32 réponses à ce sujet

[Thurelh]

Why it gets harder every time to mod DA:I, Bioware? DA:O wouldn't have been such a large success without modding opportunity... Don't let EA push you into a community destroying behaviour, there is no profit for you left, if anyone takes your place and makes a modable RPG with dialogue choices, the DA-Franchise is done. So stop throwing rock on the modding ways...

 

Of course you don't choose the engine in first place to make sure the community is able to mod it limitless, but as Bethesda mentioned in its single player games, you should keep a system running that has worked before. Bioware, the part which is responsible for the Dragon Age series, did a great job with the single player part generally, but customization got the same depth as DA:O already had, and as we remember right, most parts of the PC communtiy were such happy to be able to maximize the possibilities of character creation. It doubled the DA:O world's size and its replay worth.

 

Skyrim's modability granted it a graphical overhaul without comparison and there also have also been several ones for the Dragon Age games Bioware benefited from in the end, because they got a second spring with this bandwidth of mods. So did EA hope to "serve" the community by eventually adding everything the community wants officially with buyable DLC's?

 

- Patch 6 first made it even harder to process the mod repacks. As it wasn't already hard enough to mod it through the frostbite engine...

- Patch 7 also changed things, which worked with the modding process, but it wasn't listed in the patch notes, because this would have spread rumors inside the community, so fixes in that case seem to come silently for peace's sake.

 

Don't get me wrong, I definitely love Bioware and their work, but as a company they are addicted to EA and there's a reason, why players don't like or trust EA's policy with games and companies. They don't care about their companie's or franchise's survival, because in their world they could buy newcomers as soon as older ones don't work profitable enough any longer.

 

Just fear DA or ME could be the next franchise who gets the mass-production-assassin's-creed-effect, where ideas gets flatter and bugs are at home. Proven by their last title, where character control became a mess and gameplay less smoother. Newer and faster doesn't mean better. EA could learn from their own mistakes or the ones, made by Ubisoft, but no progress in bleeding out game devs over time is just dumb. So I really hope Bioware could release themselves from EA some day, to find some producer that's worth it.

 

EA doesn't support game dev's, they're consuming them under taff contitions. There are several organisms in the universe that do have the same behaviour and none of ever was a positive one.

 

It's my opinion, noone has to agree with, but the thread is about modding and I guess I'm not the only one, who wished to get more freedom in modding this awsome title to make it such individual as desired.

 

Greetings and a lovely Sunday,

Thur

[katerinafm]

Despite everything, there are wonderful people that have managed to get a mod manager working and are constantly updating it to work with the game. Current mod manager makes it possible to play everything including the DLC. There's only a couple of mods that are incompatible so far.

[DanteYoda]

I feel you Modders would be more appreciated in other games, its pretty plain as day Bioware doesn't give a damn about you guys, honestly look to future non bioware games where modders are wanted etc..

 

This game will be mostly dead in a year (maybe 6 months) anyway...

[Lightpanda]

*snip*

 

Skyrim's modability granted it a graphical overhaul without comparison and there also have also been several ones for the Dragon Age games Bioware benefited from in the end, because they got a second spring with this bandwidth of mods. So did EA hope to "serve" the community by eventually adding everything the community wants officially with buyable DLC's?

 

*snip*

I'm probably the only person on this forum that just felt kinda "meh" with Skyrim. I bought in via Steam and was glad to be able to have code-compliant mods for it. The mods were why I tolerated Skyrim as long as I did. I still completely prefer Dragon Age and mods would only improve that sentiment.

 

It's like that Mitch Herberg joke about turkeys (emphasis mine):

 

"If you go to the grocery store and stand in front of the lunch meat section for too long, you start to get pissed off at turkeys. You see turkey ham, turkey pastrami, turkey bologna -- somebody needs to tell the turkeys, 'Man, just be yourself.' [*cough* Aka not Bethesda. Be DA:O!Bioware *cough*]"

[AlanC9]

I'm probably the only person on this forum that just felt kinda "meh" with Skyrim. I bought in via Steam and was glad to be able to have code-compliant mods for it. The mods were why I tolerated Skyrim as long as I did. I still completely prefer Dragon Age and mods would only improve that sentiment.

Not the only one. I picked it up last fall for $5 and found it to be worth ...... all $5. I mght have been even less invested than you, since I didn't even bother getting a lot of mods. Just put in my time and was done.

[Ganalysis]

I agree, if I was able to mod this game, I would not be posting on this forum and complaining to bioware about cassandra looking like a man. instead i would just mod the game and be done with it.

 

as a result of not modding the game, it's built resentment in me towards feminists/gay/lesbian community when none existed before. i hate to say that, but there it is.

 

dragon age series was one of my fav series, but sadly I could NOT identify with DAI at all due to cass & josephine looking the way they do most likely due to political correctness of some sort and hidden resentment towards straight people for years of oppression.

 

chances are this post is going to be censored, if it's not, then at least bioware can know I bought all their games, but Inquisition was the only one that upset me to the point where I could not play it.

[Innsmouth Dweller]

pfff... DA modding is long dead (i don't give a rats ass about new hairstyles or other visual crap)... they prefer enhancing MP's pay to win rng to supporting any form of fans creativity. 

 

i'm waiting for REDKit3 and Fallout 4 release (assuming they'll release another g.e.c.k. after Valve/Bethesda, brilliant imho cuz it'd mean editors in every game and no mod-breaking patches if publisher gets some free money, idea was met with hostility)

[Octarin]

Feedback: modding and why it only applies to 1/3 of the platforms the game is released for, hence trips up every effort on our behalf to get company fixes for everyone instead of mods just for the PCs. 

[berelinde]

Modding extends the life of games. People are still playing Baldur's Gate, and that's more than a decade old, and it's all thanks to modding. BioWare is very well aware of that fact.

 

Game sales matter, of course, but so does the sale of downloadable content. You can't sell DLC to people who no longer have the game installed, so it stands in their best interests to encourage modding, or at least not make it more difficult than it has to be.

[Darkly Tranquil]

I'm probably the only person on this forum that just felt kinda "meh" with Skyrim. I bought in via Steam and was glad to be able to have code-compliant mods for it. The mods were why I tolerated Skyrim as long as I did. I still completely prefer Dragon Age and mods would only improve that sentiment.

 

You're not the only one. I think Skyrim is one of the most overrated games of all time.

[Felya87]

Mods help only PC players. Once the mods will help those who play on console too, I would start to care.

[duckley]

Is it Bioware or EA that doesn't appear to  support modding?

 

Modding is a revenue source for EA/Bioware IMO. With modding I buy a game for my PS4 and for my computer.

[Hrungr]

Mike Laidlaw touched on this just yesterday on Twitter...

 

 

User

I just wished bioware would be more supportive towards the modding community. come out with a sdk even like Beth.

 

Mike Laidlaw ‏@Mike_Laidlaw

We would like to do that at some point, but there are some intense technical hurdles before we can.

 

User

worthy target. modding turned skyrim from a ok open world into a game still relevant 3+ years later. I want that for biogames

 

Mike Laidlaw ‏@Mike_Laidlaw

Origins had a similar mod platform, but Frostbite is a much different beast. Many integrated, yet external, pieces.

[Hazegurl]

I feel you Modders would be more appreciated in other games, its pretty plain as day Bioware doesn't give a damn about you guys, honestly look to future non bioware games where modders are wanted etc..

 

This game will be mostly dead in a year (maybe 6 months) anyway...

 

I agree, DAI is the first game I've ever modded but I'm eager to mod a game where I don't have to jump through hoops just to do it. I have one mod that isn't completely finished due to the setback of these patches and I've reached a point of not caring.  On top of that, I had to do a system recovery and lost my downloads.  Now DAI has been sitting at the halfway DL mark for nearly a week and I have no desire to click the resume button.  I'd rather keep playing Witcher 1 and 2 and save space for Witcher 3.  If I can mod W3 I will be so happy! 

[Kantr]

They touched on why patches break mods in a Q&A and it was that because modding isnt officially supported they can make a lot of changes to game code to fix the bugs. Whereas on games that supported mods they had to do a lot of work to make sure they didnt break.

 

Primarily though it's because Frostbite wasn't built with mod support. So it's great that people have been able to create mods for it

[Thurelh]

It's like that Mitch Herberg joke about turkeys (emphasis mine):

 

Good objection, understand how it fits to some DLC's selling policy.

Philosophy for me here concludes: 'Think more as we were from one kind with several needs and different behaviors, than seperated nations with several fronts and strange behaviors!'

 

Mods help only PC players. Once the mods will help those who play on console too, I would start to care.

 

Totally understand that. For I'm no serious console player, I still can understand that point of view. Yet there's a big reason, why they refuse to give access to console's game data. Think one of them might be the gamecopy protection to make it harder for crackers to multiply a game version. Another reason might be, that consoles were made for uncomplicated plug(meantime also initiate a game like installation process as I mentioned lately) and play and I think that's a reason why Microsoft and Sony(to name the relevant gigants, sry Nintendo) still struggle to expand this experience. Microsoft wouldn't do until necassary, because they already has a market with an PC OS that would else come too close to each others market(several markets, several earnings, collapsed into each others markets, collapsed earnings) while Sony wouldn't do it for now, as long as it wasn't forced by competitioners or doesn't bring more money to add this 'feature'.

 

I think it'll come one day. And if one of them begins with that the other one has to draw level with it to stay in race for sure. That's why Nintendo isn't in this league anymore. They struggled to evolve graphics performance and limited their playable titles to exceptions and family games - no hard feelings, it's ok not to enter the markets war between MC and Sony, wouldn't want that for me also for my own nerves sake

 

 

 

Primarily though it's because Frostbite wasn't built with mod support.

 

Yah, but as DA's evolution more and more goes towards direct character control they could have chosen another engine for the project's sake, I think. Taming a gone-wild engine as it appears to be, might be a much bigger task then adding a tactical gameplay element to an already proved RPG-engine. So I think the initial decision has been wrong; at least you have to think further, passing the time of the first two months after release.

 

You could have gotten feedback from frostbite isiders, that there's a poor range to move around for modders in this engine, which means - as some of you already mentioned here - this game's survival time could be heavily decreased within this fact and the one on the other hand, that Bioware(DA) don't seem to be in position to change that, even if they are already trying. And that's to believe or not, because:

 

it was that because modding isnt officially supported they can make a lot of changes to game code to fix the bugs. Whereas on games that supported mods they had to do a lot of work to make sure they didnt break.

 

I'd say you cannot seriously try to beat that devil of an engine with a halfhearted will.

 

In some cases you have to decide if you do something or let it be and sadly this is one of that cases. Not because we decided that in any way, it's because of the initial engine choice, that leaves little space with huge hurdles for modders and the market.

Ok, all of you know, gamers got disappointed by Devs such badly the last years, so they learned that most companies don't give a cent to their oppinion on how their title reflects from the fan community. Bioware generally always was one of that kinda comps, that rly seem to care about it(See community feedback to ME3 ending and how it leaded to a overhaul at least) and I love them for it, so I'm able to seperate the team from Bioware A(Mass Effect) and Bioware B(Dragon Age), which some kind seems(after DA:O) to be the little brother, that tries in vain to reach the popularity of the Mass Effect sequels, and they got really close, indeed, but I think there's always one(in DA:I) or two(in DA2) things, that doesn't reach the optimal level.

 

The point is, that gamers has been tought to get along with fails and leave them behind, because there are other franchises. But in that case I totally refuse to leave the DA-universe behind as a halfway good game! As we figured out, a lot of ppl love to garnish their game with mods they like to individualize their experience, their beloved alias and be part of a story which touches part of ourselves!

 

Btw: Don't wanna extinguish this conversation with that at all!! Just throw in some thanks to all of you, that take some to tell their point of view! Special thanks for sharing external informations to serve this thread's theme here, Hrungr and Kantr!

[Shechinah]

 

Yah, but as DA's evolution more and more goes towards direct character control they could have chosen another engine for the project's sake, I think. Taming a gone-wild engine as it appears to be, might be a much bigger task then adding a tactical gameplay element to an already proved RPG-engine. So I think the initial decision has been wrong; at least you have to think further, passing the time of the first two months after release.

 

Likely not if it was a demand from upstairs that it'd be this engine used.
 

[Eternal Phoenix]

I feel you Modders would be more appreciated in other games, its pretty plain as day Bioware doesn't give a damn about you guys, honestly look to future non bioware games where modders are wanted etc..

 

Bioware used to be big in the modding community when you look at Neverwinter Nights which had its own toolset. Even Baldur's Gate was moddable. Dragon Age: Origins also had its own toolset but then after that, Bioware's mod support went south which is a shame.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Likely not if it was a demand from upstairs that it'd be this engine used.

There have been public statements that Mark Darrah chose the engine, but I don't buy it. At the very least, I expect EA created incentives (like conditional budgets) to encourage them to use Frostbite.

Then it would still be technically the case that BioWare chose FB, but EA would have created an environment in which choosing FB was the only viable option.

But there's never a good reason to prohibit mods, not even with consoles. Consoles are just computers with a limited UI. They're moddable, too.

[Thurelh]

Then it would still be technically the case that BioWare chose FB, but EA would have created an environment in which choosing FB was the only viable option.

 

Kinda what I was thinking, doesn't belong to Bioware's character at all in the end. That's what I had in focus in the mid part of the initial posting.

[AlanC9]

There have been public statements that Mark Darrah chose the engine, but I don't buy it. At the very least, I expect EA created incentives (like conditional budgets) to encourage them to use Frostbite.
Then it would still be technically the case that BioWare chose FB, but EA would have created an environment in which choosing FB was the only viable option.

It'd actually be awfully strange if EA hadn't done this.

I've lived through similar situations, working in a small business unit of a larger conglomerate. Vertical integration doesn't look so great when your business unit is chained to a suboptimal system that your corporation owns, especially if you'd previously been able to buy better stuff on the open market.

Looked at another way, though, Frostbite will make DAI more profitable than some hypothetical alternative version with a different engine. It's hard to argue with that.

[Sylvius the Mad]

My one hope is that BioWare's use of FB makes it more likely that official FB mod tools will exist at some point.

Because mods make all games better. There is no game so good that it wouldn't be improved with mods.

[Kantr]

Aside from Bioware's old Eclipse and DA2 engine, and Bethdesa's engine. What other engines allow mod support?

[DanteYoda]

 

Mike Laidlaw touched on this just yesterday on Twitter...

 

 

User

I just wished bioware would be more supportive towards the modding community. come out with a sdk even like Beth.

 

Mike Laidlaw ‏@Mike_Laidlaw

We would like to do that at some point, but there are some intense technical hurdles before we can.

 

User

worthy target. modding turned skyrim from a ok open world into a game still relevant 3+ years later. I want that for biogames

 

Mike Laidlaw ‏@Mike_Laidlaw

Origins had a similar mod platform, but Frostbite is a much different beast. Many integrated, yet external, pieces.

 

Then ditch frostbite, its a terrible engine anyway...

[FKA_Servo]

Is it Bioware or EA that doesn't appear to  support modding?

 

Modding is a revenue source for EA/Bioware IMO. With modding I buy a game for my PS4 and for my computer.

 

Yep.

 

Personally, between the two of us that make up my household, we've bought Origins three times, DA2 three times, Inquisition twice. KOTOR and SWTOR twice.

 

And that's just Bioware games.