How is SOM different (or not different) from what people do with PC games (mods)

[Holy_Diver]

I've read on RPG maker forums that the "bottom fell out" of the game making market years back. I highly suspect that it coincided with it becoming standard practice for companies to release level editors with their games. For a timeline, I think Morrowind was one of the first big games that included a comprehensive editor.

Easily 50% of the PC games I've played recently come with some sort of official editing kit, and popular games usually have quite a few unofficial editing techniques as well. Mods range from a simple texture change in the regular game to completely new addon games. They are still processed through the same engine though, so they come out something like alternate versions of the "mother" game. Our very own Verdite played a art in making an amazing mod for Mount and Blade called Brythenwalda.

Game making and modding definitely tap into the same creative root, but modding has the allure of being attached to the fanbase of the original game. And they can be as big or small as you want while still being playable by working with the original game. Game makers support modding because it expands their games through no effort of their own, and fosters long enduring community chatter about their prduct.

Modding has been around since I was a kid. I just haven't followed its development. I disagree though that modding negatively impacted "game making" software. It's just speculation. But modding was there before and was still there after. I think "game making" stopped because it was not commercially viable.

The only way game making could be commercially viable would be to turn it into a mod system. Which is to say the players would have to buy into the commercial product too. You also have weird things like RPG Maker 3 I think, that looks pretty good, lets you make 3D RPGs like SOM more or less, turn/party based RPGs but the esthetic is still quite nice. But it was a PS2 exclusive. And there was no way for mere mortals to share games. So the only person who would get to play these console game making games is the makers themselves and maybe their siblings.

EDITED: I only know about RPG Maker 3 because it recently turned up in the PSN store. And ironically even though there is no official support for sharing games, dedicated fans did find ways to do so with the PS2. But with the PSN it seems more likely that there is no way to do that.

I kind of think the spirit of modding versus game making might have something to do with continued support. Since a mod is attached to a disposable piece of software that is already decided that it will never grow in any fundamental way. But maybe that is just more to do with the way companies approach games as disposable churn...

Which is something I've never been able to figure out. Because when I finish programming something. I feel like. Great! I'll never have to do that again as long as I live. But game companies think, hey, can't wait until we are reinventing this wheel 3yrs down the road.