Mod / editor support for UE4 games? sounds too unfriendly

[Chosker]

@;16680

You could say that about any feature that UE4 does not have and you need to write your own, like Inventory system (which btw, been part of the engine in the past since beginning). If you want make your game mod friendly, if this is so impotent for you, why you need to wait for Epic to do things for you?

I notice that there some strange problems in this community, that strange mentality of building game starting from above instead from ground, thinking that somebody need to do things for you. Mentality of locking themselves in the virtual cage of others (which is opened btw), then wondering why there are sitting there and why they can’t do things in it. With this kind of mentality, modding would not be even created… bah games would not be created. So i don’t know how you can be good game developer with such mentality. If you lack abilities then find somebody with them… or continue waiting for Epic to do something if anything. iOS is known to have the thoroughest software restrictions, even thru developers complaining, it does not stop them to find even craziest work arounds to withstand those restrictions… here most of things you got open and not much of restriction, yet it some developers seem to be paralyzed.

you’re not refering to me with this, are you? let me remind you that I created an Inventory Starter Kit (complete with GUI, drag and drop, equipping, looting) for UDK and released it freely to everyone. I’m not waiting for Epic to make my game. all I want is to allow the players of my game to create their own content, without requiring me to write a complete editor from scratch… because I already have an editor!

you know, not everyone has the time and money to make Everquest Next

but regarding starting to build a game from above, isn’t this what Epic themselves are enforcing anyway? they are introducing more and more game templates and creating a marketplace

@;16680

And again if users whats to mod your game so badly then they always find a way to do so… even without paying 19$ for editor, there many examples of games which developer didn’t think about modding abilities, yet community can rip that game in pieces, even components that does not suppose to be editable. First mods been done on games which didn’t have mod support at all as developers didn’t had that idea at all, mods been created by gamers.

there are many examples yes, but you cannot compare the mod popularity of moddable games from the unmoddable ones.
think of the widely popular Diablo2 where many people wanted to mod it and failed. now take a look at how a direct competitor (a much less popular one), Neverwinter Nights, had a much longer lifetime because of the new campaigns the fans created.
The same holds true and is even more critical for any Strategy game. Just as deathmatch and arena based shooters (like UT3 itself). they become boring after a while if no new maps become available

even if some skilled hackers can change a few things in a game, if the game isn’t moddable for everyone, and the maps and mods easy to apply and use, the grand majority of people will not bother.
and so, the modding community will be negligibly small.

[Jacky]

You can see Tim Sweeney’s perspective on this here;

Does this mean that games cant be moddable?

[Chosker]

thanks, I missed that thread. definately an interesting read, and definately more in line with my opinions. many more enforcing arguments in there too.

it suprises me how this thread has so many more detractors than a similar one from 3 weeks ago.

[DieByZer0]

It’s opinions sir, Everyone has one.

[Shadowriver]

@Chosker;16758

you’re not refering to me with this, are you? let me remind you that I created an Inventory Starter Kit (complete with GUI, drag and drop, equipping, looting) for UDK and released it freely to everyone. I’m not waiting for Epic to make my game. all I want is to allow the players of my game to create their own content, without requiring me to write a complete editor from scratch… because I already have an editor!

Well sorry i didn’t know, in UDK times i didn’t attended much in forums. This editor is made for making full games not mods, having access to this editor is equile to have ability to make game in this engine and that having this ability is paid, thats the main issue, there need to be some border here… only thing we can do is wait and we all know that and said that few times here.

But if somebody (it does not need to be you) wants to make game mod friendly then no body close you a doors to do so, excusing with “oh, it’s time consuming” it’s like saying “i’m lazy”, ofcorse it time consuming, but if this is so impotent for your game no body stops you to do things towards that goal. Even if people are lazy you got people like with recently been searching for testers to his JavaScript system which would help a lot in modding capabilities, people could help him out and we our self we can make this engine mod friendly, there people who making C# bindings (in which there huge demand for) which is easier to plug in to and scenario will be the same as Minecraft, which also was not made for mods other then texture packs. Epic didn’t open up so many things just for us sitting on pile of seeds screaming for food like gray juvenile starling.

But regarding starting to build a game from above, isn’t this what Epic themselves are enforcing anyway? they are introducing more and more game templates and creating a marketplace

Well i’m not using one as no body forced me, main reason why i didn’t is because it didnt give me what i wanted Even with those templates you still need to know the basics and lower stuff to build something on those foundaments

there are many examples yes, but you cannot compare the mod popularity of moddable games from the unmoddable ones.
think of the widely popular Diablo2 where many people wanted to mod it and failed. now take a look at how a direct competitor (a much less popular one), Neverwinter Nights, had a much longer lifetime because of the new campaigns the fans created.
The same holds true and is even more critical for any Strategy game. Just as deathmatch and arena based shooters (like UT3 itself). they become boring after a while if no new maps become available

even if some skilled hackers can change a few things in a game, if the game isn’t moddable for everyone, and the maps and mods easy to apply and use, the grand majority of people will not bother.
and so, the modding community will be negligibly small.

If developer desire is to make community driven game then they make community driven game, make tools for users to do things, it is time consuming but as you say yourself it is worth it. Not to mention if you make strategy game, your game is already pretty much a editor already.

But even in current form UE4 is not so hard to mod, it is not a pit hole like Diablo 2. There always be somebody ready to pay that 19$ for editor and all user will do is ujust swap files… or add them if developers allows

[sandboxgod]

I think you should just let your community figure out how they want to approach becoming a user of Epic Game’s license. Yes they will have to fork out the little $19 fee but this empowers them to charge money for their work. And you might be able to charge them a little percentage

Let’s think out of the box here. Look at Second Life. Not my type of game but they have a great pyramid scheme going there.

That surprises me Skyrim has so many mods and these guys aren’t making any money for their work. I think that’s a ****** shame.

Now Team Fortress 2 is a good thing. People can charge money for their hard work. I know an artist that made $40k in one pop

[sandboxgod]

@Chosker;16656

Snake: somehow I doubt a custom license will fix this. If that were true, as soon as one big studio “licenses” UE4 and releases a free UE4 editor for their game, everything goes down

sandboxgod: exactly. our studio made M&MX Legacy and released the modding kit 5 months ago, but it requires Unity Pro. guess how many mods there are for MMX? sadly, zero. and it’s not like the previous M&M games lacked modding at all.
and while I don’t agree with your views about free vs. paid modding, that mostly affects map/mod “consumers”, but the issue still stands for map/mod makers.

: your option 1 is what I’m suggesting.
your option 2 is too time-consuming. and just seems wrong to be using an awesome ready-made tool to make games, only to later need to develop own tools only for map makers and modders.

Some good points. But unlike Unity Pro, your users won’t have to fork out $1500 upfront. Instead, they can just pay $19. Not trying to take anything away from your post. I will go look up your game (merely because I’m not familiar with it)

Good Luck guys I hope you can come up with something that makes you happy

[edit] M&MX LEgacy-- You mean Might and Magic X Legacy?! Cool! I’m watching some vids now.

[CRBNacho]

Good news guys! Seems Tim Sweeney did not go AWOL on us mod-content loyalists after all. Now that Unreal Engine 4 is free, it is now more possible for developers to live up to their promises and provide the User-Mod support we’ve hoped to make happen.

I no longer have reason to hold back from migrating my game to UE4 and stick with UDK.

WAHOOOO!!!