Modding of CMSF

[Xipe66]

Originally posted by gibsonm:

Well I guess everyone is entitled to their opinion.

I just don't share it.

Would you care to expound on that?

There are seriously few games, with open modability, where it hasn't exceeded the original game.

I won't push for BF to open up theirs, that's their business, but I would like for you to come up with some arguments other than replying for the sake of replying. (**** post)

[gibsonm]

Xipe66,

How about you scroll up a few posts and read my earlier response???

That would be the one that includes:

I suspect the issue is that BTS / BFC sees their product somewhere to the "simulation" side of the "game" to "simulation" spectrum.

The accuracy of the underpinning model is of great importance, so to use a CMAK example they are happy for you to change the colours of a vehicle (hence the snow, Normandy, etc. mods) but not the critical armour protection or armament penetration values.

No one wants a T-72 you can knock out with an M-16 but I suspect they wont mind if you change the colour of the T-72.

Similarly I suspect if they did allow people to modify the underpining technical data (or create their own units) someone would then start asking them for support if it didn't work.

Questions like:

"I've just tweaked the armour values of the M1 and now the game doesn't run" or "The Leopard 2A6 that I just made can't penetrate a M113, please fix" would no doubt receive a fairly blunt response.

Lastly there could be some scope for "cheating" if you modded all your vehicles to be invulnerable and your opponent would certainly become disappointed if they couldn't achieve reasonable results.

I look forward to your retraction in due course.

[Xipe66]

Sorry, you're impervious to arguments that contradict what you've already set on. No retraction imminent.

[gibsonm]

No just that you have an opinion (which I respect) and I have mine.

I guess the issue for you is that the developers share my opinion and not yours.

[thewood]

Something else to keep in mind. Research for modern war is probably 10 times the effort of WW2, and that was a lot. The research effort becomes an asset and you don't want every wannabe game developer filching your hard earned research. I'm sure that is a small part of the unit data not being shown issue as well.

[Michael Dorosh]

I wouldn't mind seeing the ability to add (not modify existing) 3D models (of buildings, etc., not playable vehicles) to the game, to be honest. Custom made doo-dads and flavour objects, right up to home made models of the Reichstag building. But the danger is of having so many of these things that no one knows where to get them, and of having scenarios that are largely unplayable because no one has the right combination of models downloaded from the right websites, most of which were fly-by-night anyway and have now vanished.

What is the ratio of total-conversion OFP mods that were ever actually completed, to the number of ones what had slick websites and bar graph charts showing all the progress they were making but only ever managed a few models before giving up the ghost?

[Battlefront.com]

As gibsonm wrote:

I guess the issue for you is that the developers share my opinion and not yours.

I don't want to step into a debate about what his issue is or not, but of course we do share your opinion

thewood,

Research for modern war is probably 10 times the effort of WW2, and that was a lot.

Oh you don't know the half of it At least while I was researching what a Tiger could do I didn't wake up one morning to read some news website that the Germans had discontinued the Tiger before it saw service, then in the middle of researching its replacement find that that too was chucked. Researching what a US force would look like in 2008 was a LOT harder than I ever expected it would be.

Steve

[M1A1TC]

Ok, I am ready to change some textures. What do I need? There is no folder with BMP files.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by M1A1TankCommander:

Ok, I am ready to change some textures. What do I need? There is no folder with BMP files.

I guess you're not half as ready as you thought you were, eh?

What you need is patience. The procedure AIUI will be as follows: a list will be distributed of file names; templates will be made available, and a folder will be designated for mods. We won't have access to a "bmp folder" but instead will just add modded images to a special folder, after the templates are made available.

[M1A1TC]

Thanks. Can't wait!

[Battlefront.com]

We've had long, and sometimes interesting (usually repetitive), discussions about this. Put simply, we don't allow modification to game data and models because:

1. We have one game engine and that is all. If you guys could make any game you wanted out of our game engine, then we'd be out of business. That's not a very good thought for either of us.

2. Companies that make modable games, like OpFlashpoint, know that their product only has about a 6 month lifespan no matter what they do. And that is best case. So letting people mod the heck out of it does no harm to them. Their engines are disposible and they are already working on a new engine the day the old one is finished. They HAVE to do this because of the nature of their audience and their need for massive sales numbers.

3. Combat Mission is a sim and it is our sim. We don't want it twisted into something that isn't what we want our sim to be. We don't want T-72s with laser cannons fighting against the hordes of jump-pack bouncing Space Marines (well, at least not until we make Space Lobsters of Doom )

4. We don't want the notion of cheating to get into our community.

5. We don't want our community splintered based on whose mod you like best. We saw that with the Close Combat community and we do NOT want to see that happen to ours.

Note that the models and animations are run through a home-grown compiler. It is highly doubtful anybody will figure out how to swap in their own models. Modders also have no idea how complex those SOBs are

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

Actually Michael, we're going to releaes our "Exploder" program, which allows you to unpack the BRZ file into regular BMP and WAVs in their native structure. That's easier than trying to document the whole thing I'd upload the one we use, but I'm pretty sure that one is for internal use only. When I have one sanctioned for distribution I'll let you know! Should be soon.

Steve

[thewood]

While I have always loved and appreciated modders and their talents, I have always wondered why instead of going in and actually playing a game, within a day they are trying to rip it apart and change it.

Are they control freaks. Or were they the kids that tore apart the VCR to see how it worked.

I can especially understand a modder who has played the hell out of a game and saying he wants more and the deveoper has abandoned it. But I still can't quite get my head around trying to mod it less than 24 hours after its out.

[tc237]

Originally posted by thewood:

While I have always loved and appreciated modders and their talents, I have always wondered why instead of going in and actually playing a game, within a day they are trying to rip it apart and change it.

Are they control freaks. Or were they the kids that tore apart the VCR to see how it worked.

I can especially understand a modder who has played the hell out of a game and saying he wants more and the deveoper has abandoned it. But I still can't quite get my head around trying to mod it less than 24 hours after its out.

That's me

I did like to take apart VCR's too.

I spent more time trying to mod TC2M and AACW then actually playing.

I'm anxiously waiting to mod the skins, got to make a woodland camo M1A1 !!

Why do I do it? It's the love man....

[thewood]

I think there are new medications to alleviate that.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

Actually Michael, we're going to releaes our "Exploder" program, which allows you to unpack the BRZ file into regular BMP and WAVs in their native structure. That's easier than trying to document the whole thing I'd upload the one we use, but I'm pretty sure that one is for internal use only. When I have one sanctioned for distribution I'll let you know! Should be soon.

Steve

I saw some guy talking about an unpacking program here in the forum - I thought he was some deluded hacker...well, that's good to know.

[Battlefront.com]

tc237

Why do I do it? It's the love man....

I hear you there I used to take apart a lot of stuff when I was a kid. Problem was I wasn't nearly as good putting it back together again!

Steve

[thewood]

I took apart my fathers presciuos Winchester .32 special carbine and ended up wrecking the reciever putting it back together. I guess Winchester never released the proper modding tools.

[Dr.Jones]

Originally posted by thewood:

While I have always loved and appreciated modders and their talents, I have always wondered why instead of going in and actually playing a game, within a day they are trying to rip it apart and change it.

Are they control freaks. Or were they the kids that tore apart the VCR to see how it worked.

I can especially understand a modder who has played the hell out of a game and saying he wants more and the deveoper has abandoned it. But I still can't quite get my head around trying to mod it less than 24 hours after its out.

Definitely something wrong with us, modders I mean.

br.

Dr.Jones

[M1A1TC]

The reason why I want to mod this game is not to just tear it apart, but to add my last armor unit's patches and markings on tanks

I made my personal modern texture mod for CMAK, but this will look much better

[FinnN]

Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

1. We have one game engine and that is all. If you guys could make any game you wanted out of our game engine, then we'd be out of business. That's not a very good thought for either of us.

Personally I think that's the main reason - and it's one I see as 100% valid.

One the other hand I wonder if it's ever been considered to do it the way that they did IL2. Basically modders were given a limited SDK in order to create 3D models to the specs required by the game developers. The developers then did the actual conversion and integration into the game, and bundled them with patches and/or paid-for add-ons. Nothing that didn't come up to standard was included but the range of planes included was increased enormously over what would have been possible - which you can bet helped sales a lot.

Have fun

Finn

[FinnN]

Originally posted by Dr.Jones:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by thewood:

While I have always loved and appreciated modders and their talents, I have always wondered why instead of going in and actually playing a game, within a day they are trying to rip it apart and change it.

Are they control freaks. Or were they the kids that tore apart the VCR to see how it worked.

I can especially understand a modder who has played the hell out of a game and saying he wants more and the deveoper has abandoned it. But I still can't quite get my head around trying to mod it less than 24 hours after its out.

Definitely something wrong with us, modders I mean.

br.

Dr.Jones </font>

[SmithyG]

Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

...

Steve

Operation Flashpoint was published in 2001 and had a huge following up untill the sequel was released in 2007. Thats 6 years and the sequel was based on the same "disposible" game engine. When it came out it didnt support mods, the tools werent even released in the first year IIRC. It sold more copies after the tools were released then it did in the first 6 months. You're really misguided on points regarding Flashpoint and other games who've allowed modding.

People wouldnt be able to make any game they wanted. For one you wouldnt be releasing the full source code. No one would expect that. There are plenty of developers that only have one engine and still support mods (VALVe, BIS, Epic..). Mods help sales, they dont hurt them.

You're already going to splinter the community with paid modules. If people sided with different mods it would only be because they found something more fun to play. Sure that might mean laser T-72s, but that wouldnt changed vanilla(no mods) CMSF. No one would forse CMSF:2045 down your throat. If people choose to play it would because they liked it.

Its true that it could possibly add new ways for people to exploit things. I dont think that would ever be a huge problem for CM simply because of the way you have to go about finding opponents.

I dont expect to change your opinions at this point, but if you ever find yourself making CMX3(or maybe the CMX2WWII), please consider adding the ability for us to add content. Theres plenty of ways to guard against the things that you mentioned if you plan to support modding from the start.

Go and actually look up how mods have helped games and companies. I know you havent based on your Flashpoint comments. I wouldnt be suggesting any of this if I didnt think it would help make CMSF more fun and in the end sell more copies. You might think other companies were only successful because they made mainstream games, but its because CMSF is such a niche game that I think it would thrive with mod support.

Will probably get ignored, but at least you had to put up with my early morning grammar and spelling. Take that Steve!

[RichyG]

Ok this is my first post and many will tell me to go away but whatever...

...anyway I cant help agree with the pro-modding group here. I've been modding for 7 or so years, ive worked with tons of engines including Operation Flashpoint, which was pretty much what got me REALY into the whole modding thing.

As it turns out now I'm aiming to be a professional games artist, I'm doing a degree in Games Design.

This is the main point now... our projects over the past year and this coming 3rd year is ... you guessed it... make a mod!!

Games Companies are essentially looking for artists who have made assets that can be ported into games and even more so those that can show that they've done it.

So my point is modding is basically where alot of young budding games artists, scripters, level designers and the rest start out. I would find it hard to believe that any of the development team didnt start out making mods for something.

On the flip-side I can understand the need to protect your assets. I mean this company is small, it could even be called an indy company and I have massive respect for all they do when they have to go up against the giants of EA and alike. Its the small companies that deliver the niche market games like CM:SF that we crave. For me BFC are a major inspiration for me to go forward and try to do the same as I realy want to like so many other indy companies that have sprung up in recent times.

Basically in conclusion I think the game should support moddability cus theres so many little things that scenario designers would like to put into their missions as well as artists who want to have their own stuff in there for variation.

It would be better for the devs to work with the modding community otherwise the community will do its own thing and chew the game up themselves.

[thewood]

I think BFC has pretty much locked down the unit data. There is not going to be any chewing up of that. They have explained themselves numerous times, including in this thread. I respect that decision.

They have clearly stated that they will support and even help with texturing and art work. Steve has posted this several times and even in this thread he said they setting up a tool to support it.