Sprked Tries To Solve Valve's Paid Mods Scandal 41
SlappingOysters writes: This article takes a closer look at the emerging crowdfunding platform Sprked, which aims to follow the Patreon support model, but exclusively for video game modders. The service is currently in its early stages, but by crafting a system of appreciation and support that acknowledges the loyalty of the modding community, Sprked has the potential to promote and foster the creativity that is so integral to modding, instead of hampering it with the murky baggage of a mandatory economy. Valve's attempt to let modders make some money for their efforts backfired within the community — there are four demons the paid mods plan must slay to actually work.
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Which is interesting because, while I share the disgust in theory, I don't actually know much about the reality and the one time I have seen it before (I wish I could remember where) it was being used by someone who actually was producing serious content, you know, an actual output other than good feelings.
That said, what you describe sounds like about the sort of cult of personality bullshit I expect enough people to fall for as to be able to support some small number of professional loudmouths.
However, I
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Can you elaborate on why Patreon disgusts you?
I wouldn't call it disgusting, but one problem with a service like Patreon is that it only really works for people who produce regular content updates. So if you are a blogger or Youtube, it can work great, on the other side if you do a create a great single player mod that only gets released once after month of work, it becomes much harder to make money with it. There is also the risk that people that bundle other peoples mods into mod-packs will end up making much more then the people that actual do the m
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Yeah, I can drop vowels too, man! Sprked. Whatever.
I sense disturance in the force (Score:1)
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Yh. Fck ths vwl-drppng bllsht.
TOTAL GARBAGE- paid mods work on Steam (Score:2)
I guess the company behind Gerry's Mod need to be informed that the TENS OF MILLIONS they have so far earned selling a mod for Valve's most popular games never really happened.
Bethesda's attempt to work with Valve EXPLOITING the long established FREE modding scene for Skyrim famously fell flat on its face, and for a thousand highly predictable reasons. However, Valve ONLY agreed to this partnership because of the very long history of successful PAID mods on Steam. Pain modding works just fine and dandy when
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I disagree, for a very simple, but very fundamental reason.
Most people wanting to sell their mods, want to get jobs in game development-- Either as asset creators, scripters, coders, level designers, etc.
They use the mod community as the springboard. The easy-access publishing stream through which they are able to shine, and show off their talents to potential employers, who are looking for such premium talent.
When you introduce the paid mods element, the community stops being easy access. People who are su
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So no one should be allowed to make paid mods because some people use it as their "Linked In?" Do you want to ban any professionals to make mods also? There are many good arguments against paid mods, but I'm sorry, this doesn't seem like one of them. You also seem to be missing the fact that most modders make mods first and foremost because they love the game...
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Most people wanting to sell their mods, want to get jobs in game development-- Either as asset creators, scripters, coders, level designers, etc.
Pretty much, for those of us who've been modding for ~20 years on a variety of games we do it because we enjoy doing it and don't want to get paid for it. Rather the only application that most of us have is that our work is recognized, used, and enjoyed. A lot of modders start out because there's xyz missing and they want to add it to the game themselves, that's how I got into modding. That, and there were bugs sometimes serious bugs that need to be fixed but weren't fixed by the developer.
People who are
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The biggest problem of paying for mods is copyright. Modders often borrow from copyrighted content to bring life to other games, often making the game much better with borrowed content than it was without the addition. So the big legal battle would be guaranteed to ensue about what is fair use and what is not fair use. All done for free tends to skirt that issue.
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I think part of the issue is price-point. In the days before DLC, a lot of games came with later "expansion packs" which were essentially a few new levels and some added weapons/units/etc, but essentially the same core experience. Those generally cost less than the initial game, but were still a decent price and often *very* popular (especially Blizzard games such as Brood Wars, Frozen Throne, etc). They weren't much more than mods, albeit by the original publisher.
There were also the unoffical mods such as
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Here's what I see wrong with the idea of paid mods (Score:2)
Most mods out there leverage properties produced by other modders. This is because talent takes all kinds of forms. A person who makes gorgeous models may be shit at level design, or may be shit at story telling, or shit at voice acting, or shit at [Insert FOO].
The mod community gets around these individual failings by allowing "Good Story Guy" to leverage "Good script guy" and "Good model guy" and "Good level design guy" to create a mod that tells his epic story, and does so with quality components.
The sa
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It doesn't help that a lot of those pay-for modders, started lashing out at those of us modders who wanted nothing to do with it. That's probably the biggest thing there, if you have access to any of the hidden forums for modders on the mod sites(nexus, moddb, modgames, etc), you'd see the personal attacks that the paid for modding used. Once that started making it out into the general community that pay-for modders were attacking others for not wanting it, the community in general had enough.
Those folks