Valve's Gabe Newell responds to paid for mods negative feedback

[zen1966]

45% to Beth? They should be paying the guys behind stuff like the unofficial patches, stable uGrids to load and brawls bug patch, and Boris and Sheson, out of their own pockets for doing the job they should have done in the first place. Maybe I'll have more sympathy for them taking a cut if FO4 is seriously QA'd instead of being released on a cool sounding date.

[Meowdance]

Yeah, if a mod reaches the point where it is of such quality it should be paid for then whoever made it should indeed put it up for sale(Dear Esther/Gmod?). The option to sell any old toss immediately brings us to Android Play store level tactics. "That's popular, do that. Make a free one that tells you to buy the full one." Also, as mentioned, most of the mods I install are just a load of popular mods mashed together and coded to play nicely with a little note about all who are involved. How will anyone make any money when 30 people worked on a mod that changes the weather and how some villagers look and then 3/4 of the take goes to the big guys anyways? Lots of people claiming 'THIS IS MY MOD'.

Of course, you do realize my compatriots that we have a lot of power in this regard? If you don't like paid-for mods then simply ... don't ... buy ... them - if there's no real money to be made then the whole idea will wither on the vine.

This should definitely be the course of action, though it's easier said than done with such a giant community.

How would it work for getting mods from other sources? I get nearly all my mods from Nexusmods or similar sites rather than going through the workshop. Would external modding communities die out if money can be made through Steam?

[Saracen]

I may have to go back through all of Saracen's posts about Steam and read just a little closer, now...

Feel free, but I doubt it'll throw much light on this. I have several objections in principle to the concept of Steam, but this wasn't one of them.

On the notion of mods popping up ads, THAT would irritate the hell out of me, and would ensure instant removal of the offending mod. If I've paid for a game, there are NO circumstances under which I want pop-up ads. Absolytely none at all. If mods started doing that, it'd see me stop using mods at all, unless they were guaranteed ad-free.

[GuidoLS]

but you found another and *poof* you was gone...

Valve yanks new mod-sales feature from Steam after only four days

Only four days after Valve Software launched a new paid-mods service on digital gaming storefront Steam, the company officially changed course on Monday and removed pricing from its Steam Workshop pages, all while admitting "it's clear we didn't understand exactly what we were doing."

[Jowsey]

Annnnnnnnnnnnnnd it's gone.

Good riddance. Please just implement a totally voluntary tipping system and perhaps allow me to decide the split of where the money goes a la humble bundle?

[Savas]

Valve gets 30%, Bethseda gets 45%, mod creator gets 25%.
Percentage split between Bethseda and the mod developer are set by Bethseda. Valve's 30% cut is the same as it takes from all content sold through Steam.

There's more.. I read that if your mod doesn't make a certain amount you don't get anything..

What a massive insult.. The sheer greed..

[Ttaskmaster]

while admitting "it's clear we didn't understand exactly what we were doing"

Or rather, "We tried it on... but there was SO much outcry immediately following the announcement, that we realised people would not fall for this crap and we were forced to abandon this particular rip-off tactic".

[Chadders87]

The News feed is a bit slow this week... Valve announced this business endeavour was to be scrapped due to the public backlash.

[directhex]

https://twitter.com/notch/status/592132655224922112

[Shordes]

I understand what Valve was trying to do, but honestly, a little more insight couldn't have been to hard, don't you think?

I'm glad they reversed the change, even though some actual modders would have liked to sell their stuff, I'm sure.

We'll see if they ever revise the idea, but I think they learned that sometimes they don't understand a community completely.

[ZaO]

I understand what Valve was trying to do, but honestly, a little more insight couldn't have been to hard, don't you think?

I'm glad they reversed the change, even though some actual modders would have liked to sell their stuff, I'm sure.

We'll see if they ever revise the idea, but I think they learned that sometimes they don't understand a community completely.

They'll be back with this idea. They'll just rethink it and leave it a while before doing so. One of the main issues that seems to concern people (other than the complete greed of Bethesda and Valve stealing way too much of the income away from the mod devs), is people selling stuff they don't have the right to sell/didn't create. This is one issue that you can't completely solve. Unfortunately, it happens a lot with digital media.

On a side note: Steam is starting to look like a bit of a wasteland of half arsed crap these days. I think devs should have to have some kind of playable concept demo for everyone to try out and rate before they can even get past/into the greenlight stage. Anything that can't yet proivide a demo should start off on Kickstarter or something. It just looks like they're trying every little thing they can to further monetize their service. Wonder what the next thing will be..

[kentishh]

It's actually not a bad idea but they went about it all wrong, especially seeing as the modders themselves get pretty much no cut of the profit.