Please Start Adding Mod Support Right Now.

[Kamikaze_Llama]

Look, I don't even own this game yet. I'll be buying it soon. But hear me out, dev, if you read this stuff at all.

I've modded multiple games and engines, including Mechwarrior 5, which runs on UE. I've dealt with a lot of games that supported modding well, and a bunch that didn't. Here are things I've learned:

1. Mods will greatly improve your game's financial long-term viability, if done early and aggressively. It'll really help get you through EA financially and provide a better long-term payoff. They spread outreach extremely effectively.

Cases:

Mount and Blade might have been a niche title at best, if it wasn't for the modding community there. Bannerlord really dropped the ball on this, supporting mods poorly, late, and suffered for it.

Starsector supported modding almost immediately, and it's largely played by people using mods.

Skyrim and Fallout et al, still selling after all this time because the mods keep them visible.

Mechwarrior 5 would probably have been an expensive flop if it wasn't for mods keeping it viable.

Noita took off skyward, in terms of sales, after I pointed out that they could make it moddable pretty easily (they were already using a bunch of exposed JSON and image files, etc., and some Lua was exposed to hook into engine functions). They listened, started opening features and adding to the Lua API... and the game took off from there.

2. Modding means exposing a lot of code and answering questions to get people involved. You can't just say "it's moddable" and release an editor that doesn't do much other than push some numbers around or let people reskin vehicles; to attract serious interest, you have to let people interact with, extend and change the code.

That means doing it early is muuuuuuuuuch more viable than doing it late. By the time you feel like the game's "done", you won't want to look at it much, and answering questions or extending APIs / exposing features will feel like more work. Don't do that; let modders start right away; it's more sustainable psychologically.

3. Everybody who codes a game thinks making a game moddable is "easy" because they already know their own product. You're wrong. Modders are going to need documentation at a higher standard; they're going to need access to one-off features and ways to extend the behaviors; they're going to see anything you've written that's not very good. Don't be scared of that; embrace it.

4. A massively ambitious game like this is a lot more likely to reach its final polish through modders lifting it up. I'm impressed by what it looks like you've done here, but imagine what happens if modders start building whole new enemies, biomes, planetary systems, etc., using your frameworks as a base!


Anyhow, that's my plea for you. Forget about getting this thing "perfect" and then "adding modding later". It's the wrong way to go. Do it now, benefit over time; finishing a game like this is going to take quite a while no matter how you go, and having fellow coders in the mix, even if they're "merely" looking over your APIs and exposed UE functions will be much more useful than you might think.

[KEEPER]

i actually agree with this message.

[Assailer]

I would start by fixing all the text typos. It's so bad, that it's almost like the game doesn't have English translation at all :)

[sedman]

+1
How cool would it be if someone in the modding community could take this game and use it to create an unofficial star wars, star trek or completely new world of characters and stories.

At the very least, the graphics, planets and mission/storyline system needs to be exposed so modders can update the graphics as time and graphics card performance permits.

[n4t]

Just what we need. A bunch of mods that break every week during updates.

See the forums of any other EA game with mods if you want to know what that looks like.

[Ruffio]

Nothing keep people from start mod this game whenever they want. Just need the will and know how. Way back when people first started to mod games, do you think they was asking for support to do so, mod tools and what not? No..

[WeelieTired]

I really love this. Can agree that Mods have made some of my fav games my favs. Grabbed a dual play mod for Subnautica and played almost all the way with my son in a shared server. That made it SO much more fun. I modded Valheim with a few key changes and it made it much better. Obvious gear adds like the "bow mod" which included a crafted quiver for 3 types of arrow, outside your inventory (backpack). And an Inv mod which put your equipped gear on their own screen, outside your base inv. I repurchased Fallout New Vegas last year and ran it with a few logical and interesting mods. Simple logical changes so obvious to the player community which the devs never could or would do... Hence the Mod community ftw! That's why we need this.

Even better: I hope some day to commission a Mod for this SB2 game which morphs it into my "Ceres 2525" book setting, which I am writing many novels in rn. So far, this is the best game system to fit. (Maybe SC but since I cant friggin load that up to play, cant confirm, doh.) Anyway, I've seen that on other games, where you can get a big mod pack that transforms it into a custom setting... That's what I'm thinking. Of course, no budget rn but that's why a gamer would write and sell books, right pilots? ! lol.

[Tactical Nuclear Coffee]

+100

[SpaceDust]

+1 hope the dev's see this

[Dwarf80]

but right now theres going to be quite a few patches and of coarse that always will miss up the mods, and mod creators will have to keep their side updated until the game becomes more stable. But yeah i can see the benefits down the road. If the dev decides to start working on another game then the existing game will be taken care of by the modders groups.

[Metroid]

Indeed, modding is needed :)

[c0de]

modding support is an amazing way to outsource ideas too.

[Prowly owly]

Hell yea. I love the content modders bring to the table. The only thing is that the game is constantly being worked on so mods at this point will be broken frequently and will require a lot of maintenance to stay afloat.

[Viper]

The game does not need mods.

Why don't you make an attempt to read the forums about the game not being very stable for anything.

But no course rather than use something that makes sense you rather make a demand that makes you look like a self centered inconsiderate child.

You guys are seriously indifferent towards anyone who is not like minded in this painfully show of indecent human behavior.

[somedude]

Personally I don't care about the mods unless the game is broken on release and the users have to fix what they've bought which is a trashy idea in the first place. But I see how some people might. Skyrim and Fallout were good investments out of the box. Mods were not needed. I ain't paying for the 3rd party content promises, I'm paying for this specific game.

Besides, most mods are trashy or buggy trojan infested messes that only come back to bite devs in the .ass. I'm cool if this guy just ignores it, co-op, MP, et... other .rap, and just finishes what he has. His current vision is cool by me -- an open world 100% single player exploration game sorta Morrowind in space out of the box.

[japp_02]

Mod support at this stage? NO. Why should the devs (a single person if I'm not mistaken) give away the control of the game? That's the worst thing he could do actually. I hope he concentrates to polish the game as far as he can get and be able to hire additional staff if need be, they will do professional work. We see in Empyrion Galactic Survival where such methods lead, to a ever-hanging game as far as progress and polish is concerned.
NO, and I hope he will never read here and instead stick to his roadmap.