373 réponses à ce sujet

[Realmzmaster]

I understand what Hanako Ikezawa is saying. It can be depressing to come on to the forums to engage in discussion of the game and listen to PC users ranting the reason why our crpgs are being dumb down is because of you peasant using console users. Get a real machine. Get a PC. Go back to COD.

 

The mods themselves is not a problem the attitude of the users is a different matter..

 

I could stand here and state that I believe that 90% of the people on this forum would not know a real crpg if it stood up and slapped them in the face fifteen times. (IMHO) But, that would not be true. It is not because they do not know what it is they just have different expectations of what they want. Unfortunately many times those expectations do not match mine. (Those dirty crpg-lite wanting gamers). But, I do not let it affect me. 

 

I think people who use mods and want a modkit are fine. I simply have no use for them. 

[Divine Justinia V]

I still think there won't be as much as everyone in this thread is hoping for. And I agree w Hana 800000%. (but i'm out of likes)

[CybAnt1]

I think people who use mods and want a modkit are fine. I simply have no use for them. 

 

It's interesting, Realmz, as mods could actually put back many of the features you appear to want in a game, but are lacking. And would enable you to play it the way you like, without affecting others play-experience or having Bioware work on an optional-state toggle.

 

Just saying.   (You do know, as I've said, I'm Ok with about 50% of what you want, give or take, but I'm not sure other people are.) 

[CybAnt1]

And, BTW, Hollywood_Undead (have to say I love the name) above figured out how to mod the BF4 game on his Xbox. 

 

That said, he does pretty much spell out why you can't DO it without a PC. 

 

Modding is not actually limited only to PCs ... well it depends on how you define it, of course.

 

Just as an example, there is a Dragon Age 2 Save Editor, First Blight, that will modify Xbox saves. And, AFAICS, runs on the Xbox itself, no PC needed. (At least seems that way from the description. Have, obviously, never run it.) 

 

http://www.xpgamesav...x-360-mod-tool/

[Realmzmaster]

It's interesting, Realmz, as mods could actually put back many of the features you appear to want in a game, but are lacking. And would enable you to play it the way you like, without affecting others play-experience or having Bioware work on an optional-state toggle.

 

Just saying.   (You do know, as I've said, I'm Ok with about 50% of what you want, give or take, but I'm not sure other people are.) 

 

I am sure the mods could. But the programmer in me knows that many modders do not test their mods through the entire game to see if the mod breaks anything for example invisible barriers in front of doors. Also some mods are in conflict with others then I have to go about debugging what happened. I have done enough of that in my life.

 

If the game is built from the ground up with my ideas in mind it lessens that possibility. Also I can complain to the developer and get them to try to fix it if there are bugs. Modders do not have to listen to what I have to say because the software provided is use at you own risk 

[CybAnt1]

It's a mixed bag. Some listen to both bug reports and feature requests for their mods on Dragon Age Nexus, and actually read and respond to them with updates with some decent regularity. BTW, of course, the one thing they can never predict is how their mod will interfere with somebody else's - because they're often replacing or altering the same files. Then the complaints come in... 

 

Oh, or it was working, then suddenly gets nuked by official patch 1.04. 

 

Others ... unresponsive as crap. They're still stuck at broken version 0.98b. of their mod. 

 

I guess the old adage goes ... they're not getting paid, usually, for their work, so you can only ask nicely, and really shouldn't be too demanding. 

[TurretSyndrome]

Well, so much for hoping for a game without mods for a change. 

 

Like I said, it's not so much the mods themselves, it's more the arrogance of the people who use them that has given me a negative opinion on the whole practice. 

 

Of course, I know not everyone acts that way but enough do. 

 

This is really some of the most ludicrous things I have heard here. You wish for a game to have no mod support because some PC gamer on the internet kept ranting about how good the game looks on his computer or how he can mod the game? Seriously? The next thing you will ask is for Bioware not to release the game on the PC entirely. Are you also friends with some of the people who petitioned for GTA V to not be released for PC?  

 

 

It more the "Ooh, look at how much better our games our with our mods, you filthy console peasants" that inevitably happens with modded games. It gets really annoying and depressing. 

 

Sigh... I am not even going to get into this. If you don't like "listening" to people talk about modding, then stay out the thread. I'm not interested in hearing how you are being treated like a "console peasant" because you have no access to mods, no one was doing that here.

[Divine Justinia V]

This is really some of the most ludicrous things I have heard here. You wish for a game to have no mod support because some PC gamer on the internet kept ranting about how good the game looks on his computer or how he can mod the game? Seriously? The next thing you will ask is for Bioware not to release the game on the PC entirely. Are you also friends with some of the people who petitioned for GTA V to not be released for PC?  

 

?!?!?!?! Where do you get that conclusion from her post? I highly doubt she'd want that.

 

Even with the fact that there's a massive amount of arrogant people that brag about mods and act like that makes PC gamers better than console gamers, there's the fact that it's completely unfair, no matter which way you're trying to swing it.

[Ryzaki]

How is it unfair? If you want to use mods you get the PC version. It's part of the Pc's advantages. Much like console advantages are being cheaper, used games are easily resellable and more convenient to use.

[Ryzaki]

Well, what can I tell you. If it's true to previous games, 70% of the mods will be some variation on making the companions run around naked (without the small clothes). Or making them have anything from bigger biceps to purple hair.  

 

If you think you're missing out on much ... 

 

Of course there's the inevitable big boob nude mod (sometimes with freaking jiggle physics!) but there's also graphic updates, added quests, and bug fixes the devs don't get to. Even in JE (one of the least modded games I've ever played) I still can have the JE in style mod which makes learning skills more fun (plus it fixes the blacked out kiss from the console version).

 

That said I don't get the "it's not fair!" PCs tend to be more picky, require far more maintence than their console counterparts also PC games are a damn pain to resell if used (if it's even possible at all most of the time it's not). Mods are simply taking advantage of the PCs far more open environment.

[TurretSyndrome]

?!?!?!?! Where do you get that conclusion from her post? I highly doubt she'd want that.

 

Even with the fact that there's a massive amount of arrogant people that brag about mods and act like that makes PC gamers better than console gamers, there's the fact that it's completely unfair, no matter which way you're trying to swing it.

 

Arrogance and stupidity exist everywhere. The very fact that she was hoping for mods not to exist just so she can stop seeing PC gamers "brag about it" just proves it. Just as you and her are tired of being annoyed by "arrogant PC gamers", I am annoyed of console gamers who have nothing to gain or lose with the inclusion of support for mods, but like to chime in and say "modding doesn't benefit me so it shouldn't exist anywhere else".

 

I'm not swinging it anywhere. PCs have always had the advantage of accessibility. That's the advantage we get as PC gamers because we choose to keep control over our hardware and software. We pay more for hardware and we have to tinker with stuff more to get what we want. Above all, we always risk breaking something if we make a mistake. 

 

You, on the other hand get cheaper pre-built hardware, and all the OS and UI is made as user friendly as possible so you don't have to deal with what we PC gamers have to deal with. In return, the company that owns your console denies you the right to freely modify anything in the software. 

 

It's a trade off that you have to deal with. It's not our fault that you're stuck with the same level of hardware for eight years. It's not our fault that you can't freely modify your games and software like us. No one here is forcing you to go PC, no one here is bragging about their own platform, all of them have their ups and downs. So yes, it is fair, and you have no right to complain or whine about it.

 

And I don't care how many arrogant PC gamers you had to face, who constantly called you peasants or whatever. I don't do that,  and I haven't seen anyone here do that either, so whatever complaints you may have, keep them out of this thread. 

[Hanako Ikezawa]

This is really some of the most ludicrous things I have heard here. You wish for a game to have no mod support because some PC gamer on the internet kept ranting about how good the game looks on his computer or how he can mod the game? Seriously? The next thing you will ask is for Bioware not to release the game on the PC entirely. Are you also friends with some of the people who petitioned for GTA V to not be released for PC?  

 

 

 

Sigh... I am not even going to get into this. If you don't like "listening" to people talk about modding, then stay out the thread. I'm not interested in hearing how you are being treated like a "console peasant" because you have no access to mods, no one was doing that here.

As I said, I have no problems with mods in and of themselves. My negative opinion on the matter comes more from people who derive a superiority complex because they can afford a good computer to have mods on. Not all of us are blessed with that much money. There is no choice involved. I have never wanted to deny people access to games, and in fact have actually asked for some exclusives to be multiplatform because it seems unfair for players who love a franchise to buy a gaming PC or console just so they can enjoy that game. 

 

I don't want to cause a fight, so let's leave this be.

[Allan Schumacher]

Allan, I'd be terribly curious about how the non-finish in CRPGs compares to action games. By that, I mean, I bet there are a lot of people out there who play a shooter like Call of Duty or Battlefield 4, and never finish all the levels in the single player campaign either. I'm genuinely curious whether that percentage is higher or lower vs. a CRPG like Dragon Age. (Problem too could be they never start the SP campaign because they have no interest in anything but the MP, or don't finish it because, same reason.) 

 

Of course, it might not be tracked ... like, does the achievement of finishing those shooters "report" to the developers that the player has finished? 

 

A lot of people assert people never finish CRPG's because of their complexity. But I'm betting a lot of people don't finish games, because they just don't have the patience to finish all the hours of any game that's lengthy - regardless of simplicity or complexity.

 

We have to be careful how we look at data.  For Mass Effect 3, for example, if someone doesn't finish the game but has played 400 hours and has unlocked all the MP aspects, then it's safe to say they played the game for a while and probably weren't all that interested in playing the MP.  If someone didn't complete much of the single player, and didn't play a second of MP, then we can conclude that the player didn't finish the single player (for some reason).

 

I don't know if the percentage is higher or lower, since I haven't heard anything about the data for those games.  I could probably poke around and find out how many people played BF4's SP which might help.

 

It's important to note that I'm not actually suggesting that someone that didn't finish our game didn't like it.  Or didn't feel like they got their money's worth.  I can't be certain why someone didn't finish the game.  I can find out, however, various statistical measures (i.e. mean and median) of players that play our games pretty quickly.

 

 

The main evolution from Eclipse/Lycium to Frostbite is graphical. The main thing Frostbite is updating is the graphics, animation, and physics, to make it all more realistic.

 

This is a bit simple.  Yes, graphical improvements are huuuuuuuuuuge, along with all those aesthetic things like animations and physics (although physics can be applied in other ways, too).  It also has things like different memory managements, the actual existence of some sort of streaming technology (so we don't need to load an entire level into memory anymore - this immensely helps us with the size of our levels), and various other forms of improvement.

The biggest deficiency the Frostbite engine had for us was the lack of tools and systems that we were used to using for creating a game the way that BioWare usually did.  While this is a huge cost, it DOES provide us with an opportunity to actually improve upon previously known issues with our tools, but weren't fixed because it was "good enough and we need to ship games, yo."

 

 

Personally, I suspect the things some people want to "touch" or edit in DAI are still in 2DA files (essentially 2 dimensional arrays like an Excel spreadsheet), like how many points you get when you level, or the experience points you get for certain things. For the record, Bioware used 2DA files in BG2, in NWN1, DA1 & 2, and I feel safe betting they'll continue to use them in DAI.   Oh, I could be wrong, but I am calling this as a safe bet.

 

We definitely do not use the same 2DA file structure that we used (it's important to note that the legacy of DA2's engine is actually NWN1, so that we continued using 2DA files is less surprising).  They are stored in data files, but it more resembles an XML file now (though it's not).  Whether or not that data file retains its structure when packaged and bundled in the release version of the game I honestly don't know.

 

 

You *are* correct, however, that there will be data files and enterprising people will try to rip them apart.  I'm not sure how easy it will be to do so, nor what data will be likely to be found.

[Allan Schumacher]

It more the "Ooh, look at how much better our games our with our mods, you filthy console peasants" that inevitably happens with modded games. It gets really annoying and depressing. 

 

Those people are silly and seeking validation.  I'm a through and through PC gamer with easily 99% of my gaming time spent on the PC, but I have zero issues with consoles, console players, and so forth.  I'll joke (less and less, though) about PC master race but mostly it's just "PC gaming is what works for me."  Gamers are gamers and we're all on the same side IMO.  Perhaps interestingly, as a PC gamer I very rarely use mods.  They can be a nice to have when ones that interest me come along (like Counterstrike back in 1999), but banking on the PC version of game simply because it has mod potential isn't something that jives with me since I have no guarantee that mods that I would be interested in will even come out.  The base vanilla game is significantly more important to me.

 

I know it can be easier said than done, but try not to let those that seek to brag about how superior their game is because of mods get you down (and if you see them on these forums, remember the ignore function!).  IMO it reflects more on the poster than anything else.

[TurretSyndrome]

As I said, I have no problems with mods in and of themselves. My negative opinion on the matter comes more from people who derive a superiority complex because they can afford a good computer to have mods on. Not all of us are blessed with that much money. There is no choice involved. I have never wanted to deny people access to games, and in fact have actually asked for some exclusives to be multiplatform because it seems unfair for players who love a franchise to buy a gaming PC or console just so they can enjoy that game. 

 

I don't want to cause a fight, so let's leave this be.

 

I wouldn't have a problem with your post if someone was actually showing their "PC superiority" here, but they weren't. Everyone was being civil and were only talking about mods for the game.

 

I understand your frustration on the matter however, I myself get saddened by the fact that I can't play any of the exclusives that get to be released on consoles. There were so many games last gen that I wanted to play but they always stayed to PS3 and Xbox 360. even now there are games like Final Fantasy XV, Destiny, Deep Down etc that are hitting consoles but not the PC. Even with all of that I prefer PC gaming, and I don't wish for anyone not to get something because I didn't get it. 

 

I prefer PC gaming because of the freedom it provides me with games. It's also because I know in the long run, it'll be cheaper for me just to upgrade a few parts and not pay that online subscription and cheaper games. I'm also not "blessed with money".

[Allan Schumacher]

Why didn't they just use a modified namespace for their XML? I guess it works for them XML is good for creating data structures.

The keep probably uses a J2EE platform as with most of bioware's server software.

 

Note that I didn't say we were using XML.

[CybAnt1]

In return, the company that owns your console denies you the right to freely modify anything in the software. 

 

 

Yep, the barriers to modding on gaming console are less technical than ... authoritarian. I.e. Microsoft and Sony simply try to make it difficult for players to do (because of a variety of agreements with people who make games for their platforms and concern over other legal issues).

 

There's guides on how to do it. P.S. if I've inspired you, it's not for the timid. These things are tricky, and doing them wrong could result in your Xbox or Playstation becoming a doorstop. But don't be mad at me, be mad at Sony and Microsoft.

 

http://www.wikihow.com/Mod-an-Xbox

http://www.se7ensins...n-3-modding.83/

 

Hell, if you want to, there are even guides on how to put Linux on your gaming console, and use it as a 'lightweight' PC. (Obviously, the key trick there is lack of ports.)

 

Gaming consoles are personal computers (more or less), but just loaded with an OS that pretty much locks you out of using it for anything other than games (well, perhaps watching DVDs, listening to music, anything passive) or doing much to modify those games. 

[Realmzmaster]

 I do not think that Hanako was talking about just this thread. When DA2 came out the forums were rife with posters condemning consoles for dumbing down their PC experience. The attitudes of a lot of posters approached preposterous levels. Some posters came, saw and left these forums because of the negativity being displayed. 

[Realmzmaster]

The point for Sony and Microsoft is that if the mods come through their online facilities they become responsible for them. Microsoft and Sony could just say use at your own risk, but that would not go over well. It is like buying an app from the Apple store and it bricks your IPhone. Apple cannot say you used it at your own risk. (I know it an extreme example.).

 

The mods would have to be completely vetted. The mods would have to go through a certification process that would insure that no other parts of the game gets broken.

 

Pc users do not have that problem. The PC manufacturers provide the tool and that is it. If the tool has a physical problem that is their concern. The software you run it is not their concern. That is the OS makers concern as long as the software plays by the OS rules.

 

Bioware is not responsible for any third party mods. Now if Bioware provides a toolkit Bioware is responsible for that piece of software.

 

If a third party mods screws up a PC or the game that is the PC owner's problem. If multiple mods cause problems the PC owner gets to sort that out. Gamers using consoles will not be that forgiving to Sony or Microsoft.

 

So the technological reasons can be overcome.  The other reasons are a different kettle of fish.

[slimgrin]

Well, what can I tell you. If it's true to previous games, 70% of the mods will be some variation on making the companions run around naked (without the small clothes). Or making them have anything from bigger biceps to purple hair.  

 

If you think you're missing out on much ... 

 

Edit - I misinterpreted your stance. Ignore me quoting you. 

 

Always baffled me that certain gamers actually deride the modding community when they make massive contributions, all for free. It's as if certain gamers can't have them, so out of spite they want no one to have them. Ridiculous. I couldn't bear to play DA:O without at least a dozen mods to make the experience better for me. 

 

As for DA:I and modding, I wouldn't hold out hope. Bioware would have to create an extensive toolkit or release the code. EA and Dice weren't keen on doing either for Battlefield 3.

[TurretSyndrome]

 I do not think that Hanako was talking about just this thread. When DA2 came out the forums were rife with posters condemning consoles for dumbing down their PC experience. The attitudes of a lot of posters approached preposterous levels. Some posters came, saw and left these forums because of the negativity being displayed. 

 

That doesn't serve as justification to start posting negatively here. It's a discussion about mods, and neither I nor any other posters I've seen here have shown any hatred towards consoles.

 

Always baffled me that certain gamers actually deride the modding community when they make massive contributions, all for free. It's as if certain gamers can't have them, so out of spite they want no one to have them. Ridiculous.

 

This is exactly what angers me. Gamers these days really say some of the most ludicrous stuff. The fact that we're all gamers seems to fly over people's heads these days.

[Lord Raijin]

I assume that Dragon Age Inquisition is going to be priced at around 50 to 60 dollars, right? This means that we are entitled to have the maximum performance that's out there, and that means to also gain access to mods for us PC users. Once we paid our money into the game we should be allowed to do anything we want with it, since we own DA: I, and not just Bioware.

 

Using legal issues as a shield is lame. Bethesda allowed us Skyrim players to mod the game, and guess what? To this very same day people still play Skyrim (Because of the mods) despite of it's lack of story, and to my knowledge Bethesda hasn't got into any legal problems because of their decisions to allow people to mod their games. How many people today are still playing Dragon Age 2 with so very few mods available to them?

 

The bottom line is that we are your boss, Bioware. We want access to mods to the products that you guys sell to us. It is for your best interests to work hard to please us, since we finance your company through purchasing of your games.

[Ryzaki]

*sigh* now that is obnoxious. 

[Sylvius the Mad]

Perhaps interestingly, as a PC gamer I very rarely use mods.  They can be a nice to have when ones that interest me come along (like Counterstrike back in 1999), but banking on the PC version of game simply because it has mod potential isn't something that jives with me since I have no guarantee that mods that I would be interested in will even come out.

For the modders, themselves, however, they know that those mods will come out, because they're the ones who make the mods.

 

If I like modding in and of itself, then I very much want games to be moddable.