This will never happen for several reasons no amount of petitioning will ever change.

First is that consoles are very technically limited, Bethesda is going to use every cycle and ever iota of ram they can on the PS3 and 360. Adding even so much as a new sword model could at some point eat up more ram than the consoles have and ruin performance, which is very much a thing that is almost universally expected to remain consistent on consoles. Things like Little Big Planet take user levels into account from the very beginning, The Elderscrolls does not. So point one: It's technically almost impossible to run mods on today's consoles. No, don't argue this, I was once a CS major, and still program on occasion.

But even if it were technically possible, Microsoft and Sony would require heavy moderation of any and all mods available for consoles. The last thing any of them want is parent's calling their help lines complaining that little timmy played a game where he could do cocaine or see someone naked. Then it gets in the paper and Fox News calls Bethesda a smut peddler targeting children and then some moron sends a letter bomb to the Bethesda offices. So Bethesda would have to hire people to look over every last mod, which costs them money and frustration and complaints from people asking why their mod got rejected. Not something they really want to deal with.

So there we go, two reasons why it will never happen on today's consoles. Will next generation consoles have enough ram and cpu power to spare? Possibly. If people want it enough to justify the cost, and if they build the next Elderscroll's to allow this from the very beginning, then yeah we could very well see mods and etc. available then. But there is no way it's going to happen with Skyrim. Unless of course Talos himself appears and commands them. No one argues with a giant dragon god.

I'm going to argue it anyways - the fact that you were a CS major and that you program sometimes doesn't make you right.

A new sword model wouldn't instantly destroy performance entirely unless the entire game was completely stored in RAM, which simply isn't the case. It almost certainly wouldn't have any sort of impact until the game actually had to access it (such as when the player or some other local character is wielding it). Some things might cause more of a performance hit - significantly increasing the overall number of NPCs in the game, for example - but there's still a pretty broad variety of tweaks that could easily be done without immediately destroying performance or even impacting it at all.


Again, no. Sony wouldn't require moderation, because Sony doesn't care what games do on their consoles so long as they don't mess with the console itself. Case in point: Unreal Tournament 3, which allows mods on the PS3. Not "select mods", but any mods made for it. For better or for worse, the PS3 is a considerably more open system than either of its competitors, and that means that things like this are generally allowed on it.

Not that it matters, because Microsoft is the exact opposite. We aren't talking "heavy moderation". We're talking things like this quite simply not being allowed at all unless they're extremely restricted and limited to things like map editing. For better or for worse, Microsoft tries to control the quality and consistency of the overall experience on their platform, and part of that involves not allowing things like this to be done at all.

The trouble being, of course, that since the 360 is typically Bethesda's lead platform it's Microsoft's policy that's going to guide their decisions with the PS3.

You guys do realize that Microsoft (and possibly Sony) have a rule when it comes to DLC; if it's over a certain size, it must come with a price tag. In otherwords, many of the great mods, such as Better Bodies or Natural Environments, that are more than a few MB would cost you money to DL. Imagine paying for a mod only to find that it's lame. Or imagine if you'd had to pay for all the mods you have for Ob or MW. One heck of a bill, am I right?

This is all assuming MS would even allow users to upload these mods. What happens when one causes an error in the game? Who is to blame? If you want a reimbursemant, should MS deliver it, or should the creator of the mod? Would the creator be paid at all? What if they already spent the money? What if they, the mod's creator, doesn't make a bug fix? Is MS going to? Is Bethesda?

At least with a computer, the internet and one's computer is personally owned. You have the liberty to do with it what you want and to accept the consequences. Ownership is much more of a fuzzy area with consoles. And you can't search out your game's mod files and manually remove/repair files either. Even if they made some handy mod manager, there's no guarantee it would be as flexible as a true PC OS.

In summary: console mods and console CS are two cans of worms that both Bethesda and Mircosoft have (wisely) avoided in the past. And it's probably in their best interest to continue doing so.

No. Microsoft has a rule where a certain amount (not size, quantity) of DLC is allowed for free for each game, after which it has to be charged for. Sony has no rule regarding this - if you want to release free DLC for a game on the PS3 until the end of time, I'm pretty sure they won't ever stop you. The whole issue isn't nearly the "can of worms" people tend to make it out to be, either. People probably won't blame Microsoft or Bethesda if they manage to get their hands on some mods and those mods don't work properly. That's not why they aren't allowed on the 360.

There were a lot of complaints about how the combat/tactical view worked on the consoles. Dragon Age: Origins was originally intended to be pc exclusive. After Bioware was bought by EA, it came out for all platforms.

Now DA2 is being developed for all platforms. One casualty is the tactical/overhead view. There are a lot of other changes as well, some of which seem to be added for the console, like changing the UI. The threads over on EABioware's "social site" are interesting, at times.

Actually, the PC version of DA2 still has the old UI and tactical/overhead view combat. Only the consoles are strapped to the new system. And as for the original, most of the talk I recall on how it worked was over how well it worked given what they were trying to do, albeit with the caveat that it worked better on PC.

I own Oblivion on the X360 and PC.
I see the 360 owners point of view, but it wouldn't be possible to have something complex as the CS on the consoles IMO.

Even with a more simplified version of the CS that was built into the Xbox game, it would require a lot of work to make it work with a console interface etc.

I'm surprised Bethesda have kept up the CS on the PC for so long to be honest; it's not like every PC developer gives out a piece of kit like the CS for free.

Maybe in the future they will develop something like The Forge for Halo 3, but even that is no where near as complex as the CS, not even close.

I guess maybe they could develop a way of allowing PC made mods to work on a 360 but there would be a lot of legal issues and problems that would arise with that.

I could only see this happening if there was a lot of money to be made, but I don't see making a CS for consoles really bringing much more money in and covering the expense of designing it.

There was a pc gameplay trailer released. Here's a comparison of the old ui and the new.
http://social.bioware.com/forum/1/topic/141/index/5486253/1#5486796

From round portraits with the health/stamina "bars" as the border of the portraits to square pictures and the bars down below, the "Windows" taskbar/quickbar at the bottom and the non-bordered translucent map at the top I think there's been a few changes from the old pc UI to the new one. Unless I have a very special copy of DA:O, that is. Mine matches the first screenshot.

I think the tactical view thing changed too. I'll try to find the quote. Sifting through the Varic's chest hair and other equally game making issues takes a while.

EDIT: http://social.bioware.com/unofficial%20http:/social.bioware.com/forum/1/topic/141/index/5263887/3#5264321

Pulling "out" isn't "overhead". Since they removed FF from any difficulty other than Nightmare, I guess it isn't as crucial because accidentally targeting your party with AOE spells won't matter. Or something like that.

Ah, bad choice of words on my part - I didn't mean that the UI hadn't changed (not sure why I referred to it as "the old UI"), just that the PC version is still using a UI that's markedly different from the console version. Same with the combat - they're trying to make the combat more "immediate" and streamlined in both versions, but the PC version still uses the old tactical/overhead view. The differences are more in terms of how characters act and react when commands are given. The console version's combat is actually closer to something like Ninja Gaiden or God of War, which is pretty markedly different.

Mostly, the point I'm trying to make is that the PC version's changes are rather separate from the console version's, and are pretty clearly intended more for streamlining the game for the general audience on the PC than for bringing it more in line with the console version of the game. Something people tend to forget when blaming these kinds of changes on the consoles is that the entire market - including console and PC gamers - has been moving in the direction that causes these sorts of things to change, so a lot of these kinds of changes happen because of that overall shift in the market, not because of a slide towards a more console-centric philosophy.

Why can't they do like Unreal Tourney, where mods cold be added.
We would download PC mods and install them on our systems, they would be in the install data, what's difficult about that?

Microsoft won't allow that on the 360, and the 360 is Bethesda's primary development platform (since it's where most of their money is made).

I would love a construction set on the console. It will never happen.

XBox will not let just anyone mod a game on their console like you can do with a PC. I'm not sure about Sony and the PS3. It also would dip into the sales of cheaply made DLC that can be sold.

In any case, you'll never see a construction set on the consoles.

Just a bit of a side point: this sort of thing doesn't dip into the sales of cheaply made DLC. Official DLC is always going to be seen as being higher-quality than most solely because of its "official" status, so it's always going to be considered more valuable by most consumers regardless of the availability of mods. As a result, third-party modifications are rarely (read: never) in direct competition with official content, but at the same time can still be used as a selling point for the game itself. Not only does this mean more sales of a $60 game, but it also means more people capable of buying that cheaply-made $5-$15 official DLC for it.

Basically, third-party mods actually help to increase sales of first-party DLC, not decrease them. They also increase sales of the game itself, which is worth several times what the DLC is.

It would be annoyingly difficult if you were stuck using the puppeteer controller system of consoles *shudders*.
If they could find a way to port mods made on the comp into the console, it would work fine.

It is a dream that can simply never come to pass. Now I am on the side that wants it on the consoles (which I think is just about everyone but the ESRB and big game heads at Microsoft and Sony) but their are many problems such as model making and animations and scripts that just wouldn't work well with a controller and console technology. I do believe it might be more possible to transfer mods to your console from the PC, but again I don't think we'll see that happening because the companies don't want stuff messing up their systems reps and files.

it was only a matter of time before this topic took control.

sorry, it'd be cool, but not gonna happen on current gen consoles.
ever.

it wont happen unfortunately but if you want the same experence get a pc that can hook to a tv a wireless keyboard and mouse and a wireless controler maybe gonna run ya 120 for all the wireless gear from tiger direct less if you sahop around

Ah, wasn't sure of the exact way they went about setting the limit; thanks for correcting me! :blush:

Still, with the number of mods out there the cost would still be high. As for the can of worms, I can guarantee you it would be a mess. No matter how black and white they make the rules, if they were implement it the way it is on the PC, then there would be issues. Some other, alternate route would have to be taken. And I don't think they're willing to go down that road for the hassle it would bring. The majority of DLC for games on console has exclusively come from developers, with some exceptions where the devs take player products with consent and heavy QA. However, I can see them porting significantly worthy mods over in a monthly/bimonthly fashion. Make it a contest or w/e. But it'd still never be as open ended as PC modding. :confused:

I should have known theyd be behind this

Except that Unreal Tournament 3 was a higher profile game than this, allowed mods to be played on the PS3 with absolutely no restrictions, and has seen absolutely no "can of worms". History disagrees with you, simply because developers are rarely (if ever) held responsible for the work of their fanbase (and on legal grounds, can't be).

They aren't refusing a CS or mods on the consoles because of any kind of backlash it could cause, because there would be no backlash. They're refusing to do it because adapting the CS to actually work on the consoles would be a massive amount of work for something that Microsoft simply wouldn't allow on their system, and even allowing mod support would be an extra bit of work for the PS3 version that couldn't possibly be applied to the 360 (because, again, Microsoft wouldn't let them do this). It's just not worth the investment given that it wouldn't be supported on their primary platform.

Honestly I would just be happy with the ability to edit my house. If you've ever used the construction set you could go into a floaty camera like that then have options for moving stuff around and adding/deleting stuff from a list of things you've bought at a furniture store or something. It could be restricted to only your house and I would be happy with that. Cause that's all I would really want it for on consoles anyway.

Sony used to be far more flexible with what owners could do with a P/S3. For example, you used to be able to load linux on one with their blessing!

Microsoft have always seen the XBox, of any version, as a gaming appliance, not a computer. User created content does not fit the model of 'gamer as consumer'!

if the CS is designed to be used by consoles then the entire game must be capable of being created on a console (code, scripts, and everything). =><=

[] .

It's great that such a program has worked for UT3, but one case of it working there does not mean it would work here. It's also hard to imagine UT3 sees the same level of modding that the ES games receive, especially since the former is more of a niche game than the latter. I'm not saying there would be some huge backlash either; just a lot of issues and headaches. With PC mods, there is no set middle man (modder uploads to any infinite number of sites, user downloads). With console mods, there is a set middle man (modder must upload to Beth/MS system, user downloads from that system).