Skyrim Workshop Now Supports Paid Mods Options

[Acadian]

Gstaff, of Bethesda, announced on the Bethesda forum that Skyrim Workshop Now Supports Paid Mods. Here's the thread.

To say the reaction there has been underwhelming is a massive understatement. If I spend more than a moment pondering unintended consequences and pitfalls, I’m afraid I must agree with the ominous implications this has for the future of modding. A ton of posts on that thread already beat up the subject pretty well.

I confess I prefer as little to do with Steam as possible and have never touched their 'workshop'. I get my mods from Nexus, but the implications are disturbing - even for private hobby modders. Naturally, Steam is taking a big cut of all proceeds. Does this mean that for future games, the CK/CS will only be made available to 'for profit' Steam workshoppers? This seems to validate the concerns many of us have about Steam and their ability to control what you thought you paid for.

[Acadian]

I'm scratching my head here still at the lack of sense. It is clear that the modding community overall is not behind pay for mods. BethSoft has provided their CS/CK free and, in return, has sold more games because of modding and not had to repair tons of tiny bugs that the modders do. The situation has been, in my mind, symbiotic with mod makers, players and BethSoft all benefiting. If it ain't broke. . . .

If there is a case for paying some modders, it seems that BethSoft should look at paying the wonderful 'unofficial patch' teams for doing a notable chunk of their patching work for them.

But decisions like this don't always make sense. Even big company's sometimes only learn by screwing up and getting bitten (ESO, I'm looking at you and the embarrassing reception to your pay to play MMO).

[Callidus Thorn]

I'm scratching my head here still at the lack of sense. It is clear that the modding community overall is not behind pay for mods. BethSoft has provided their CS/CK free and, in return, has sold more games because of modding and not had to repair tons of tiny bugs that the modders do. The situation has been, in my mind, symbiotic with mod makers, players and BethSoft all benefiting. If it ain't broke. . . .

It makes perfect sense. Modding only benefits Bethesda up to a point. It keeps people playing the games, keeps the games at the forefront of the players gaming library until the next game is released. Then it becomes a hindrance. How many people stuck to playing modded Morrowind rather than buy Oblivion? How many stuck to modded Morrowind or Oblivion instead of buying Skyrim? Once that happens, that free program that lets players extend the games lifespan gets in the way, and starts costing them sales. The fact that Morrowind still has an active section on the Bethesda forums shows how many people are still playing the game, and no doubt the high ups at Bethesda consider that lost revenue.

And on top of that, there's DLC. Players already have the choice of buying the DLC as it comes or waiting for the ultimate edition/GoTY edition and maybe getting them cheaper, but mods present another option: content that can be at a higher level than Bethesda can provide, but which doesn't come at a cost. So modding's potentially costing them money there as well.

And finally, there is a penalty to having people playing a TES game right up until the release of the next game; people immediately compare everything they find out about the new game to the old one, which is still fresh in their minds because they're still playing it. So of course people look negatively on the new game, particularly considering the direction Bethesda has been moving in with Oblivion and (more noticeably imo) Skyrim.

Killing off modding can benefit them, and doing it this way means they can sit back and make money while the modding community destroys itself. Sure, it might cost them sales, but the ones they'll lose, the long term modders aren't in their target demographic anymore.

Maybe making a mountain out of a molehill, but I can see how this can ultimately benefit Valve and Bethesda. Bethesda's gotten away with making questionable moves in the past, and Valve continues with its horrendous consumer practices, so I doubt they're particularly worried about this backlash.