News - ModBlog

2 comments by INtense! on Mar 12th, 2008 digg this super bookmark

A bit of a random update this one covering a few different things. First up, do you run a community site outside of the Mod DB or have you created a Mod DB profile on another site? If so let us know, so we can let our community know, because as I always say there is no such thing as too much modding. Four sites which currently feature Mod DB which I encourage you all to check out are:

• Mod DB on PWNED
• Mod DB on Facebook
• Mod DB on Steam
• Mod DB on Wikipedia

Secondly now that Mod DB v4 is well and truly here with a new look, we decided it was time to freshen up our link image kit for game sites and mod sites that want to link to the Mod DB. Link your mod profile, your downloads, anything you want - help us spread the word of modding to the entire game community and receive cake*

Finally userbars plague forum systems, slow loading times and waste valuable space but we still love them so we decided to craft a game developers userbar kit which has custom userbars for sound techs, modders, coders, artists and more. Check em out and slap them in your forum sigs.

*You may, or may not receive cake

51 comments by jacksonj04 on Mar 9th, 2008 digg this super bookmark

Archiving mods isn't something we like doing. We dislike banning mods even more. However, Knights of the Force has finally reached the point where - despite numerous chances at redemption and erring on the side of goodwill - we have decided to add it to our small list of "Don't touch this with a very long stick" mods.

As some of you may be aware, KotF has long had a reputation of being a sham mod with no original content, never delivering what was promised when it was promised. This was compounded by allegations of attempting to charge for the mod, misappropriation of donations and various other stuff. Mod DB's policy of not getting involved with the politics of individual mods was rolled out time and time again in response to various users asking (And in some cases demanding) that we ban the mod, TimFx, and anybody else who happened to say that perhaps the mod might be legitimate.

Months passed and it all faded away, only to be brought back to the forefront a couple of days ago with the advent of Knights of the Force 2.0 (Part 1). We duly downloaded the file, read the readme, noticed the mentions of the virus alert, checked the checksums and decided that at least one part of the mod was as described - there was no virus in cmdow.exe. The rest of the mod looked to be vaguely correct to our non-Jedi-Academy-playing eyes, so we tentatively authed the download.

Two days later, we've been getting allegations of trojans of varying degrees, pointless file bulking, distribution of LucasArts' original content, non-attribution of some content and various other stuff. Some of this is verified, other is scaremongering. Either way this adds up to what is, in the eyes of some of Mod DB's core staff, a simple verdict:

Pull it. We've given enough chances for the mod's reputation to be restored.

For legal reasons and to avoid the subsequent headaches I'm not going to make or repeat specific accusations against the mod or say which of the above we believe to be true, but suffice to say we believe it has broken several of Mod DB's terms of use, and just goes against the spirit of the entire modding community. We have pulled the 2.0 (Part 1) download completely and banned the mod, although you may find the changes haven't rippled out to you by the time you read this.

Any questions you have we'll do our best to answer in here if you post a comment, or if you'd rather not say something publically then fire me a PM.

1 comment by INtense! on Mar 7th, 2008 digg this super bookmark

So I have finally begun working on the Mod DB v4 forums, 2 months after I estimated they'd be done. I cannot begin to describe how much work there is to do behind the scenes on a daily basis, with events like MOTY taking up a ton of time (infact I'm still working on the event now). Plus it takes me a good three hours to respond to my emails daily, meaning development time is limited. But rest assured they are coming, so if you have feedback or suggestions, please PM me.

In other news, a number of fixes/changes have been deployed over the past 2 days which I will list now:

• Fixed upload system bug with filenames > 40chars
• Optimized many site SQL queries lowering load time significantly (yay!)
• Fixed video audio encoding incorrectly (unfortunately WMA3 still screws up videos, so if you are uploading a movie to ModDB, make sure the audio is encoded in MP3 if possible!)
• All video galleries RSS is in podcast format for you to subscribe to using apps like iTunes
• Last updated date of mods/games will be updated when news is auth'd or images are added to the gallery. This should make the mod and games listing much more accurate.
• Link spamming has been cleaned up significantly.
• Stats on the sidemenu have been fixed when browsing content i.e. downloads.
• Archived news will now trigger a modwatch update.
• Comments can now be previewed.
• Page 2 of your friends list actually works.

If you want to keep ontop of everything happening on ModDB.com, watch this blog!

15 comments by stenchy on Mar 4th, 2008 digg this super bookmark

Since the release of v4, we have been looking for new ways to help developers in their quests to reach audiences to enjoy their creations. The newly christened 'Modcast' is just the first in list of changes and additions we are implementing. We are always looking for ways to put developers into the spotlight.

Effective immediately, the Mod DB staff is going to provide even more exposure for quality major releases of mods by listing them on the Flash-powered Rotator that appears above the news listings. The extra effort that many mod teams put into their projects and press releases should receive more attention. We want to help teams that do their best to capitalize on every tool, resource and service Mod DB offers.

This being said, there will be a few ground rules going forward that we will use to determine which releases warrant the extra attention:

• Featured releases must be major releases with significant changes. No bugfixes or minor patches will be accepted.
• News posts about releases must be well formatted (spelling!) and contain the following:
  1. Links to downloads of the latest release on ModDB.com's download section
  2. Media (screenshots/video) taken from latest release that is linked to the gallery for your mod's profile on ModDB.com (you can use the embed html code in the lower right hand corner seen in gallery pages)
• Mods of varying sizes will be considered - everything from gameplay tweaks to full-out total conversions (alpha, beta, charlie, etc.) but the quality of the both the mod/game content and press release will be the main determining factors.

We believe that this presents a fair chance for all mods to showcase their works. At the same time, it provides gamers with quick easy access to the best mods with information that is easy to digest. So start proofreading and slapping some polish on those press releases and news posts, it could lead to a whole lot of extra heads turning your way.

If any of you mod teams out there want to drum up even more coverage and do a feature or pop onto the Modcast, drop me a PM and we'll chat.

10 comments by INtense! on Feb 29th, 2008 digg this super bookmark

For a long time now myself and others who work on Mod DB have been silently adding new features to the site, shifting things around, printing t-shirts and doing various other interesting (boring?) stuff. I've always wanted to share these updates but never really had a place to do so. Well that has just changed thanks to the introduction of this BLOG, which will be updated whenever we make a change.

So for the fans of the site I highly recommend you watch this group, as you can expect tons of inside info, a tour of the Mod DB office, shots of us wearing Mod DB shirts and random thoughts about the mod scene in general. We'll keep it interesting promise!

For the first installment, I'd like to point people to the Old Timers Group Image Gallery, which now has images of all mod related sites I have worked on from 1998 onwards, and gives some good (badly written) insight into the history of the Mod DB. Here are some preview images:

Oh and the marketers who run all the ads you guys love have posted a survey. Check it out here if you have a few minutes.