Steam enables charging for mods? WTF?!

[xMobilemux]

DLC abuse isn't enough?

Arguably the greatest thing about the all mighty PC master race is the ability to make games remain fresh decades after their release with the glorious mods that the communities make.
Thanks to mods my all time favorite game Duke3D has thousands, yes thousands of levels to play and limitless content, a lifetime of playing Duke3D and I still haven't played a quarter of the total amount of user created content, for gods sake the legendary 2001 build of Duke Nukem Forever was recreated in Duke3D!!

Plus there's the awesome mods like Brutal Doom like overhauls, HD upgrades, character swaps, hell thanks to mods I can play Doom 1 remade in Doom 3 as well as give it the graphical level of Crysis, also let's not forget those glorious nude mods.:inlove:
The best part is it's always been FREE!!!

But it's pretty much inevitable that charging for mods will get out of control, be abused to hell and back much like modern day DLC and ruin PC gaming and gaming in general.

Now on the other hand Valve is also adding a Donate option for the modders alongside this which I actually like, modders who work hard for nothing to make these games even better deserve to at least be allowed some donations so Valve should keep that on board, but the charging for mods needs to go.

What do you all think about this, is Valve playing with fire here?


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[Wuodan]

What do you all think about this, is Valve playing with fire here?

Definitely. This could very well will be the beginning of the Early Access fraud on mods hence degrading their quality standarts and the end of such amazing communities like Nexus which will eventually kill what made modding great in the first place.

I don't think Steam's intentions are bad and some modders deserve to get credit for amazing works they've done but I can clearly see how this can go very, very wrong.

Well, Gaben opened Pandora's box. We can only wait for the outcome and hope it will be for the benefit of gamers.

 

[Dark Drakan]

It has its good points and has its bad points, I believe a mod has to have a certain amount of up votes etc before they can start charging for it or something to that effect. A voluntary donation is the option I would have gone to also as some of the mods are better than some official expansions and take a lot of man hours and time and effort to create. However charging 99p etc for some new weapons etc and new skins is a joke and shouldnt be encouraged as modders will start to lower the amount of items and skins they put in packs so they can sell more packs etc. Everything can be abused and they will have to be very careful with this, might actually encourage more companies to create mod tools for their games as they get a cut of the revenue made from them.

Mods are one of the main reasons I have currently spent over £1000 building a new PC, so I would hate for the scene to change so much before I have even finished my build. Purchased Skyrim Legendary Edition on Steam last night in preparation as it was on sale for just over £6.

 

[Foxtrot94]

This is one of the most BS news I've ever seen.

Voluntary donations, fine. But straight up charching? F you, Valve. Sincerely.

 

[Sieghart]

From what i heard, only 25% of profit will go to the mod creators and 75% for Valve/Bethesda. Though i also fear that what if most modders from Nexus moved over Steam workshop due to this system? It means that most mods there will be abandoned and the latest version will be uploaded to Steam. Those who don't want to pay for the latest version of mods will be stuck to their old version. It seems to me that this already happened to Isoku, the author of the Wet and Cold mod from Skyrim(One of the biggest and acclaimed mod), and was said getting harassed online by now.

I really can't even play Skyrim without mods because some of them have become really essential for my Skyrim experience. Examples being Frost Fall, Wet and Cold, Immersive armors and weapons, Climates of Tamriel and ENBs for few examples. It's good and all that Valve allowed 24 hours for testing the mod but good god, anyone here who have any experience of Skyrim modding will know that 24 hours is not enough to test a mod. Single weapon or armor mod? Sure 24 hours but mods with the scope of, let's say Frost fall or Falsakaar, 24 hours is simply not enough. I have tested mods before for three days minimum and i suddenly encountered game-breaking bugs and glitch after a week.

This whole monetization is more of a scumbag move really. Nexus has a donation button and the mod creator will get 100% of that donation. Modding has been fine for years with just being free and most mod users from what i have seen are willing to donate to support their favorite mod creator.

 

[lorddemolatron]

Well this also shocked me, as Im well i been playing on Steam well known game what surerly mostly relies on Mods what is Garry Mod and now this nonsense, only pray that this Valve controversial mode ends cancelled ( or rather i think this not happen well) beacuse Im afraid that some mine liked mods would end as only pay ones., this would not amuse me now.

 

[WolfOD64]

Good thing I got every Skyrim Mod I would ever need.

 

[Sieghart]

Trololol: http://www.pcgamer.com/paid-for-skyrim-mod-removed-in-a-matter-of-hours/

 

[Wuodan]

I think this belongs here.

 

[ef9dante_oSsshea]

Looks like modding won't be so easy on DMC4se so , glad I am not into mods as I am sure this is a blow to those who are

 

[Foxtrot94]

Looks like modding won't be so easy on DMC4se so , glad I am not into mods as I am sure this is a blow to those who are

It ain't an issue for DMC4 or the SE man, since there's no Steamworks mod support for them. DMC mods are from external sites.

It affects all Steamworks supported games however, like freakin Skyrim.

Luckily for The Witcher 3 at least, mods are gonna be surely downloadable from the RedKit site.

This situation sucks though.

 

[Sieghart]

It affects all Steamworks supported games however, like freakin Skyrim.

I'm not that worried when it comes to Beth games because you have Nexus for that. That site mostly had the best mods around and more people use them rather than steam workshop because it's safer and faster to integrate your mod through nexus manager or mod organizer than steam. Though as i said before, if most mod creators from nexus decided to move over steam workshop and abandon their mod in Nexus then you'll stuck with the old version since the newest version has a price tag on it. But from what i have seen, even most mod creators doesn't like this new system by Valve.

 

[Dark Drakan]

Think Boogie covered all my concerns here.​

 

[Wajpa]

Steam doesn't allow mods which exceed some size doesn't it? If that's the case then people are going to use Nexus anyway. I don't like that they are charging for it, I'd prefer encouraging donating for the mods you like. On the other hand, to me it doesn't seem that bad aside from the fact that Valve takes 75% of the money. I could understand it for Dota 2 and TF2 since these are their games but they have nothing to do with Skyrim. I do think that Valve abuses its position on the market but this could potentially allow mods, which had their development halted simply because of the lack of time, be continued again.

TB shares most of my thoughts on this.

 

[Dark Drakan]

Already been a major legal issue on Day 1 and the well known modder Chesko now on his way to quitting modding and losing access to his mod as Valve has taken it. He created a mod that used some animations created by another modder after being advised that it would be ok as the animation pack was freely available to download and now his mod has been pulled from steam workshop and he can no longer distribute it himself as Valve have claimed ownership. He is now considering removing ALL of his work from Nexus and quitting modding altogether. With Valves hands off approach to this its only a matter of time before this happens to someone else and legal battles pop up everywhere and the hobby of modding people once loved and had a passion for turning into something corporate and them walking away from the scene entirely.

Also worth noting that if the mod fails to get a total of over $400 regardless of time length, Valve & Bethesda receive all of that revenue and the modder gets nothing. If it does manage to pass that amount then the modder will only get 25% of it.

So far Bethesda & Valve have earned a minimum of $4,000 from total purchases (from what I have read), while most of the mod creators have received nothing only a handful have actually made anything at all and lots have already had their mods pirated. People pay for them then requested a refund (which you can in 24 hour period) then they uploaded the files to other sites for people to download for free.

 

[Foxtrot94]

This is so wrong, so ****ed up, so bullsh!t. I have no words, it's ridiculous.

 

[Viper]

Welcome to the world of corporate business, where gates of hell have been long open.

 

[Sieghart]

Chesko? That's the guy who made Frostfall and Arissa for Talos sakes. One of the best modders in Skyrim community for a lot of people including me.

 

[xMobilemux]

Highly praised icons in gaming are really screwing up lately aren't they?
First Tim Schafer becomes an insulting a$$wipe by calling female and minority gamers sock puppets and then the all mighty Valve falls down to the scumbag levels of Capcom, EA and Ubisoft with this crap, both of them did it in one single move too while EA, Capcom and Ubisoft did it slowly over time.

It fills me with dread to think what gaming will be like 10 years from now.

 

[LordOfDarkness]

I might not use mods. But still, this is ridiculous to an almighty level. I'm in no way surprised though. Companies like to pull dick moves. Still, this sucks a whole other lemon.