Why abandon the steam workshop?

[playboi14]

It looks like paradox are moving to their own platform for mods, moving away from the steam workshop.

The overall goal seems to be with this new approach they can integrate these mods into the console version of the game easily.

That's great and all, but why not have both? The ability to have mods both here (where arguably the main player base is going to be) and also on their new system?

That's seems like a perfectly fair solution and there's been pretty much radio silence on why it's not possible.

[briansterling81]

To moderate content for quality and compatibility with the console version…. AND to gatekeep content that could later conflict to profitable DLC’s.

Too lazy to retype whole take so refer to “mods” section below;
https://steamcommunity.com/app/949230/discussions/0/3877095833483320033/?ctp=4

[Sasha Mason]

Some people have stated that this is so that Paradox can gatekeep mods. Whether they'll do that or not, who knows, too early too tell.

Though generally speaking, it does make sense. Cities Skylines 2 is also on game pass. Game pass is generally HUGE, but those players cannot use the Steam Workshop at all.
The workshop works well enough for games that aren't available on other stores and platforms, but in this case, it just means that any workshop uploaded content by creators who do not bother with the Paradox store lock out any of the game pass players from being able to use mods in their game.

[archonsod]

A better question might be 'why stick with the Steam workshop'. It's not like it does anything they couldn't do themselves, and if they actually put some effort into it they might even avoid the calls from 2009 asking for it's UX back.

[General T.Montana Tropic Thunder]

IMHO without the Steam Workshop for CS:1, the game would have died after a few years.

[wilsmith24]

It all about money and control. They want to control the game meaning they want full control of the DLC, Letting people make thousand of mods take away from game. DLC are money to the company. the want to control mods or money. Just don't look for as many mods as you saw on Steam.

[spielerinchen]

they are trying to enable mods cross platform. imo it will be a desaster.
it's not coincidence that Steam is the number one gaming platform & it's not a coincidence either that CS1 was widly popular, with the steam workshop.
Paradox develops atm next to CS, a city building simulation, also the game Life By You, a life simulation, which as anybody who dabbled ever in The Sims franchise knows is a huge cash cow for Electronic Arts. interestingly Electronic Arts came after their fairly unsuccessful gaming platform to Steam. so yeah, Paradox tries to redo what others have already tried, Electronic Arts included. i'd guess Paradox works also on an own gaming engine, that's what's still missing.

people wonder often why Paradox develops CS on the Unity engine instead of the Unreal engine. but against the Unreal engine speak several points. is owned by Epic, is not suitable for management games, is worse for cross platform porting.

in short, Paradox works on independence as game dev studio & publisher.
at least in the short run, it will be detrimental for the players.

[Professor H. Farnsworth]

Originally posted by briansterling81:

To moderate content for quality and compatibility with the console version…. AND to gatekeep content that could later conflict to profitable DLC’s.

Too lazy to retype whole take so refer to “mods” section below;
https://steamcommunity.com/app/949230/discussions/0/3877095833483320033/?ctp=4

No. No AND no.

Paradox Mods was a thing for CS1 too, if they wanted to moderate for quality and compatibility, they wouldn't have let people rip of the game buildings and then repost them as a mod. Nor would Steam Workshop, which they could also take down whatever mods they felt didn't live up to the quality or compatibility they wanted.

See, if they wanted to gatekeep "profitable" DLC, they wouldn't have allowed CS1 Workshop to get as big as it ended up being. They have zero interest in that, because modding is what make CS1 big and it is what will make CS2 the best City Simulator on the market.

Your own post proves nothing.. It's for the most part just a bunch of conspiracy shizzle.

They have been pretty upfront about it. They want all platforms to have access to the same mods and when Steam Workshop is around, that's simply not possible (as you can see there's 1000x less mods for CS1 on Paradox Mods than there is for Steam).
Nor are they going to charge money for mods.
They are specifically developping the mod tools to be even more expansive than they were in CS1.

[Sasha Mason]

Originally posted by spielerinchen:

people wonder often why Paradox develops CS on the Unity engine instead of the Unreal engine. but against the Unreal engine speak several points. is owned by Epic, is not suitable for management games, is worse for cross platform porting.

It's worth nothing that Paradox is the publisher, not the developer. I wouldn't be surprised if other Paradox published games are developed in different engines.

As for why C:S2 is developed on Unity and not Unreal, is because the same dev team (supposedly pretty small too) made C:S1 in Unity as well. Switching to a completely new engine pretty much means throwing away all of the established workflows.

There's a reason why so many were so upset with Unity's monetiziation decisions, if it were feasible to simply use a different engine, people would just do that instead of being upset at Unity. But having to completely re-learn an engine takes a lot of time, and no doubt C:S2 was in development before the Unity stuff happened, so throwing it all away is not financially viable~

Just some food for thought~

[briansterling81]

Originally posted by Professor H. Farnsworth:

Originally posted by briansterling81:

To moderate content for quality and compatibility with the console version…. AND to gatekeep content that could later conflict to profitable DLC’s.

Too lazy to retype whole take so refer to “mods” section below;
https://steamcommunity.com/app/949230/discussions/0/3877095833483320033/?ctp=4

No. No AND no.

Paradox Mods was a thing for CS1 too, if they wanted to moderate for quality and compatibility, they wouldn't have let people rip of the game buildings and then repost them as a mod. Nor would Steam Workshop, which they could also take down whatever mods they felt didn't live up to the quality or compatibility they wanted.

See, if they wanted to gatekeep "profitable" DLC, they wouldn't have allowed CS1 Workshop to get as big as it ended up being. They have zero interest in that, because modding is what make CS1 big and it is what will make CS2 the best City Simulator on the market.

Your own post proves nothing.. It's for the most part just a bunch of conspiracy shizzle.

They have been pretty upfront about it. They want all platforms to have access to the same mods and when Steam Workshop is around, that's simply not possible (as you can see there's 1000x less mods for CS1 on Paradox Mods than there is for Steam).
Nor are they going to charge money for mods.
They are specifically developping the mod tools to be even more expansive than they were in CS1.

I just don’t have the same faith that you do I guess. They can release all the statements they want that they won’t monetize content or gatekeep but I’m a little more cynical of corporations when it comes to unrealized revenue streams.

And it is also possible they did not alter the CS1 workshop because they didn’t have the resources to have their own equivalent at the time or making that change would have been too disruptive to the community to switch tracks.

[Prometheus]

Colossal Order has a 20 man team. They are Finnish and based out of Tampere as well. Yes the in game map is a recreation of their local geography.

PDX/CO have full control even on the Steam workshop. Steam gives them admin accounts that can veto any mod that is uploaded.

If they give us both then mods will get split between the two. Its an easily predictable result that mod makers will not bother to upload to both.

Everything else is paranoid fear mongering.

Is it possible this is so PDX can monetize mods? Yes.

Is it likely that is the case since they have released several public statements now that they have no intention to do it? No.

[Sasha Mason]

Originally posted by briansterling81:

I just don’t have the same faith that you do I guess. They can release all the statements they want that they won’t monetize content or gatekeep but I’m a little more cynical of corporations when it comes to unrealized revenue streams.

And it is also possible they did not alter the CS1 workshop because they didn’t have the resources to have their own equivalent at the time or making that change would have been too disruptive to the community to switch tracks.

I'm sorry, but I really have to call out the tinfoil hat here as well. Up until we actually see them abusing their own mod workshop to actively take down mods that are entirely unproblematic for no apparent reason, it's really not something to worry about much.

Like I have said, Cities Skylines 2 is also on gamepass. How would gamepass players obtain mods if people just stick their mods to the Steam Workshop exclusively? They could use both, but then that's a double system when there only really needs to be one. And gamepass is no minor thing mind you.

Instead of worrying about gatekeeping mods, worry about the fact that mods were not a launch feature, and as such, creating and publishing mods is outright impossible at the moment.

[Professor H. Farnsworth]

Originally posted by briansterling81:

Originally posted by Professor H. Farnsworth:

No. No AND no.

Paradox Mods was a thing for CS1 too, if they wanted to moderate for quality and compatibility, they wouldn't have let people rip of the game buildings and then repost them as a mod. Nor would Steam Workshop, which they could also take down whatever mods they felt didn't live up to the quality or compatibility they wanted.

See, if they wanted to gatekeep "profitable" DLC, they wouldn't have allowed CS1 Workshop to get as big as it ended up being. They have zero interest in that, because modding is what make CS1 big and it is what will make CS2 the best City Simulator on the market.

Your own post proves nothing.. It's for the most part just a bunch of conspiracy shizzle.

They have been pretty upfront about it. They want all platforms to have access to the same mods and when Steam Workshop is around, that's simply not possible (as you can see there's 1000x less mods for CS1 on Paradox Mods than there is for Steam).
Nor are they going to charge money for mods.
They are specifically developping the mod tools to be even more expansive than they were in CS1.

I just don’t have the same faith that you do I guess. They can release all the statements they want that they won’t monetize content or gatekeep but I’m a little more cynical of corporations when it comes to unrealized revenue streams.

And it is also possible they did not alter the CS1 workshop because they didn’t have the resources to have their own equivalent at the time or making that change would have been too disruptive to the community to switch tracks.

Again, this is what is considered conspiracy theory.
I can't trust the statement of scientists either, they can tell me as much as they want that the earth is round and that it's not the center of the universe, but I'm a little bit more cynical of them when it comes to their often times not perfect theories. Also I can obviously see that other planets are flat and that the universe revolves around this planet.

Do you see how anything can be twisted then?

The very first thing that CO is releasing on the mod platform is a free 2500 asset mod covering 8 regions which includes works from many of the best Asset makers and CO artists.
In the 8 years of CS1 not once did they take down a mod that didn't violate Steam Workshop rules. Not. Once. Nor did they take down any of the mods which gave access to similar assets as the ones they sold in their CCP DLC or any of their other DLC for that matter..

I think you can extend them a bit of faith here.

[General T.Montana Tropic Thunder]

Currently no Steam workshop = Steam users can't break the game more or fix it

[briansterling81]

Originally posted by Professor H. Farnsworth:

Again, this is what is considered conspiracy theory.
I can't trust the statement of scientists either, they can tell me as much as they want that the earth is round and that it's not the center of the universe, but I'm a little bit more cynical of them when it comes to their often times not perfect theories. Also I can obviously see that other planets are flat and that the universe revolves around this planet.

Do you see how anything can be twisted then?

The very first thing that CO is releasing on the mod platform is a free 2500 asset mod covering 8 regions which includes works from many of the best Asset makers and CO artists.
In the 8 years of CS1 not once did they take down a mod that didn't violate Steam Workshop rules. Not. Once. Nor did they take down any of the mods which gave access to similar assets as the ones they sold in their CCP DLC or any of their other DLC for that matter..

I think you can extend them a bit of faith here.

You do make some fair points and I sincerely hope my skepticism is misplaced. On that day I will gladly concede, repurchase the game, and play the game that should have been released.

Until then I feel I need to lower my expectations because the let-down with the release was pretty substantial.