Money for Mods: Valve Announces Paid Skyrim Mods

Bat Vader

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Smooth Operator said:
Bat Vader said:
I wouldn't mind paying for a full conversion mod like the Game of Thrones mod or the Elder Kings mod for CKII but I can't see myself paying 75 cents for a weapon.
Neither of those full conversions are legal when you start selling shit, and all the weapons need to be cross-referenced with art from other games/sites because there is a very high likelihood someone borrowed something... and as you start selling shit that becomes illegal.
I would gladly donate to their Pateron accounts if they had any set up. The guy who does the Clash of Kings one for Mount and Blade: Warband has one set up that I donate to.
 

SonOfVoorhees

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SadisticFire said:
I can't believe this. It's ridiculous on way too many levels. We should start with one of the most basic things and that's using other people's assets.
The first mod on there has been deleted due to using another person assets. But more so other gamers pointed it out to Steam so if it goes unnoticed then i guess they will keep selling it.

http://www.kotaku.co.uk/2015/04/24/the-paid-for-mod-world-has-its-first-casualty
 

shirkbot

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nickpy said:
Shamanic Rhythm said:
The more I think about this, the more I hate it. Especially when it's only added to their Steam Wallet, meaning they can only buy more fucking games with it.
Just to clarify - this is not true. The mod author's part is transfered to them by bank transfer on the 15th of each month.
Just wanted to make sure this information gets some reposting since I couldn't find any confirmation either outside of a single Giant Bomb thing. I will note that all refunds from paid mods go into the user's Steam Wallet, which is still kind of uncool since A) You weren't trying to pay Valve in the first place and B) this means they get 100% of the money in the future.

OT: I fundamentally agree with the notion that modders should be able to collect money for their labor, but as others have mentioned this was a bad way to go about it. A Patreon system would have gone over much better, not only because it means mods are still "free", but also because it preserves the "Try Before You Buy" aspect, which is kind of critical in anything so finicky. Valve is also taking way too much from the entire enterprise considering how little they're actually doing. Even if, as others have indicated, it's to split with the game's original developer they're leaving only 25% for the person that made the content the consumers are paying for.

Lesser Discussed Issues:
You still must provide bank account information to Valve prior to publishing on the Steam workshop even if your mod is free.
You must earn 100USD before Valve will pay you anything at all.

I think this one will get sorted out by the market, but not before Valve takes a pretty thorough PR beating, which might be good for them all things considered.
 

FieryTrainwreck

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It's adorable that people think Valve/Bethesda aren't already rewriting their agreements to freeze out Nexus Mods and any similar platforms. They're trying to turn mods into a revenue stream, and that's never going to happen if people are downloading the shit for free elsewhere.
 

Soulrender95

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My biggest concern with this is given Valves market dominance and the inability to gain some games on other platforms that they are going to start blocking mods that come from external sources like Nexus mods.
I mean the technology is already in place for them to do so (verifying file integrity) all they need to do is add a mandatory scanning for mods at start up and then any mods that aren't subscribed to via their workshop can be detected and removed without the users choice.
 

shirkbot

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direkiller said:
As the creators are getting store credit, Valve are the only ones making real life money off this.
Can you tell me where you found/heard this? I couldn't find any confirmation, but you can refer to my previous post for my other complaints with the system.

I'm sure Games Worshop or Disney will be happy to sue over that power armor or light saber mod people are charging for now.
It seems like the offerings they're testing all of this out with are pretty minimal, and so far none of it is copyrighted, well, except the Lambda Suit, which Valve made themselves, and makes me think they're doing this so they can get paid for making mods themselves...

EDIT: I'm specifically ignoring the mods listed in the "Under Review" section.
 

nickpy

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shirkbot said:
direkiller said:
As the creators are getting store credit, Valve are the only ones making real life money off this.
Can you tell me where you found/heard this? I couldn't find any confirmation, but you can refer to my previous post for my other complaints with the system.
As I said before, (and you quoted me before) its 100% not true.

The actual answer can be found on Valve's " Getting paid on Steam >> Payment info FAQ" page ([link]http://steamcommunity.com/workshop/workshoppaymentinfofaq/#Payments[/link]), the relevant text being:

Q. What method of payment do you use?
A. We will make your payments by Electronic Funds Transfer which is a bank-to-bank transfer. We do not currently offer any other payment methods ? please ensure that you are able to receive payments in this manner. Valve is unable to provide additional documentation to help you receive your funds.
For all the reasons I said in my original post on the matter, this is or could be very bad, but Valve are not quite so mad as to only give the mod authors steam wallet credit.

I notice that one of the paid-for mods has already been taken down due to copyright infingement - see http://www.kotaku.co.uk/2015/04/24/the-paid-for-mod-world-has-its-first-casualty - though in this case I think Chesko was actually in the clear: his mod didn't include nor require FNIS, it gave some instructions as to how FNIS, obtained seperately, could be used to improve the mod, he just accepted the DMCA in order to be diplomatic during the current shitstorm.
 

Saulkar

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Shinkicker444 said:
Speaking of legal, wonder how many of modders use a free student version of autodesk...

Oh.. I hope not [http://knowledge.autodesk.com/customer-service/account-management/account-access/education-community-account/educational-licenses#Can%20I%20use%20free%20Educational%20licenses%20for%20Autodesk%20software%20obtained%20through%20the%20Education%20Community%C2%A0for%20commercial%20purposes]
One of my favourite modders got by using just Blender, if anyone is too stupid to not follow her example if they do not already have the license or cash then may God rest their souls.
 

Chessrook44

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Silentpony said:
So...whats the difference between paid mods and DLC? 'cause as far as I can tell, they're exactly the same but 'paid mods' looks better on a PR spreadsheet.
Mods are frequently made by amateurs.

Oh ok fine, yes, sometimes Mods are much better or more hilarious but come on... adding money is just going to put dollar signs in people's eyes, causing more amateurs or people who don't know how to make stuff to come out and do just that while charging.

It's DLC by amateurs!
 

shirkbot

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nickpy said:
Q. What method of payment do you use?
A. We will make your payments by Electronic Funds Transfer which is a bank-to-bank transfer. We do not currently offer any other payment methods ? please ensure that you are able to receive payments in this manner. Valve is unable to provide additional documentation to help you receive your funds.
For all the reasons I said in my original post on the matter, this is or could be very bad (I notice that one of the paid-for mods has already been taken down due to copyright infingement - see http://www.kotaku.co.uk/2015/04/24/the-paid-for-mod-world-has-its-first-casualty), but Valve are not quite so mad as to only give the mod author's steam wallet credit.
I didn't think so either, but thank you very much for pointing out the relevant text. I actually read through a lot of the FAQ, but for some reason I couldn't put two and two together for that. Any other misinformation we can work to disspell?
 

Grumpy Ginger

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They seem to doing the whole thing pretty incompetently but at the same time I don't think people charging for a mod is an inherently bad idea. After all we have plenty of things which we buy and then pay for modifications such as cars. If people are smart with there wallets and the vendor (not necessarily valve) stays vigilant for rorts and potential lawsuit material I could see this working.
 

OldNewNewOld

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Adultratedhydra said:
So are we going to stop pretending Valve is the best thing since sliced bread finally or are we gonna get some Valve apologists coming out now?
Valve are the guys who won so many "developer of the year" awards without making a single game in years. The Valvedrones are so blind at everything Valve does that even if Valve nuked half the world they would still find a way to make excuses. Valve stopped being good a long time ago.

Hell, they were never really good in a moral way. They were "good" in an economy way, they gave people what people want for cheap while also making a shitload of money. Now they are just greedy fucks who can't make anything themselves. Freaking Origin is sounding better and better with every news about Valve.

Just yesterday I started up Origin and Steam after a long time of playing games that don't need them. Origin opened up in like 10 seconds. Steam took a freaking minute to open. It's a bloated pile of shit and the only real advantage over Origin that it has is the screenshot button (Jesus effing Christ EA, get your shit together. You can at least put in a screenshot button on that shit if you can't put more games).

I realized that it's impossible to make a slippery slope fallacy when talking about Valve. If you can think of something terrible to happen, Valve already thought about that and is working on it.
 

Flames66

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In theory I am for modders being able to get some cash for their work. However, I cannot support the developer being involved in that in any way. Once they are, they inevitably want some form of authorial control over what is created and that defeats the entire point of an independent modding community. I really am sorry to say it, but I hope this fails on every level.
 

Karadalis

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Horrible horrible thing.

Modders only get 25%

People stealing mods and uploading them as their own

Paid for mods using parts or resources made by other community members that until now put their resources up for free

Copyright issues

No customer support

No assurance that the mods will even work if a new patch for a game comes out (the mod creator is aparantly in no way forced to make sure his mod works with the latest version of the game... youre suggested to "ask nicely" for them to fix an issue... despite you having bought a fucking product at that point)

This will either horribly backfire for Steam just like Greenlight did... or it will ruin the modder scene...

All i see here is a Early access 2.0

Lots and lots of crap... with the rare gem burried under piles of bullshit and projects that will never be finished or feature complete but still asking a hefty sum for it.

Patreon is a much better medium of support for modders... they get all the cash and they actually get to engage with the people that support them.
 

jklinders

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RatGouf said:
EA: We'll do this only if we can sell it through Origin. Think of all the Commander Shepards saying this is their favorite tavern in Cyrodiil!

Ubisoft: We'll do this only if they log into Uplay. Think of all the parkour!

Capcom: We'll do this only if we can lock out certain parts of the mod for an extra cost. Think of all the zombies like in Dead Rising & Resident Evil! Wait you already have those? Okay think of all the crafting in Dead Rising! Oh you already have crafting too. Um, think of all the Demons from DMC! Oh come on you already have those too?!

Microsoft: Ooh! Can we tie it into Windows 10! Then we can tie it into Xbox Live! Then we can find a way to undermine our own products while hoping to not suffer any backlash!

Nintendo: Wii U is failing & We'll do this but only if we can tie ours into Amiibos.

Sony: Due to a shifting landscape we've decided not to do this. Then we'll get praise for not doing this. Ah 0 effort can be amazing! Why else do you think we shut down PS Home?

Rockstar: Our mod will add Roman Bellic. He'll give you a cell phone & call you up at awkward times to go bowling, play darts, or see Great Big Argonian Titties!

Volition: Three words, Purple Dildo Bat. You already want it. Don't deny it!

....

All the good mods are probably free on Nexus anyway.
Brilliant.

Good God what were they thinking? the only reason people even play Elder Scrolls games is for the modding. You start charging for that, even indirectly and there will be blood.

i'd like to think that nexus will stay afloat and do well, but it already looks like leeches are going in there downloading and reverse engineering other people's mod scripts to "create" and sell them on Steam. the community will wther and die under this shit.
 

VincentX3

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Seriously, the only thing that's going to happen is cause a downhill trend of having to start pirating "obligatory" paid mods.

The solution was so fucking simple, have a "Pay-what-you-want" service on each mod and to each their own.
That way all mods will stay free but the actual modders could legally make money off their work.

Also 75% cut? I don't care if Valve is only getting 25% and Bethesda, it's fucking greed and exploiting modders for free cash, end of story. If they really cared about the modders and community they would have it a lot less.

I'm hoping all this shit backfires on them if it hasn't already for other services to take note (Origin this is your fucking chance!) and do this system right. If you want to charge for mods make it non-obligatory, a tip-jar will be more than enough for good mods.
 

WarpedMind

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Welp, I hope this was worth whatever measly mammon Valve and Besthesda manage to squeeze out of it before the whole thing collapses.

The modding community is already FILLED with drama and the Steam Workshop is already filled with people stealing other people's work and uploading it for themselves.

This WILL kill modding, it is ALREADY [http://i.imgur.com/Zz2GuR8.png] killing modding. Mods are getting pulled left and right on the Nexus, modders and resource creators are leaving probably never to return.

This move is stupid on a level I didn't think possible, no amount of Simcity's or Diablo 3s could even dream of doing the kind of damage that Valve has inflicted on the PC platform in one fell swoop.
 

Scars Unseen

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FieryTrainwreck said:
It's adorable that people think Valve/Bethesda aren't already rewriting their agreements to freeze out Nexus Mods and any similar platforms. They're trying to turn mods into a revenue stream, and that's never going to happen if people are downloading the shit for free elsewhere.
I don't think Bethesda would survive that shitstorm. TES and Fallout both thrive on their mods, and pissing off the entire modding community at once is a good way to lose their support. And I think Bethesda knows that. So I'm pretty sure the Nexus isn't going anywhere.
 

templar1138a

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With all the trouble abandoned mods on Workshop already cause, this looks like a very bad idea. I'll stick to Nexus, thanks.
 

Pr0

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The shit storm going on in regards to this might as well be called #moddergate

Its going to get ugly and eventually its going to get out that this was done in collusion with a small handful of mod developers that were pre-recruited by Bethesda themselves.

I find it amazing that people as talented as some of the developers buying into this ponzi scheme are willing to sell themselves for so little. If someone offered me a 25/75 split for simply handing something I made to someone else, I'd die laughing.