Steam now allowing people to charge for mods.

http://www.kotaku.com.au/2015/04/people-can-now-make-money-off-game-mods-on-steam/

If this was already posted, mods do your thing.

This is going to suck for us. I'm all for people getting paid for hard work. But if EVERYBODY makes you pay for mods, it's going to really kill the mod enviroment.

Good.... its about god damn time !!!

So far there are 25,000 free mods for Skyrim on Steam and only 17 paid mods.

I don't agree with how steam are handling it (the mod creator should get the majority of the the money) but the concept of paid mods is a non-issue.

@toast_burner:

So steam is getting a cut of the money ?

Now that I have a problem with.

The mod creator only gets 25%

@toast_burner:

All right I've heard enough..... this is officially a bad idea !!!!

mod sites like the Nexus allow you to include a donate option and have done so for awhile. I'm certainly all for giving money to someone I think does good work, but the problem is Valve's implementation. 75% just for file hosting is absurd. I want to reward the modder for his work, not Valve for being a dick.

And this is why I love the mod community

If you don't want to click on the link, it's a new Skyrim mod that went up on the Nexus in the past day called "give me money for no reason" and it's just a woman in fine clothes and jewelry that sits outside of whiterun asking you for money. Her name is Beth (*wink) and her choice of chair is quite amusing.

Never used mods before and certainly won't do it now. But i heard from most of my friends and acquaintances that do a lot in mods that they now have to spend a shit ton of cash and they are not happy

Also im wondering how long the developers will look on if this turns into a big earning for the modders, because in the end why would any developer allow some kid to make money of their hard work.

No wonder Bethesda is taking so long to make a Fallout 4 announcement. They want to see how these paid mods develop so they can take it to another level and implement it with the new creation kit. Sony, Microsoft and Steam. 3 consoles to choose from. 2 pre built, 1 you can build yourself, lol. Gaming is getting better and better every year.

In order for a snowball to roll down a hillside, it must first move an inch.

Hahahahaha you thought Valve would make a decision not based solely on profit and taking advantage of stupid consumers? Scum company continues to scum.

@firefox59:

Nope..... I always thought Valve was Evil (DRM and all that) but I didn't know they would pull something like this.

One more piece of free internet falling off the wall.

Right now it more just the same gamers whining and throwing out false claims because the companies are now worshiping at their feet.

@wiouds: um what?

And other than paranoia is there any reason to assume that there will b less free mods?

People are still making games for free, so why would you assume they will stop making mods?

@n64dd: well then don't pay for it

Microtransaction DLC... times a million, without having to do anything to get a cut.

Yep and it doesnt bode well, because again as i said , you can be sure developers want a piece of the cake and if they don't they will limit modding capabilities

It will be interesting to see how this will progress.

I'm a little torn on the issue, I wouldn't really mind if the ones that's making the Skywind or Falskaar mod got a little coin passed their way for their time and effort with their mod, Someone who simply changes the textures of a weapon or the color of an armor and then charge 5$ for it is tougher to swallow.

But I do think many are taking their sorrows in advance since this has been recently implemented and it's far too soon to see how it'll turn out in the longer run just now.

I am just pointing out that the gamers that are whining are doing it for themselves. They are doing what they normally do and this is throwing out unproven claim as fact for their viewpoint.

Saw this coming a mile away

@toast_burner:

That's terrible that Steam takes such a huge cut. Time to move the mods off of Steam I'd say.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wsi7DbCd0BU

He says that it been going on for a while.

I'm not really familiar with more recent mods, but I remember there were some awesome ones for Quake, Vampire:the Masquarade, Neverwinter Nights, and even Halo. I'd have rather paid for them than some of the more recent add ons for games.

Agree that quality modders should have an opportunity to make money but the greed of valve has been astonishing

Valve is one of the two group that look bad in this.

Don't like this at all. Valve has gone in a weird direction with their shit overpriced steam machines now this bull shit.

@wiouds: who is the other group

who cares

It's more of an inevitability than it is paranoia, unless for some reason, the many people who make free mods somehow don't want to capitalize on their time.

How is it an inevitability? Steam didn't kill the free game market so why would it kill the free mod market?

You seem to be basing your argument on ignorance.

@toast_burner:

Now now..... don't be rude.

Ignorance is not a slur. It is not rude to call ignorance ignorance.

@toast_burner:

Its rude..... or mean....... nobody wants to becalled ignorant even if they are.

This is what I was wondering as soon as I heard it. Mods, as they are now, are a great way to keep people interested in a game for a long time, which is a very positive thing for both developers and gamers. If modders are now putting their stuff for sale I would imagine the developers would be entitled to some of the profits, and I don't know that developers will let people profit off their work with no return for them.

The whole thing is just a bad idea, shame on steam for messing with such a long standing pc gaming tradition.

The gamers that are whining about it.

First, I never said paid mods would kill the free mod market. You mentioned how it would mean less free mods? Some people who made free mods will now charge for them, resulting in less free mods. Simple math.

Secondly, I'm not basing my argument on ignorance. I'm basing it on history. Every horrible DLC practice can be traced back to horse armor. Every horrible microtransaction and free to play structure can be traced back to the mobile market. That free mod market won't be killed, but it will be affected. You claim it is a non issue, and I say otherwise because a portion of those modders WILL want money when they find out they can charge for them. Depending on how successful these modders become, it has potential to become a serious issue.

fair enough.

I think it has many potential positives, we might get higher quality mods because if people get money for them they can spend more time and resources on them. However Valves greed and potential missus are drawbacks.

By missuse I mean its possible to copy a free mod from nexusmods, then upload it to steam workshop and charge for it, that's one example of things that could potentially happen.

From what I understand this is not something new. I think they are called payware expansion.

Well it Valves and their normal business plan of do nothing and make money. At least EA is still making games I like.

My problem with the gamers that is throwing dirt to make a bole hill and then start to cry about the mountain.

Missuse can happen with any system there was kickstarter that was showing some unique dice which the kickstarter claims to be costly to make but turn out you can order them cheaper than what the kickstarter claims.

I had bought a ton of paid mods for FSX, the money I spent on mods for FSX was a lot more than the game itself.

So are they commonly better than free mods?

Two facts that I think are being overlooked:

One: Valve could not decide for it's self to allow paid mods for Skyrim, Bethesda had to sign off on such a thing in order for such things to be legal.

Two: In order to get Bethesda to sign off on such a thing, Valve had to present a payment model that would be worth the time and attention of a company like Bethesda.

Yeah, 75% going to the pockets of someone other then the modder is all kinds of icky, but we have no idea what percentage of that is going to Valve, and what percentage was required to get Bethesda to sign off on all this. Maybe Valve is getting sixty five cents on every dollar, but it is possible they are only getting five. Considering Bethesda holds all the legal power, odds seems pretty good they are going to be getting the most money out of any such deal.

Or Bethesda could just like the modders more freedom to make another choose and Valve choose the amount instead.

Seeing how valve control steam then one could say the seem likely that they choose the percentage to take.

We don't know how much say Bethesda has if they have a say?

What I do know is a fact is that valve has this statement in their EULA agreement for a while now. In steam's EULA it flat out told you that Valve has the right to take any percentage they want with user to user transaction.

Valve absolutely has the power to say: "If paid mods are a thing, we get all the money!" but on the other hand Bethesda can say "No dice, we are not signing over a blank check for folks to modify and make money off of our IP in exchange for twenty cents on the dollar." While I of course concede that Bethesda doesn't have to be making a cent off of all this, Bethesda could be the super awesome party in all this, they hold all the legal power in this situation. They signed off on something pretty unprecedented (Which they should get credit for, even if they are getting fifty cents on the dollar) and it is unlikely they would do it for anything less then the largest chunk of the pie.

This is pure speculation of course, but if Bethesda is getting less then fifty cents on the dollar, I would be honestly stunned at Bethesda's awesomeness. Valve's cut however of most products is between ten and fifteen percent after all no? Seems unlikely they are the ones getting more then twenty five cents on the dollar in this three way split.

You're ignoring that this will encourage more people to make higher quality mods. I'll use my free game example again, the amount of free games has not decreased even though it's becoming more and more easy for devs to sell their games, if anything the production of free games is increasing. So why would mods be different?

@wiouds: yeah most of them are

That is good.

I can see Valve getting the largest cut very easy. They hold a great deal of power in this. I can see them having as much if not more sway than Bethesda. We don't know the percentage that Valve takes from mods.

Unprecedented? Other than the game it has happen.

@n64dd: i do have an issue with them taking 75% of the revenue