Originality in mods

[dux]

www.blackmesasource.com

Someone had to say it.

[e-freak]

while black mesa is not the most original one in terms of base-idea, I think the creativity and originality in it's art direction is superb and stands out.

[Seldoon182]

http://www.blackmesasource.com

Someone had to say it.

Half-life: Source was bullshit, they're fixing it!

[Sentura]

http://www.blackmesasource.com

Someone had to say it.

Half-life: Source was bullshit, they're fixing it!

that's a feeble excuse.

[Hourences]

At the end of the day, the most important thing still is whether or not a mod gets finished (most important), and secondly how polished the experience really is. None the less I agree that there is a serious lack of creativity and skill. You dont notice that only in terms of design, but also in terms of mod management. Most mods are grosely mismanaged. People are completely and utterly unrealistic about what they attempt to create. They want to run 40 people mod teams with senior lead producer roles, lead positions, and a game about the size of GTA, and end up spending more time on making their site look nice, or their trailers look nice, than on the actual mod, because updating ModDB is just a whole lot easier to do than actually building something... It is not suprinsing that if they can't even run and manage team, they also can't come up with a neat and original idea...

The thing with modding is that it costs no money, the only thing you need are friends really. And everyone has those. It is very easy to start a mod (and very hard to finish), so plenty of people who are not up to it, and usually have way too little experience, jump in...

[Campaignjunkie]

http://www.blackmesasource.com

Someone had to say it.

Half-life: Source was bullshit, they're fixing it!

that's a feeble excuse.

No one needs an excuse to mod. You're not in it for the "glory" or the (non-existent) pay-check. You do it because you want to do it and you enjoy doing it. That's it. For the love of the game, art for art's sake, design for design's sake, etc.

That said, I think we should all follow the Adam Foster model: Periodic, self-contained, highly polished releases until Valve offers you a job.

[Sentura]

http://www.blackmesasource.com

Someone had to say it.

Half-life: Source was bullshit, they're fixing it!

that's a feeble excuse.

No one needs an excuse to mod. You're not in it for the "glory" or the (non-existent) pay-check. You do it because you want to do it and you enjoy doing it. That's it. For the love of the game, art for art's sake, design for design's sake, etc.

That said, I think we should all follow the Adam Foster model: Periodic, self-contained, highly polished releases until Valve offers you a job.

i never raised a question about whether or not you need an excuse to mod. i don't go into what people waste their time on; because frankly, i don't care. the excuse presented, however, is not an opinion of the mod team or whoever may be responsible, but rather just a way of displaying negative bias towards a mod/game.

it was uncalled for.

[Inveramsay]

http://www.moddb.com/mods/smod-crysis

Can anyone say pointless?

Wow, it is a shame really. He has some very nice models (from what you can see from the grainy video at least) but really, why would you? Source will shit itself on most computers playing that since it is definately not made for it.

[⌐■_■]

nothing wrong with it really, execpt that the talent of the people working on the mod could have a far better purpose imho.

but that's just my opinion, not theirs, obviously.

[Seldoon182]

http://www.blackmesasource.com

Someone had to say it.

Half-life: Source was bullshit, they're fixing it!

that's a feeble excuse.

This isn't an excuse. Their own aim is to recreate Half-life with better graphic as players expected it! They're doing the job well. This isn't only a remake this is an enhancement!

[Freak]

http://www.blackmesasource.com

Someone had to say it.

Half-life: Source was bullshit, they're fixing it!

btw, are they still working on it? I haven´t heard something about it for a long time now...

[Mr. Happy]

The most original mods fail because you either can't get a team behind you or they require to much work for people to do in their spare time.

The least original mods fail because they are crap ideas came up with by people who don't know anything about modding and just produce a single shitty concept drawing of a character and a two sentence plot.

So you gotta be somewhere in between.

Mod's, and game's in general, should just be fun. You can't expect everyone to make the the next dystopia, natural selection, or whatever. People have to work inside their capabilities, not everyone has groundbreaking ideas, and you aren't getting financial incentive to keep going. Even if you are making the same old City 17/HL2 style maps there is lots of room for creativity in goals/puzzles/enemy placement/level design/pathing/etc., without changing at all the basic core gameplay or idea of the game.

[2d-chris]

As Hourences mentioned, the management of mods that actually start to produce some nice work gets absolutely stupid. they are 100% convinced that without management and leads the mod will fail, is depressing.

Some mod teams even have NDA's to digitally sign to say your not going to screw around with it, I mean talk about going over the top. I kind of think of it like playing soldier as a kid.

5 Good friends can make a fantastic mod with no leads, NDA's or deadlines.

If I ever make another mod it will be with a small team of friends with a common goal. None of this pretending to be a professional studio mentality.

[Nysuatro]

You guys maybe have some information about good management in mods?

Would be very helpfull in the future.

[Hourences]

I hope that my ball mod gets really far, so I can push it as an example on how you are suppose to run a mod team without NDAs, 300 members, 300 leads, and a cooler website than mod...

Running a mod:

-No paperwork. No NDAs, no contracts. If someone wants to screw you they will anyhow, with or without a fancy self written NDA. No one will fly to the other end of the world to sue a 16 year old kid who did something uncool to a non profit project. Give me a break really. All paperwork will negatively impact mutual trust.

-Small team. You cannot manage 30 people, you really cant. With 30 people, you will get politics kicking in. It will prove to be difficult to keep everyone involved and up to date. As a leader, and presumably the most experienced dev (as if..), you will spend pretty much all your time on just talking to these 30 people, hampering your own dev work... 30 people is also wholly unneccy. If you need this many people to create your thing, your design is flawed. See next point

-Great and super efficient design. You cant make the next GTA game as a mod. You cant make a WOW clone as a mod. You cant make a mod with 30 playercharacters, 6 different environments and 29 levels, and 4 types of gameplay. You need to go for something that is doable. Im actually writing a book/article about this step at the moment.

-You need to go step by step, and create releases often to keep the team motivated, and proof to them that progress is made. Do not attempt to create the entire mod at once, go step by step. Work on core functionality first, make a working release, and then go onto the next step.

-People spend their time onto mods, for free, because they want something out of it. Identify what, and try to give them that to keep them interested. If they want neat pics for their portfolio, have them work on nice things (and not a bunch of barrels all the time). Take on dirty work yourself if you can to keep it fun for those who help you for free.

-Have just 1 lead. Too many leads and paperwork ends up in a bureaucracy, thats bad for the team. Too many leads also results in too many different visions, arguments following, and so on.

-You need a strong lead who will create the entire mod by himself if he must. This will also motivate the team in the sense that they know it will get finished for sure.

-You cant force teammembers to do exactly what you want them to do if you dont pay them, much too boring especially for artists and designers. Strike the balance between getting what you want, without taking their creativity and input away. Push them into a direction, but then let them handle the rest themselves.

-Mods cannot be run like companies, because people are not being paid. People who are not paid will accept a whole lot less crap than people who are. Your highest priority is to cut down on the amount of crap, and keep it as down the earth and basic as possible.

The last point is one of the reasons so many mod teams fall apart. And inexperience and lack of people of course.