forcing new versions means mods wont work long term,

[Jackal]

allow us to pause a version or stop updates completely, stop forcing updates on us.
all future games will mean all mods will be immediately incompatible with no choice to stop an update or prevent it. making entire games and playthroughs unplayable

[Chocolate Pie Kitten]

It is up to the developpers to keep in their beta tab old versions of the games for modding
Many do it already

[Sazzouu]

Messaggio originale di Quint the Alligator Snapper:

No reason to prevent players from playing the game before the modders update their mods.

Good thing that no one does that

[Aachen]

Messaggio originale di Toby:

.... which means players with mods are prevented from playing the games until the mod makers also update their mods ....

How and when do people lose the ability to disable mods?

[Sazzouu]

Messaggio originale di Toby:

Given the context of the conversation, he is actually right. Steam prevents players from playing their games if they don't update their games.

Nope. Steam and the developers decide on their product which you solely bought the right to use. And if YOU decide to not update your game that is YOUR decision. So the person preventing you from playing your games is you and yourself.

Messaggio originale di Toby:

Mods are often broken when a new update to the game happens, which means players with mods are prevented from playing the games until the mod makers also update their mods

No one forces you to keep mods installed all the time or at all. So if you decide to break your game that is up to you as well as it is to wait for the third party - in this context the mod makers - to update their product which is a completely different one from what you buy on Steam.

Messaggio originale di Toby:

It would be better for players to have a choice to not update the games and still be able to play it while they wait for all the mod makers to update their mods.

Subjective view wich I absolutely respect. But reality is that Valve decided on how to handle such things - which you as well as any other user on Steam agreed to on account creation...

Messaggio originale di The Living Tribunal:

https://store.steampowered.com/subscriber_agreement/

From the ssa you signed.

-LONG QUOTE OF THE SSA SNIPPED FOR READABILITY-

[Aachen]

Messaggio originale di Toby:

Messaggio originale di Aachen:

How and when do people lose the ability to disable mods?

Disabling mods usually make save games made with the mods active not able to work ....

So did my HDD failure a few weeks ago.

The games remain playable—albeit there’s some starting from scratch. Point being “can’t use existing save data” is not “can’t run program.”

.... Besides, disabling the mods, even if the saves still work, means the player is being prevented from playing the game in the way they wanted to ....

What entitles a user to do as they please?

[Aachen]

Messaggio originale di Toby:

So you are asking what entitles the players having the choice to determine what is installed on their own PC?

Incorrect. There’re more issues than “can I install or uninstall this” and when installing you typically accept some terms to do so.

[nullable]

A new version of a game doesn't break every mod or even most mods. Some mods may need to be updated true. Steam as a system wasn't designed around ensuring mods would always work, workshop support was added much later. And 3rd party mods aren't Valve's concern. And there's plenty of arguments to be made about making sure people are running the same/current version of a game simply from a support perspective.

[Aachen]

Messaggio originale di Toby:

Terms you have to accept if you want to play vast majority of games, and not because one actually feels those terms are fair or justified ....

Individual feelings would be a terribly scattershot guide for licensing.

Regardless, as it stands, those same agreements also result in “the player is being prevented from playing the game in the way they wanted,” which is to reïterate: “what entitles [that user]?”

[Aachen]

Messaggio originale di Toby:

.... Steam as a system was designed to be a hindrance to modding, while modding has been a core feature of PC gaming for many decades.

Can you expand on this?

[Start_Running]

Messaggio originale di Snakub Plissken:

A new version of a game doesn't break every mod or even most mods. Some mods may need to be updated true. Steam as a system wasn't designed around ensuring mods would always work, workshop support was added much later. And 3rd party mods aren't Valve's concern. And there's plenty of arguments to be made about making sure people are running the same/current version of a game simply from a support perspective.

Si. Whether or not a mod breaks depends on whether or not the mod was making use of some unintended artifact in the coding, or a bug/glitch.

Messaggio originale di Toby:

Messaggio originale di Snakub Plissken:

A new version of a game doesn't break every mod or even most mods. Some mods may need to be updated true. Steam as a system wasn't designed around ensuring mods would always work, workshop support was added much later. And 3rd party mods aren't Valve's concern. And there's plenty of arguments to be made about making sure people are running the same/current version of a game simply from a support perspective.

Steam as a system was designed to be a hindrance to modding, while modding has been a core feature of PC gaming for many decades.

And they did that by..
making modding easier and simpler than it ever has been for both the miodder and the gamer?
They are apparently very bad at what they are attempting to do.

Also interesting not it has been a feature of PC gaming.. but not a core feature since the vast majority of PC games have had no support for modding.

[Mad Scientist]

Messaggio originale di Toby:

Mods are often broken when a new update to the game happens

when this happens, modders usually don't have to do very much to get the mod working again, RUST is an example of monthly updates that breaks mods, but is patched within 5-10 minutes on average, and from then on everything works normally.

Welcome to Modding, where if a game doesn't have an architecture that isn't overly friendly to mods, you need to update it with the game. Nothing new, just a minor nuisance at best.

Messaggio originale di Toby:

Modding is one of the fire features of PC Gaming, and Valve objectively ruins that cure feature.

You know games are updated on other platforms and still have this problem, right? It's not a Valve Exclusive thing.

Some older games could be updated and yet the mods would work, strictly because of HOW they allowed mods to work individually, in some cases it would be another file entirely that would take priority in what the game essentially "listened to", as to what settings between the two files to listen to (core files vs mod file), and it would have the mod as priority over the core game files. But games are typically not made in this fashion anymore, so people can write to Devs about making such a system, including to support it in multiplayer or just singleplayer, yet ensure everyone has the mod if multiplayer in order to play said mod.

Since there's so many Devs, I doubt any were really aware of such a unique and perfect system as to what I'm referring to. Though you can always suggest more mod-friendly status to Devs for their games.

[nullable]

Messaggio originale di Toby:

Messaggio originale di Snakub Plissken:

A new version of a game doesn't break every mod or even most mods. Some mods may need to be updated true. Steam as a system wasn't designed around ensuring mods would always work, workshop support was added much later. And 3rd party mods aren't Valve's concern. And there's plenty of arguments to be made about making sure people are running the same/current version of a game simply from a support perspective.

Steam as a system was designed to be a hindrance to modding, while modding has been a core feature of PC gaming for many decades.

I don't agree with that claim, that Steam was designed to hinder modding. Pure fantasy. I've been using Steam for quite a long time and never had an particular issue with modding games.

Microsoft Game Pass, now there's a system that hinders modding...

Messaggio originale di Toby:

And there's plenty of arguments to be made about making sure people are running the same/current version of a game simply from a support perspective.

Those same arguments, from a support perspective, can be used to justify Valve preventing any modded game from being played including .ini edits, or any modded game that used mods obtained outside of Steam Workshop from being played.

But that's not what has happened. Valve has made no attempt to prevent users from modifying files. Modding is just a secondary concern, always has been, always will be.

However if a developer doesn't want to support mods or modding they can certainly develop their game without that support or otherwise impede it. And that doesn't have much to do with Valve.

[Aachen]

Messaggio originale di Toby:

Messaggio originale di Aachen:

Can you expand on this?

Forced updating of games which makes it so you are not allowed to play the game until you update it is a hindrance to modding because it takes time for mods to be updated to newest version of the game ....

And that somehow negates the Steam features that support modding?

.... the core feature of PC gaming which is modding.

When people talk about why they prefer PC gaming over console games, modding is one of the most common and one of the most popular reasons why PC gaming is preferred ....

I .... see. You’re using “modding” but really only talking about a specific subset of mods.

[Aachen]

Messaggio originale di Toby:

Not negates, it's a hindrance ....

You’re talking about the system-as-a-whole, though, I thought. For the system to be a hindrance wouldn’t it need to hinder more than it facilitates, on the balance?

.... What sunset of mods to you think I am talking about?

Outdated and abandoned ones.

[Sazzouu]

Messaggio originale di Toby:

Steam as a system was designed to be a hindrance to modding, while modding has been a core feature of PC gaming for many decades.

Sorry I can't hear you over the thousands of Workshop-Items I've been using for ages now