. Edited April 29, 2015 by greggorypeccary

[Zoophilian]

If I may, Iam in no way a modder, I am against paying for mods, But why dont our proud modders open paypals or google wallets and ask for donations when they upload to the nexus? This way our favorite mods remain free and out favorite modders get support!

 

 

I understand modding is alot of work, Hell many of you have teh skill to completely redo Skyrim or Fallout and could make your own game one day, Lets support our Modders! But it needs to be optional not forced,

 

My fellow Modding family, Open Pateons or Paypals let us make donations or offer support ^.^

[greggorypeccary]

In response to post #24797694.

Zoophilian wrote:

In reality very few people pay anything if they can get away without. No matter what you hear on these posts. There is already a donations button. The most rarely used button on the internet. Edited April 29, 2015 by greggorypeccary

[blackasm]

In response to post #24794924. #24795654, #24797254, #24797654 are all replies on the same post.

greggorypeccary wrote:

macintroll wrote: Very well done resume of the situation.
This fit so well with my idea of a "youtube-like ads solution" to keep the free mods for all and also give some retribution to the content providers aka the modders.

DaddyDirection wrote: How is unfair that the Nexus gets to make money from memberships and ad revenue? Do they charge everyone who walks in the door? No. Does the Nexus charge people to upload mods to their site? No. Are all of the servers and other excess costs non-existent for the Nexus? No. According to Dark0ne it costs $500,000 a year in order to pay for the servers, the CDN, the bandwidth, the database cluster, the firewalls, the legal counsel, the accountants and the programmers to keep the Nexus running.

Last time I checked, things like GIMP, NifSkope, the Creation Kit/Geck, etc. were free to use. Does this mean modders do not deserve compliments and endorsements if they provided a quality mod? Of course not, everyone deserves a pat on the back for a job well done. But not everyone remembers do that, some just never realize they should. At the same time, modders, and everyone for that matter, shouldn't feel entitled to thank yous and pats on the back. Nobody is entitled to anything. Many a genius goes unnoticed throughout their lifetime, but they never stopped their work.

When it comes to money however, I do feel that modders do deserve Patreon like support should users feel they wish to contribute. But in no way do I feel that adding pay walls to mods is fair. Getting donations is something many modders have earned, but it is also something no modder or anybody is entitled to. A donation is a show of support and appreciation. It's a marvellous gift that I think those capable and willing should do more often. But I don't feel anyone should feel entitled to getting donations or payment for something that they didn't have to do.

While it is certainly true that time is money, it is also time you chose to spend. You shouldn't hold people responsible for not satisfying you the way you had hoped, regardless of how much time you spent trying to satisfy them. Life is disappointment. If you expect people to commit money to mods, then perhaps you should also learn that much like time, money is something not all of us have a lot of, and many are not willing to spend it so easily/casually. To expect users of mods to hand money out of respect and appreciation for the modder it would first require the modder to respect the user, and by looking at your post, it doesn't seem that you have a lot of it.

Source for Dark0nes comment about the costs of running the Nexus:
http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/news/12459/?

greggorypeccary wrote: The nexus can do whatever it wants. It always has. I benefited from the nexus community and freely admit it. It also benefited from me. My point is that the Nexus is not a charity that exists for providing a place for modders. Nor is it giving mods away for free. That is an illusion. It is a business. If it wants to continue to be profitable it will have to adapt. People will move to a place where they feel their work is being appreciated. One sure way to feel appreciated is to be paid. If the Nexus wishes to continue to profit from modders they will have to give something tangible back. If they do that modders will stay. and you can still get free mods. If the nexus keep pretending that modders are not the soil that grows their crop of mods that they are allowed to make money from. They will lose their business.

I couldn't agree more, The sad truth is that the reason there are starving artists is that they do s#*! for free. It is a poor catch 22 that artists fall into because of this illusion of "exposure" which is an utter croc. No artists simply does art, gets "exposure" and then gets a job, sorry but it really doesn't work like that. You have to put time into but most importantly VALUE on your artwork and find a market niche that you can earn from, and of those too few exist for creative people to utilize.

Just ask the thousands of graphic designers working at Starbucks, just ask all of the illustrators whose art probably decorates your desktop background, they are unemployed messes either living with mom chasing a dream or basically working some other job wishing there was a way to be paid for their god given talent and passion. A perfect example of this trap that any illustrator will tell you, is drawing book covers and sometimes even whole comic books for the promise that once it is published they will reap the benefit. Of course publishers have their own artists and most writers know that, effectively getting a really good pitch to a publisher being hand drawn for free. Artists are taken advantage of all the time but more often than not they deserve it because they put zero value on their own work and as a result devalued a lot of art as a whole.

I love modding but like every modder knows, after a point you just cant justify putting time in it, I have had a number of armors that I had been working on in my free time for years, but had never had the incentive to actually finish them, I can honestly say now I never will. This choice isn't just because of my disgust with the worst of the modding community, but because quite literally my armor designs are worth more to me to as an asset that I can use to create real sellable artwork and I do lose a the ability to do that when I upload my designs for free to an army of ungrateful trolls. I have learned the hard way as a starving artist that used to do s#*! for free that by doing so, I was devaluing my own life and that simply cant be maintained.

[julper]

In response to post #24758429. #24758664, #24758854, #24759374 are all replies on the same post.

julper wrote:

drwebs2 wrote: The SkyUI team spent the entire time bashing and marginalizing the community.

"There is no "community". The past 48h have shown this. There never was."

Never forget that.

https://np.reddit.com/r/skyrimmods/comments/33r0r9/a_genuine_appeal_to_the_true_sons_of_modding_the/cqnvk2z

undedavenger wrote: THAT makes sense. Instead of a buck for a mod here or a mod there, why not create a pack of mods that aim at a certain goal, like graphics overhauls, or immerive environments, or realism? that way we can get ONE mod in our load order where all the parts are compatible and don't require us to tinker and patch?

An actual EXPANSION PACK? (What we used to call DLC before games became pay-to-win for all the newer folks out there)

I'd pay $30 or 40 for a pack containing SkyUI, the unofficial patches, graphical corrections, and performance enhancements all in one. With scripts integrated into the BASE GAME without the need for extenders or patching together.

The same goes for overall graphics options, say we want a darker and grittier and more realistic Skyrim. Wet and Cold, Necessities, and a graphics package of darker and dirtier textures, all in one integrated package.

Or an armory mod that contains the top weapon and armor packs integrated seamlessly into the actual game.

Then you're getting a cut of more than a few bucks, and you're not only getting new content, but convenience and stability!

sunshinenbrick wrote: Nothing wrong with all this, but that was not what was on offer. it's that which a lot of the more mature sections of the internet were saying.

If a supermarket raises all its prices for no other reason than because it can, it is people's right to object.

@ sunshinenbrick

I know it was not what they proposed and offered. But, let's be honest. Through all this mess, all Bethesda did was testing and preparing the ground for the upcoming Fallout 4. So, we have to expect that this will be a reality very soon. All we can do is give them some ideas to make this viable and acceptable.

If I have to pay for mods one day, I wanna be sure the mod author(s) I'm paying will be able to update/fix it if it needs to be. And I don't want to pay to be a beta tester. There has to be quality control in some way.

As I said, many talented modders here would deserve this. Heck, like many others have already mentioned, I just think Bethesda should have hired some of them. With the billion bucks they made with Skyrim, I think they have the funds to hire. But they don't... So, some modders would deserve it. But not every modder out there. This way, this could be an incentive to every modder to create even better stuff.

[OpenWorldAddict]

I have an idea for modders.... why not use Patreon. I know alot of modders from other communities that have patreon accounts that allow people that want to support them to pay want they want either per month or for each mod that is uploaded or updated.

 

I think the way patreon works would be great for the modders and the community. Not It allows people who really want to support their favorite content creators and have the money to due so, but it also ensures that the modders will make enough money for those high paying patrons and thus be able to provide their content for free to the rest of the community who can't afford to even pay donations.

 

That is my idea, and I think it is a great one.

[iXenite]

@greggorypeccary

 

I have never been under the illusion that the Nexus is a business. However to state that it hasn't created a marvellous environment for their modders to share their works, a platform in which to become known in this community is nonsense. The Nexus is probably the most used site for mods, yet I keep seeing people commenting that the Nexus sucks or that it doesn't support modders. If the Nexus didn't support modders, then why would they spend 500,000 dollars a year to maintain the site and forums? I think it's a safe bet to say that if the Nexus wasn't here, many modders would not be as known as they are today.

[macintroll]

In response to post #24797694. #24797804 is also a reply to the same post.

Zoophilian wrote:

greggorypeccary wrote: In reality very few people pay anything if they can get away without. No matter what you hear on these posts. There is already a donations button. The most rarely used button on the internet.

Asking for donation is forbidden on the nexus, asking for endorsements too.
However the functionality exist.
Paypal donation is already available on nexus for any member who choose to set it up (simply you put your paypal email account in the right box).
But you know , it's not really used a lot.