What would you like to see more of on Mod DB?

You're forgetting that maybe some certain mods are based on IP's because they are made by fans for the fans of some kind of show or movie and that Good games etc. might not be available for yet! Some people might love a certain tv show and also love gaming and wanna step into the world in which their favorite show or movie is based on!

I've seen a lot of negative comments lately aimed at those projects that base themselves on TV programs and / or movies and I have to say that I'm a little disappointed at the overall attitude! It's okay for fans for the likes of Star Wars etc. cod there are plenty of official titles out there for that particular kinda movie! But what about the fans of movies and show's that have little or no official titles available to them based on the franchises they love?? That's what certain TV Show / Movie based mods are there for in my opinion! As I already said... These are mods / games made by fans for the fans of certain franchises!! Consider it "Interactive Fan Art" if you will..! There aint no need to continue giving IP based mods etc. a hard time!! :)

I'm sure you're referring to my negative comments. :) But in a blog many weeks prior I addressed the fan issue...

"I understand too that people sometimes use existing IPs to make games because they are die hard fans and simply want to play a specially themed game, but I don't think that they should be allowed to profit from their theft by winning prizes/awards. Especially since IP theft is in direct contravention of moddb.com's TOS and results in a completely uneven playing field."

"There aint no need to continue giving IP based mods etc. a hard time!! :)"

I believe there is. Because there are literally billions of dollars at stake, eventually the IP holders WILL litigate. And when they do, when they get smart, they won't simply C&D the poor modders, they'll sue the rich game companies who profit from IP infringement by being able to sell more copies of their engine to players and modders alike. The game companies will then begin to safeguard their engines against modification.

Billions of dollars have a way of making this sort of thing inevitable.

I fail to see how using another persons intellectual property creates an uneven playing field. Because they already have an installed fanbase? I suppose that's true, but then you'll also have nitpicky fanboys tearing it apart in ways you won't if you create an original idea. If your original idea is good enough, it'll create it's own fanbase that'll grow far beyond the few fans of SHOW X that go out looking for an independently created modification based on it.

And billions of dollars in litigation? Wow. If that much was at stake and so easily in the grasp of these companies, you'd think they would have done this by now. Except, the angry IP holders would hold the burden of proof to show that a significant portion of the game sales resulted from this specific mod existing on their platform, which would be very, very, very hard to prove, and therefore, will not happen.

"If your original idea is good enough, it'll create it's own fanbase that'll grow far beyond the few fans of SHOW X that go out looking for an independently created modification based on it."

Unfortunately there's a Venn diagram styled overlap that occurs with fanboys and gamers. C'mon JoeX111 ;), I don't think for a minute that you honestly believe any original idea spawned here can possibly build a bigger fan base than what currently exists with Star Wars or Stargate or Star Trek (or anything Star themed for that matter) modders and gamers! Certainly not within the short dev cycle of a mod. And there's no such thing as a few fans when it comes to Star Wars/Gate/Trek.

"Except, the angry IP holders would hold the burden of proof to show that a significant portion of the game sales resulted from this specific mod existing on their platform, which would be very, very, very hard to prove, and therefore, will not happen."

You wouldn't necessarily need to prove any sales resulted from the infringement. There's legal precedent for sueing out of existence companies that engage in "contributory and vicarious copyright infringement" under the over-reaching DMCA.

But the game company that produced, say, Unreal Tournament 2004 is not responsible for what it's product is used for after the fact. The company that produces a handgun is not responsible for someone using it to kill another human being. The same applies to videogames and intellectual copyrights. The only way the IP holder could take Epic Games to court would be to say that sales of their own IP were hurt by modders using the Unreal engine, or, that the mod in question increased sales of Epic's product, both of which would be very, very difficult to prove.

And as for fanboys, yes, Star Wars and Star Trek both have huge fanbases, but then you have to divide from that the number of people who are also gamers, then divide that number by the amount of people who are gamers AND familiar with the modding industry and know how to seek out, install and play these games. The numbers dwindle. Independent games can build quite a loyal following with very little effort, as you need only look to Introversion Software to find out. There's no reason why modders with a bit of work can't achieve the same result.

It's not just the pre-existing, world-wide, generation-spanning fanbase (that, however dwindled, are able to round-up enough ppl to make and support multiple variations of the same IP infringing mod). IP rip-offs also rely on the work of highly paid professionals to do their design work for them. Wouldn't you agree that having Lucas Arts do your design work for you would help give you an unfair advantage?

For these reasons, it's no coincidence that 5 of this year's top 10 mods are IP rip-offs.

Re: litigation, again, it's my understanding that the aggieved wouldn't have to prove anything regarding sales, just that Valve et al engaged in "contributory and vicarious copyright infringement".

As for "it won't/can't happen", brace yourselves, because it already is. What got me to thinking was the Marvel vs. NCSoft case. NCSoft allowed users to modify the appearance of their own in-game characters. Predictably, many users created characters named after/resembling Marvel characters. Instead of harassing the users a la RIAA, Marvel filed a suit against NCSoft. NCSoft, realizing Marvel had a case, quite smartly settled out of court.

That's fine for NCSoft and Marvel, what happens when a gang of angry IP holders come calling at Valve's doors?

I can hear a lot of ppl out there right now saying, "that's not the same thing!" and heading off to wikipedia to try and find reasons why it's not, but I'm pretty sure it's similar enough to warrant concern.

I would have to totally disagree with your comment about cracking down, some companies openly acnolage the fact that people mod the game and don't care, I believe that they see it as free advertising as peole who don't know the ip will go out and buy it. The only people who I know that care about IP is Microsoft and they took about 3 years to get round to telling them

Not all IP holders will litigate. Different IP holders see and value different pros and cons based on their values, principles and bottom lines.

I'm not giving them a hard time per se, I'm just saying I'd love to see more originality.

I'm with Wraiyth, I don't care about people having target markets for there mods, recently many mods seem repetitive and boring. I think everyone respects innovation.

I think he's talking about Stargate Mods [=

Long live the show-mods [=

"More variety FTW. More original mods, less remakes and mods based on existing IP is what I'd love to see."
in reply to this, ignoring the IP part and all the issues that it entails.. (:/)
I'd like to see LESS variety of multiplayer mods. because more individual mods translates to "too many mods to choose from" and more importantly less active players and servers; and so, people get less chance to actually play a decent game of a less-popular multiplayer mod, despite the high quality or potential fun the mod might likely have. What I'd like to see on ModDB, are more active-players (in numbers; greatly expanding the number of your site visitors? can that be bad?), and some game server stats.

(Fanpeople should be strangled!)
Anyway, I see no problem in mods based on already exciting universes vs. new universes. In the End all one should go for is: Coolness, and expected funfactor. Sure, Tiberian Sun Rising is going to Rock hard. But Mid East Crisis 2 & Asylum looks so much more awesome. And sure, Project Oblivion looks awesome too, but Zombie Master will still be the greatest for HL2 in my opinion. And I hold firm beliefs that all universes in games really do exist(Since space is infinite and all). So nobody should have the right to copyright other peoples existence...
(Personally, I'd be ****** if someone copyrighted me)

"Sign", I replied on wrong post...
Sorry for that!
(I was going to reply to the: Orion2sirius Diskussion)

Well thanks to the UT3 Engine for one being able to Export to PC, PS3 and Soon Xbox360 so far, Seeing many more "Console" Mods is starting to become so much more likely and a reality!! Amen for that so far at least!! lol :)

Moddb I believe is for the superior PC Master Race.
Not you nasty Console buggers obsessed with over rated games like Halo 3.

Super PC Race - TimeLords
Console Buggers- Cyberboys(I'd put men but that'd be a compliment)

I wouldn't exactly say 'properly' for it anyway. Last I heard you can't even export sounds to the console version.

Just so I can fit in, is "reuse" the preferred euphemism for theft?