Skyrim - Bethesda Talks Skyrim's Paid Mods Controversy @ Gamespot

[Bedwyr]

I think 30% is pretty much Valve's standard rate for most anything on Steam. Not that I agree, I also think the 10/10/80 split would encourage modders.

I would be much less inclined to pay for a graphics mod or similar, for instance I didn't buy Oblivion's Horse Armor, than I would content such as new quest packs.

30-33% is a pretty standard platform cut. I think the AppStore is similar. I'd go with that. Some kind of one-third take from the IP and platform owners and two-thirds to the dev. Valve could insist on getting their standard one-third take as platform owner, but I think they need to take a bit of a hit on this do-over and create a little bit more goodwill.

 

[flabbyjack]

Bethesda - 49 percent
Valve - 49 percent
Modders - 2 percent

"ITS INDUSTRY STANDARD DEAL WITH IT!"

nice argument

After factoring in the price of the base game, Valve and Bethsoft are making more like 45% each.

 

[Bedwyr]

"ITS INDUSTRY STANDARD DEAL WITH IT!"

nice argument

After factoring in the price of the base game, Valve and Bethsoft are making more like 45% each.

Can you break out how you got those percentages please?

 

[forgottenlor]

Just something to think of: Any store you go in, for anything you buy, that store is taking 40% of the profits for a sale, so that Valve is taking 30% is nothing unusual in our economy. I find the 45% from Bethesda high though. Its their software, and so they are not going to let anyone get away with giving them a small cut. I think 35%/35% would have a much better optic, but expecting Bethesda to give modders 80% is unrealistic.

 

[flabbyjack]

Can you break out how you got those percentages please?

Sure can bud. Let's work under the assumption that Steam is taking a flat 30% off the top of purchase transactions as stated elsewhere in the thread. Let's take the single case where I buy Fallout 4 from steam for $50 and then buy a DLC for $20.

base title ($50)
$35 bethsoft
$15 steam

DLC ($20)
$9 bethsoft
$6 steam
$5 DLC provider

total spent: $70
Who got how much of it:
$44 bethsoft (65.86%)
$21 steam (30.00%)
$5 DLC provider (7.14%)
——————————————————-
I'd like to add that Steam needs to un-gimp their community mod system.

 

[BoboTheMighty]

Why is it unrealistic? Name me a single reason, why Bethesda should receive any money from sale of Sky UI mod?

 

[Bedwyr]

Sure can bud. Let's work under the assumption that Steam is taking a flat 30% off the top of purchase transactions as stated elsewhere in the thread. Let's take the single case where I buy Fallout 4 from steam for $50 and then buy a DLC for $20.

base title ($50)
$35 bethsoft
$15 steam

DLC ($20)
$9 bethsoft
$6 steam
$5 DLC provider

total spent: $70
Who got how much of it:
$44 bethsoft (65.86%)
$21 steam (30.00%)
$5 DLC provider (7.14%)
——————————————————-
I'd like to add that Steam needs to un-gimp their community mod system.

I'm sorry, but you just demonstrated why your numbers are bad. First you declare 2% and now you declare 7%. Which is it? Really your percentages fluctuate because the game and DLC are priced independently. You can't make a good point doing that. It's nonsensical.

 

[Bedwyr]

Why is it unrealistic? Name me a single reason, why Bethesda should receive any money from sale of Sky UI mod?

Wrong question. The right question is why should they not seek remuneration for someone profiting off the use of their game and toolset? You haven't really made a case for that.

Doing mods for free as hobbyists generates community interest and builds the fan base for the game. There's a good business model there. Once you start talking about people profiting off those tools, the business model changes and its perfectly reasonable to expect compensation. That's normal. That's business. You need to explain here why this is somehow not normal or expected or why it's somehow morally egregious.

 

[BoboTheMighty]

For mods such as Falskaar or similar, Bethesda absolutely deserves a share of the profits.
But for mods, that fix the game, such as UI or unofficial patches, it is completely morally unacceptable for Bethesda to profit from something THEY should have done in the first place…good business model or not.
Generally speaking...when modders create their own material which they add to the game or improve on the existing ones, Bethesda should be charging a minimal fee.

 

[wolfing]

30/30/40 is the perfect ratio.

 

[Ivanwah]

Richard Stallman has a great idea how to solve this problem, but nobody listens to him cause he's a looney and dresses funny...

 

[Gloo]

You can always just not use paid mods.

Sure I could but I'm mostly concerned by the progressive shift in their philosophy year after year...

 

[flabbyjack]

I'm sorry, but you just demonstrated why your numbers are bad. First you declare 2% and now you declare 7%. Which is it? Really your percentages fluctuate because the game and DLC are priced independently. You can't make a good point doing that. It's nonsensical.

Lol what? 2% was a ballpark estimate, and then I actually went to the trouble crunch the numbers upon your special request and got 7% which is pretty damn close. The number breakdown yielding 7% speaks for itself.

But all you really wanted to do was complain and give me shit. Not classy Bedwyr.

 

[Elhoim]

35/30/35 would be a good split, and mods should all start from free + pay what you want. I would only accept paying with no free option for very large mods, like total conversions.

 

[Brumbek]

My take on this whole subject is why not allow modders to sell their mods and just see how the market reacts. It's possible it could take off. It's possible it could fail. Why not just see what happens?

I'd certainly pay for certain mods starting with SkyUi… without that mod I'd never even have played Skyrim at all.

Excellent comment. That is what I wanted in April: let the market decide with their money. If people didn't like paid mods, no mods would get paid and the modders would still release their stuff for free.

Note how SkyUI team came back for version 5.0 with the prospect of paid mods. With paid mods canceled prematurely SkyUI 5.0 is nowhere to be seen. Like others have said, I'd gladly pay a few dollars for SkyUI 5.0, but now the SkyUI team has no incentive to update their mod. And why should they? Modding is INSANELY HARD work.

My ultimate point: without having paid mods, many awesome mods will simply *not exist* because the incentive isn't there. This is the downside no one seemed to talk about back in April. If you are serious about thinking about this issue with an open mind, here is my 10 minute explanation of how paid mods results in better quality.

PS: in case anyone doesn't know, I made the SMIM mod for Skyrim. It's pretty cool.

Why is it unrealistic? Name me a single reason, why Bethesda should receive any money from sale of Sky UI mod?

It's how business works. It's how the law works. Mods in many ways are derivative works that do not distinguish themselves enough to be free of copyright claims because they still require Skyrim to function, which is owned by Bethesda. It is simply a matter of business and law.

 

[BoboTheMighty]

I don't debate that Bethesda has great business sense and what the word of the "law" in here dictates...their basic human decency is an entirely different matter.

 

[zahratustra]

Note how SkyUI team came back for version 5.0 with the prospect of paid mods. With paid mods canceled prematurely SkyUI 5.0 is nowhere to be seen. Like others have said, I'd gladly pay a few dollars for SkyUI 5.0, but now the SkyUI team has no incentive to update their mod. And why should they? Modding is INSANELY HARD work.

http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mod...smods.com/skyrim/ajax/modfiles/?id=3863&pUp=1

 

[figment]

So the thing about paid mods is it changes dynamic. Several years ago I was doing a lot of support tools and never made a dime and didn't want to. We did get consulting offers by other businesses using gamebryo but never took them up on it.

My issue is that once money changes hands then it changes everything involving the support model. If I'm paying money I expect a fully working product and support for any issues. Most mod teams are in best effort mode and cannot really provide good support.

As a modder, I would expect that Bethesda work for their money and provide proper support. That means releasing tools like a fully supported 3dsmax exporter and their character rigs for example. But then again maybe I'm being unrealistic since they are in the position of power and can dictate terms.

 

[wolfgrimdark]

My main concern is that most modders are complete addicts to new stuff. I wonder how many people download X mods, install them, and then never change them around for that game?

Most modders I know on Nexus change mods all the time. Always trying out a new thing, switching around others. Oh sure there are many core mods people always seem to have ... although those core mods depend on the user.

I suppose paying for certain core mods would work fine but I wonder what the ripple affect would be when it comes to trying new mods. Would only a few elite modders dominate the marker as people would not want to spend money just trying out dozens of mods each month? Would it limit new comers to modding? I suppose if Nexus was still around it wouldn't.

It is inevitable most likely but I suspect it will change the way things work. Not that it matters. Once all the current gamers used to free mods die off the new gamers will never know any other system and be perfectly happy with it.

 

[SonOfCapiz]

Wrong question. The right question is why should they not seek remuneration for someone profiting off the use of their game and toolset? You haven't really made a case for that.

Doing mods for free as hobbyists generates community interest and builds the fan base for the game. There's a good business model there. Once you start talking about people profiting off those tools, the business model changes and its perfectly reasonable to expect compensation. That's normal. That's business. You need to explain here why this is somehow not normal or expected or why it's somehow morally egregious.

Aren't you in a way answering the question yourself? Bethesda is *already* profiting off the use of their game and toolset when mods "generates community interest and builds the fan base for the game". Would they be generating as much money without mods? I doubt it. I personally would not have touched anything Bethesda after Oblivion
and I've seen many others express the same sentiment. I also remember reading somewhere about there being many people who bought their games on consoles buying it again for PC for the mods and how Morrowind is still getting sales from people who want to use it's mods.

Personally though, I wouldn't mind if Bethesda got a little something. I'm really just for modders getting more (much more) if (when?) they finally do go down that route again.