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[Stumpokapow]

Okay, so, now that there's a post between my last post and this (didn't want to dilute my point from the previous post)

http://store.steampowered.com/app/358960

Pretty neat. The game is a classic. I think I got a barebones PC version in a bundle like literally 3-4 years ago. Wonder if he'll honour keys from that. I'm guessing not.

 

[Twentieth]

In the mid-90s, the PC had a very vibrant freeware game scene, largely because if you couldn't get in retail, the only other payment model was pay-by-cheque-by-mail. Not ideal. So a lot of people were cutting their teeth making free content. A few things disrupted this: First, Paypal. Second, digital distribution services. Third, the democratization of paid digital distribution starting with the app store (and now continuing with Steam allowing basically anything). Fourth, pre-release funding sources including crowdfunding and early access. Now, there is very little incentive to create freeware, because even if you're making small game projects of no consequence, why not sell them on Desura and bundle them and make $200 a year? It's better than $0.

I think modding will follow the same natural trajectory. First, mods emerged for free. Then, it became possible to monetize them. Now it will become so easy to do so, there'll be no reason not to. I would expect basically any mod to charge $0.99, because why not?

The biggest disruption from changes like this is never that the top 1% can make a living doing this stuff, it's that the bottom 99% can make a couple bucks doing what they used to do for free.

Agreed. I think it's a natural thing to happen, I'm just a bit disappointed it's happening now. Hoepfully Valve can increase that ridiculous 25% share for content creators and we get more great mods.

 

[Miguel81]

Finally got the itch to play through Ground Zeroes yesterday. It was short and sweet(Normal and Hard), and hopefully I can S-rank it without too much trouble now. Still need to collect all those tapes and the rest of the XOF badges, but I'll save it for after the side ops missions. The audio in this game is just sublime.

 

[Teggy]

It's 9. You said pc twice, but yeah, get some help. Seriously.

What, you don't have a lowercase PC and and uppercase PC? Technically I could turn one of the PC into Macbook.

I feel like I might need to just go drop a whole mess of the games I'm playing and just come back to them later. I was doing great on the 52 game challenge, too. I am approaching 40 games.

 

[HoosTrax]

Going to wait for a heavy discount on After Years.

Already played through the PSP version. Not too inclined to pay $15 for an uglier version that runs at a terrible frame-rate.



A good portion of the game is divided into chapters (3-4 hours each).
In each chapter you play as 2-3 different characters.
Then there's a long-ish second to last chapter where you get airship access but you're stuck with a certain party.

Then there are the final dungeons where you can use everybody.

Also IIRC some chapters even add or drop characters as you progress.
So yeah, it's a big headache.

If that's something you didn't like about FFIV, you're absolutely going to hate The After Years

Oh god why. It was so obnoxious, particularly when a character permanently left the party with no warning, taking your gear with them. Or you ended up with a party where you have level discrepancy of like 20 between some of your characters.

 

[TheMadMan007]

Fantastic! Now I get to pay for stuff that used to be free! Hurray!

Honestly though, this is really bad. This is going to turn into the whole twitch thing where everyone is just asking for money for every single thing they do... ugh. I hate what the internet has become.

This is a hobby, if you make a mod, do it for making a more fun experience to the game you are playing. Don't do it for money, and don't expect to get paid for doing something in your free time. This shouldn't be someone's JOB. This is going to turn into a app store situation where there are going to be 4 million .99 cent fart mods for games.

 

[Jawmuncher]

SHUT UP



i mean

are you saying there's a lot more gameplay to lis?


i mean it's an interesting case study on how to drive your franchise to the ground at the very least


SHUT UP



lol wtf


this is just depressing me now....


might be

still, gone home was a lot more divisive even here while lis is somewhat of a steamgaf darling for whatever reason


so it is a moba?

The fact that the game takes in more of my feedback is more gameplay alone. Rewinding to avoid danger or solve puzzles, choosing what to say, and exploring different locales where certain actions can affect things is definitely more.

He'll really I don't think they're even that comparable. Really think a lot of the talk during early PR was because people just assumed

Spoiler

lesbians

. Talking about the trailers that just shoved Gone Home a ton.

 

[Maniac]

Well... As far as I can tell, "Pay what you want" isn't really what you want, it's basically tiered. The one I'm currently looking at had it's lowest at 2.59, another at .92... Bleh.

Ofcourse, several of the mods I had subscribed to have now been removed and replaced by updated, paid for versions.

I'm already hating this.

 

[Nirolak]

In the mid-90s, the PC had a very vibrant freeware game scene, largely because if you couldn't get in retail, the only other payment model was pay-by-cheque-by-mail. Not ideal. So a lot of people were cutting their teeth making free content. A few things disrupted this: First, Paypal. Second, digital distribution services. Third, the democratization of paid digital distribution starting with the app store (and now continuing with Steam allowing basically anything). Fourth, pre-release funding sources including crowdfunding and early access. Now, there is very little incentive to create freeware, because even if you're making small game projects of no consequence, why not sell them on Desura and bundle them and make $200 a year? It's better than $0.

I think modding will follow the same natural trajectory. First, mods emerged for free. Then, it became possible to monetize them. Now it will become so easy to do so, there'll be no reason not to. I would expect basically any mod to charge $0.99, because why not?

The biggest disruption from changes like this is never that the top 1% can make a living doing this stuff, it's that the bottom 99% can make a couple bucks doing what they used to do for free.

We actually saw a first attempt at this with StarCraft 2, which had solid discovery and highlighting of mods, a large pool of users, and a good distribution and update service for mods, and no one actually ended up buying them. Despite this, we see many very high effort free mods appear in StarCraft 2 because people are passionate about building things in the game and reaching a large number of people.

I think you get into the exact same dilemma as selling paid apps on iOS. Do some people buy them? Sure, but it's a tiny fraction of the number of people you get with a freed app, and you'd have to convince users to pick up your paid app over the free ones.

There's also the compounding factor that many modders who wanted money now have tools such as Unity and Unreal and instead actually go out and release games, or simply release what would have once been modded models or functionality on the Unity app store. You also have the option of doing something like creating assets for a game such as Dota or TF2, where you're providing a service similar to the Unity asset store.

I think the people who are still actually sitting in the modding scene, which has shrunk decisively in project scope over the years, are not doing it for the money, because they have tons of options to make money already. They strike me as a group of people interested in sharing things freely, and the people who are downloading them have deep inset opinions that this type of thing should be free. I have a hard time imagining this taking off in a notable way.

 

[Dsyndrome]

You're all buying every single Final Fantasy game that appears on Steam until XII IZJS is released. Capish?

They release that, it'll be the first FF I have on Steam.
Edit: Nevermind. I already have XIII and XIII-2. I'm fucking dumb.

 

[Uzzy]

How is Injustice Gods Among Us on steam?
I need a fighting game fix

Poor netcode, lots of single player content though. If you're wanting some online matches then I'd grab MKX and hope for netcode improvements. Ultra's still got a decent population, but has average netcode. Sadly, the game with the best netcode, Skullgirls, has very few people playing it these days.

 

[Catshade]

In the mid-90s, the PC had a very vibrant freeware game scene, largely because if you couldn't get in retail, the only other payment model was pay-by-cheque-by-mail. Not ideal. So a lot of people were cutting their teeth making free content. A few things disrupted this: First, Paypal. Second, digital distribution services. Third, the democratization of paid digital distribution starting with the app store (and now continuing with Steam allowing basically anything). Fourth, pre-release funding sources including crowdfunding and early access. Now, there is very little incentive to create freeware, because even if you're making small game projects of no consequence, why not sell them on Desura and bundle them and make $200 a year? It's better than $0.

I wish more indie devs follow the Stealth Bastard/Spelunky/Cave Story's business model: Release free 'basic' edition for publication and exposure, then release Enhanced/HD/GOTY edition as paid apps.

 

[chronomac]

Okay, so, now that there's a post between my last post and this (didn't want to dilute my point from the previous post)

http://store.steampowered.com/app/358960

Pretty neat. The game is a classic. I think I got a barebones PC version in a bundle like literally 3-4 years ago. Wonder if he'll honour keys from that. I'm guessing not.

This is awesome. I played a ton of the iOS version.

Here's a message from the dev:

Holy moly. So, only about 4 years later than I hoped, for reasons I cannot go into right now, Canabalt is finally coming to Steam!! We worked with Kittehface Software to bring the full Canabalt 2.0 experience to desktops, including all the game modes, two player mode, the optional 3D graphics from Canabalt HD, gamepad support, all the music (including Mega Ran's lyrical cover!!), achievements, and leaderboards. We also built a full set of trading cards, wallpapers, and office furniture emoticons (spoiler alert!!), which I hope you all enjoy because it was kind of a hassle.​

 

[jshackles]

You're all buying every single Final Fantasy game that appears on Steam until XII IZJS is released. Capish?

You got it boss

 

[Maniac]

We actually saw a first attempt at this with StarCraft 2, which had solid discovery and highlighting of mods, a large pool of users, and a good distribution and update service for mods, and no one actually ended up buying them. Despite this, we see many very high effort free mods appear in StarCraft 2 because people are passionate about building things in the game and reaching a large number of people.

I think you get into the exact same dilemma as selling paid apps on iOS. Do some people buy them? Sure, but it's a tiny fraction of the number of people you get with a freed app, and you'd have to convince users to pick up your paid app over the free ones.

There's also the compounding factor that many modders who wanted money now have tools such as Unity and Unreal and instead actually go out and release games, or simply release what would have once been modded models or functionality on the Unity app store. You also have the option of doing something like creating assets for a game such as Dota or TF2, where you're providing a service similar to the Unity asset store.

I think the people who are still actually sitting in the modding scene, which has shrunk decisively in project scope over the years, are not doing it for the money, because they have tons of options to make money already. They strike me as a group of people interested in sharing things freely, and the people who are downloading them have deep inset opinions that this type of thing should be free. I have a hard time imagining this taking off in a notable way.

I can't imagine it taking off notably either, however I can definitely imagine (and already see) that it'd likely be a big headache for the gamers around that just want to mod their damn game.

Ofcourse it doesn't help that people have to explicitly sell the mod instead of enabling a "pay what you want, if you want" option, or atleast that seems to be the case as far as I can tell. I would've been all for this if it'd been a simple "donate" button instead of this... This madness.

All of this has also severely deflated my hype for the upcoming custom gamemodes for Dota 2... ;_;

 

[Twentieth]

I think the people who are still actually sitting in the modding scene, which has shrunk decisively in project scope over the years, are not doing it for the money, because they have tons of options to make money already. They strike me as a group of people interested in sharing things freely, and the people who are downloading them have deep inset opinions that this type of thing should be free. I have a hard time imagining this taking off in a notable way.

It might work for people who aren't part of a team and rather work on a single thing (script/asset/texture) for a game they like and get some cash for it. In a sense, it's a decent option.

 

[BronzeWolf]

Is Skyrim Legendary Edition worth it over the basic game?

 

[ashecitism]

All of this has also severely deflated my hype for the upcoming custom gamemodes for Dota 2... ;_;

If you didn't know before, people already found stuff pointing towards Custom Game Tickets.

www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=992234

 

[PepsimanVsJoe]

Or you ended up with a party where you have level discrepancy of like 20 between some of your characters.

Well.
Not sure if the remakes (specifically the DS/mobile/Steam) fixed this.
But after Cecil becomes a Paladin, you can kill off the old wizard & the twins, and grind away. Everyone that joins your party afterwards is going to be at or close to Cecil's level.

(This makes a good chunk of an already easy FF absolutely trivial though)

Is Skyrim Legendary Edition worth it over the basic game?

Most of the really cool mods (and you're going to want them) require the DLC.
Otherwise...ehhh.

Dawnguard has way too many fetch quests.
Dragonborn has some neat visuals but the new landmass is mostly uninteresting.
Hearthfire is just dumb.

 

[TheMadMan007]

Is Skyrim Legendary Edition worth it over the basic game?

I got it when it was on a steam sale, and I'd say yeah, it was like $2 bucks more or something like that, and not having to worry about getting DLC later or anything is totally worth it.

 

[ashecitism]

lol

 

[BronzeWolf]

I got it when it was on a steam sale, and I'd say yeah, it was like $2 bucks more or something like that, and not having to worry about getting DLC later or anything is totally worth it.

The thing is that I usually don't care for DLC but if Vanilla Skyrim is like OMFG Boring YOU MUST GET DLC I'll get it

 

[Messiah]

Well.
Not sure if the remakes (specifically the DS/mobile/Steam) fixed this.
But after Cecil becomes a Paladin, you can kill off the old wizard & the twins, and grind away. Everyone that joins your party afterwards is going to be at or close to Cecil's level.

(This makes a good chunk of an already easy FF absolutely trivial though)

The remake of 4 is actually one of the hardest Final Fantasy games I found.

 

[Miguel81]

Is Skyrim Legendary Edition worth it over the basic game?

The Legendary edition is a much better deal. You might end up wanting the DLC down the line, and the regular prices for those are absurd.

 

[crazyrabbits]

The Legendary edition is a much better deal. You might end up wanting the DLC down the line, and the regular prices for those are absurd.

Yeah, that's why I waited for the complete version. I would have gone crazy if I had to pay through the nose for the DLC separately. Bethesda's DLC track record speaks for itself.

 

[PepsimanVsJoe]

The thing is that I usually don't care for DLC but if Vanilla Skyrim is like OMFG Boring YOU MUST GET DLC I'll get it

Naw.
It's not like Oblivion, where Shivering Isles is several times more fascinating than the base game.

Skyrim's DLC is mostly blah, but like I said, it's necessary for some quality mods.

 

[zkylon]

just watched the mad max trailer, actually looks pretty good!

seems like it'll be a sort of shadow of mordor thing with more cars, or something

i kinda wish it had a less "dark 'n gritty" mood since one of the things i enjoyed so much about mad max 2 is how goofy and campy it was. like max was a reluctant hero but he was a hero after all, and there was that silly helicopter thing and that ridiculous 80s gimp bad guy and shit

i hope the final game is a bit more self-aware, i'm tired of antiheroes and dark 'n gritty stories

The fact that the game takes in more of my feedback is more gameplay alone. Rewinding to avoid danger or solve puzzles, choosing what to say, and exploring different locales where certain actions can affect things is definitely more.

He'll really I don't think they're even that comparable. Really think a lot of the talk during early PR was because people just assumed

Spoiler

lesbians

. Talking about the trailers that just shoved Gone Home a ton.

i dunno to me lis doesn't feel like that much of a difference. puzzles are lite to the extreme and yeah you have a bit of dialogue and you get to make a few choices but choices only affect the story so it's not like there are actually gameplay systems governing anything. the time reversing mechanic is cool and i have expectations to do something with the whole "teleporting" thing, but from what i tested in the first episode it didn't seem to do much. i think i did the pidgeon thing using that but that was about it

and like the environmental storytelling in gone home is really really good and you can really explore that game at your leisure and get as much of the characters and story as you want. they don't lock progression behind anything so you can do it in whatever order you want or even get lucky and by chance find the secrets you're told of if you follow the regular path

i feel like gone home's level design is criminally underrated

Well... As far as I can tell, "Pay what you want" isn't really what you want, it's basically tiered. The one I'm currently looking at had it's lowest at 2.59, another at .92... Bleh.

Ofcourse, several of the mods I had subscribed to have now been removed and replaced by updated, paid for versions.

I'm already hating this.

oh wow they actually removed mods?

this is fucked up

 

[JaseC]

oh wow they actually removed mods?

this is fucked up

Surely you're not surprised that some mod creators saw the news as an opportunity to coax people into paying.

 

[Turfster]

You're all buying every single Final Fantasy game that appears on Steam until XII IZJS is released. Capish?

Fuck Final Fantasy.


Also, Receiver is a weekend deal at 66% off

 

[Salsa]

lol

 

[jaundicejuice]

I infrequently use mods, making them paid is only going to deter me from using them at all. I get that they're trying to be inclusive with modders the way they are with TF2 and Dota 2, and maybe this will be great for people making stuff like that Skyrim total conversion Enderal, or the up-port of Morrowind to Skyrim but I don't see how this will work with the fan patches or smaller items. It will probably blow up and be huge. Bethesda will turn Skyrim into a service without even trying. I mean if horse armor made Bethesda a shitton of money, why wouldn't this work?

 

[MUnited83]

There really are. Just not for the mod creators.

And not for consumers as well.

 

[Dr Dogg]

I think I've gone crackers by stumping up for an extended warranty on my GPU. Well that or paranoia after the last little problem. My power supply has less cover now and that's not likely to be outdated half as quick. Oh well I guess that'll add some resell value.

Haha, I wondered what that was about but forgot to follow the breadcrumbs.

Edit: Oh, the context is in the post immediately above Snake's. In my defence, the link lead straight to the post and I missed the page jump.

IX is the goal here.

Yeah sorry should have linked the posts but it was more to show him what the price was but he appears to have done a runner since it went up. I knew he'd welch on me!

They release that, it'll be the first FF I have on Steam.
Edit: Nevermind. I already have XIII and XIII-2. I'm fucking dumb.

I was looking at something in a bundle the other day, checked Steam quickly and thought 'nope don't own any of that' but I bloody owned everything I wanted. Thankful I notice before I checked out.

You got it boss

You would even if everyone in here told you not too.

lol

Hahaha brilliant.

 

[Jawmuncher]

We'll have to agree to disagree. I was not a fan of gone home at all and really have nothing nice to say about it. So I'll just step out of this conversation.

Edit: all I can add to take it back to the original comment is that both games are so different that it's not that odd people are liking one or the other or even one over the other. I know others who didn't like gone home as well and like LiS. I really still don't understand why the initial previews/ads tried to push that so hard.

 

[zkylon]

Surely you're not surprised that some mod creators saw the news as an opportunity to coax people into paying.

i dunno i'm not too pessimistic so i didn't expected this to have negative repercussions right away

 

[chronomac]

This is an insightful post from a mod developer, regarding the new Steam Workshop store.

People always get upset when something's free and then it's not, but they need to get over it. People put a ton of time and energy into good mods and it makes sense for them to get something back.

 

[zkylon]

We'll have to agree to disagree. I was not a fan of gone home at all and really have nothing nice to say about it. So I'll just step out of this conversation.

Edit: all I can add to take it back to the original comment is that both games are so different that it's not that odd people are liking one or the other or even one over the other. I know others who didn't like gone home as well and like LiS. I really still don't understand why the initial previews/ads tried to push that so hard.

they tried to push what?

 

[Jawmuncher]

This is an insightful post from a mod developer, regarding the new Steam Workshop store.

People always get upset when something's free and then it's not, but they need to get over it. People put a ton of time and energy into good mods and it makes sense for them to get something back.

I don't really care but it sure had basically shifted me to "if I gotta pay I'm not gonna bother". Yeah they put that work in but mods for me were a fun little addition and nothing more. I thank them for their hard work, and maybe they'll find success with others. They won't with me though. Especially since the mods I would like they technically can't charge for anyway "like character from game x as a skin etc".

they tried to push what?

Just googling Gone Home Life is Strange brings up what I'm talking about. One of the trailers pushed this with press comments citing this as well.

 

[Dsyndrome]

Will they be able to charge for My Little Pony or Macho Man Randy Savage dragons now?

 

[InfiniteNine]

Darn getting some emulation issues with DMC3:SE in PCSX2. Capcom re-port DMC3:SE to PC and have it not be an awful port this time.

 

[Jawmuncher]

Darn getting some emulation issues with DMC3:SE in PCSX2. Capcom re-port DMC3:SE to PC and have it not be an awful port this time.

You're playing for the story right.

 

[InfiniteNine]

You're playing for the story right.

I'm playing it because the combat is awesome. Cheese story is a bonus.

 

[Freedom = $1.05]

Darn getting some emulation issues with DMC3:SE in PCSX2. Capcom re-port DMC3:SE to PC and have it not be an awful port this time.

I bought the DMC collection on the PS3 for like $9. I dunno what your situation is like but it's competently done and plays like you'd expect.

 

[jaundicejuice]

Will they be able to charge for My Little Pony or Macho Man Randy Savage dragons now?

Only if they have the rights.

 

[Jawmuncher]

I find this more annoying than funny. It looks similar, so what.

 

[TheMadMan007]

This is an insightful post from a mod developer, regarding the new Steam Workshop store.

People always get upset when something's free and then it's not, but they need to get over it. People put a ton of time and energy into good mods and it makes sense for them to get something back.

Wow... "People need to get over it"....

Ok, other than that, I think one of my biggest problems is that the work was already done for free a long time ago. Sorry, the real world doesn't work that way. I can't go up to a client at work, build them a server and say "Pay me I already did the work like a year ago and did all the work without even asking. "

If I made something on my own free time before, doesn't give me the right to now take it away and start charging for it. and the whole "I should get paid for the time and energy I put into this" argument. Sorry, no you shouldn't. If you did it before without being paid and went it just trying to create something fun on your own time, do that..you shouldn't ever expect to be paid for it. If you want to be paid for it, get a job in the industry. I think the piggy-backing on other people's work, and then making a mod or two doens't entitle you to any money whatsoever.

Again, maybe it's just me, but man, this whole internet culture of "pay me for anything I ever do ever" needs to stop. Everyone is way too entitled.

 

[JaseC]

Only if they have the rights.

It's a pity the creator of the Thomas the Tank Engine dragon mod can't sell his work.

 

[madjoki]

Are Canabalt developers providing keys for Humblebundle purchasers? I'm pretty sure the game was in a HB.

Was android only.

 

[Salsa]

since im stuck getting 3 stars again watch me get my hand cramped

 

[Stumpokapow]

Ok, other than that, I think one of my biggest problems is that the work was already done for free a long time ago. Sorry, the real world doesn't work that way. I can't go up to a client at work, build them a server and say "Pay me I already did the work like a year ago and did all the work without even asking. "

... I think you may have picked a bad industry to go to, given the move towards virtualization, cloud servers, and outsourcing system administration and IT to service companies. Hardware is being service-ized like anything else. Software even moreso, almost all the corporate software that used to be buy-once pay-to-upgrade is now subscription based SaaS stuff.

If I made something on my own free time before, doesn't give me the right to now take it away and start charging for it. and the whole "I should get paid for the time and energy I put into this" argument. Sorry, no you shouldn't. If you did it before without being paid and went it just trying to create something fun on your own time, do that..you shouldn't ever expect to be paid for it.

Right, except literally every business ever starts a money-losing hobby. It's entirely typical in just about every product category for people to start by offering things noncommercially and then transition to offer them commercially. I agree that it's a bit crass to immediately withdraw free stuff and sell it, but unless they're retroactively taking the thing back from people who managed to get it for free, I don't know who this is actually negatively impacting or how this is different than any other thing.

If you want to be paid for it, get a job in the industry.

I'm not sure how this isn't "getting a job in the industry". You are literally being paid to make video game components. That's having a job in the industry. Why does it only count if you work at a pre-existing company? If an artist starts his own art outsourcing company, and Bethesda pays him to make art for their games, that's a job in the industry. If an artist makes art for Skyrim, and Valve and Bethesda pay him via Steam Workshop having made art for Bethesda's games, that's a job in the industry.

Is the difference that you believe that workers should be salaried instead of being paid based on product sales? The whole point of capitalism is that company owners pay you in salary and then make profit because they get paid based on product sales. That's how they get rich. Literally surplus value. The idea that it's a bad thing when the people on the bottom of the food chain start thinking like the people on the top of the food chain is nuts.

To the extent that I have a worry about this, my worry is more along the lines of "what if companies stop paying people to make content and start relying on everyone being pay-per-sale contractors to reduce all their risk and get away with not providing non-salary benefits".

I think the piggy-backing on other people's work

He says, having just said his job was putting together servers made out of hardware components made by other people, installing software components made by other people, using instructions made by other people. We all piggy back on other peoples' work. Even when we're educated, our education is us piggy-backing on past research and piggy-backing off the hard work of our educators. That's literally what society is, people getting together to build off each other's work.