Papy on 20/10/2008 at 14:12
Editing tools will cost a lot more (they obviously can't give away anything under license so they would have to create them) and are also mostly useless for changing fundamental gameplay aspects.
DDL on 20/10/2008 at 14:18
Wait, how fundamental are we talking here?
"I want to mod Doom3 to play like Katamari Damacy"?
I mean, unless you want to implement incredibly silly changes, a simple map editor and a code editor is really all you need. And since to make a game in the first place devs usually need a map editor and a code editor...they could release those? It's not like they'd have to go and code up and entirely separate editor JUST for fans.
Papy on 20/10/2008 at 15:34
Most developers now use 3rd party softwares under license (sometimes modified to suit their needs) to create their own games. They can't release those so, yes, they would have to create a new set of tools JUST for fans.
As for a "code" editor, if you mean by that having the possibility to add a few scripts here and there, this is not enough to do anything meaningful. You need access to the source code. And to be honest, as I guess most code is barely documented, even with the source code it would be very difficult to do meaningful changes rapidly. The only ones who could do that sort of things without wasting weeks trying to get the big picture of how things work are the original developers. Some hacks are possible quite fast, but hacks are really error prone when you combine them together.
The_Raven on 20/10/2008 at 15:47
You also have to remember that most editing tools for games are unstable and completely undocumented.
TF on 20/10/2008 at 16:37
Quote Posted by The_Raven
You also have to remember that most editing tools for games are unstable and completely undocumented.
Like that's ever stopped anyone before. You could give people an undocumented commandline exe that doesn't display anything and nothing else hinting as to what it is and they'll make a new campaign with it, and a better one than the original.
Quote Posted by Papy
Most developers now use 3rd party softwares under license (sometimes modified to suit their needs) to create their own games. They can't release those so, yes, they would have to create a new set of tools JUST for fans.
As for a "code" editor, if you mean by that having the possibility to add a few scripts here and there, this is not enough to do anything meaningful. You need access to the source code. And to be honest, as I guess most code is barely documented, even with the source code it would be very difficult to do meaningful changes rapidly. The only ones who could do that sort of things without wasting weeks trying to get the big picture of how things work are the original developers. Some hacks are possible quite fast, but hacks are really error prone when you combine them together.
I doubt the licensed software is modified in any way other than adding in custom plugins. Plugins which could be shared out without any licensing problems.
van HellSing on 20/10/2008 at 20:19
Someone on the official boards posted a (pretty well made, btw) photoshop of Adam's head on the "gangsta Alex" from IW. René responded with "I just threw up in my mouth."
If this is the way the devs feel about IW, then we're good, I say.
René on 20/10/2008 at 21:11
Quote Posted by van HellSing
Someone on the official boards posted a (pretty well made, btw) photoshop of Adam's head on the "gangsta Alex" from IW. René responded with "I just threw up in my mouth."
If this is the way the devs feel about IW, then we're good, I say.
I need to be careful about my personal opinion, but yeah. Actually IW wasn't horrible, it just wasn't anywhere near as good as the first game, which is the reference for the DX3 dev team. Not IW.
Chade on 20/10/2008 at 21:46
Quote Posted by Papy
I already answered that point, so I guess you disagree with my numbers. So how much to YOU think it would cost to change the gameplay to make BioShock more challenging and complex, and how much people do you think would prefer that version?
Did you? I thought we agreed to disagree over the changes hardcore gamers would accept ... ?
Anyway: my opinion is that, going back to release date, they would have needed to at least make substantial changes the AI and level design. That includes a lot of testing and prototyping. It's difficult (read: completely impossible) to put a cost down when you don't have any experience in the industry, so this is going to be a complete guess, and I might get it wildly wrong.
I'll use 30 million as a baseline for total development, and guess that it might be another 5-10% of total development costs. That's 1.5 to 3 million dollars, and I think you'd have absolutely no chance of recouping anywhere near that amount in extra sales.
You could probably make a patch now with considerably less effort which might placate a few people, because their expectations have already been shot down, but I doubt it would generate any noticable sales.
Papy on 20/10/2008 at 21:52
Quote Posted by Chade
I'll use 30 million as a baseline for total development, and guess that it might be another 5-10% of total development costs. That's 1.5 to 3 million dollars
LOL
DDL on 21/10/2008 at 10:41
I don't suppose you'd care to add anything more helpful?
"Hi, I am going to make a guess, because I have no idea, so feel free to correct me."
"ROFL UR GUESS IS TEH SUK"
