Steam Workshop now supports paid mod creations
polycounter lvl 14
http://steamcommunity.com/workshop/aboutpaidcontent/
This is yet another avenue that artists, designers, enthusiasts, etc. can start earning some cash on the side or as their primary revenue if they are producing content that people want. Personally, I'm really excited about this as I think it will start upping the quality of the content available.
This is yet another avenue that artists, designers, enthusiasts, etc. can start earning some cash on the side or as their primary revenue if they are producing content that people want. Personally, I'm really excited about this as I think it will start upping the quality of the content available.
Replies
OMG!!!
The community pushback on this has already been staggering; if I'm given the option to bring my mods to market, I'm not completely sure I would consider it given the downright vitriolic response against not just Valve but the individual authors that dared to pilot the program. I feel bad for the guys that are part of this initial push, I don't envy them or the cleanup they're going to do on their steam profiles.
I'm worried that valve might have messed up on the pricing; I think it would have been smarter to introduce a gradient, a pay what you want/donation type atmosphere for at least the short term, because regardless how you frame it - from the consumer perspective - you're now asking for money today for something that was free yesterday.
On the other hand it also means lower end content might still have a price tag attached to it. I feel like my Skyrim would be 95% less modded if I had to pay for most of the mods and addons I currently run. Sure some of the prices look cheap enough, but I can't begin to count how much content I've installed and uninstalled just trying to find a modded balance that I like. I'd be more hesitant to try new addons when a small price tag is attached knowing that it could quickly spiral just like a F2P game.
I think it's much smarter for Valve to leave their hands off the price controls.
This store isn't curated like Valve's previous workshops, and the content you put up can still be free (or at any price point you want). Those freedoms will create a more competitive market, which actually controls cost escalation.
It's also not quite right to cast it as "free yesterday, paid today." The entire context has changed; having a payment system will bring in more creators than would otherwise be making mods at all.
Huge news!
+1. That's my aim. A looong way to go. Still until then I can still try this.
Is it just me, or is this terrible? Unless I am seriously missing something, Valve is really abusing their position that they are in with steam. What possible justification is there for them taking 75% of the item price, there is hardly any work for them, or cost now the system is implemented. The amount of money they will be making off this will dwarf whatever was invested. Unless as I said I am missing something? Can anyone come up with any good reasons aside from "we are a monopoly we can do what we like?"
I can imagine a large portion of this money will also need to go to the developer of the game since technically Valve and these community creators are profiting off mods made for their game.
50% goes to the game creator
25% content Creator
25% to the host of the service, creator of the service.
Not only is it fair, it's been ridiculously lucrative for many of us artists who have contributed.
Just to let you know:
http://kotaku.com/5669981/making-team-fortress-2-hats-turns-out-to-be-very-profitable
$47,000 was the FIRST Payment. Then it went down a little by little each month, but because the re-sales of each item are 10%, most contributors are still making money off of work they created 4-5 years ago.
So unless you can tell me anywhere else in the industry where you can make over $100k+ on a set of weapons+Hats, please let us know.
;P
You are assuming that valve is taking 75%, when that 75% is actually getting split between steam and the creators of the game. You know, the people who are providing the platform for the game and the people who are providing a platform for the paid content.
The 25% precedent was set with tf2, csgo, dota 2, and the content creators there aren't complaining when their checks are getting delivered.
You don't need more reasons than that although plenty are available:
If you think they pulled a magic number out of thin air, then I think you still have a lot of work ahead of you if you want to prove that your particular magic number would be better
Don't get me wrong though, I love that this is happening and have half known it would happen sooner or later, and I guess I am glad that Valve is in a position to make it happen.
Game updates, breaking previous mods.
Bunch of people wasted their money unless the mod creator updates their mod, or simply resells their mod for the updated game.
This person is selling early access for their fishing mod:
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=430324898
People are selling other people's content even:
It is quite a mess right now.
2) Make paid mod.
3) Make another paid mod that's dependant on the first.
4) Release both mods the same day as the game.
Day 1 paid DLC with day 1 paid DLC.
5) Watch community consume itself Akira style.
In all seriousness I like the idea, but I think allowing game devs an easy way to set up a cash shop, where they can closely monitor the content that is charged for might be easier.
I wonder how Second Life handles this.
This already happens in any industry subject to infrastructure it doesn't control. Consumer loyalty will go to those creators whose mods are less broken more often.
There is no inherent difference between early access for a paid mod and early access for a game. You could argue for or against early access in general, but supporting it for games but not mods is inconsistent when they both can cost money now.
It's also functional, to quote for context -
"Art of the Catch is early in development, however the fishing mechanic is fully functional. Because of this, it is currently being offered at an Early Bird Introductory Price."
Definitely a problem, and definitely one that other industries also experience, as well as different parts of this industry. Anyone who's been around turbosquid for enough time has seen a stolen model there. The DMCA is not perfect but it does exist for a reason, creators do have weapons against thieves.
in fairness of bethsoft's cut, was their part in the transaction not fulfilled with the original required purchase of the game
Bethesda did less then wholesome things, such as remove the version variable check, which allowed mutiple people to work on a single file project when coding, destroying entire group projects because of this a couple of months before. Clearly your everyday artists doesn't care about this, just like they don't care how IPhones are made.
These games already are lacking in content with a half broken engine that can't render shadows correctly, and the Developers think they deserve 50%? Seriously, a simple reading of the patches will show things which are still broken and only have been fixed by the community, so now people have to pay for that extra?
Publishers contributed next to nothing here apart from the base product, which they already got the money from the initial sale of said product, it's bad enough I have 'licensed' the game thanks to DRM, but now this as well? You either get the money from the base, or you sell it a lite value and ask for money from the mods, you can't ask for both. Consumer doesn't like being asked for amatuer projects.
Glad to see this isn't a way for developers of certain kind just to essentially offer a platform to play dress up in, instead of bring any depth to a game of all things and allow artists to tear each other akin of reselling oil at the lowest price.
Price =/= Quality. Nothin is stopping me from making a half assed mod that looks good for the first couple of hours in the game and drop like a rock later on, on the promise of 'real life costs' time frame. Remember, mods aren't quality controlled, what you're getting is only pass-control akin to that of Mobile Stores.
Valve has a terrible record to dealing with copyright material and stolen assets, so by the time they get into it, the best they can offer is a Steam refund, if you even think about doing an actual charge back, you Steam account will be terminated. Try and say that even is remotely fair (and yes, it extends to modding currently).
This leads to a second issue, this will force Valve to automate the system, they can barely deal with their customer support on actual 60$ products, let lone on hundreds of mods. This can absolutely stream-roll smaller developers, lets not pretend Valve didn't play favortism with certain creators on the TF2 and DOTA2 market when it came to this issue.
In relation, the SIMS had this issue as well. People started charging on private sites for SIMS mods and a small group of said people threw money hands over fist, this split the community as you might think. Once the well became dry so to speak, the mod creators released their mods for free on other sites under different aliases, this totally destroyed the SIMS modding scene (doesn't take much imagination on how by the community) and we now have a barebone version of anything resembling a modding community.
Lastly the 2 big elephants in the room, first one is piracy. Don't ignore the elephant in the room, which is that your mod isn't worth much in the first place (you're already charging 3$ to stay competitive, only 50-75 cents return per sale) nd hope to only see maybe a grand or two in a year and you don't have the protection of a large company to fight it if someone uploads it for free somewhere else.
And if Valve plans on being more strict, and stopping all people from modding a game with a mod from non-Steam store, then what is the point of even buying the game legally? This will only serve to raise the issue even further, are you guys ready to have this talk? Because clearly some people are too busy counting thier cents currently (we're not in Binding of Isaac where 99 cents = fortune).
Remember back in the day when you guys said you didn't care about owning a Ferrari or that artists didn't work for chicken feed? I hope you made senior at your studio, because the community will fill in the gaps for the rest of you.
eh.. I'd rather have it setup as more of a donation thing to be honest. Not to mention the amount of hate mail you might get because the mod you're selling was broken because of an update by the developer that you'd have no control over.
I don't think it's a "terrible" idea, I just imagine there's going to be a lot of people trying to abuse the system or reuploading other people's work, or consumers hassling you because it isn't compatible with mod number 532.
But hey, it's 2015, let's see how this plays out.
Its a pretty cool idea and fits with valves current model. I think it was gaben or notch that said, they can never compete with the full force of the internet, so modding should be endorsed.
Ace says it best though, the current model is ripe for exploitation. Be it by devs or modders.
Exactly my thoughts on this... There has to be a better way to encourage or allow user generated content for profit, one that doesnt end up with a cluster of theft and low quality content filling up the market.
This could also encourage more developers to start incorporating mod tools and workshop support within their games, since it means the creators of the original game will also get a new cheap method of getting more profits. It seems like everybody wins in one way or another.
I wouldn't want to see (especially for more popular games like skyrim) modders focusing on what sells rather than what they think makes a good mod. That's how we end up with an app-store full of shitty clones and lowest common denominator content.
(And yes I realise I can simply choose not to buy rubbish; that's not what I consider the problem)
For over a while people were complaing about this mod here being a system hog on your average system: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=429374670
But since it's a free thing, we just enjoyed it as it was, even with it's issue.
Look at the newest line from the updated version: https://sites.google.com/site/modsbyisoku/the-elder-scrolls-v-skyrim/wet-and-cold/changelog
They finally optimized the mod in several ways...after the author 'supposedly gave up' on modding, magically, on the first day of this 'event'.
And apparently they did it for kicks? http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/articles/50134/ .
It's clear that Valve and Bethesda organized all this before hand, since you can buy a large number of mods called "Debut Bundle", so there is no kicks in here, organizations that most authors failed to discloused to update on until ruckus was stirred.
Note here, on how people cannot monetize their work unless they enroll in it first, which magically some these authors doing it for the 'kicks' were able to before hand.
[ame]
I'm not talking about fun little things like the addition of Summer weather, etc. I'm talking about a core function of the mod being updated for the paid version to be less resource hungry so it doesn't kill save files in the middle of a snow party, genius.
Oh, look, a half completed (not joking) sexy dress #20577498 that isn't even finished and is being sold for less then a pack of bubblegum: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=429526712
Doesn't even talk about what bodies it uses, or what extensions. It's as if the artist has no idea about 95% of the base work already created as a standard. Early Access mods, are you serious?
Please note that at least 1 mod got removed recently because it RELIED on a extension tool (which again, Bethesda and Co. couldn't even bother creating) called FNIS for new extended animation registry, read it up.
Also, what about the fact a large portion of these mods RELY on other mods to be used, which STEAM DOES NOT USE OR CANNOT LAUNCH? FNIS and SKSE are two examples. Valve didn't even put a fraction of the research on this, and are still relying on external 3rd party tools to do half of the work to make them work in the game. Betheseda didn't even provide half of the tools to the community, the community made them, the Creation Kit is barely functional as is.
So again, let me ask, is the publisher seriously entitled to 50% at this point for anything? Because sure as hell not if you look at their support history, Skyrim's robust tools aren't here thanks to the original devs. They don't even have a real Mod Organizer tool that works.
Only personal comment I have is this; no, Developers of any caliber won't support mods either, they know pack mules will do the work for them for free (again, look at NIF and SKSE) because of Valve, Valve got away with providing next to nothing to the modding/content community and grew because the people around them were willing to brunt the effort needed to create said tools for a engine that was a little more sophistcated then a rock.
Those that will do support modding are going to be the small indie dev's in the hope of garning a following, but lets face it, they will be limited to Steam only rigging unlike Nexus sites.
Valve and Beth/Zeni had since Skyrim's launch to fix this, this was the original intent about the Workshop, this right here, and they still didn't provide anything to the modding community outside of a toll and a broken Toolkit which got tweaked to break group projects a couple of months before.
Disgusting behaviour, and all this for a couple of cents per file.
http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2009/05/entitlement-issues.html
Interesting read, thanks for sharing.
I agree with Ambershee. A donation button would have been less detrimental to the established community, but we'll see how this plays out.
I've lost interest in Steam's storefront since the floodgates opened. But I was never really big on the workshop since I was already accustomed to the Nexus. I'm curious to see what this evolves into, and whether or not it'll produce any gems.
Agreed. RIP modding. We've now been replaced with DLC makers.
Don't get me wrong. I didn't make those weapon mods to make money. I wanted to learn how to 3d model and needed an outlet. However, I just want to make it clear that having a donation option is basically useless.
I'm sure more massively popular mods may attract more donations. And if the mod author advertises the option to donate, that would help too. I've never done so and I believe it's against the Nexus ToS to do so. The donate button is there on my nexus mod pages, fully visible.
It might lead to people creating higher quality mods, but if Greenlight is any example, opening the floodgates can have the opposite effect. In fact, I'm not really sure if I like Valve's recent decisions. They've made a lot of steps to make their platform more open. But I find myself liking the storefront less and less. Steam had lost that premium feel it used to have, something that I loved on the otherwise messy PC market.
Overall, I'm not really sure if what they're doing is good for the PC market either. Allowing all kinds of content might appear good for devs and content creators, but it feels like everyone is competing for a slice of a relatively small pie. And with Steam letting in lots of low quality content these days, I'm not sure if it will keep on growing so fast, especially if it creates a bunch of angry consumers that got burned by a shitty purchase.
As for the mods, I will be curious how they tackle some of the details. Two things I'm certain off. Given how ego driven the mod community often is, I can bet we'll see some shitstorms coming out of this. Also, I'm pretty sure it will make people much much less willing to let anyone else use their content in other mods.
I do not think that the DOTA/TF2 marketplaces are comparable, both of those games are F2P and (afaik) content providers are not selling direct to consumers. They're also far more popular than Skyrim.
Currently Skyrim has about half the number of people playing TF2, and 5% of those playing DOTA2. You might think those numbers are still good considering how much people have made off TF2 sales but then Skyrim is currently FREE for the weekend, and on sale for $5 so it's a safe assumption that its numbers are higher than usual.
The Elder Scrolls games have lots of replayability but it doesn't even touch the scope of DOTA2/TF2. The games are not going to last as long which means content creators have a much smaller window to actually earn anything, from a smaller user base, who already paid a entry fee just to buy the game and probably not particularly thrilled at the idea of spending more...
But well... IDK. Nothing left to do now but see how it plays out.
i imagine a lot of modders who make stuff for steam workshop are working on either student versions or pirated versions of the software, neither of which you are legally allowed to make money off. hasnt this got massive ramifications?
You're going to see an influx of people charge for shit mods too, but I feel those will fall off as people realize they're not making money off of them. However it opens up the gates for talented people to earn some money off their time. While the comparison between Skyrim and Dota2 is a stretch, I wonder how many awesome assets we'd see in the game if people weren't making money off of it? Would polycount even have an entire subforum dedicated to it? People wouldn't be doing it full time, that's for sure at least. Skyrim is the start, but this is obviously going to be implemented into other titles as time goes by. I don't see how adding another venue for artists to make money off of their creations is a bad thing. The cream is going to rise to the top, and who the fuck cares about the chud anyways.
And people saying they'd rather have donations? I bet they would.
I've had Skyrim mods up on the nexus for years with the ability to donate, and I've never received a single penny.
I even created a thread on the Nexus forums asking other authors about this, and the general consensus was that people do not donate. Ever.
I hope this whole thing blows over, and that these people are just maybe some sort of vocal minority.
Because if I thought the community was like this, I never would have started modding in the first place. And I've been at it for over a decade.
These aren't the kinds of people that deserve to freely benefit from the fruits of other's efforts.
People are even so fucking horrible that they will plead that the main point of contention is the pay rates. Fuck off, since when have consumers ever truly cared about payment rates with music, games or movies to the creators. Sure a few might legitimatley care, but i guarantee the majority of the outrage is selfishness and some justification that mods can't be worth money.
Why do these gamers only argue for the free market when the argument suits them?
to be honest im not totally on board with the idea either, its like having microtransactions in games.
what happens when it comes to games with competitive multiplayer, and mods can give you an edge (eg Insurgency)? does that game become pay to win?
its down to mods being free for so long, and the idea that its only now that some people are charging for them, even after the mod has been available for free for ages.
i mean, im all for content makes being rewarded, but this seems like a bad way to do it. especially as people are now doing early access paid for mods, and using other peoples mods to make money.
its going to damage Valves rep a lot i think, before people saw them as for the consumer, after this alot of people will see them as greedy.
They're pissed because they want to be pissed, valve takes its regular fair amount of chunk as it does any DLC or game, then bethesda takes its own part and leaves the rest for the modder.
This is all after the modder herself has decided to sell the mod. The actual game developer can most likely decide how the split looks after valve has taken its part.
People are upset because something that was always free due to license-holders deciding who gets to sell what is now able to be sold, people don't like changes.
In reality people leave modding sooner or later anyway to pursue realistic and more fruitful endeavors like making their own games, while this might actually retain modders for longer.
They always shout "why aren't you working on this mod anymore!!?".