Modability

I''m always curious about something like this. On the one hand the mod community can popularize and extend your product. But from a strictly business standpoint, how much revenue do you see from that? Perhaps if you''re in the business of selling engines it can be very profitable?

It disturbs me that since products are so short lived, efforts that go into making it modable subtract from other things. This is particularly true the more competitive your product is. I think the more niche you are, the more it helps you (Ambrosia''s Escape Velocity is one example I think that worked very well for them)

From a fan / design standpoint, I say the more the better. ''Course, that doesn''t necessarily make good business sense.

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Just waiting for the mothership...

Modability is what its all about!
Half-Life for instance, has been modded in so many ways and so many times, it has proven the GEM of all games.
Aliens vs Predator, though, looked decent, played well, but since until recently the source has been kept out of the hands of the fan community, the game never recieved IMHO the popularity it deserved.
Many times, the mods of a game end up being more popular than the actual game.(Counterstrike or Rocket Arena anyone?)


-Ryan "Run_The_Shadows"
-Run_The_Shadows@excite.com
"Doubt Everything. Find your own light." -Dying words of Gautama

Can someone please explain to me what exactly you mean by modable? Are you saying that a combat system is one module and economics is another or is it something completely different. I''m not up to scratch with this term precisely.

A designer doesnt need to know everything about code, they just have to have an appreciation for its limitations and how those limitations affect features they may wish to include in their design. - Drew

Assuming that you are talking about a genre that it makes sense to extend, I''d say that allowing people to mod (or modify - as in perhaps allowing players to add additional maps/levels or completely change the goal, look, and items in the game) is pretty important for long-term success of the COMPANY making the game, not necessarily for the title itself. It is something that builds goodwill in the gaming community, and beyond that I believe it helps foster a learning environment for future game designers/programers/artists. I don''t think that it is entirely necessary, but if I were designing a FPS or RTS right now, I''d make it "modable" from the get-go.

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Dave Myers
Co-Founder/Programmer/Designer
Twenty-One Six Productions

I don''t think I ever think it''s a bad thing. Elders Scrolls 3: Morrowind (CRPG) is going to ship their game w/ the editor they used to make the game.

People can then make their own towns, NPCs, items, quests, etc. I think it''s a great thing.



"All you touch and all you see is all your life will ever be --Pink Floyd
Need help? Well, go FAQ yourself.

Modifiable, gotcha. ahem. That''s a hard one for me never having been part of a commercial game development enterprise. What mandrake2112 said seems rational to me. The genre is probably the most important part of the equation next being the complexity of the game design. Reason why i think this is due to the time constraints of developing editors and the like. Quake did it although it may have been an after thought after they''d already made their cash and people may also have been requesting a map-ed. I guess that brings up the issue of developing for PC or console. With PC you have the luxury of developing these things as an after thought (wait and see) were as console this isn''t so much the case.

So if its PC i would say go with the wait and see approach were as on a console you''re probably best doing it for a sequal only if the first game was a strong success. But at course there''s the other element in the equation two. This being whether of not the game is multi-player or MMO. A MMO or online FPS for a console would probably seem like a good idea to have some sort of modifiability if you''re very confident about your games success, but then people will have to download maps to their console just to be able to play against you. Hmmmm

A designer doesnt need to know everything about code, they just have to have an appreciation for its limitations and how those limitations affect features they may wish to include in their design. - Drew

Ship with a Map-Ed?! Thats nothing. Unreal Tourney Shipped with a Map-Ed, and a compiler for UnrealScript. You CAN write a mod out of the box with it. Starcraft''s map-ed has shown its TREMENDOUS ease-of-use and unlimited custom maps. etc, etc, etc.
Ship a game with all your in-house proprietary editing tools, give the buyers of the game the ability to play it, then make their own version of it.


-Ryan "Run_The_Shadows"
-Run_The_Shadows@excite.com
"Doubt Everything. Find your own light." -Dying words of Gautama

Personally, I''d say it''s not so much about making it modifiable (although no doubt some people will have views one way or another on the issue), but more about how you''re designing the engine for your game in the first place. There are many benefits to a fairly ''open'' and soft-coded structure, ranging from fewer/shorter code compilation times, to being able to have code-illiterate designers write what amount to short programs to make more intelligent gameplay. I think it''s only a very small step from this point to making the tools user-friendly enough for the end-user to modify your game themselves, at which point the question is not "should we make it modifiable?", but "why shouldn''t we allow the user to make the same changes we did?"

>> but more about how you''re designing the engine for your game in the first place

Sure, using scripts to allow the designers the flexibility to modify AI, add gameplay features etc is a definite benefit. Most of the time however these scripts rely upon some form of hard-code in the engine itself, and are programmed in on a per-need basis. Designing and structuring the engine to be modifiable from the beginning can add quite a lot of work to an already hectic schedule.

>> I would be more concerned with the programmers opinion on this modularity.

Its always valuable to get the programmers opinion, but what Im speaking about is designing with feature potential in mind. Can the programmers make it modifiable without taking too much away from the actual game?

>> Ship a game with all your in-house proprietary editing tools, give the buyers of the game the ability to play it, then make their own version of it.

Thats a lovely perspective. Unfortunately, its not quite that simple. You have to also ship the tools with sufficient documentation, and that documentation can be a whole world full of work. Some tools have features which are added in but only work for the site that the tool was developed for, so then you end up with more than one version of that tool (internal/external) etc etc etc. I dont think its quite as simple as "give em out!". Theres a lot of hidden support costs in releasing such tools, and thats money that could be spent elsewhere.

Drew "remnant" Chambers
Game Designer
Irrational Games

quote:

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by Kylotan
at which point the question is not "should we make it modifiable?", but "why shouldn''t we allow the user to make the same changes we did?"

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Or how far should we go will allowing the player to see through the game using these tools. Maybe this is the next best thing in game development. I don''t think developers should be stingy by not making these tools and yes they should be as user friendly as possible. It can also be seen as a great source of feedback for a game by looking at what your fans have made with the tools you gave them.


A designer doesnt need to know everything about code, they just have to have an appreciation for its limitations and how those limitations affect features they may wish to include in their design. - Drew

Unreal is the mother of mod-ability, ohh yeah... can anyone say TC? that was a great game.

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ANDREW RUSSELL STUDIOS