"Opening up Arma 3 to paid user-made content" - How?

[biggerdave 56]

Here are some facts:

Fact: Many developers do not even get net royalties at all for the games they develop.

Fact: Revenue split is very rare, and very desirable

Fact: a 25% revenue split is a much better deal than I get or could ever hope to get with DayZ.

Fact: Three parties are involved and the creators are getting slightly less than a third

Fact: TF2 creators get 25%

Which seems to prove the exact opposite of what he's trying to say, and exactly what everyone's complaining about? That the publishers are a bunch of greedy money-grubbing capitalist scumbuckets who'd suck the air out of our lungs given half the chance. Hell, just try to imagine how Codemasters would have handled DayZ.

Because that's who's taking that 75% here, Zenimax and Valve, not Bethesda Game Studios.

[I give up 152]

Wondering what "professional modding" means, exactly?

From what I've seen is like make the mod, sell the mod, grab the money and go to Bahamas for a nice vacation.

Now, there are modders that we can call professional like the guys from PR who decided to create a new game, that's professionalism.

Or the known modders from Sim Racing community who decided to create Assetto Corsa, that's also professionalism.

[soulis6 24]

That's a magnificently dumb way to rationalize it. But coming from Dean, it doesn't surprise me at all.

Let's draw a comparison, if I make a specific aftermarket parts for a, let's say Corvette, and sell them to Corvette owners, do you think Chevrolet would need to take 75% of every sale because I'm making parts that fit their car? The part can't fit any other car, so without the car my parts are nothing.

No, because the parts are a physical product, and that costs something, along with the cost for tools, transportation, marketing, etc. If you made the parts using material that was free, using Corvette's factory and their tools, and was displayed next to their showroom (steam in this example), all without having to leave your house, then what? I would probably say that yes you should give them a cut in that case.

Someone like Dean should fucking know much better where the value for the developer of the game lies, and that's the increased sales of the base product because your mod is increasing the inherent value of their base product. It's incredibly obvious how many people bought Arma 2 just for DayZ. The modding community has had this effect on games, their sales and their lifetime ever since the dawn of modding. And he somehow seems to forgot it in a span of two years.

And considering the base product is sold on Steam, Valve takes a cut from extra sales and the game dev takes a cut from extra sales. This is basically double dipping.

How much value does any Arma title have without the mods? How much value does Oblivion or Skyrim have without mods? They'd be fucking weekend titles you rented and returned.

While true for extreme cases like DayZ, is it true for the vast majority of the mods out there? It's an extreme outlier as far as I know, I can't think of any other mod for any game that has had that much impact on sales of the base game. Part of the problem with thinking along those lines, is that it's very hard to measure the impact that mods have on sales of the base game.

You ask how much value does Obliivon or Skyrim have without mods, but I think you are skewing how many people use mods and are 'in the know' in regards to the mod community. I know about 8-9 friends or coworkers who played through at least most of Skyrim, and as far as I know only one of them used ever used mods.

I suspect that the amount of people playing with mods in those games are much less than what you might think. For Skyrim for example, I remember seeing that something around 60% of all sales of the game were on consoles, so right away that's only 40% of users who have access to mods, and I would be surprised if more than 10-20% of those players ever use a mod.

Edited April 24, 2015 by Soulis6

[badluckburt 78]

You ask how much value does Obliivon or Skyrim have without mods, but I think you are skewing how many people use mods and are 'in the know' in regards to the mod community. I know about 8-9 friends or coworkers who played through at least most of Skyrim, and as far as I know only one of them used ever used mods.

I suspect that the amount of people playing with mods in those games are much less than what you might think. For Skyrim for example, I remember seeing that something around 60% of all sales of the game were on consoles, so right away that's only 40% of users who have access to mods, and I would be surprised if more than 10-20% of those players ever use a mod.

I'm pretty sure most of the people who play Elder Scrolls games on PC know about mods, wether they use them or not. Vanilla level-scaling in Oblivion is absolutely horrendous. Also, Morrowind, Oblivion and Skyrim all have community-made patches that fix a craptonne of quest bugs and other stuff that is broken in the base game. It's a shame the Skyrim mods are disappearing behind a paywall atm but I wonder how many of your friends that didn't use mods would've kept playing vanilla once you made them aware that mods were available. Oblivion's and Skyrim's UI's were prime examples of bad console porting and not optimised for PC at all, mods fixed that and Bethesda couldn't be arsed to although that probably would've panned out the same as Virtual Arsenal vs VAS.

Fact is, the Elder Scrolls games sell better BECAUSE they are moddable. I still install Morrowind from time to time to try out new mods that came out and I enjoy it every time.

The way they're dividing this pie right now, the modders get crumbs while putting in most of the work. Sure, the developers provide us with tools but that is their decision, the tools are already there anyway and are mostly provided on an as-is basis. In some cases, like Bohemia's, updates are released yes but those are often necessary to enable us to keep on modding so it's not like they don't gain anything already by doing that. Epic Megagames has done this for a very long time and are a prime example of how to do it right in my opinion.

[vegeta897 13]

The way they're dividing this pie right now, the modders get crumbs while putting in most of the work.

It's not about the work, it's about value. Work doesn't matter to the end user, they are paying for the value of playing the modded game. When you look at it in terms of value, it makes more sense. What is the value distribution of playing a modded game? There is no way the mod makes up for more than half of what you're playing. 25% sounds quite reasonable to me.

It doesn't take "work" to generate 1000 CD keys for a game, but you aren't paying for the work, you're paying for the value of the CD key. Digital content is tricky like that. It's not comparable to physical goods.

Edited April 24, 2015 by vegeta897

[badluckburt 78]

It's not about the work, it's about value. Work doesn't matter to the end user, they are paying for the value of playing the modded game. When you look at it in terms of value, it makes more sense.

It doesn't take "work" to generate 1000 CD keys for a game, but you aren't paying for the work, you're paying for the value of the CD key. Digital content is tricky like that. It's not comparable to physical goods.

I code for a living and depending on the project will be charging either by the hour or for the whole package. It is true that the end product dictates the 'value' of a product, be it digital or tangible. There is one big difference here in my opinion, modders do not WORK for either Valve or whatever game publisher / maker is involved, they create something in their own time because they want to. If Valve / Zenimax or whoever feels entitled to such a large percentage so be it, they will be companies that I avoid like the plague. I don't care what arguments Dean Hall spouts about how the gaming industry works, modding should never become integrated fully into the business side of it which is what is happening here if you ask me.

[soulis6 24]

Yes you are definitely right that part of it is visibility, many people would probably use mods if they knew they existed and didn't feel like it was a pain to go looking for them, but doesn't Steam mod integration help with that? or at least I think it will once everything has settled down.

You say that they sell better because they're moddable, but again, that's very hard to prove, because not only are more than half the sales of both those games to consoles - which don't and can't use any mods ever - but there are no good numbers on how many PC players are running mods. And even if they do, would they have not bought the game if it didn't have mods?

I play tons of Arma 3 for example, and I use a big list of mods with the group I play with as well, but there's no doubt that I still would have purchased the game even if it had no mods at all.

I'm not 100% sure of the split, if it's fair one way or another, would it be better if Bethesda decided that modders should get 100% of their revenue (giving mod makers 70% total)? It definitely would be for mod makers, but if they thought that the increase of mods bolstered by giving 100% of their split to them, would result in better sales for the game then wouldn't they do that? I'm not sure, but either way, 25% is better than the 0% they're getting now surely?

---------- Post added at 18:51 ---------- Previous post was at 18:48 ----------

I code for a living and depending on the project will be charging either by the hour or for the whole package. It is true that the end product dictates the 'value' of a product, be it digital or tangible. There is one big difference here in my opinion, modders do not WORK for either Valve or whatever game publisher / maker is involved, they create something in their own time because they want to and are then selling it for money. If Valve / Zenimax or whoever feels entitled to such a large percentage so be it, they will be companies that I avoid like the plague. I don't care what arguments Dean Hall spouts about how the gaming industry works, modding should never become integrated fully into the business side of it which is what is happening here if you ask me.

I added that part to your quote, because I think it's very important. The cut they're taking isn't off of donations to mod makers who are doing it in the spirit of creativity and just because they want to, they're taking a cut to mod makers who would like to try and sell their work to earn money, work that is 100% dependent on the base game and (even more importantly) it's audience.

[chortles 263]

I play tons of Arma 3 for example, and I use a big list of mods with the group I play with as well, but there's no doubt that I still would have purchased the game even if it had no mods at all.

The fundamental difference between us and a bunch of other people on this thread, evidently.

[vegeta897 13]

I code for a living and depending on the project will be charging either by the hour or for the whole package. It is true that the end product dictates the 'value' of a product, be it digital or tangible. There is one big difference here in my opinion, modders do not WORK for either Valve or whatever game publisher / maker is involved, they create something in their own time because they want to. If Valve / Zenimax or whoever feels entitled to such a large percentage so be it, they will be companies that I avoid like the plague. I don't care what arguments Dean Hall spouts about how the gaming industry works, modding should never become integrated fully into the business side of it which is what is happening here if you ask me.

I don't see the relevance of them not "working for" any of those companies. In a sense I'd argue that they are, because they are increasing the value of the game, and getting paid for it. They're even entering an agreement with all involved parties when they decide to monetize their work. They're not required to make this decision, but I'm not required to sell web designs to anyone as a freelancer either.

Modding will never be fully integrated as long as free mods exist. I have no reason to believe they'll ever go away, just as freeware games and software still exist.

[I give up 152]

This sounds a healthy and profiting business.

The guy who makes the mod, gets 25% from the mod price, sounds fair, from those 25% the guy is relieved with more 30% for taxes (tax retention) and also needs to include the outcome with his annual tax report.

Some simple math with a mod that have the price of 2 bucks.

25% of $2.00 is $0.50

$0.50 after taxes is $0.35

The impact with annual tax report cant be taking in account in this simple math as it depends on many other factors.

For a mod that has the price of $2.00 the author gets $0.35 and since for to get the money he needs to have a business rate up to $100.00, he needs to make 286 individual transactions, hoping there are no refunds (the buyer has 24hrs to ask for refund, for whatever reason).

Really sounds a healthy business, finally modders will be paid for their work.

[badluckburt 78]

You say that they sell better because they're moddable, but again, that's very hard to prove, because not only are more than half the sales of both those games to consoles - which don't and can't use any mods ever - but there are no good numbers on how many PC players are running mods. And even if they do, would they have not bought the game if it didn't have mods?

I play tons of Arma 3 for example, and I use a big list of mods with the group I play with as well, but there's no doubt that I still would have purchased the game even if it had no mods at all.

I'm not 100% sure of the split, if it's fair one way or another, would it be better if Bethesda decided that modders should get 100% of their revenue (giving mod makers 70% total)? It definitely would be for mod makers, but if they thought that the increase of mods bolstered by giving 100% of their split to them, would result in better sales for the game then wouldn't they do that? I'm not sure, but either way, 25% is better than the 0% they're getting now surely?

The cut they're taking isn't off of donations to mod makers who are doing it in the spirit of creativity and just because they want to, they're taking a cut to mod makers who would like to try and sell their work to earn money, work that is 100% dependent on the base game and (even more importantly) it's audience.

I think Morrowind's and Oblivion's sale numbers on PC will more than prove it, it's hard to find games to compare them to but the lifetime of those two games is definitely owed to mods, even if we only were to talk about graphical fidelity aka texture mods.

It's hard for me to say if I would've gotten Arma 3 if it had no mods, the Alpha was dirt-cheap so I probably would've gotten it but I do 'fix' certain aspects of the game in my own play sessions. I can say for sure that I would've enjoyed it less if it weren't moddable.

As far as dividing the revenue goes, I'd say 50% for the mod-maker(s) and 50% for Valve / Insert company. They can fight out amongst themselves on how to divide it but that would seem fair to me.

No need to put words in my mouth if you want to make a point by the way :)

25% is better than the 0% they're getting now surely?

I wonder how much they'd get if Valve shuts this system down and allows donations once again now that they've tried pull this. Every modder involved was apparently under NDA which is standard practice in this business probably but also shows that they half-anticipated this shit-storm. The damage control is going to be interesting to watch but Valve blew any credit it had with me.

[soulis6 24]

This sounds a healthy and profiting business.

The guy who makes the mod, gets 25% from the mod price, sounds fair, from those 25% the guy is relieved with more 30% for taxes (tax retention) and also needs to include the outcome with his annual tax report.

Some simple math with a mod that have the price of 2 bucks.

25% of $2.00 is $0.50

$0.50 after taxes is $0.35

The impact with annual tax report cant be taking in account in this simple math as it depends on many other factors.

For a mod that has the price of $2.00 the author gets $0.35 and since for to get the money he needs to have a business rate up to $100.00, he needs to make 286 individual transactions, hoping there are no refunds (the buyer has 24hrs to ask for refund, for whatever reason).

Really sounds a healthy business, finally modders will be paid for their work.

I think you were trying to be sarcastic, but that really doesn't sound that ridiculous. Some of the top mods on Skyrim have 500,000 + downloads (not sure if all of those are unique or not, but still). If they charged $5 for a huge top selling large content mod, and assuming they had even half that many people buy it, that starts to seem like some serious money.

[biggerdave 56]

This sounds a healthy and profiting business.

The guy who makes the mod, gets 25% from the mod price, sounds fair, from those 25% the guy is relieved with more 30% for taxes (tax retention) and also needs to include the outcome with his annual tax report.

Some simple math with a mod that have the price of 2 bucks.

25% of $2.00 is $0.50

$0.50 after taxes is $0.35

The impact with annual tax report cant be taking in account in this simple math as it depends on many other factors.

For a mod that has the price of $2.00 the author gets $0.35 and since for to get the money he needs to have a business rate up to $100.00, he needs to make 286 individual transactions, hoping there are no refunds (the buyer has 24hrs to ask for refund, for whatever reason).

Really sounds a healthy business, finally modders will be paid for their work.

And if they only make 285 individual transactions, the publishers pocket the whole $399.99. :rolleyes:

[I give up 152]

Yup, serious business for the guys who get 75%.

Still, the mod who has more subscriptions is around 850.000 but that is for a 3 years period. And also because was free?

Anyway, I like the "pay what you want" feature. Looks like a donation (with less 75%)?

[biggerdave 56]

Yup, serious business for the guys who get 75%.

Still, the mod who has more subscriptions is around 850.000 but that is for a 3 years period. And also because was free?

Anyway, I like the "pay what you want" feature. Looks like a donation (with less 75%)?

Pretty sure the "pay what you want" feature works the same way. How would you feel if you donated $1,000 to build wells in Africa, only to find that $750 of that was going directly into some CEO's swiss bank account?

[vegeta897 13]

How would you feel if you donated $1,000 to build wells in Africa, only to find that $750 of that was going directly into some CEO's swiss bank account?

Come on, that is an absolutely ridiculous comparison and you know it.

[roshnak 41]

It's not about the work, it's about value. Work doesn't matter to the end user, they are paying for the value of playing the modded game. When you look at it in terms of value, it makes more sense. What is the value distribution of playing a modded game? There is no way the mod makes up for more than half of what you're playing. 25% sounds quite reasonable to me.

It doesn't take "work" to generate 1000 CD keys for a game, but you aren't paying for the work, you're paying for the value of the CD key. Digital content is tricky like that. It's not comparable to physical goods.

I don't see how digital content is that tricky. I also don't see why you would look at it in terms of value. Frankly, your value distribution argument would only make sense if mods were included in the price of the game, which they wouldn't be under a monetized system. They're aftermarket products.

Have you taken a look at Sniperwolf's example? Here:

Let's draw a comparison, if I make a specific aftermarket parts for a, let's say Corvette, and sell them to Corvette owners, do you think Chevrolet would need to take 75% of every sale because I'm making parts that fit their car? The part can't fit any other car, so without the car my parts are nothing.

Should BI give Microsoft 75% of their sales because Arma runs on Windows?

Can you think of any other industry in which this would be an acceptable business model?

Edit: This is a pretty good example of why I think it's naive to suggest that the "market will balance itself out." People accept all kinds of dumb stuff in the video game industry that they don't seem to accept anywhere else.

Edited April 24, 2015 by roshnak

[I give up 152]

People accept all kinds of dumb stuff in the video game industry that they don't seem to accept anywhere else.

From all these 55 pages of intense debate, this sentence is the one that is more close from the truth.

[soulis6 24]

I don't see how digital content is that tricky. I also don't see why you would look at it in terms of value. Frankly, your value distribution argument would only make sense if mods were included in the price of the game, which they wouldn't be under a monetized system. They're aftermarket products.

Have you taken a look at Sniperwolf's example? Here:

Can you think of any other industry in which this would be an acceptable business model?

Edit: This is a pretty good example of why I think it's naive to suggest that the "market will balance itself out." People accept all kinds of dumb stuff in the video game industry that they don't seem to accept anywhere else.

Not at all a comparable example.

No, because the parts are a physical product, and that costs something, along with the cost for tools, transportation, marketing, etc. If you made the parts using material that was free, using Corvette's factory and their tools, and was displayed next to their showroom (steam in this example), all without having to leave your house, then what? I would probably say that yes you should give them a cut in that case.

[Defunkt 431]

Let's draw a comparison, if I make a specific aftermarket parts for a, let's say Corvette, and sell them to Corvette owners, do you think Chevrolet would need to take 75% of every sale because I'm making parts that fit their car? The part can't fit any other car, so without the car my parts are nothing.

If you *design* an aftermarket part (i.e. a digital IP) but Chevrolet take care of manufacturing (not directly applicable in this case), sales & associated administrative overhead, publicity and distribution through their dealerships then yes, I think you could certainly anticipate them taking a 75% or greater cut. Not that I'm defending Steam, given there's no manufacturing component I think 75% is a bit obscene, but your analogy is flawed.

[badluckburt 78]

I don't see the relevance of them not "working for" any of those companies. In a sense I'd argue that they are, because they are increasing the value of the game, and getting paid for it. They're even entering an agreement with all involved parties when they decide to monetize their work. They're not required to make this decision, but I'm not required to sell web designs to anyone as a freelancer either.

Modding will never be fully integrated as long as free mods exist. I have no reason to believe they'll ever go away, just as freeware games and software still exist.

They are taking a massive cut of something that they had very little to do with, invested very little effort in it's creation. Companies provide the game and the tools, Valve provides the distribution platform but that's about it. All of that is covered by other sources of income already so what exactly entitles them to 75%? It just feels wrong to me and I want no part of it, my signature sums it up basically.

[biggerdave 56]

Come on, that is an absolutely ridiculous comparison and you know it.

Yes, you're absolutely correct. Nothing like that has ever happened in the real world, ever. Next thing I'll be telling you that PETA actively kidnaps people pets and has them put down, what sort of a crazy world would something like that happen in, right? :rolleyes:

Or were you claiming that the idea that mod developers donations should, you know, actual go to mod developers was ridiculous?

[da12thMonkey 1943]

I think you were trying to be sarcastic, but that really doesn't sound that ridiculous. Some of the top mods on Skyrim have 500,000 + downloads (not sure if all of those are unique or not, but still). If they charged $5 for a huge top selling large content mod, and assuming they had even half that many people buy it, that starts to seem like some serious money.

500,000 subscribers is a pipe dream even if you're only charging $1, never mind $5.

Looking at the subscriber counts and prices of the =paiditems&actualsort=totaluniquesubscribers"]most subscribed paid items in the Skyrim workshop:

So far only 2 items have made more than $100 for the authors, so only 2 people have actually become eligible to receive money so far, while Valve is already sitting on a day's profit of 1000s of dollars off the back of this.

How many of the mods on there that will accumulate more than $400 over time is anybody's guess. There will probably be plenty that languish for months only accumulating $300 total, and $0 for the author.

[vegeta897 13]

I don't see how digital content is that tricky. I also don't see why you would look at it in terms of value.

I don't see why you wouldn't. When I purchase a game, I don't care how much work was put into it. I care about the value it has. Another developer might put a hell of a lot more work into something that I value far less. I don't see how anything but value should matter when we're talking about paying for something.

I

Have you taken a look at Sniperwolf's example? Here:

Can you think of any other industry in which this would be an acceptable business model?

It's a unique industry. Creating and selling a mod distributed on Steam is not the same thing at all as creating some aftermarket part for a car. You are ignoring a whole hell of a lot of differences if you think that's a valid comparison.

Mods on Steam are utilizing Steam's distribution and tools, they're utilizing the engine, assets, and IP to create value. There's also risk that both Valve and the developer or publisher take by officially endorsing mod content.

while Valve is already sitting on a day's profit of 1000s of dollars off the back of this.

Not profit, revenue. Do you think it's free to host modded content? Like there are no costs involved in this venture for Valve?

[badluckburt 78]

There's also risk that both Valve and the developer or publisher take by officially endorsing mod content.

I'm pretty sure that if you pick apart the whole legal agreement you'll find clauses that wave their responsiblities and put it all on the modder.