If you don't know, Valve recently - with little fanfare - added a paywall to the Steam Workshop, meaning there are certain mods you now have to pay for to use. Whilst it currently only applies to Skyrim, a game I've only recently started playing because I live under a rock on Mars, fans are already signing petitions asking for this feature to be removed.
I applauded the Steam Workshop when it first came out. The biggest problem with modding is how it's the typical PC gaming experience made 100 times more frustrating, and PC gaming is already 50 times more frustrating than it should be. First you have to download the file online. If you're lucky, its the latest version with an .exe installation file. If you're unlucky, its an outdated 7z.zip file that requires some arcane software to extract the 867 separate files which then need to be placed in 20 different folders, and then you need to hack into the games source code and type in a line of text to enable the mod.
You see: this is why I stuck to the PS2 for so long. You get a game, you put it in the machine, you pick up your controller, and you play the game. So I appreciate a service that installs mods with just the click of a button. Sure, nine times out of ten the mods don't work - but that was the case beforehand anyway.
But now, just as Steam Greenlight was ruined, the workshop has been utterly destroyed also.
The first problem is that it's un-monitored. Already, mods have been stolen and prices are extortionate. There is no money-back guarantee if the mod is rendered incompatible or broken - which always happens because mods are created by amateurs. This also means that, just like Steam Greenlight and Steam Early-Access, there is no quality-control. Any old crap can extort money from unsuspecting audiences. If I wanted to, I could draw a stick-figure, scan it into the game, and charge $5 for it. The fact that beforehand modding was free meant that only the dedicated creators published anything, meaning it was generally quite high quality because it takes real commitment to work on something for nothing. I should know: I'm not getting a cent from this blog.
Next: the whole culture of modding has been destroyed. I first got into modding when I played System Shock 2 and thought "this is one of the greatest games I've ever played, but if the graphics looked less like crap and some of the obnoxiously difficult parts were removed, it might be even better." And so I started looking around online to find that even though the game is over 15 years old, there is a dedicated community committed to making the game look and play a thousand times better. These guys often band together to create super-mods such as the System Shock Community Patch which removes countless glitches and also removes two moments where if you don't do a certain, specific thing beforehand, the game is unwinnable. The System Shock Community Patch also combines several previous mods, making it so essential that I'm surprised the company that now owns System Shock 2 hasn't added it to the official release.
It's a huge project that would be impossible if it was in the Steam Workshop and with a price-tag. No-one would willingly share their content and source-codes if money was attached to it. Just as the culture of micro-transactions and DLC is forcing companies to take their balls and go home, this'll completely remove the community spirit that makes modding so great.
Another huge problem is, of course, that Valve will take 75% of all profits earned from this. They claim this is a way of rewarding the hard-working people who create the mods, when in reality they only get 25% of their profits, and they need to make $100 before they actually see a penny. Valve are lying through their VR-Headsets here. This isn't rewarding anyone. This just a thinly-veiled way of making sure that developers can barge into the tree-house and demand rent money.
Valve: what the hell do you need all this money for?! You already take 30% of all profits earned from Steam, you already hold a monopoly over the entire PC gaming market. You've won. This is like God charging VAT.
The best option, if you want to receive some recognition for your mod, is and has always been to add a 'donate' button. That way you're not getting screwed over by a big corporation, you're not screwing anyone over yourself, more people will check out your work, and when people do donate money it will be sweetly rewarded.
What's hilarious is that the reason why Skyrim is so modded is because Bethesda release buggy, unbalanced messes and leave the community to fix it. I despised it when the creators of Deus Ex: Human Revolution made consumers pay for the DLC that fixes the horrid boss-fights. I've already paid for the game. I shouldn't have to pay all over again. It's like getting shot and having to pay the medical bill yourself.
I used to encourage developers to release the games source code so modders can go crazy. It essentially hands the game over to the player, even if you don't mod and just enjoy seeing if there's any way of making some of your favorite games even better. You haven't just bought a film, you've bought the studio it was made in. The game is your oyster...except now it isn't. Now the game will always be something you can only stare at longingly from behind a fence before Valve drags it back into the dungeon.
