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This article was written to spread all my anger about the games and to criticize the game developers, the mod makers and everyone else.
It’s divided in topics, but you’d better start from the beginning (I love this phrase ;)). Good reading! Don’t forget to comment later!
I still remember the first “big” game I played for PC: Doom. At that time, PC games weren’t so popular, but Doom was a successful game. I guess everyone played it a lot, and liked it as it was. There were some modifications, but they couldn’t reach everyone because the Internet wasn’t so common.
After Doom, many games had come. Every release was marked by something new, enhancements and better graphics. The games were different from each other, but all were good.
The main things that marked the “game evolution” were the graphics, the playability (giving much freedom to the players) and the gameplay, usually bringing something totally new. Yeah, the damn creativity was there.
And then, each new game brought more and more innovation… when suddenly the modding came up. It was so hard to modify the games, but people did it anyway…
Today, what we have? Games coming with own editors, with a clear code… should we say “games that exist to be edited”? Yes. But… what changed in the games? The “fun factor”, really. I could play games such as Warcraft 2, Diablo, even Quake 1 for months… sometimes 1 or 2 years, having a lot of fun.
What can I say about UT2003 or U2? Nah. It gets boring after a week. Ok ok, a month it’s still acceptable. But we all know those games have big mod promises. So, do you agree we’re buying a game to play its mods??? That’s the truth, sadly.
I wonder how the future games will be. I guess they’ll come without any maps, models or even gametypes – Just the engine and an easy editor. Maybe they’ll include one or two things as example, so we’ll be able to mod them. Yes, I’m nearly sure that’s going to happen.
If you stop to think a little bit… link the “boring games factor” to the “editable games factor”, and what you’ve got? We’re doing their job. Sadly, we’re just finishing what they were supposed to do: make a game enjoyable.
I’m not against modding, but we’ve to take care with this things… otherwise the future will be like I said.
It’s the best example I have in mind. They said the game would be much bigger than it’s, the game would run differently according to your decisions in-game, it would have 3 classes (each with its own stats and story)… but what did they do? They didn’t finish the game. They thought “hey, we can earn money today instead of in the next week… lest release it as it is! Someone will finish the game for us *for free* :D”. And then, the game came out, with tons of bugs, we all know.
Even the UT2003 had a lot of bugs. I think it’s the first time I saw a Demo that had a patch. Why? Because they didn’t finish their work. How many patches UT2003 had since it was released? I think it’s 4, and more are coming. Have you ever paid attention on how much bug fixes the patches have? Tons of it. Here we can see that something is tremendously wrong.
… really. Let’s see an example to check this.
Do you play UT2003? Ok… what are the differences between UT2003 and UT? It has better graphics (but needs a super computer), real physics simulation (doesn’t change anything in the gameplay), the adrenaline thing (could be easily coded to UT)… I guess the biggest difference is that it had a “2003” added to its title.
So, why people bought it? Because of the possibilities. I’m sure it’ll have lots of mods in some months, but are we doing the right thing? No way!
That’s a good point. If we want to modify something, probably that’s because we aren’t satisfied with what we have. Observing the huge number of mods for games like HL and UT, we can see that almost no one is satisfied.
Ok, there’s another decisive thing before start modding. I hate discussing about it, but it’s true. People like being at the spotlight. Most people would like to appear in the television just to “be popular”. Moreover, that’s the reason that people love being photographed.
Returning to the mod content… people like being famous, at least they try to be famous. I really can’t accept someone doing a mod to be famous, but it’s so common today that I even can’t judge everyone.
I usually say I hate Half-Life, and people used to ask me why. The answer is CS. It’s so stupid that a mod becomes so popular… and if you compare CS to many other similar mods around, you’ll see what I’m talking about. CS is a crap. I wonder how it became so popular in the whole world…
Would you play a game just because everyone plays it? It looks like that’s what happened. That’s the reason many people presented me when I asked them “why CS?”, instead of other Mods. Everyone here knows that’s I’m the “UT whore”, so I’ll compare CS with a mod called Infiltration.
I don’t know what makes a Mod popular, and I don’t know why a mod such as Infiltration isn’t popular. If a low-level mod as CS is played in the whole world, Infiltration should be played in our galaxy.
If you like CS, consider stop playing it for a while, and go get other mods for any games. I’m sure you’ll find a lot of much better mods. Don’t click the “modDB TopSites” to search for them… no way. Check a review site you have a link to, or search for some mod news in the modDB news archive.
I have in mind a solution for the crap-gaming. Instead of playing UT2003, play UT. Instead of Quake 3 or HL, play Quake 2 or 1. Don’t mind with useless things such as graphics. Remember: What makes the difference is the “fun factor”.
Modify the old games. You may not become a pop star, but you be honoring the old games, which made us have fun during a big period of our lives. They’re worth it.
If you’re trying to become a pop star, or if you’d like to finish their jobs (you know what I’m talking about), ok. It’s up to you, but keep in mind what kind of games you’ll be playing in the future. It’ll be all your fault.
wow.... thats impressive :o
Well, I am some one who does not have a clue on how to make a mod... I wouldn’t know where to start... But I do play allot of games that I like... UT (My favorite and will always play it), all three Quake series along with Team Quake, Soldier of Fortune, Rune, Wolfenstine, Medal of Honor, and the list goes on... But after beating the single player 6 or 7 times the games get boring... Then you get into the Multiplayer aspect of the game... Where you get to shoot and test your skills against real people in a game setting, but some parts of the game don’t look or feel right...
Lets take Medal of Honor as an example... When you shoot some one in the game, the blood looks like dry power bursting out them... Some one made a mod that made it look a little more realistic... Should the developer have done a better job??? Hell ya he should have, but he didn’t... His job was to get it developed for production to make money... And we bought it cuz it's a good and fun game with or with out any mods...
No one is forcing people to make mod, maps, or skins... They do it for themselves as a challenge or to enhance a game to make it more fun and exciting... Granted there are some mods that are just down right stupid... But for the most part, I enjoy adding good, fun mods and mutaters in to my games and starting up a server for others to enjoy... You guys in the mod community, not only modify or enhance these games, you keep these games alive by your willingness to share with the gaming community... I for one am grateful for all the hard work and dedication you and others put forth in creating these mods...
There are allot of great minds out there in the mod community... As for the future of games, it may be you, who develops the next generation of games... And perhaps that why, these game developers put the tools in for you to modify
I guess the game developers put tools to let us finish their work... :rolleyes:
I have three of the most modded Games around, UT, Quake 3, and Half Life. I have wanting a new for powerful computer since UT2k3. I've heard a lot about it, and I've started to think I won't. I have the full Quake series and I play Quake 1 alot. If you have Quake 3, you might notice that it has most of the weapons from Quake 1. But It has no story line and that really ****** me off. Even more, when i can't find any SP mods for it. UT is sorta the same, except does have SP mods and plenty of them. Half Life is just bad. I don't download mods for it, and I'm cleaning out my Mod Watch of HL mods soon except for some good ones. In fact, I only play Half Life Opposing Force (which was better than the original game IMO). Anyway, good feature Darkness.
I know what you mean... that's exactly what happened to me ;)
Quake 3 has storyline- The Vadrigar captured the universes greatest warriors and put them in an arena to fight each other.
Not the exact words but thats what the story was basically.
And, I found a few single player quake3 mods
1 on moddb, and a few on Planetquake.
People dont just make mods to improve games, in some cases there was nothing wrong with the games-
People make mods to include their own Ideas in the games.
But you are right, games should be made right the first time, we shouldnt have to correct the mistakes they made.
Exactly, ViperX :D
The main reason companies make their games moddable is to let people make their own ideas into games without a ton of programming. Plus, they say nothing thrills a game designer more than to see good mods made for his game :D
What a retarded article. "*******" is acceptable?
First off most games do come complete, it comes down to money usually; not lazyness.
Your example; Unreal 2. Was just a sucky game, they probably didnt impliment the stats addition because it would prove un-needed and gimmicky. INstead they focused on level design and story, but hey Legend suck and hence so did the game.
Releasing modding tools with a game does not make the developer lazy, it means they want the community to create new material that will keep the community alive, which is what all developers want.
As for games coming out with just a few levels and lots of modding tools: wrong. Your confusing yourself with actual engines people buy to make there game on (litech), no way on earth would a company stick its neck out, or do something so stupid as to create a brilliant engine then just sell it with a few levels, the reviewers would slate it and no-one would buy it, because modifications take time.
I could go on and on, retarded article.
azz0r: would you mind if I call you "retarded"?
care to point out how Im wrong?
I think most mod makers create mods because they got bored playing the game. After finishing HL, I already got bored and never tried playing it again. So what's wrong with CS? Many like it because it rocks. HL's gfx makes me dizzy but when I saw Cs, I never thought that it was just only a mod. oh well. The unfinished thingy is so obvious, the game developers rush the game, earn money then let somebody finish their work
The answer to "why we mod games" isn't "because we're not satisfied with them", its because "i could do so much with this engine" or "this player base will really help my mod get off the ground". You don't mod a game because its not satisfying enough, if that were true then every game would have at least a million mods. eg: this is what you're saying - "Unreal Tournament, its a great first person shooter, yes, but it doesn't really deal with the conflict in Iraq, or the fact that it doesn't tell me which method of cooking eggs it prefers. This makes me unsatisfied. I think i'll make a mod about the war in Iraq." A game can never FULLY satisfy a gamer, even if you were to specify it to say, first person shooters - if Quake 3 is the best deathmatch experience, its teamplay modes are sorely outmatched by Tribes 2.
If we see potential in a game, for example Unreal Tournament 2003, we think - "hey, i could really use that particle system to *blah*" or "the high polycounts will help me make my *blah* really scary/realistic/humorous!" or "the UDN will really help me get my *blah* mod off the ground!" (UDN = Unreal Developers Network). The playerbase is obviously important too, noones gonna play your mod for a game noone plays, thats why there ARE so many Half-Life mods, its so damn popular. Thats also why making mods for doom/quake is pretty pointless now, there will be no new players. Sure, theres a few of old ones still left, but when they stop playing, noone will replace them, and your mod will die.
In short, good luck to all the modders modding the big new games, and lets hope mods for old games stay alive as long as possible, now excuse meh, I'm off to make more ranting posts about Counterstrike ¬_¬
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Thats also why making mods for doom/quake is pretty pointless now, there will be no new players. Sure, theres a few of old ones still left, but when they stop playing, noone will replace them, and your mod will die.
Wrong. I routinely see new players come into the quake 1 scene. In my opinion, many newer games lack what I call a "soul". What exactly is a "soul"? It's what happens when you pour yourself into a game for the sake of the game and not for the sake of money. It's when you look at your game as you would your child. And it is, because it's a child of your mind. Your creation. I beleve that what is currently wrong with game developers is that they no longer understand what it is that the gamers like. They are in it for the money as opposed to being in it to create a work of art. Take games such as Freespace 1 and Freespace 2 for example. Volition created a game that they themselves would enjoy playing. Even UT has a "Soul".
My own personal drive in creating mods, is not so much to become popular myself, indeed quite the opposite. I work to create a mod that does things that I personally enjoy. A mod that I myself would play. What matters to me is that people actually LIKE the mod.
THIS is my main driving motivation behind the mod I'm currently working on (TROH:NQ).
Hee.... I everytime finish my st//
Yeah, I see what you mean... but there're two different stages of modding:
The first is usually our first modding experience... which may be something we create by ourselves, just to test it, etc. This kind of Mod you do for yourself, and there're a possibility that you won't publish it... or will send it to your friends only, you know.
But... when you publish your mod and you see people like it... man, everything changes... at least, that's what happened to me. I mean, I no longer mod for myself, but... for the rest of the people. Actually, I rarely play my mod today... but I'm still working on it. I don't like this way of modding, but it seems that we're dragged to do things like this after a while.
And then, what happens? Sure, I've lost a lot of motivation since that... instead of releasing a version once a month, now it takes 4 or 5 months. I no longer code everyday as I used to do; now I may even not open the editor for a whole week.
So... I think that sometimes it'd be better if I hadn't published my mod. Of course, it wouldn't be as it is, I can't say if it'd be worst (I think it would), but at least I'd still have the same motivation I had when I started coding...
I find it interesting that the only reason the author could find for people making mods is to either get glory or because they're unsatisfied with the game as is. I think you're leaving out a large portion of the modding community.
I mod for quake to create things and to develop new things for myself and others to enjoy. I like to play my mods Jeht, Battle Mech, and Galactix, and I find it very delightful when someone else plays them and likes them. Galactix just got a creativity award and a huge amount of coverage, as did Battle Mech, but that's not the reason I made them. Glory is nice, and it's fun to improve on the game, but to me it's a hobby, a fun thing I do.
I find myself wondering if the author of that article was even a modder himself...
I see what you mean... but I didn't say that those were the only reasons to mod a game - I just said that they're very common, that people tend to mod because of them. If you're not sure about this, check the other comments here... and you'll see what I'm talking about.
And yes, I AM a modder...
omg.... wow!
Just because you mod as a result of boredom, doesn't mean that's why others mod too... I've talked to a lot of mod developers and been through a lot of development forums, and to me it's more of an aesthic desire and attempt to get into computer development careers. Although, in most cases, making a mod doesn't get them into a position of gaming development, most people seem to base their modding on that. I, personally, started out with making custom maps for already developed mods, etc... This was not because of my boredom with the other maps, this was because I wanted the satisfaction of making my own map that others were "woed" by. The enjoyment of other players playing a mod you helped to make is why most people do it, of course, I could be wrong... But I don't think i am.
Although I do agree that games are losing their fun factor, as it's become all about graphics and realism... pfff
by aesthic, I meant aesthetic... really should proofread before submitting, eh?
Crap...that last post stole what I was going to say...:lol: But made a good point. Game designers today think they can "wow" us into thinking a game is good with flashy graphics and added features. Graphics are okay, but after a ten hour drive, you get tired of looking at scenery go by, and the same is true of a gaming experience...if it's okay to look at but boring to play, who gives a damn about it? Likewise, added features just bog down players after a while...it frustrates me to have to reach all around the keyboard like an octopus in a feeding frenzy, trying to reach all the different game function keys when I could be enjoying a game just as much with a simple set of controls. No, I'm not Amish, I just enjoy what we liked about games of the FPS type when they first came out...the fun factor that comes from solid gameplay, good level design, and that undeniable feeling you get playing certain games that says, "Hey...the guys who made this really had fun putting it together, and wanted us to have fun too...". I think somewhere during or slightly before HL come onto the scene, when designers realized they could make a bundle off substandard games, and we weren't expecting the drop in quality, the game design ethic went down the toilet, and here we are now... :P
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It's not fair to call CS is crap; it was actually innovative in it's time. Its like saying Doom is crap because its graphics are nowhere near as good as Doom III. It's not CS's fault that there are some many CS clones that they take up trillions of terrabytes. Anyways, the people who "start" a mod and keep at 0% forever are the dark side of the modding community. We need to do something about it; modding is one of the (albeit many) reasons the PC is far superior to the console. Let's keep it that way.
Yeah, modding is something great in the gaming community, but the game developers should not make a game "just to be moddable". That's the point of this article, and that's what's happening now. A lot of people here were just waiting for games like Ut2k3 (and are waiting for Hl2, for example) just to mod it... and it's not right.
As we said, all they want is money, and the faster they get it, the better it's for them, no matter what's the cost (the cost that WE pay). Ahmm... I guess I'll have to update this article later... :paranoid:
The things you say don't have a lot of point to them.
Darkness your last post says it all really.
Basicly you'd rather purely play a game where you couldn't ever mod it and it must be complete from the game devs, the problem with this thinking these days is that a lot of people are purely wanting a game engine to mod, they couldn't care if the devs game is good or bad it has no bearing and what some people want to do as a mod of the game engine.
Geennrally most mods arn't around because the game devs didn't make the game great, it's because people want to play different things.
HL is about a single guy trying to get out of a base that has major alien problems. This is the real game from the devs.
CS is about a team of SAS or badies trying to kill each other. This is a single mod made for the HL engine.
The two games don't relate in any way, yet you seem to think the "game" and all the mods must be related to each other other wise you wouldn't mod the game, The game is made for certain things that the game devs want and some player really do like the game as it is.
Some people how ever would rather see something else and instead of creating a game dev company etc and trying to get publishers and raise money for the company etc, they instead buy a game and slowly find out that you can mod it and they slowly work out how to do that so instead of playing the game devs game you can now play something you'd rather play yourself.
A lot of FPS games don't really intrest me because they all get boreing after a certain amount of time, but over time I now wish to mod a game engine so that I can start playing something that I would like to see FPS wise, So I have gone out a got a game purely on the basis of modding the game not to play it as the game doesn't intrest me all that much in general.
I also couldn't care less if heaps of people do or don't like the mod I intend to make as I will be make it for myself to play so, in answer to your articale I would say that you'd be somewhat wrong in general, because most mods arn't meant to fix up the orginal game devs game.
They are meant to stand up on their own merits and be it's own game, though for a mod to exist it must have a platform from wish to stand upon and that is the orginal game devs game engine, just the same as the game devs's game bits must use this game engine as a platform.
Hmm... not really.
Sure I like mods, I played a lot of them, I even created one.
That's what I mean. And I think it's somewhat wrong. Here comes the "unfinished games" - all they have to do now is to create a nice engine, with cool graphics, an editor, and that's all, as we are going to create things from it.
Of course modding doesn't only exist because people feel that a game is not complete, but in fact, games will tend to become more and more imcomplete with this.
That's what you want? That's what's going to happen if we want games just to mod as you said.
And then I wonder: why we have 348 registered HL2 mods here? It looks like these people knows that HL2 will inherit the popularity of HL. That'd be the only reason to wait for it, instead of moving to a released game, unless their mod is going to be related to HL2 itself (characters, weapons, plot, etc).
Of course I know mods can be completely different from the game, but in this case, I guess people wouldn't have to wait for an unreleased engine that doesn't promise a thing, right? Do I have a point now?
1- Game developping as developped to a industry. And some creativity has been lost in the process. Releasing more titles, even pointless titles, its needed for this industry.
2- You dont need reasons to mod, but exist tons of reason. From fun, to get popularity, to get money, etc.. etc.. etc.
3- The problem with some games its not unfinished work, but not having Soul. You will mod for a engine popular (half-life), or for a engine with soul (Morrowind), but you will not mod for a engine withouth soul and unpopular. Except for fun, and for etc..etc.. etc...
etc..
Impressive Review. I must say :|
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I fully agree with many points in your article. But I also have some things to add.
There ARE still games that have a "soul". Take Katamari Damaci for example. A great game that is totally finished. The most enjoyable ones are the most simple. Games like this are usually shoved into the "arcade" genre. Many of the Nintendo 64 titles were original and enjoyable. Anyone ever played spacestation silicon valley? Nothing beat jumping into a new animal and blowing things up with rockets. Iggy's Wreckin' Balls? That game was incredible. Totally new racing style. It's bringing new ELEMENTS and not new features that make a game enjoyable. Katamari Damaci has been one of the first games in a long time to capture this.
If you want to make the world a better place, DON'T make mods for "dead" games. Quake 1 is dead. I don't care how many people there are, it is dead. you count the number of people who play it in the hundreds instead of the thousands. Bring "soul" into a new game and then, and only then, can the world be restored to balance.
or not.
I know what you mean, I played RA2 and YR for a loooong time and I 'm still not bored, All these new games are nothing much, the old games are better, especially because the old games have more mods. I've always wanted to make a mod for YR, because people says it's crap, I've planned the mod but I don't know how to create it. The new HL2 is very big, a few GBs, and do you know where mostly these GBs are spent on? Graphics of course, why not just choose HL? Or they could just play something better.
I don't know about UT, but HL has mods much better then the own game. CS is a great game, it's fun, great for clans, to play with friends and etc. Now you are saying that people makes mods to be famous? That's the most retarded thing I ever read about someones opnion on mods.
Conclusion is: "Most of the things you said are retarded".