For many, they are one in the same. Comcast and EA aren’t evil, they are caught up in financial decisions.
I find it somewhat humorous that the only people in here who use the words “evil” and “valve” together are the ones saying that they aren’t evil (including me).
Have you met Rachel?
This is what I’ve been saying from the start - The next Elder Scrolls and Fallout games will only use mods from Steam Workshop, thus generating more revenue. Its easy to see where they get the idea from, seeing how Skyrim still ranks amongst the most played games every single day on Steam.
In the beginning non Steam mods will work fine, then they’ll become slightly inconvenient to use, later still they’ll become “unsupported but possible” and finally impossible to use without hacks.
Thats one of the fears. After seeing how all the fears for DLC where right, people is just scared new changes mean gaming will turn worse.
I think the real problem is not Paid mods, but DLC. Developers releasing games with in-disc DLC. Developers anouncing DLC before the game is released.
One attack to the concept of “Pay once, own forever” is the betrayal of Season Pass. A SP used to be paying once to get all DLC’s. But that quickly turned into pay 30$ to get 1 average DLC and 3 crappy ones.
And another betrayal to “Pay once, own forever” is the “GOTY edition”. For whatever reason the GOTY edition used to be the version of the game with all the DLC. Not anymore.
People don’t want to buy Half a Game. They want to play complete games, not play half of one and know theres another half floating around. It ruins the feeling.
DLC is poison for the gaming world because of that.
So the reaction to “Paid mods” is the fear another thing in the gaming world is going to turn to shit. Now a new GTA game can release with low res textures, no endgame and poor variety of cars… but all of it would be fixed by strong modding support, so people make new textures or cars. But the best mods, the ones that add cars of consistent quality, cost 30$. Here the ugly face of DLC, the one of “We play only half of shit, not complete shit” shows his ugly face.
People is scared and angry.
I agree completely Teiman. I guess we’ll see, but there is every reason to think that the last few years of modding for Bethesdas games have been datamined extenesively, so they know exactly what to monetize and how when they release Fallout and Elder Scrolls games.
touché
Gabes Reddit AMA is nothing more than PR damage control from a company that knows exactly what it is doing.
They knew there would be a huge backlash, they have already weathered many of them.
I remember the day that Steam was first released and people were shaking their pitchforks because Half-Life required an internet connection to activate.
As soon as everything dies down and the sheep get used to paying for mods then Valve will be laughing all the way to the bank.
Obligatory xkcd comic.
Nice vid of a Steam exec… hehe.
Today I learned that raising the possibility of having to pay a small fee for previously free entertainment is apparently the worst thing that has happened to some people.
Reddit has become unbearable. Ye gods.
I remember when Skyrim started there steam workshop I thought, wont be long before they start charging for it. I was kidding! I thought Valve wouldnt touch selling mods from anything but there own games… but $$$$ talks, go get your shoeshine box and shut the fuck up.
I’m keeping an open mind but it’s obvious that this isn’t just about pocketbook resentment, there are principled reasons to be concerned that we are entering the end of an era and what’s coming next might just suck a lot.
You’re seeing the entitled folks, but not see the slippery slope folks.
And yes, the one thing that will anger people fast is paying for something they expect to be free. You don’t turn non-paying users into paying customers that way.
I do see your point (and those of others) who see the potential for good in this. I just think that requires a level of trust in gaming companies that the industry hasn’t earned in general. Large publicly-owned publishers especially have earned massive distrust. Collectively their reputation is around Comcast level.
Nah all things must pass, nobodys really buying the apple Watch are they? Steam will pass, or sellout to a multinational, you will forget about your games on steam. and life will go on.
I have 300+ mods on skyrim alone, nevermind the fallout games. I can’t imagine what that would cost…
I foresee people leaving PC gaming for consoles. Although it’s probably only a matter of time until you can buy mods on consoles if this works. This hobby has been sold into slavery between DLCs, freemium games, and now Steam. We had such a nice thing going, too. I disagree that quality in mods will improve because of this. Airlines used to give free meals… Did the food quality really improve since they started charging?
I don’t know why you would leave a platform where there’s some potential for free mods (and maybe some carefully selected paid mods, if push comes to shove) to go to a platform where there’s no modding and little to no user control over the game whatsoever, especially as a protest move over the idea of paying for mods. It’s not like the base game is going to be any better on consoles.
I guess his argument is that if PC loses mods as one of its main advantages then it certainly helps consoles.
I find it interesting how modern economies try whenever possible to turn everything into a recurring fee rather than complete purchasable product. This isn’t just true of games either, it crops up everywhere now. Heck, it’s even creeping quickly into labor.