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To mod or not to mod...

Invictus

Arcane
The Real Fanboy
Joined
Nov 3, 2013
Messages
2,789
Location
Mexico
Divinity: Original Sin 2
There are some game series that are synonymous with mods; hell I first learned what they were through Morrowind’s Construction set, reskins for the criminally underrated and forgotten Freedom Force and very interesting takes on gameplay like Ascension and Unfinished Business for Baldur’s Gate 2

Looking back at that crazy time of adding Storm Troopers to Morrowind, all sorts of crazy retextures, having some sort of semblance of balance to Oblivion’s level scaling with different mods, as well as getting the hottest dancing demonesses as companions for my char or simply adding back some unused content made modding just so much fun... in fact I think games like Oblivion I spend usually more time adding and testing mods than playing

But nowadays things have changed a bit; looking at my “gaming” laptop’s icons I see New Vegas, Morrowind, Daggerfall and well as Gothic, Arx Fatalis and Ultima Underworld
The funny thing is that the “newer” games are almost as vanilla as the older ones

Other than adding the usual unofficial patches, a few ease of life mods, a particular interesting (and lore compliant) mod here or there I have come realize they are mostly vanilla

It started because my “gaming” laptop is a 8 year old computer that was never much of a powerhouse so I decided to add the bare minimum of mods to games to have them run as well as possible with it’s limited power and so far that has been an awesome experience.
I spent last nite playing New Vegas, one of those nights were you are enjoying yourself so much that when my cat started bugging me to go to sleep I realized it was 3 am but I was just so engrossed

High poly bouncing breasts are cool and all but this experience has taught me that mods are like sprinkles on ice cream; they are good and all but too many just make a mess they are there to enhance the experience of the game itself not change it so much it becomes almost irreconcilable from the original game itself

So what are your thoughts guys? Are most “hardcore” gamers here interested in heavily modded experiences as to tailor the game to your liking or more focused on adding some tweaks and patches to have an arguably “better” version of the base game?
 

Malamert

Arcane
Edgy
Joined
Oct 19, 2018
Messages
2,466
I unironically enjoy spending hours upon hours downloading hundreds of mods and then making them work together in harmony. It's a journey, an experience, something close to divinity I dare say to perfect a game with various modifications. To completely change a game that is about adventuring and whatnot to something entirely different is a joy that transcends all others if you ask me. Hell, even games that allow minimal modding are alright in the end. Just the fact that you can make changes, however small they may be, is enough if you ask me.
I wish Todd Howard were a woman and I were her husband.
 

Latro

Arcane
Joined
Jun 5, 2013
Messages
7,345
Location
Vita umbratilis
Lilura ’s approach is best: to play the game as originally released as close as possible, then modding or adding whatever extraneous content so that there is a clear comprehension of what is authoritative or what is tacked on by fans.

So play vanilla and then mod your balls off.
 

lukaszek

the determinator
Patron
Joined
Jan 15, 2015
Messages
12,620
1st step is to embrace your inner larper
2nd step is to embrace mods to tailor your larping experience
 

purupuru

Learned
Joined
Nov 2, 2019
Messages
414
I try to keep it as close to vanilla as possible for the better games.
For Oblivion, Skyrim and Fallout 4 I go all out.
 

gurugeorge

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Aug 3, 2019
Messages
7,437
Location
London, UK
Strap Yourselves In
There are some game series that are synonymous with mods; hell I first learned what they were through Morrowind’s Construction set, reskins for the criminally underrated and forgotten Freedom Force and very interesting takes on gameplay like Ascension and Unfinished Business for Baldur’s Gate 2

Looking back at that crazy time of adding Storm Troopers to Morrowind, all sorts of crazy retextures, having some sort of semblance of balance to Oblivion’s level scaling with different mods, as well as getting the hottest dancing demonesses as companions for my char or simply adding back some unused content made modding just so much fun... in fact I think games like Oblivion I spend usually more time adding and testing mods than playing

But nowadays things have changed a bit; looking at my “gaming” laptop’s icons I see New Vegas, Morrowind, Daggerfall and well as Gothic, Arx Fatalis and Ultima Underworld
The funny thing is that the “newer” games are almost as vanilla as the older ones

Other than adding the usual unofficial patches, a few ease of life mods, a particular interesting (and lore compliant) mod here or there I have come realize they are mostly vanilla

It started because my “gaming” laptop is a 8 year old computer that was never much of a powerhouse so I decided to add the bare minimum of mods to games to have them run as well as possible with it’s limited power and so far that has been an awesome experience.
I spent last nite playing New Vegas, one of those nights were you are enjoying yourself so much that when my cat started bugging me to go to sleep I realized it was 3 am but I was just so engrossed

High poly bouncing breasts are cool and all but this experience has taught me that mods are like sprinkles on ice cream; they are good and all but too many just make a mess they are there to enhance the experience of the game itself not change it so much it becomes almost irreconcilable from the original game itself

So what are your thoughts guys? Are most “hardcore” gamers here interested in heavily modded experiences as to tailor the game to your liking or more focused on adding some tweaks and patches to have an arguably “better” version of the base game?

There are only two kinds of mods that interest me:-

1) hardcore realism mods.

2) hardcore mods.
 

Harthwain

Magister
Joined
Dec 13, 2019
Messages
4,689
The only real problem I see with modding is how much you need to mod the game to have a good experience with it and how user-friendly it is to apply all the mods you want. Due to the latter I tend to avoid modding (unless it's really easy to apply), because I am more likely than not to break something in the process.
 
Joined
Jan 14, 2018
Messages
50,754
Codex Year of the Donut
First play is best done vanilla or with minimal modding - stuff like bug-fixing and such. Second play is when you go all out.
some games are flat out incomplete and should be modded on your first playthrough
e.g., kotor 2 doesn't even have an ending, ToEE is basically an alpha build, etc.,

the problem is that when mods add questionable content which is what the codex is for -- to tell you whether a mod is shit or not.
 

xuerebx

Erudite
Joined
Aug 20, 2008
Messages
1,001
First play is best done vanilla or with minimal modding - stuff like bug-fixing and such. Second play is when you go all out.

The problem is whether you have the energy or time to play the same game twice without too much time passing between playthroughs that you forget what you wanted to change in the game.
 

Xeon

Augur
Joined
Apr 9, 2013
Messages
1,858
Most RPGs are pretty long and I am not sure if I'll like them enough to replay them later, so for new games as long as the mod doesn't alter the game drastically that requires a restart, I just add mods as I play them and see if I needed them changed. If the changes are too drastic, I just watch a short gameplay of the original and the mod to see which one I might like.

If its a replay, I just try and add mods to spice things up but honestly nowadays I am too lazy to spend too much time modding things so I most likely watch a little bit of a recent YT vid of modded game and see what mods they are using and go from there.
 

demoman

Educated
Joined
Sep 11, 2020
Messages
32
Interesting question. Obviously, to each his own. Personally i do not have a specific guideline about what to do, it mostly stems from the game specifics and how it meshes with IRL issues like time or even physical bottlenecks. Still i do think there are three broad categories of mods.

On mods that affect mechanics:
I personally believe that any form of "purity" or "correctness" only exists to limit you in some way so regardless if i choose to do it or not, i do not fret if someone cheats, save-loads a lot or uses mods that "change the game experience". Whatever makes you enjoy as many games as you can.
(examples you will probably hate me for : I started enjoying Underrail only when i removed the weight limit and added a speed-hack. Also I could write an essay about how much i respect the people that made Bag of tricks for Pathfinder:Kingmaker)

On mods that affect graphics or aesthetics:
All in! Maybe not from the beginning of the first play-through but if i find something that doesn't click with me i will check if there is something that can be done. Notable examples are the "widescreen fixes" for most older games which I try to install before my first playthrough. Then again there are some games that are in my personal top 10 that i never even bothered to look if they can be made better because i like to experience them as i did the first time and think about the technological constraints of the time.
(e.g. System Shock 2, Deus Ex although i have also thoroughly enjoyed Revision)

On mods that restore or add content:
Pretty straightforward. First Vanilla Content then everything that i can find that is as close to vanilla (F2RP, Kotor2RP, Hot Coffee...Im kidding). Then go crazy! I especially enjoy fan made content for the fallouts and gothic2.

All in all i LOVE gaming, and pretty much everything around it (except streaming). So i enjoy playing em, modding them and making them work (Hi Malamert!), reading other peoples guides and walkthroughs and making them better, messing with hex editors and making them my own.
 

Darth Canoli

Arcane
Joined
Jun 8, 2018
Messages
5,687
Location
Perched on a tree
Some mods address specific issues and are required to play an older game (Wizfast, fastanim or faster combat for Wizardry 8 for example)
Some mods are just turning a good game into a great one (Temple+ for ToEE is essential to any replay)
Some mods are just fixing so many bugs and adding some gameplay enhancements they're also compulsory for a replay (sfall, fixit for Fallout 1 & 2)
Some mods add a new layer to a good game (Legends for Babble Brothers)
Some games are just too bad to be played without mods (you know which ones i'm talking about)

But most mods are just bad, so it really depends on the game and the modders.
I'm "addicted" to good mods because it allows you to tailor your gaming experience instead of enduring the devs psychosis.
 

Mexi

Dumbfuck!
Dumbfuck
Joined
Jan 6, 2015
Messages
6,811
I played Skyrim unmodded, and it was unbearable after the 15 minutes or whatever (not including Helgan) I was playing it for. I've never been a fan of modding, but Skyrim, crazily enough, was the game that broke my strict adherence to no mods.

If you are seriously purchasing a game just to mod it, then you aren't really buying a video game... but like a toolset or something. I'm not hating, but it doesn't make sense for me. Like, I've never bought a game just because of the mods, not even Skyrim. So playing a game completely modded at the start is super fucking foreign to me. You'd think someone would at least enjoy vanilla to see what could be improved on before throwing a bunch of mods on it.

For example, Skyrim's combat was boring as fuck. It offered no challenge so plug-in YASH or Requiem and that's all you really need to improve it exponentially.

Like, most games I've played, I've never thought needed mods, but I don't do much mainstream gaming nowadays. So no, not to mod. I feel mods are telling you that the game sucks. Maybe play a better game instead.

Like, some fucking gremlin reviewed a modded Alpha Centauri. I felt like breaking everything I own seeing that. You're taking it too far if you're seriously modding games like Alpha Centauri.
 

Darth Canoli

Arcane
Joined
Jun 8, 2018
Messages
5,687
Location
Perched on a tree
Like, some fucking gremlin reviewed a modded Alpha Centauri. I felt like breaking everything I own seeing that. You're taking it too far if you're seriously modding games like Alpha Centauri.

If you dare to mod the games i like, i'm holding my breath!

(TM Lilura)

tenor.gif
 

Parabalus

Arcane
Joined
Mar 23, 2015
Messages
17,432
No reason not to mod games even on the first playthrough - especially with no-brainers like GMDX.

What's authoritative and historical is less important since most people are just playing the game and not writing a prestigious blog.
 

Chippy

Arcane
Patron
Joined
May 5, 2018
Messages
6,037
Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Games like Skyrim and X3 need mods to fix retarded developer decision or things that are flat out broken. Skyrim example: QOL things like being able to see ore veins clearly. Since the game crashed every 4min anyway, you might as well spend a day throwing mods at it and hoping the game works.

X3 was another example. I installed a mod that let me strip a ship for parts, so I could install engine tunings to my ship and move around faster. So if I played the game for 3 months, 2 months wasn't spent just travelling from point a to b. Then there was basic stuff like (even if you had a PC built by NASA) the game would slow down if you had too many stations in a complex - so an actual genius released a mod that 'crushed' them all into one station.

Then you've got W3. Gives you 80 feats, and lets say 50-60 'feat points' or so. And then a limited number of slots you need to drag and drop them in to activate them and make them work. What was it - 12?. So I don't get to use the feats I earned from the game, and have to swap them around like a metagamer in BG2 taking advantage of the pause in inventory and swapping items around mid-battle? Fuck off game. I installed a mod for that right away.

So I think certain mods are essential for games, and others just expand on how great they are. Like the class mods for Kingmaker.

It'd be nice if reviewers were to pay more attention to those two things, and then maybe I might acknowledge the existance of reviewers once in a while.
 

Darkforge

Augur
Joined
May 25, 2011
Messages
216
If I don't like a specific aspect of a game there is usually a mod out there that addresses it. Usually my modding actually makes the game either make more sense or be more challanging. Witcher 3 I find unplayable without a few key mods since the gameplay aspect of it is pretty badly designed. On the other hand find skyrim impossible to play without almost modding out the entire game.

That witcher 3 example is a good one. I put the game on highest difficulty and change the perk system to allow you to put points anywhere, it doesnt even feel unbalanced and just like the game should have been made on the outset.

On the other hand games like Kingmaker I just add QOL stuff like Camera rotation and a few Class mods like COTW
In other words the better the game the less modding I tend to do.
 

Desiderius

Found your egg, Robinett, you sneaky bastard
Patron
Joined
Jul 22, 2019
Messages
14,131
Insert Title Here Pathfinder: Wrath
Modding has come to preclude the understanding of, let the alone appreciation for, the logic of a game’s design.

Games should be mastered before modded. Modability should unlock like Nightmare and Hell in Diablo.
 

slymer

Augur
Patron
Joined
Jun 15, 2014
Messages
103
Location
California
Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2
Mod after you've played through the game, or in the case of older games mod for modern resolution monitors and QOL improvements, enhanced graphics/textures
 

Jonathan "Zee Nekomimi

Hoarder of loli kats./ Funny ^._.^= ∫
Patron
Joined
Mar 4, 2019
Messages
6,352
Location
Brasilien
Codex+ Now Streaming!
If I don't like a specific aspect of a game there is usually a mod out there that addresses it. Usually my modding actually makes the game either make more sense or be more challanging. Witcher 3 I find unplayable without a few key mods since the gameplay aspect of it is pretty badly designed. On the other hand find skyrim impossible to play without almost modding out the entire game.

That witcher 3 example is a good one. I put the game on highest difficulty and change the perk system to allow you to put points anywhere, it doesnt even feel unbalanced and just like the game should have been made on the outset.

On the other hand games like Kingmaker I just add QOL stuff like Camera rotation and a few Class mods like COTW
In other words the better the game the less modding I tend to do.
don't forget the mod to fix the stupid random level/damage stats on the swords and armor you loot/craft during the game.
 

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