The Rebirth of PC Gaming? Bring On the Modders!

Deathspawner writes "The future of PC gaming is oft-debated, but one thing's for certain: modding has always made it better. With that, wouldn't it make sense for developers to focus more on giving the community the modding tools it needs? Further, couldn't publishers look to modding as a way to increase revenue, by allowing modders to sell their sanctioned creations? Valve already offers robust community options in its Steam platform — and already has payment processing in place. Is this the natural next step for PC gaming?"

Comments

The questions developers ask

[Anonymous Coward]

How much do I make off mods?
Nothing

And where are most of my sales?
On consoles.

And where are most of my pirates?
On the PC.

Who do modding tools benefit?
Only the PC gamers.

Does developing modding tools cost me?
Yes.

And remind me again how much I make off any given mod?
Jack and shit. And Jack left town.

I think I've made my decision.

Re:The questions developers ask

[Anonymous Coward]

That's the difference between a good developer and a crap dev. A good dev will put years into their product, and give a game that people truly love like an artisan spending months to years on a single piece. A crap dev will crap out a product every 6 months, make a truly forgettable game (it has to be otherwise people won't buy the next one in 6 months time!) like cheap imported furniture that is going to fall apart in a year anyway.

Re:The questions developers ask

[Kreigaffe]

DayZ is responsible for more sales of Arma2 than Arma2.

Re:The questions developers ask

[Shikaku]

So why is TF2 the most valuable game to Valve, when it allows modding, and also puts them on sale?

Re:The questions developers ask

[Colonel Korn]

How much do I make off mods?
Nothing

Many games make most of their PC sales because of mods. ARMA2 is a good example given by another poster, but each and every Bethesda game is an even bigger one.

Re:The questions developers ask

[MobyDisk]

How about making the modding tools run on consoles? Today, consoles have:
- Hard Drives
- Internet connectivity
- Keyboard and mouse support
- Good resolution displays
- Powerful enough CPUs for editing tools
- Sufficient memory for editing tools

10 years ago this would not be possible. But today it is entirely feasible. There is a marginal cost to having to Q&A the tools, but it might be worth while because you can then sell the tools as DLC. Or release it later on for free to revitalize sales of the existing game.

Re:The questions developers ask

[morari]

The Team Fortress franchise in itself started as a mod for Quake.
Counter-Strike started out as a mod.

Re:The questions developers ask

[TemperedAlchemist]

Hi! Obese leech basement dweller (neckbeard) here!

Or I must be since I make maps and mods for video games. We are basically level and game designers (mostly amateur) who have a real passion for creating content and perhaps more importantly, creating good content. We're basically like a whole team of content designers that don't actually ask for anything in return but a handful of tools to help us do it. That's a small price to pay for the huge amount of content we can really churn out, note that the competitive maps that really made Starcraft what it is today were designed by us, not Blizzard.

Oh, and I'm skinny, live on the ground floor, and don't receive one cent from my parents.

Re:The questions developers ask

[oakgrove]

How much do I make off mods?

Nothing

Yeah because Valve hasn't made a dime off of Counter-Strike, right? I mean they've only shifted 27 million units in the franchise since buying the rights to the mod. I'm sure they really regret opening that can of worms now.

Re:The questions developers ask

[geminidomino]

This exactly what Runic Games (Torchlight/Torchlight II) did, and it got them a lot of good will and a lively and loyal, if small, community around them.

Supposedly, Bethesda claimed to have done the same thing. Having tried to use the Skyrim mod tool, though, I can't imagine that the devs used it day after day and haven't strung someone up by their toenails in the breakroom yet...

Re:The questions developers ask

[Earl_Parvisjam]

Games that benefit from modding off the top of my head:

The Sims, Sims 2, Sims 3...
Elder Scrolls Series
Starcraft
Halflife series
Portal 2 (added a mod tool to stir new sales about a month ago)
Civilization series
Torchlight series
World of Warcraft (heck, almost all MMO's for that matter)

Re:The questions developers ask

[PopeRatzo]

A crap dev will crap out a product every 6 months, make a truly forgettable game (it has to be otherwise people won't buy the next one in 6 months time!) like cheap imported furniture that is going to fall apart in a year anyway.

I think this is one reason for piracy.

I enthusiastically purchase well-made games that are enjoyable. I can think of one game that I've logged hundreds of hours on and that I've purchased four times (once on PC, once for console and two for gifts to friends). If the company announced they were making a sequel, I wouldn't hesitate to pay 0-day price and pre-order.

There are other games, that for various reasons, feel like nothing but money-grabs by developers who are out of ideas. Unfinished, unloved and leaving me pissed off.

I recently played a game called "Gas Guzzlers Combat Carnage" by some indie studio (I think in Eastern Europe) called Gamepire that was a hoot to play, worked very well and cost less than $20. I even wrote the devs a fan letter telling them I hoped they'd go bigger and do a "Burnout Paradise"-style game with lots of wild arcade racing and crashes and explosions and stunts and stuff, because they did Gas Guzzlers with such elan and a sense of fun. It's basically Forza with guns. Good single player, good multi-player. Good all around.

But when a company has done such a bad job over and over, and ripped people off by not giving them value, I don't see how it's a surprise that people are pirating their games instead of laying out $60.

I know for a fact that there are people who have pirated a game and then liked it so much that they went and bought a copy. I actually think this is pretty common.

I'm not convinced that a big shakeout in the PC gaming industry is a bad thing. There are a lot of big-name game companies that are putting out crap and ripping people off and deserve to go out of business.

Re:The questions developers ask

[hairyfeet]

Not to mention you have to look at how mods can give your game real legs. I recently rebought Freelancer which is from like 2004 because i lost the box in my last move, why would i buy such an old game? the Mods frankly make that game fricking HUGE! Hundreds of systems, stations, bases, factions, you can be a pirate or a miner, join guilds, they created this huge expansive world around the game. And there is no reason you game devs can't make money off the mods either, just look at how Running With Scissors packaged up their Postal 2 with several mods as the "Fudge Pack" and sold quite a few copies.

But you are right, the grey sludge producing bean counters that want a game to be usable exactly X amount of time (so they can sell you the next grey sludge, ala EA) don't want mods because they figure if people are enjoying game A then they might not be willing to buy the same game with one or two features tacked on for another $60. Hell most of the shooters being released today are so damned generic that if you squinted you probably couldn't tell which game you were looking at. Those kinds of devs HATE modders, because often the modders frankly make the game better than they do. For an example Red Faction: Guerrilla with the weapon mods is actually pretty damned fun, without them? Royally sucks, might as well just stay in the truck and just run over everything...yawn.

Re:The questions developers ask

[dj245]

I'd agree that's what they are thinking. But I think they are wrong. A good example is Neverwinter nights. I bought that game 5 years after release so I could play some of the mods people had made for it. That's money they wouldn't have had. Look at Team Fortress 2... that wouldn't even really be a game without all the player made maps. It would have faded into obscurity a few months after release. The mod community let Valve spend less time making maps and focus more on game play.

I'm not sure I totally agree with that. The maps made by valve are excellent, and you can tell that they spent a lot of time thinking about player routes and wall placement. I have over 800 hours in TF2 and I only play Badwater, Gold rush, and Turbine.

Not to say that there aren't great player-made maps too. Turbine is an excellent map, and I believe it is player-made entirely or in part. I think this map is so good because it emulates a lot of the features that Valve uses in their maps- 3 routes to every flag, enough space and obstructions that 1 sentry doesn't dominate, a way to destroy every sentry given enough skill and thought, etc. One of the reasons I think TF2 is special is because the textures are so simple and cartoonish. You don't need to spend hours and hours painting textures or figuring out stylizing. Everything fits together well aesthetically already. You can concentrate on the things that matter like player pathing and other geographic placement.

But your point that without player-made maps the game would have failed, I can't buy it.

Re:The questions developers ask

[VortexCortex]

How much do I make off mods?

It's hard to say, but it's substantial: Mods are free advertizing. Advertizing costs money. Ergo, Mods are worth free advertizing to me. The Doom & Quake Modding communities are still around, and people are still buying the original games -- Even though the engine is open sourced! Why? To make & play mods. The source-ports and many game mods require the original assets. Total conversions like Freedoom are not compatible with all the mods, so the huge library of mods drive original game sales. The point is that it's far from "Nothing"

Seriously, "nothing" is a very deceptive and/or ignorant answer.

And where are most of my sales?

PC and Mobile, because Consoles have an artificially elevated barrier to entry, and the console market has severe discoverability issues -- Though this really doesn't matter much when it comes to mods, you'll see why two answers below.

And where are most of my pirates?

Piracy isn't a problem, It's more free advertising. "Pirates" are more likely to pay for, and get the word out about, my next game. One example: I bought myself and my nephew several games that he found out about while playing at his friend's house -- his friend pirated the games because he's a teen with no cash. That pirate made up for his piracy 200%

You can't stop piracy -- It's a symptom of an artificial scarcity system -- A BAD economic model. Piracy is only possible because we don't get paid enough up front for making the game & try to recoup costs after the fact. I'm working to change this, but it takes a strong reputation to bootstrap into the new model where I can give games away after they've been built (hey, it's just like working for a Publisher, I only want to get paid for actually doing the work -- works for mechanics and all other labour industries).

Who do modding tools benefit?

Primarily: The Game Developers. Yep, without them I wouldn't be able to make games. In fact, before I can even make a game, I must make "modding tools" to create everything from font rendering & GUIs, to level editors and multi-texture combining visualisers. Some dev studios require much simpler tools, others license engines that come with said tools -- Let me repeat that: THE ENGINE COMES WITH MODDING TOOLS. Considering that we've got to make the modding tools anyway, and that the tools themselves aren't really useful without an engine to go with it, the modding tools are only worth NOT distributing if you plan to increase the artificial scarcity of DLC. Which is dumb. People will just make their own (inf | sup)erior mod tools. Inferior tools produce mods that make your game look like crap to others on Youtube; Superior tools help folks create content that drives sales of the game and showcases what others can do -- Ding Ding Ding! More Engine Licensing Deals!

Does developing modding tools cost me?

Yes, but that's part of the cost of making the damn game! You think we dump 3D graphics and textures in a folder with the engine and it magically becomes a game?! Nope. True, some modding tools are created as plugins for 3DS Max or Maya or Blender, etc, but the point is: We've got to make them anyway. Furthermore, it may cost NOTHING! That's right! NOTHING. Sometimes folks actually reuse software...

And remind me again how much I make off any given mod?

For the high quality official in-house made mods? Well, DLC goes for anywhere between 1% and 10% of the original game sale price, or 50-100% of the original game sales for expansion packs. The sales figures vary wildly depending on how well the game has done. For community made mods, the answer's even more complex (see above), but it's provably infinitely more than "jack shit".

Re:The questions developers ask

[Penguinisto]

He's not an outlier. I've done the same thing nearly 14 years ago, just for the hell of it.

A bunch of guys took Quake 2 (then Quake3, then Unreal Tournament), and all together, we made one hell of a mod out of it.

The result wasn't counted in dollars, but was counted in untold hours of solid fun gameplay for thousands of people. Almost everyone involved did it for fun, and even looking at it from well over a decade, it was still worth it.

Y'all can keep your hypothetical $10m that 99.9% (or so) of all aspiring game designers will never see. I'll keep the awesome memories gathered over years of kick-ass gameplay and a ton of sweat.

Re:The questions developers ask

[Canazza]

Here's a handy checklist of wrong reasons to make a video game:
  - Are you making the same game two or more years in a row? (Bonus points for adding the Year onto the end of the name)
  - Is your game an clone of another, more successful game, adding no new features and having near identical art assets?
  - Do your long-term goals revolve around a microtransaction model that requires people to pay money not to be Kerb-stomped?

Each boil down to "I'm making this game to make some quick cash" whether it be by taking an initially inovative and fun game and reskinning it every year, wholesale lifting of game mechanics from another game you *dont* own the rights to and reskinning it, or creating a potentially fun game, but requiring people to constantly fork out cash just to have fun (I'm mostly looking at World of Tanks in this case, as well as alot of Mobile games).

Games made for those reasons are rarely remembered - they might make a shittone of cash, and that's why they keep getting made - but in the same way that 9 out of 10 Rom Coms won't be remembered in 2 years time, these games will fall by the wayside, meanwhile games that have some love put into them a decade ago are still selling today.

Like one of the GPPs said, people are still playing Freelancer. There's still a community for a bunch of old X games too. The Modding scene for Oblivion has seen it still being bought today, even after Skyrim - which also has a decent modding community now - was released.

Companies like Valve and Acti-Blizzard have seen the way forwards for modding, the Steam Workshop and SC2's map/mod store thing (I don't know what it's called I don't play SC2) allow people to look for mods and maps in-game, download them through a common interface and play them right away.

When it comes to Valve, look at the PeTI for Portal 2 or the community submissions workshop for TF2 (which actually shares revenue with creators who've had their stuff put in-game) - They became the giant they are today because of the loyalty of their fans, which for the most part came from how moddable their games are.

Rebirth

[Anonymous Coward]

What do you mean rebirth?
PC gaming is in full swing..

Re:Rebirth

[Colonel Korn]

What do you mean rebirth?
PC gaming is in full swing..

Nor was it ever in serious decline if you look at sales data (hint, right now it's the biggest gaming platform and the fastest growing), but the meta-narrative has asserted its decline for years.

Re:Cap

[Colonel Korn]

Why spend $2k on a pc rig, in order to play a game that I can play for free on onlive?

Because OnLive will cause you to hit your ISP's monthly cap earlier. Or because not all games are on OnLive.

Or because OnLive under the very best conditions has terrible graphical degradation and noticeable input lag.

People who buy the game for the mods

[tepples]

How much do I make off mods?
Nothing

I disagree. Would Valve have made as much money from Half-Life if there were no Counter-Strike?

And where are most of my sales?
On consoles.

If you're a sufficiently large developer. Do XNA games released on Xbox Live Indie Games outsell comparable PC games?

Does developing modding tools cost me?
Yes.

Developing level and scenario editing tools in the first place costs you. Why not continue to polish them and release them a few months later so that you can make a few bucks off players who will buy a game for the mods?

Thought PC gaming was "dying out" 10 years ago

[cpu6502]

At least that's what the /. articles were saying back then. Maybe it's just FUD like the movie-makers in the 1950s who said TV would kill theaters.

Modding has pretty much always improved sales

[onyxruby]

Looking back over 25 years of computer gaming modding has pretty much always improved sales. From the days of the original Civ games to Wolfenstein to Doom to NeverWinter Nights vs NeverWinter Nights 2 examples abound. Those games that support the community readily modding them have pretty much always had better sales than those that didn't.

Simple example would be NeverWinter Nights vs NeverWinter Nights 2 for an example in point. Embrace your user community and you will be rewarded in sales for years to come. Pull a Sony and you'l end up with a (what was the name of their PSP replacement again?)....

Human resources

[tepples]

I just realized that you appear to have forgotten a question:

Where do I find artists and programmers to hire for my next game?
From the modding community.

It's not necessarily tools that are needed

[Milharis]

I'm a Rome Total War modder, so my knowledge of modding is mainly restricted to the Total War franchise, and how The Creative Assembly deals with modding.
But I think that it's probably the same thing everywhere.

When people think of mod tools, they often think of an editor which allows to modify textures/models and scripts, for the most part. While that's great because it allows beginner to easily mod a few things, that's only minor modding.
The problem is that while it's fun to change the texture of a horse to a bunny with a hat, it's not those kind of mods that TFA is talking about.
It's the total overhaul mods that make modding so good, like Counter Strike. And with the amount and diversity of modifications needed, no tools is going to be able to do it.

In RTW, most files are text files, which means that basically everything that is not hardcoded in the exe can be changed using Notepad. The only place where a tool is needed is for art ressource, as those are packed. And for RTW, it wasn't CA that released this tool, but a guy who reversed-engineering the packing system. In the subsequent release Medieval II Total War, CA actually released a tool to unpack things, because they had added protections.

The newer TW games however don't have the same major mods, because they changed the way data is structured. Things which used to be rather easy to do are now (almost) impossible, simply because no one can access the data in a useful manner. Because of the thriving modding community created by the previous games, there are a few people that are painfully trying to make sense of things, but HEX editing is a huge pain, and has huge limitations.

All of that to say that modders don't really need tools like editor (though they are quite nice).
What they need is a way to access and modify data easily (which can be through a tool like an unpacker, or a converter), and documentation/information to make sense of it.