I thought folks here might find this an interesting article, worth of discussion/debate... do you think a game needs to support Mods to be a success these days?

from: http://www.business2.com/articles/mag/0,16...0,43489,FF.html

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Game Development à la Mod
Hacker Minh Le's Counter-Strike is the stuff of media execs' dreams -- an over-the-transom blockbuster.
By Geoff Keighley, October 2002 Issue

Mad for Mods

   User statistics for mods and the games they're based on.Like a lot of college seniors, Minh Le had no idea what he wanted to do with his life. In June 2000, on the verge of graduating with a computer science degree from Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, British Columbia, the 23-year-old Le really would admit to only one career goal: He didn't want to work in a cubicle. If pushed about his ambitions, though, he might shyly point to a computer game he had built in the basement of his parents' suburban home and given away over the Internet.

Today, Le's homespun project, called Counter-Strike, is the most popular multiplayer action game in the world. Bigger than Quake. Bigger than Unreal. The numbers are staggering: Over 1.7 million players spend more than 2.4 billion minutes a month in the game. (The top-rated TV show Friends generates 2.9 billion viewer minutes a month.) In addition to its free Internet distribution, Counter-Strike has sold 1.3 million shrink-wrapped copies at retail; in 2003 a version for Microsoft's (MSFT) Xbox will hit the stores.

Rail-thin and self-effacing, Le seems largely uninterested in the impact he could have on the gaming industry. At the very least, game hackers activate a form of free viral marketing that can keep a game selling well beyond its expected shelf life. But when the hacker is as talented as Le, the result can be independent versions of games that actually challenge the work of industry titans like Electronic Arts (ERTS) and Activision (ATVI). "The success of a game like Counter-Strike is leveling the field in game development," says Jason Della Rocca, an official of the International Game Developers Assn.

The process starts with an existing game. Le chose the extremely popular Half-Life -- a game he liked to play himself -- about a scientist who must shoot his way out of a government lab invaded by mutants. Downloading the basic programming code from the manufacturer's website, he proceeded to fiddle with its inner workings.

Thousands of gamers with hacking skills and too much time on their hands have done similar things with other popular titles, like Quake and Doom. The results are called modifications, or mods. Usually these underground developers make small changes, such as building new game levels or dropping in new characters. You can download fan-made files that make Gene Simmons of Kiss appear as a Jedi knight in a Star Wars game or let you play Doom as Homer Simpson, complete with an Uzi to blaze away at bloodsucking succubi.

Le, however, didn't just create new characters; he evolved Half-Life into an entirely new game. In mod lingo, it's called total conversion, or TC. While the original featured a fairly conventional run-and-gun experience known as a death match, Le's Counter-Strike has a new theme -- counterterrorists vs. terrorists -- and introduces cooperative team play and a virtual economy in which players earn money to buy better weapons. Le did all the art and most of the sound design himself, and with some programming help from a loose network of unpaid hacker friends, he completed a beta version in six months.

Elsewhere in the entertainment industry, this is the point at which lawyers would come knocking on Le's door. But gamers tend to have a less rigid notion of intellectual property. Not only does Valve, the Kirkland, Wash., software company that makes Half-Life, give away the game's basic programming code for free, but it also releases the software tools needed to hack it.

In fact, according to Gabe Newell, the 39-year-old Microsoft millionaire who is Valve's managing director, Le's interest in Half-Life has been the best thing that could have happened to the game. You see, to play Counter-Strike, you still need to buy Half-Life. "We've actually sold more of the overall Half-Life family of products each year since we shipped back in 1998, which is very unusual in a market typified by three-month shelf lives," Newell says. Counter-Strike developed such a large following of its own that Valve bought the rights to the game. Neither side would disclose the sum, but it is safe to assume that it cost Valve considerably less than the $5 million or more it can take to develop a best-selling PC game. Retail revenues for Le's mod have come to nearly $40 million.

So far, Counter-Strike's runaway commercial success is unique in the mod world, but game companies are now on the lookout for other professional-quality TCs. For example, Valve recently acquired Day of Defeat, a World War II-themed add-on to Half-Life that Newell believes could have some of Counter-Strike's success. Infogrames used a mod of Unreal as the basis for its Tactical Ops. And giant Electronic Arts is encouraging gamers to modify its classic The Sims. So far, more than 30,000 different Sims mods are available, from a Britney Spears character to '50s furniture for your virtual living room. EA even hosted a weeklong "mod university" in Las Vegas to kick-start hacking of its action game Command & Conquer: Renegade.

As for Le, he has been working hard on a Counter-Strike sequel in the basement of his parents' home. But his main goal has been accomplished. In the two and half years since he left college, he hasn't set foot in a cubicle.

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Andrew Welch / el Presidente / Ambrosia Software, Inc.
Some people's minds are like cement: all mixed up and permanently set...

Just an offhand comment before I read the article.

I thought you meant you were planning on deploying moderators for propoganda runs, touting Ambrosia's games as the next big thing.

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"But I think we shall find that when he has disposed of his foreign enemies by treaty or destruction ... he will continue to make trouble abroad in order that the people may continue to need a leader, and in order that high taxation may reduce them to poverty and force them to attend to earning their living rather than to plotting against him."
-- Plato, The Republic (10.6)

I thought it was going to be about the new Bubble Trouble:Counter-Strike mod that he has been secretly working on.

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Q44

It's nice to see that the popular press is finally realizing the importance of fan created add-ons to the longevity of games. Although there may be more and more companies that gear towards releasing what are essentially game development packs rather than closed off, finished games. Ambrosia is ahead of the curve with the Coldstone Engine and Novatools, which I think is a fantastic idea, because it's like that old saying goes, "Give a Man a fire, he'll be warm for a day. Set a Man on fire and he'll be warm for life."Or something like that.

All kidding aside, TCs and other mods will what keeps games flying off the shelf even when they start to show their age. It's good for buisness, and is a great way to encourage beginning game developers.

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Does anyone even bother to read signatures these days?

I'd have to say in the beginning, CS was one of the best mods, and still is, provided you're not on a server full of cheaters/hackers.

DoD is pretty fun too.

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In Nomeni Patri Et Fili Spiritus Sancti
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Clicky Clickerton • EVula, eh? • define FUBAR • think geek.

I don't think it's a requirement...though it sure helped EVN.

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Mods, and the ability to make them has definately influenced many of my game purchases. Although not the most important thing, it is very high on my list. My most favorite games are all very customizable. All three EVs, Starcraft (Broodwar), Warcraft II and III, the Civilization games, UT, and many more. In fact, the main reason for me buying Harry the Hansome Executive was because it had a level editor, and so I could play custom levels. The way I see it, either a game has to be able to be played over and over again (like the Sim-type games, especially SimCity x000), or it needs other ways to keep it interesting, like mods. Mods/user-levels won't make or break a game, but it can certainly be a huge plus, and a community-builder. And we all know how much communities have made things more interesting.

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Nova was a TC for Escape Velocity...

I think the ability to add mods is important as it adds an extra air of replayablitiy. Players wouldn't want to throw the game away after they've beat it and found every secret kinda thing.

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In Nomeni Patri Et Fili Spiritus Sancti
Too many Vidmasters not enough Style.
Clicky Clickerton • EVula, eh? • define FUBAR • think geek.

What's wrong? A little sore that Buisness 2.0 decided to go with the guy that made Counterstrike as opposed to a full cover story on the life and times of ATMOS?

I think it's just a matter of age. Nova came out only last spring, and if my memory serves me correctly, Counterstrike has been the de facto online FPS for like what, 30, 40 years? Or maybe it just feels that way.

Give it a little time, and Nova will probably be held up as one of the standards of how to make an expandable game. I wish the "editors" most major game publishers release were a third as easy to use as NovaTools.

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Does anyone even bother to read signatures these days?

[This message has been edited by Twitch (edited 10-22-2002).]

I agree, the ability to extend the life of a game nowadays is VERY important. There are so many games out there, if you're able to retain someone to keep playing the same one over and over, even if it's not the stock scenario, is very important.



Hehe, that was my thought at reading the topic, too.

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Mods certainly matter. A part of the reason I purchased Civ III was that I knew Play the World would come out (next Tuesday!) and make the game that much cooler than it already was.

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mods are a conerstone in a develpoing game industry. The days when a game would be in development for a few years and then on the shelves for a few months are gradually fading away. I love it when a company releases an engine and an amazing scenario as a game, and then allows users to add on as they like. For years, software companies have been trying to preotect their work from hackers who want to modify their commercial property. Advertising a game for mods gives these hackers something productive to do, and increases the replayability of the game. It also gives hope to us who are developing scenarios. I remember being told only a few months ago that developing mods was something taht could never be profitable. My guess is that in the next few months and years, we see competitions and such to generate quality mods. Imagine if Ambrosia gave a $2,000 cash prize for the best Nova TC (that they could then exclusively market). Money for the developers, money for Ambrosia, and a better product for all gamers.

Basically, all this trend is portraying is that gamers have creative mindsets, most of us, and given a chance, we love to put some our own ideas into something.

Oh, and by the way, my TC needs some writers...

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Gage Stryker
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"Complacency can lead to Extinction"
Proud to be CANADIAN!

I personally think that the popularity of the original EV (And, indeed, the sequels) has been due to its expandibility. Otherwise, you start playing a game, a while later, you finish, you put the disk away, and don't look at it again. Mods keep you playing

- Light.

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"Brevity is the soul of wit"...(yeah, right)