One of the most useful techniques for growing a videogame user base is the addition of modeling capability. We have seen games like Skyrim play far beyond the normal lifespan of a video game because of their extensive modeling community, something embraced by their developers.
Allowing simple modification to textures, models and other components allows users to change the game to suit their taste, add new content and expand upon the existing game.
Making a game modifiable need not be hard. While it is wonderful if developers provide tools for doing this, the simple act of making game resources (e.g. image files, sound files) available and not compressed into exotic formats which are not easy to access, still provides the ability for modeling.
Modding tools are not planned for the first release
They are a still hidden goal in the indiegogo campaign, though.
We have plans to eventually provide tools to add or change some stuff to the game.
We love the Skylines approach to this with the tools integrated nicely in the game itself but these kind of tools need lot of development time.
Totally agree wholeheartedly. Modding extends the life of a game and can also enhance the replayability of the game as well. Other games that come to mind other than Skyrim, which is wonderful, are Cities Skylines, Transport Fever, Stellaris just to name a few.
small stuff for Total War games. I worked a little bit on Mount and Blade and Crusader Kings 2. I’ve never published my own mods before. But, I have worked with the Radius team on some of their unit packs. Mostly cosmetic stuff and balancing.
Whilst I am all for modding, I find that many mods are nothing short of cheating to make them easier, which in turns suggests to me that parts of the game was not balanced (or broke) to start with.
I am all for enhancements though! Especially cosmetic, HUD alterations and other tweaks.
That depends on what kind of mods you’re used to using. If you played any kind of Total War game then you’d notice that most of the mods are there to make the game more fun to play through additional units, different eras, different factions, stronger enemies, more diplomacy options etc. In most cases, the community wants to make the game more fun, not easier. However, if the game is sufficiently hard or time-consuming (Dragon age or Skyrim) then many mods do make it easier to play. Although in those examples, most mods only serve to increase the bust size and nudity of the NPCs…
Since the majority of players are usually made up of hormone filled teenagers most of the mods are going to be about increasing bust size and nudity and cheats for those with little attention span, but if you look you can find amazing mods that can add a lot to the game. I only play heavily modded Crusader Kings II, Europa Universalis and Skyrim and never touched those kind of mods, on the contrary I primarily look for mods that increase realism, immersion and difficulty by improving the AI and combat.
Indeed… not sure why nudity had to be brought into it, though these are the type of mods I mean.
Like on Cities Skylines they had the improved information of the various buildings in one place, improved vehicle AI and improved cosmetics of lighting and building skins of various cultures…
I also use mods for the purpose of realism. I run almost 150 mods on my Skyrim build most of the time. I made about 10 or 15 of them, nothing complicated. I’ve done my best to convert my Skyrim game into an early Neolithic simulation LOL my character runs around with bow and obsidian dagger.
Ironically, while nudity is sometimes included in mods for the purpose of entertaining people so attracted two such, it’s actually the component of realism which would exist and a prehistoric setting. Of course, its purpose would not be the sexualisation we see these days. That seems to be a product of our culture more than anything else.
well, it seems I struck yet another cord lol. I only brought up nudity because some of the more popular Nexus mods for Skyrim were nudity and body mods. I won’t lie and say I’ve never downloaded some of them, but I did find them to be pointless for the most part… except for “realistic” jiggle physics. When I played modded Skyrim, it was all about immersion and cool quest mods. I never thought to mod it into a neolithic simulator. I would suggest just playing Far Cry Primal for that kind of an experience.
I play Skyrim as opposed to Primal Far Cry because the protagonist in PFC is gender locked as male. The character I play in my Skyrim games is based entirely off of my book character, so I keep everything reasonably similar. The reason I use a nudity mod is for realism. I don’t have any of the silly peanut gallery mods you often find on Nexus. My wife won’t play Skyrim without a nudity mod as well as about 200 other mods. She does a lot of optimizations 4 graphics mods.
Keep in mind, the level of realism I look for involves skinning animals, cooking all meals and realistic wounds. If I could get my Oculus Rift to work correctly with Skyrim, it would become the ultimate fun.
I can’t get into a male protagonist. For me, it’s not a minor point. Also, inspired it may be but FCP is far from Neolithic. It seems more Paleolithic. I like the Neolithic, personally.
For some it is and for some it isn’t.
Games are often made for the “male gaze” and staring male protagonists, which can exclude an entire 50% of humanity. lol
