Ah, I was not aware of a refund period. I didn’t know steam even knew that word. That makes the idea sit a good bit better with me. My concern was paying for something and being stuck for junk.
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Those will be the Mod’s that have a short life, along with the Author that published it. Good Mod’s will always be around some Paid, Some free. You will always have crappy mod’s flooding the market, is it really any different then having crappy games flooding the market? or crappy paid DLC’s flooding the market?
In this day and Age the word will get out fast on so and so’s Mod’s are good! and so and so’s are garbage and just a money grab.
It will be interesting none the less, The topic is circulating and the Idea is getting exposure. Wouldn’t surprise Me if it’s tried again… Only with more thought put into it.
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After sitting and thinking on it a bit i can see how a mod store could work well enough if there was a refund period and reviews on the mod purchase page itself that the modder couldn’t delete at a whim. I suppose my next issue with what I saw with steam would be making certain that the modder got the money. Steam was wanting to give them just 25% of the total purchase. I realize they have hosting costs and such, but that is just too steep for my liking. How do you address that problem fairly?
Edit to add that I have been stung by a few games and mods in the past, so I tend to be a bit knee jerk response to things like this. Anyone familiar with Towns will have an idea of what I mean.
In Steam’s case, that doesn’t matter. The publisher/developer takes a cut from all mods, regardless of what they contain (in Skyrim’s case, a hefty 45%).
So what you are saying is, essentially, that people should invest their time for free because you don’t want to pay.
This is a mentality that varies widely between communities. Take Sims for example; since the very first game there have been paid mods and while I’ve lost touch with the game and the community, I doubt that has changed. There are quite a few (quality) mods that were behind a paywall. Nobody had an issue with that, except the “I’m poor or cheap and can’t/won’t afford it”. The paid content probably was a reason EA saw it fit to have Stuff packs beginning with Sims 2 and an ingame store with Sims 3.
Mods are a huge investment, even small ones. Most larger things (with “larger” being all the behind-the-scene stuff too) aren’t done in one afternoon. They also require constant grooming when a game update breaks them. So why shouldn’t I be allowed to be reimbursed for my efforts? Just because mods for many other games did not allow this?
Do you have any idea how much effort it is to make a game? Even if you take a complete framework like Unity3d and buy half of the asset store, you’re still at about nowhere. Modding a game is much easier, faster, and gives you access to a (well) established community already. I mean, I’ll just ask you directly. Would you download my game? Probably not, for various reasons, starting with “Not another game” and ending somewhere with possible security reasons.
Except that, at least for programming, every other field pays much more than game development - for obvious reasons (the aforementioned mentality at hand). So unless you’re doing this to realise your dream or have a great team or anything, there’s no reason to be a game developer.
Radiant has an interest to have mods for their game though, because it’s proving that their modding API works. If some of those mods are even high quality, then that’s even better. Personally, I think paid mods is something that will become way more commonplace than today. Like I’ve said, some communities have already established it quite well (like Sims, Team Fortress or DOTA2) and only few seem to mind it over there.
(whose main reason it blew up so much was the 75% cut Valve/Bethesda take)
Which is a valid point, but I think that in the end it will regulate itself. Mods that use this kind of technique won’t be downloaded, won’t get good or any reviews, and therefore will die out as they can’t really be used for free.
The main reason people are upset about this is because many mods they grew attached to have now moved away behind a paywall. So content they feel they were entitled to has moved out of their reach. If a new mod is released immediately as paid mod, I can’t see this argument work, even if it has a “demo” version available for free.
Except that nobody forces you to make your mod paid. You can still release free stuff on the workshop and it will still nicely integrate with your game and everything.
At least for the moment, and if this ever changes it’s very likely up to the publisher/developer, free mods are still available. You can have pay-what-you-want too, and although it lacks a donation of some sort, it’s not changing the way the current workshop works. Just because some people decided that their content suddenly required paying doesn’t mean that the whole system will crash and burn. It won’t.
In that case it wasn’t even code, it was an asset and probably poorly handled by the modder and Valve. It’s really simple, if somebody steals your stuff, you report them. The only real problem is that currently, you have no way to verify that, unless you bought the mod. Of course you can refund it in a 24 hour period, but that’s very uncomfortable.
There’s no difference for paid mods and free mods. If you copy code or assets without the author’s permission, you’re just asking for trouble - reputation-wise and legally.
Train simulators, most notably Microsoft Train Simulator, has (had) a huge economy around them with many third party studios creating content for it, sometimes crappy, sometimes outstanding quality. Sure, they’ve likely been doing it for the money, but in the end, don’t we all? I mean, you have to pay the bills somehow.
In the end, mods have a value too, always had. Why shouldn’t it be possible to reimburse a developer for his efforts?
I disagree. Modding requires just as much debugging and as many resources. And what’s wrong, morally, to charge for signing a book that you didn’t write? As long as you aren’t giving away the book for free?
Mods are an asset for a game. It can increase the longevity of a game tremendously - just take Skyrim for example. Some may say that it was released with bugs and little content because they knew the modders would pick it up and fix most issues, adding more content and gameplay - and several years down the road with little intervention from the developer, the game is still thriving, as the whole paid mod thing shows. There’s still a lot of people playing, and caring, for it.
Demand and offer. I can offer you a mod that changes all buttons in the game to a blue color and sell it for $99.99. I doubt anyone will buy it, but then that’s my problem. Nobody is forced to buy it, so I’ll probably make it cheaper or pull it altogether, therefore reducing the offer - because there’s no demand.
In Valve’s case, a 24h return policy. For others, I suppose a review system is necessary. “Free Weekends” or similar could be helpful too.
Steam has so many features for games, like free trial periods, guest passes, sales, reviews, and all those have not been used for mods. If they had, I’m sure the outrage would have been smaller, too. I’m somewhat sure that this will come in the next attempt, probably for one of Valve’s games.
They will drown. Take Garry’s Mod for example: The workshop is free, yet flooded with unbelievable amounts of junk. They don’t make money, but for some, good ratings and subscriptions are worth more. I’m partial to that group. I can’t believe I have made stuff that has been downloaded by more individual accounts than there are people in my state.
The costs for Skyrim were as following:
- 30% was taken by Valve. This is a fixed amount.
- 45% was taken by Bethesda, the publisher/developer. This was set by them themselves.
- Additionally, and I’m not sure where that is heading, there’s the whole IRS business, which is supposedly 30% too.
If the income tax wasn’t already in Valve’s bit and had to be paid, a modder would earn a total of 17.5 cent per dollar. That’s disappointingly low. I wouldn’t go through the hassle of registering with the IRS and all that for that.
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That was also the agreement that Bethesda put in also, and if you you think about it (yeah not the best deal) some is always greater then 0. I’m sure other Company’s would offer differing deals and eventually the Market would adopt a standard. 
Not meaning to sound like an ass, but that seems to come up to 105% Is there a typo in there?
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Anyway, after a bit of debate which allowed me to learn a bit more about the subject I suppose I could support a mod store that actively worked for the benefit of good modders and customers alike. I have been basing my opinion on several bad experiences with vaporware and a few other things. If bad mods can be forced out, modders can get fair pay, and the customer can get value for their money then I say go for it. Although I would love to see bad mods get kicked off the store for getting too many refund requests. But I am just mean that way.
Not meaning to sound like an ass either, but do you know how percentage works? The 30% is the income tax, hence based on your income, which would be 25% - so you get 17.5% in the end.
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Ah, that is where I got it wrong. Thanks for clearing that up. I was just counting it all up. Forgot that one percentage came out of another.
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Agreed. I left that out, but very important. Only your own IP and no one else.
@RepeatPan Your post was very informative. I completely agree with you.
I also agree with @RepeatPan.
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Haven’t really gotten to read all these but somewhere else someone equivalated paid mods to someone paying to use a game engine.
Not sure if I’m seeing the comparison. Mods are an end product, while a game engine is a foundation on which to build your own game. It makes sense in this case to pay for a game engine, especially if you’re going to charge for the resulting game. Mods in this case are more like the “resulting game” that one sells. It would make sense that Radiant would get a cut of that too, but hopefully not a robbery like the 75% that valve+beth took.
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to me it just seems kinda stupid to charge someone for a mod when the game is still in alpha… maybe im looking at it all wrong though.
edit: but then again, i guess it depends on how much content the mod adds…
that beth, she sure is greedy 
to me it just seems kinda stupid to charge someone for a mod when the game is still in alpha
Of course. Thus, “in the future” in my first post.
oh, i totally missed that, sorry mate 
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It was something like “buying the game and using its base to make your own content”.
Edit: didn’t finish reading you comment. 75% though? Outrageous. Mostly.
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It makes sense to give the dev SOME money. Like 5-10% maybe. But those greedy execs at steam have enough money. Honestly, if I had the option for 5% to go to radiant! and 5% to valve or just 10% to radiant! I would much prefer the latter. Radiant, you could make a lot of money off of peoples hate towards steam! 
Rant begin.
Valve makes enough money off the developers sales. Everything you buy a game on steam, a certain percentage goes to valve. That is fair enough, although I personally don’t know the exact amount. I can assume it is quite high, I mean it is valve.
I often question our society (North America/Europe). Everybody says it is free and great but we are all run by thousands of corporate dictators. Compared to other countries (Middle East/Ukraine etc) it’s the best of the worst, as I like to say.
Rant end.
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you know, some times i look at the world and wonder if there really are any leaders, or if its just run by money…
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We are ruled by paper, and electrons. Unfortunately, this capitalism has dated back for thousands of years. Hopefully soon we’ll change.
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