Gamasutra: The pros and cons of Bethesda's Creation Club

[TheModernStoryteller]

Gamasutra just published my critical evaluation of Bethesda's Creation Club on its front page. I hope it's of interest.

[ibldedibble]

Gamasutra just published my critical evaluation of Bethesda's Creation Club on its front page. I hope it's of interest.

 

I was gonna say "Isn't Nick the guy who did The Forgotten City?" and then I realize that... yep, it was you. :P (Still need to play that at some point, it looks fantastic.)

 

And I agree on all points. I'm really looking forward to the Creation Club, it feels like a great initiative, and seems a lot more thought-out than the "paid mod scandal".

[Ethreon]

Mate, be careful, you make too much sense.

 

Small nitpick - there's more fundamental right than being paid for your work :P

[mortisedsnail35]

we could just charge console users for mods, im just learning to make small mods built a pc so i could, i wouldnt want to charge anyone on nexus but if consoles people want it well then i could see it working out

[Dark0ne]

I feel like any talk of "donations don't work" is a very moot point considering how hand-tied we are by Bethesda.

 

I think donations would work if a Patreon-style system (or even Patreon) were allowed by Bethesda, but it's not. And sure, some mod authors are flaunting Bethesda's "dislike" of the system and using it anyway, but I don't think this is a fair indicator of how popular the service would be, compared to if we were allowed to integrate it here and mod authors were allowed to talk about it freely and openly without fear of Bethesda throwing the rule book at them.

[Alexotero1219]

You have a right to ask to be paid for your work. Everyone else has the right to not pay for your work regardless of how hard you work or not. There in lies the problem. Single bow mods will never sell especially since people have had the very same thing for free for over 15 years now. A charge for mods system is highly unlikely to actually be successful especially since the VAST and I do mean VAAAAAAAAAAST majority of the consumers who would be ask to buy them DESPISE the idea. This isnt some sort of human rights issue its a business one. Bethesda's attempt to create some micro transaction market is going to badly hurt a hobby we all know and love (yet AGAIN) and ultimately end up getting nobody paid anything substantial.

 

 

I feel like any talk of "donations don't work" is a very moot point considering how hand-tied we are by Bethesda.

 

I think donations would work if a Patreon-style system (or even Patreon) were allowed by Bethesda, but it's not. And sure, some mod authors are flaunting Bethesda's "dislike" of the system and using it anyway, but I don't think this is a fair indicator of how popular the service would be, compared to if we were allowed to integrate it here and mod authors were allowed to talk about it freely and openly without fear of Bethesda throwing the rule book at them.

Thanks for commenting on this. Ive seen how well donations and selling t-shirts and the like works for many other people (youtubers, streamers, ect. ect.) and I have to wonder if a similar thing wouldn't be successful for many mod authors out there as well if bethesda simply "got out of the way" so to speak.

 

I think you and I both know they wont stand for anything that doesn't also make them money at the same time. Kind of a shame but thanks again for clarifying bethesda was standing in the way of advertising for donations. I had always thought that was the case but wasn't 100% sure.

Edited June 14, 2017 by Alexotero1219

[Unedjis]

I'm also quite ambivalent on the whole thing. What I really appreciate is that Bethesda seemed to listen to the constructive parts of critisism by her user base during the Steam paid mods sh*tstorm. Their current approach does seem reasonable. I've recently crossed from mod user to mod "developer", and that has made me realize just HOW much time and effort is involved even in things as simple as a house mod. So far I've put about 80-100 hours into my house mod, and I haven't even finished the interior, although of course I still need lots and lots of time to learn everything, so an experienced modder would probably achieve the same in some 20 hours. If all goes well and I get my house up-and-running from an aesthetic and usability standpoint, my plan is to incorporate it into a rather complex quest and story arc, which would require me to find voice actors. And that's where money might come in. Being the perfectionist I am, I'm not going to settle for noticeably amateur voice acting on bad equipment, and where am I, as a newcomer who doesn't have the backing of tens of thousands of endorsements, to find people willing to sacrifice considerable amounts of THEIR time to voice the dialogue I write - for free? So some form of payment would probably have to be brought up, which is beginning to make it hard for me to justify. I'm already putting most of my spare time into my mod, but am I also to put in my own money without any chance to get it back? I love the modding community, and I'm willing to contribute my part, but ... time AND money is a little much to ask of a content creator. So I'll probably have to settle for less-than-perfect, or be lucky and convince one of the really talented VAs we know from other mods to contribute to mine as well.

 

In comes the paid content. Now, of course being the newbie I am I wouldn't be accepted by Bethesda into the Creation Club, BUT: others will be. And others will have the chance to make *real* quality content because they don't have to beg for 4th party contributions - they can pay for them (or rather, have Bethesda pay for them). And this is, in my opinion, the strongest argument in favor of the new form of paid mods. (And really, they should just have called it DLC with independent contributors or something and they'd probably get only half the backlash as they do now that they again seem to threaten the Holy Grail that is free mods.)

 

HOWEVER I have one major concern about all of this that you, Nick, haven't mentioned in your arguments, and I haven't seen it mentioned anywhere else yet (although I admittedly only watched the videos on it by MxR and Gopher). And that is that to me, this new attempt at introducing paid mods might just be the next logical step toward banning free modding from future Bethesda titles. Bethesda might just use this to test the waters, to prepare us as the modding community to meekly accept that future games might not have free modding tools anymore, that the only way to publish mods legally is through their own Bethesda network, and charge mod users for access in some form. I don't have the legal or economic knowledge to know if this is a real danger or just some Skooma-provoked conspiracy theory, but given that over the past year we have become so numbed towards ... interesting political developments all over the world that we just shrug our shoulders and do nothing when the inevitable next "scandal" pops up, I fear that this might be a calculated move to eventually completely take away something 99.99% of mod users (according to Nick's statistics on donations) perceive as their unalienable right: free mods. I want to be able to continue to build my own perfect game that suits my own specific tastes (and those change from playthrough to playthrough) with literally hundreds of different mods. I won't be able to do that if I have to pay for all of the 194 mods in my load order, even if it's just 25 cents each (and it won't be less than $1 for each). I'm not worried that Skyrim will suffer this fate (go Nexus go), but I do fear that future Bethesda titles might.

[Galvon94]

future games might not have free modding tools anymore

While such a thing is plausable, I don't think Bethesda would do it. One of their largest strangleholds on the community is the fact that, for most projects, the CK is the primary tool. I think they would lose a great deal of influence by forcing us to create alternatives. Bear in mind that the OpenMW team has made great progress on an open source equivalent of Morrowind's Construction Set, so there's already a base to work from.

[b1zz781]

One thing is. If you think that the examples of mods they showed us on the cc video wont be the normal stuff, you need to think about it a little more. They would have showed something good if they had it. What they put there wasnt a joke. They knew a lot of the young console kids will eat all that s*** up. People dont want to be paying what bethesda will charge for mud crab armor. After reading through what everyone says, that is one of the main issues. Second thing is, they wouldnt have said youd be compensated like a normal bethesda dev if your pay is going to be based off of sales, or if you would receive royalty's. My understanding is pay will be based off of how many hours they think it will take to complete the project you propose. Thats it. Its possible theyll pay you for your idea then make it themselves in order to pay you less. We need these things clarified more than anything at this point. I think most people would agree, this is something they could deal with if it was done right. So far it doesnt look like it was. But seeing our beloved mod creators taken advantage of bothers me. To work hand in hand with beth is a lot of peoples dreams, and bethesda knows this. So they are taking advantage of it. People dont feel taken advatage of in the moment, sometimes it takes a friend to say dude your getting f***ed for you to realize it. With there being money involved in mods, and looking at how bethesda has acted in the past, it would surprise the hell out of me if modders dont end up getting dmca takedowns for anything similar to things that are published onto the cc first. IMO we need to unify and try to get the answers. Since this whole thing they are doing isnt possible without YOU. Im just a grateful user that hopes the best for the community.

Edited June 14, 2017 by b1zz781

[MrJoseCuervo]

This is whats going to happen.

 

Game content will be reduced and the things you normally got as part of the game will be behind this Creation Club Pay wall, and it is a paywall no matter how much they try to hide it behind the "Credit" system.

 

The Bug filled incomplete game you used to pay $80 for will now be a $200 bug filled incomplete game with less default content.

 

The system they have created is completely unwarranted and completely destructive to the modding community. A few jealous modders who fume over Youtube people making money talking about their mods is giving Bethesda Softworks (Not Studios) an opening to fleece mod users and lower costs with "contractors". I would be concerned if I was a grunt in the gaming industry.

 

You will not be making a living making mods. Sorry. Perhaps less than 1% of the modders on this site are really talented enough to make that happen. Bethesda is counting onyour greed to get you to help them increase their bottom line. Not because they are evil or hate you, its because they are a publicly traded Corporate entity that is required by law to pursue profits over all else.