Hello fellow Skyrim-Gamers!

I'm currently working on my BA thesis and decided to write about modifications in games, their support by developers and it's impact on customers. After I've polished my first survey version with the help of several game communities, receiving loads of amazing feedback, the time has finally come to release my questionnaire to the public; I'm a bit nervous to be honest.

Anyway, you can find the survey following this link: goo.gl /forms/oSkFdgtXKx (I'm not allowed to post links, please use copy + paste and delete the space; I've not found any explanation why not or how I could attain the allowance)

The survey is made for all players of Bethesda Game Studios' games, although some parts are more focused on TES 5: Skyrim. However, I'm happy about every single one of you who takes the time (it's about 4-8 minutes in my run-throughs), regardless which games you play/own or if you are interested in modifications at all. This survey is neither exclusively for players of TES 5: Skyrim nor for active mod developers or users. It's about how important mods are to you and your attitude towards Bethesda Game Studios and their games in general.

If there's any interest in the results of my research I'll gladly translate the most important insights and post them here, once I've graduated.

Thanks again for all your support and happy playing!

Bastian

PS. If you want to comment on my thesis, the survey or anything else, feel free to do so! Either in this very thread or the comment field at the end of the questionnaire.

Here is the link, in case anybody's interested: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1Uc3Mv0EPPLvelARUydPz2IaNbyCYXPxuJTSuzzTp7QM/viewform?c=0&w=1

Well, I'm off to take a questionnaire.

You need to make at least 10 posts. It's a measure put in place to prevent site bots from posting links to commercial web sites.

Okay, I've taken it. I have serious problems with two of the questions.

1. The choices of which types of mods we use is poorly thought-out. These are the choices you offer: "User interface and/or graphic customization" and "Game conversions." It sounds as though you do not know mods very well. I've used 100 mods in a single game in the past without using any mods that fit these categories.

2. "How much time did you spend playing TES 5 according to your Steam statistics?" I've played Skyrim for 4000+ hours but I was forced to answer "Less than fifty hours," because I play in offline mode. Steam does not keep track of my statistics.

Would you care to provide examples for the first case? Because personally I can't think of any - however it might be the case that it's more difficult to actually correctly assign the mods you use to the appropriate category. I haven't received this kind of feedback in another games community this survey has been posted in (based on a different game) and accumulated more than 200 participants there.

As for your second issue, I understand your problem. I'd ask you to use the comment field at the end of the survey for things like that. However, steam statistics is the only reliable and comparable way to measure these, since your 4000+ hours is an estimation and might be well off after all. I did consider different solutions but couldn't come up with a better way.

Thank you for your participation and feedback, it is much appreciated and at the least will be part of my "Possible improvements and shortcomings of the questionnaire"-chapter.

Survey complete. I share the same concerns as my fellow forum member. While mods can be broken down into many sub categories, I feel it should be expanded upon. For example, the most popular mods created, The Unofficial Skyrim Patches don't fall into either of those two listed. Then you have new weapons, armors, player homes, new lands, overhauls, animations, audio and sound, combat, followers, mechanic tweaks, lighting, flora, fauna, environment..

I continue to share PW's view on Steam. You don't need a conformation form Steam, as your time is stamped into the savefiles.

Thank you too!

I agree on the Skyrim Patches, I did not consider these at all to my regret. However, the remaining examples all fit into the two categories (which are rather broad, I agree): they either change the games perception (flora, fauna, animations, audio) or include new content or rule changes (overhauls, mechanic tweaks, weapons [that are not purely graphical modifications of existing ones]). However the actual type of mods used luckily is not crucial for my paper and mostly a "I might use this information so better ask for it than miss it later" kind of question.

Regarding steam, I did not know the time played was stamped into savefiles. That is pretty embarrassing and bad research on my side and will certainly be a part of the "What should have been done better"-chapter.