Steam Launches Paid Mod Support

[steve58]

...well this will change things up a bit ???

http://steamcommunity.com/workshop/aboutpaidcontent/

Try any mod, Risk Free
It's still important to spend a little time learning about any product you are about to purchase. But, if after purchase you find that a mod is broken or doesn't work as promised, you can easily get a refund of that mod within 24 hours of your purchase. View the full refund policy here.

...and Steam doesn't see the irony with this?? 

[PanzersEast]

...well this will change things up a bit ???

http://steamcommunity.com/workshop/aboutpaidcontent/

Try any mod, Risk Free
It's still important to spend a little time learning about any product you are about to purchase. But, if after purchase you find that a mod is broken or doesn't work as promised, you can easily get a refund of that mod within 24 hours of your purchase. View the full refund policy here.

...and Steam doesn't see the irony with this?? 

Slippery slope.... people will demand to get their monies worth and mod creators will have to support their creations.  Not sure if this is a good move or not...


PE

[steve58]

Slippery slope indeed....Steam may have to be a bit more forthcoming with refunds themselves...

[Rayfer]

And what if the original game developer upgrades the game engine...are the modders required to go in and make the paid for mods compatible?

[steve58]

This sounds like a very poorly thought out idea.  And from reading some of the comments on Steam, a lot agree.

http://steamcommunity.com/discussions/forum/0/618459931322607080/

...these comments I can agree with.

Modding has always been about passion, fun, creativity and community. As soon as money is involved, that dilutes that. Issues such as plagarism, copyright and intellectual theft become issues and suddenly 'sharing' becomes 'stealing'.

A donation button would have been a much less intrusive and controversial method.

[Zulu1966]

And what if the original game developer upgrades the game engine...are the modders required to go in and make the paid for mods compatible?

Yes - a true minefield.
Are steam short of money ?

[Philippe]

This is a very slippery slope indeed.

I haven't read a EULA in about fifteen years or so, but since they are mostly boilerplate I doubt that much has changed in the interim.

Most of the EULA's that I remember reading usually contain some kind of language to the effect that the game and its derivatives are the intellectual property of the game's copyright holder. Despite what most modders believe, the mod is probably not the property of the modder as much as the company which produced the original game.  And even if this were wrong, would you really want to go to court with a large corporation for several years over a mod that didn't generate enough revenue to offset more than about two seconds of your lawyers' billable hours?

When you add in the fact that most modders play fast and loose with copyrighted material to begin with, I can imagine the game's copyright owner suing a modder (who passed the consideration test by charging for his mod) and Steam (because they've got deeper pockets and were enabling the modder to violate the game's copyright for money).  But it gets worse.  Many mods contain bits and pieces of things borrowed without attribution from the web, so I can imagine several other game companies suing our hypothetical modder and Steam and the original game's copyright holder for violating their own copyrights, and I can imagine several music companies and book publishing companies chiming in because some of their sounds had been lifted or images scanned or copied off the internet (with or without substantial modification).

Who in their right mind would want to open this particular can of worms?  It's a bit like a short call option: no real upside and unlimited downside. 

What were they thinking?

[JudgeDredd]

Agree with all above.

As someone else posted - a donation button. Mods for pay are totally different to free mods (apart from the obvious). With free mods, there's no expectation. If it works, good. If there's issues, report them and if they get sorted - good. But paid content means there's an expectation.

It'll likely kill modding unless there's an option for the user to bow out of the process.

[Nefaro]

Selling mods?


F that S.  Burn the heretics who proposed & implemented this blasphemy.   Unsurprisingly a Steam creation.  ::)

[Philippe]

I have released non-Workshop Steam versions of a few of my mods, and have sometimes wondered if I should learn how to use the Workshop.

After this I'm not ever going near the Workshop to avoid taking (potential) collateral damage.

People will simply have to reinstall my mods if they get overwritten verifying the integrity of the game files.

Modding is aggravating enough as it is, without adding an element of financial risk.

[jomni]

What the hell!
Paid mods = 3rd party DLC.

The world is not falling appart. It's an opt in process. Steam just provided a platform for greedy moders to turn their junk into unofficial DLC.  Don't worry too much about this and avoid those greedy guys.

Decent moders who has a heart and brain will not sell their mods at a fixed price (Donations maybe). Too much headache.

Plagiarism will become a bigger issue. I create my own stuff in my Japanese mod to avoid copywright issues.  Free resources like pictures, 3d models, sounds that can be used in modding also cannot be part of a commercial product. Someone has to police this now. 

Same issues like monetizing YouTube vids.

[Gusington]

This is uncool on many levels.

[Toonces]

^ +1.

[panzerde]

This is the number one contender for Stupid Gaming Idea of the Year 2015.

I wonder what Bethesda thinks of this? Because if I can't mod their games anymore without dropping an extra $40 for mods, I won't bother buying them. They've always depended on modders to finish their work.

Edit: Read some more, and Bethesda is in the thick of it. Oh well, it isn't like I don't have plenty of other games to play instead of Fallout 4.

[GibbyG]

Have to agree with Jomni her...this is totally optional

Set your own price
As creator of your Workshop submission, you get to set the price. You can specify a set price or choose to sell as pay-what-you-want and let the customer decide how much to pay.

Free, Paid, or Pay What You Want
With over 24,000 free mods available for Skyrim in the Steam Workshop, there will always be lots to do and explore for free. Now you can also find mods with a specified price, or mods where you can choose how much you wish to support the creators. The price is up to the mod creators.