What do you think about paid addons idea?

[RN Malboeuf 12]

Hi. Game editing gets more and more complicated. Creating game content needs a lot of time, expensive software and specific skills. Addon making is not only a hobby but hard work too -  and too often good projects are abandoned due to lack of time or motivation.

There were already attempts to make money out of ofp/arma editing -shareware FSM Editor for ex.

But I wonder what if some type of addon on request service was possible ? Will anybody use it ? What is community attitude to it ?

Note that is has nothing to do with already existing wips or addons. It's about theoretical possibility to get more stuff released on paid request

[MEDICUS 0]

I won't pay. I don't want to have money for the maps i made, also.

[opteryx 1562]

Disregarding that it's in violation of the modding tools EULA.......

I think it's a bad idea because it is somewhat offensive to addon makers that spend TONS of their free time into addon making. Goes against the spirit of the community IMO.

-edit-

I still don't understand why BIS hasn't reacted and take down <link removed> YOUR website, but the MLOD issue which was way less harming to BIS was reacted upon Immediately.....

[RN Malboeuf 12]

If you can please avoid discussion about EULA, author rights etc. It'll be long flame topic... i answered all i can at armaholic already. no links, no offers.

just _theoretical_ discussion here - that's all that is allowed here and i want to abey the rules atm

[[aps]gnat 28]

If you can please avoid discussion about EULA, author rights etc.

ummm, lol .... I think that is impossible, its overshadows the whole topic and will not go way no matter how hard you close your eyes and put fingers in your ears.

[sickboy 13]

lol @ Opteryx, As if Marek is skimming the Forums every few milliseconds to detect stuff like this. Get real dude, this thread is alive for .. 12 minutes

Also, I believe mlods available to the whole public without EULA, downloadable for you, me, everyone, other game users, developers, and what not, is a copyright infridgement and problematic for BI as business.

I don't see this problem as big with an initiative to pay for creating content. Im not a fan of it, though I believe there's nothing wrong with it.

Apart from possibly being against the EULA of the tools as you say (but thats out of my scope of responsibility here)

Ppl can also show appreciation to addon makers, by form of Paypal etc, something that's very common in about every other development scene (from vBulletin forum modules, to about anything )

Don't get me wrong; I don't want to get paid either. Still I believe it's not so weird to say:

You tell me what you want, I create it right away, but it costs $$ money. (Again; apart from the EULA of ArmA/Tools etc)

[Maddmatt 1]

I am completely against it. You are making money off someone else's game without permission, as well as violating the EULA and the law in many countries.

I wont pay for an addon. And I wont charge people for an addon I make.

As for you ArmA addons site (assuming it's you), how will your addons ever be widely used if you charge for them? And how are other mods going be able to make use of them? All they can ever become is a little toy for the person who bought them, which IMO makes them a waste of money. You also have no real way of stopping that person from distributing that addon to others for free.

As for an addon maker asking for donations, I have no problem with that. I don't know if I would do it, but there is nothing wrong with it if it's optional.

And what if someone isn't happy with the quality of the addon? How do they know it's not some quick crappy rush job? I see no mention of other addons that you guys have made.

Not to mention that free tools and possibly community ideas/content are used for these addons that are being charged for. So in a way people here are being used for you to make money.

Although I wonder, what kind of prices are charged for these addons?

Edit: Something like asking for donations so that the addon(s) could be made and publicly released would be a different story though.

[Guest Ti0n3r]

Sounds idiotic to me.

[opteryx 1562]

lol @ Opteryx, As if Marek is skimming the Forums every few milliseconds to detect stuff like this. Get real dude, this thread is alive for .. 12 minutes

I reported this to BIS a week ago.

[sickboy 13]

lol @ Opteryx, As if Marek is skimming the Forums every few milliseconds to detect stuff like this. Get real dude, this thread is alive for .. 12 minutes

I reported this to BIS a week ago.

Ok you got me by the balls there No comment

[RN Malboeuf 12]

once again

Quote[/b] ]If you can please avoid discussion about EULA, author rights etc. It'll be long flame topic... i answered all i can at armaholic already. no links, no offers.

just _theoretical_ discussion here

I contacted Placebo with full text of this topic before i got the account. This thread is allowed in the current shape only

Quote[/b] ]You also have no real way of stopping that person from distributing that addon to others for free.

If someone bought smth... It's his own buisness what to do with it. share, delete, forget delete or whatever

Quote[/b] ]And what if someone isn't happy with the quality of the addon? How do they know it's not some quick crappy rush job?

Do you think someone will pay for it in advance ?

If someone really wants to flame... don't know... i can setup forum on my site (those who wants will find it) but please stop it here

[wipman 1]

Hi, i haven't voted because any of the offered options reflect my

point of view; but if i hardly can pay my weekends... as for pay

a man or a woman for make addons. Aside of the EULA thing that

clearly prohibits this. I preffer to waste money in destroy the two

remaining neurones that i've than pay someone for do addons and

upgrade his computer or waste this money in drugs like every good

person "should do". Let's C ya

[ebud 18]

I'd be more than happy to buy and DL high quality addons and mods similar to how they are made and released for Microsoft Flight Sim series or similar "addons" for Strike Fighters. Those are the only 2 I follow that have pay addons, I thought there were cockpits for sale for Falcon as well. As long as it's "legal" I think it's a great idea. I have no idea if these concepts ruined or split their respective communities, but I could really care less. This community has been going downhill for months, dare I say years with the in-fighting and douchebagery of people ripping addon/mission makers. Let addons makers and mission makers charge for their work and give BIS a big cut, it's not like the "community" will get much worse.

[Maddmatt 1]

If someone bought smth... It's his own buisness what to do with it. share, delete, forget delete or whatever

So they could even post it on a public site for everyone?

If they are just paying you to make the addon, instead of paying for a license to use it like when you buy a commercial game, that isn't so bad.

The thing that I am against is selling them as if they are an expansion pack/full game and having people buy the rights to play with them. Only the makers of the game really have a right to do that as far as I know.

I guess if someone just paid me to work on something and then I/they could just release it for free it would be fine

Still, I wouldn't pay someone for that. But if someone else wants to, so be it.

[mr burns 132]

Depends on the quality of said addons.

I´d be more than willing to pay for releases that are anything like Eagle Dynamics BlackShark and it´s following successors (full blown sims, taking every litle aspect into consideration).

But if it´s anything like QG .. hell no.

[ExtracTioN 0]

If someone bought smth... It's his own buisness what to do with it. share, delete, forget delete or whatever

So they could even post it on a public site for everyone?

If they are just paying you to make the addon, instead of paying for a license to use it like when you buy a commercial game, that isn't so bad.

The thing that I am against is selling them as if they are an expansion pack/full game and having people buy the rights to play with them. Only the makers of the game really have a right to do that as far as I know.

I guess if someone just paid me to work on something and then I/they could just release it for free it would be fine

Still, I wouldn't pay someone for that. But if someone else wants to, so be it.

Fully agree

[mrj-fin 0]

I hope BIS could use some community members works on their games like using best soundmod, vehicles and weapons on ArmA 2 and paid to them creators little bit money but I am very against after game release addons to be cost anything I dont wanna pay money to any extra and its true out of spirit of addons making.

[RN Malboeuf 12]

Quote[/b] ]So they could even post it on a public site for everyone?

If they are just paying you to make the addon, instead of paying for a license to use

In most cases - yes. things are just as you described. Selling copies to every gamer is mad idea in this case and believe me i'm not insane. Another thing is that good addon can be rather expensive for one man

It's aloso obviuos that noone want to pay for anything But you know - i'm not trying to force anyone

[ebud 18]

If it can work like this

Linky

I can't see why people would object. I guess it's because so many people are used to getting everything for free. It's a neat idea that would never ever work for this game.

[nephilim 0]

Quote[/b] ]I hope BIS could use some community members works on their games like using best soundmod, vehicles and weapons on ArmA 2 and paid to them creators little bit money but I am very against after game release addons to be cost anything I dont wanna pay money to any extra and its true out of spirit of addons making.

theres some community members that work/work for bis.

obviously they HAVE it what it takes to get "paid" for their addons.

would buy the other crap floating around...

besides that.. how would someone value it?

50 bucks for a 10 mins retex job on a m4 thats just dyed tan?

hell yea..

[Rambo-16AAB 0]

If it was a fee to cover the cost of the bandwidth costs of the hosting server, fair enough, or a fee to cover the burning of said addons to a CD/DVD & postage in a non profit sense, then fair enough.

Charging for an addon that you didnt make, for the purpose of profit for you, nope.

[sickboy 13]

If it was a fee to cover  the cost of the bandwidth costs of the hosting server, fair enough, or a fee to cover the burning of said addons to a CD/DVD & postage in a non profit sense, then fair enough.

Charging for an addon that you didnt make, for the purpose of profit for you, nope.

I believe the topic creater is talking about Demand & Answer.

You want an addon created. He makes it. You pay him.

Quote[/b] ]Charging for an addon that you didnt make, for the purpose of profit for you, nope.

That's imo putting words in his mouth

Anyway, while thinking further about it... Even though the topic starter means to create projects on demand and sell _HIS_ work, I think it would complicate things a lot more. There is always the chance that people out there will sell work (initially) created by others. It's already hell sometimes for Addon Creaters when another person takes (bits of) their work and claiming it as their own.

I believe this problem becomes bigger incase someone else is going to make money with your work

[The_Captain 0]

BIS is a small company, and they can't tailor their already released game to the exact needs and wishes of the community. Many community members have extensive experience in various areas, and potentially this experience could translate into high quality paid addons. Individual members and small teams are more nimble than BIS as a whole, and could do a good job at satisfying what players want.

However, there are some obvious issues:

1) Copy protection (in a download-to-play addon system)

2) Intercompatibility between addons & players

3) Limited utility for buyers & small market size

4) Differentiation between free addon quality and paid addon quality

5) BIS' overall involvement in regulating/authorizing products and release, as well as sorting out legal issues.

6) Customer entitlement vs. developer profit

1) Copy protection or some sort of anti piracy system would need to be developed if simple PBO's are going to be offered for sale. Otherwise, they will be freely traded, which undermines the financial motives of the developer. Copy protection is usually a losing battle, especially when added to an open format like Arma's PBO's. This would be a difficult problem to solve. With the 'like it free' mentallity of the Arma community, I'm not sure an honor system release would be profitable either.

2) Not all players will have all pay-to-play addons, esp if many are released piecemeal. Heck, it's hard enough to get a group of players to download the same set of free addons to their hard drive to be able to play together. If the addons or packs had to be purchased? Cost aside, the hassle is an even bigger problem. The hassle and cost involved might lead to a splintered community that finds it difficult to play together.

3) Addon buyers would be doing little more than downloading the packs and playing with them, which they can do well enough with the myriad of free addons. This suggests that the market for paid addons is not very large, nor lucrative (what, $5 addons?). Individual addons would seem to not offer enough 'bang' for a user's buck, and most users would ignore them. In addition, the relatively small pool of Arma players would negate any advantages in pricing the addons at a low price.

4) Free addons can make use of content others have developed (sounds, models, etc, from original game or other media), and most people don't mind, as the author isn't trying to profit. A paid addon would need to make all aspects from scratch, which could be an expensive and time consuming proposition. Furthermore, there's no guarantee that a paid addon would be of significantly better quality a free addon, especially considering free addons can usually rip commercial content. The paid addon would need to be priced to leverage its advantage over free content, and if this is low, then the makers of the paid addon will likely not profit much.

5) BIS would need to spend time hammering out the legal issues involved in such a process: contracts, NDA's, lawyers. At the very least, a large amount of BIS' effort would need to be spent in setting up such deals with the addon authors; time and effort which would likely not be recouped (given the small number of potential buyers).

6) People are cheap. Don't sell to cheap people. Cheap people are whiny and demand features and support from a developer far beyond their buy-in price. Arma addons would naturally have to be priced low to attract any sort of interest, but in selling them at a low price one would attract buyers who felt entitled to the developer's time, effort, and support. However, if the addons were priced relative to the amount of time that was required to make them, I'd expect most addons would be priced at $50+... At any rate, I would forsee an unhappy developer who never felt that his time had value.

One of the natural benefits to Arma and OFP were that once you paid for the game once, community releases and patches to this very open game would extend the product beyond your initial purchase. Offering addons for players to buy on top of their initial purchase undermines this obvious advantage and leaves a bad taste in many people's mouths. I already paid my $50 for arma, and I'm not terribly interested in investing more unless it's obviously worth my money.

I can't see producing paid addons being a profitable enterprise. I would expect it would be more of a hobby, with a slight income, but with all of the hassles of producing and maintaining a commerical product. I would think it would be much more satisfying to develop an addon that you, as an author enjoy, and make it available for others to further enjoy.

Edit: Ack, I just realized that the OP was referring more to a commission system: You want a harrier, or osprey, and you pay the addon author a princely sum to develop it. Work for hire, as it were, though who retains the rights? The commissioner or the original author? This negates most of my concerns above, but it would still be a difficult proposition by the author.

[RN Malboeuf 12]

fun discussion about 2nd option - i doubt someone will ever donate a penny via WM or Paypal... i can even try once MiG is ready, but.. i'm almost sure about results

[-HAC-_mainframe 0]

guys I think that most addon makers see this primary as a hobby.

For me this is what makes the hole idea great.

The fact that we already have so many addons and a lot other under way validates that the free system works just fine.

Also we are not professionals so we have an open error threshold.

We can always start from scratch and enjoy the hole process.

So for me charging for an addon that you did or didn't make for the purpose of profit, nope.