So I've been spending some time on this forum reading occasional threads mostly lurking. What I've seemed to notice in any discussion of features to be/wish or suggested to be in Skyrim, the bulk majority of post have "If not there are mods" in them.

While mods are a great thing and certainly should be put in and not taken for granted I am somewhat disappointed at this attitude. However I think that mods should be more for preference or additional content. No mods should be necessary to fix a poor game play mechanic or simple laziness. Should you as the consumer not demand a good product? I don't know about you but I certainly don't buy games for a DIY project. I also don't want to wait for mods to come around for it to be playable. Or what if someone plays on PS3 or Xbox 360? Mods can't save them.

No I am not saying that this game is going to turn out terrible and only mods can save it, I do not expect that. However my question is, at what point will you draw the line? Honestly, why should we the consumers allow Bethesda to even get the notion in their head that they can simply release something and if we don't like it fix it our self's (not to imply that this is the way it is but with things like PC UI on Oblivion and Fallout 3 considering it was a know issue hardly fixed in Fallout 3 it seems to be the attitude that Bethesda is acquiring). Would you continue to buy TES games if they became of low quality but you knew the mod community support is strong?

Unfortunately no one will know if this is truly an issue until the game actually releases. I personally will buy the game day one because Bethesda still has a good track record but this is an issue that concerns me.

I AGREE.

I've found that a lot of the time that people say "Oh there will be a mod for that", it is for a feature that wouldn't necessarily add tons to the game (for a wide audience), it is more of a gameplay preference.

Most of the suggestions aren't needed for a good game. Mods can take care of all the silly little way-too-specific things people want in the game. People always expect WAY too much. We are fortunate that TES games are so moddable.

Don't worry, even if SKYRIM is nearly perfect, mods are still going to be needed...maybe some people might like a different aspect changed, or something like that.

Even 20 gigs of mods did not keep me interested in Oblivion. Why? Simple - mods can change gameplay elements, they can't change the whole game, the base is always there unless it's a total conversion, and non of thous go far.
Generally - a good game is enhanced by mods (as Morrowind is), mediocre game with lots of mistakes, is made tolerable, but will never achieve the same level of "awesome" that a good game has, not even with mods (as Oblivion is).
So it is very important to get the most interesting, reach world we can and the best gameplay we can before any modding, so no "mod it" not the response to the game play issues and Bethesda being lazy.
The less time modders have to spend fixing mistakes, the more time is left for making "awesome"

While your right, people want specific crazy things n the game that should just be mods, but I think devs should add alot of the way-too-specific things that make sense. Thats something that makes a great game.

Bethesda makes great games, but they can't include everything everyone wants. I don't think anyone is willing to stand by and let Bethesda release a broken game just because mods can fix it. What people are willing to do however is let mods implement features Bethesda wont, or can't. Alternate methods of travel, for example. Bethesda wants us to fast travel, and isn't providing any alternatives, forcing those of us who don't want to fast travel to walk everywhere. Mods will fix this by adding in what Bethesda didn't want to. I personally would be much madder at Bethesda if they had this stance and weren't supporting mods this time, but that's not the case. Bethesda has given us these mods tools to make the game our game, even if our game (a game with Morrowind-style travel, for instance) is different than their own vision.

I agree, to an extent. It's absolutely critical that we push the developers to make the best product they can, however, I also understand that developers are people. People dealing with looming deadlines, limited budgets (Not to say Skyrim's budget is small, but it is finite nonetheless) and at that point they need to prioritize. They can't please everyone.

I see mods as a great way to make the game your own, to add small or large touches to really make it the game you want, mods can in theory please everyone, as long as they put in the effort to learn how to do it...and play on the PC, this is kind of a big hypothetical. Modding is also very fun, creating something and seeing the fruits of your labour in the game and getting feedback from the community on what you did right and what you need to do better is a great feeling. It's also quite good practice for me, as I'm considering becoming a level designer. I love building things, in the GECK I've built not one but three unreleased entire cities for Fallout 3, I just built them to build, just to have fun.

What I'm looking forward to the most with Skyrim is building my character a house. Just sitting down with the CS and making a simple but practical and nice looking house.

BGS are pros man, Im sure they have more self respect then that.

Im know they love the modding community, but you can bet your ass they’re not thinking about putting out a sub-par product because they know the modders will fix it.

That would be some real bad business at the least.

Yes, the less mods I need for a game to please me, the better. New Vegas was very well enjoyable without them, same as Morrowind. Oblivion and Fallout 3, not so much.
I especially resent Beth's attitude towards patching stuff that is clearly pointed out. Looking at New Vegas for example, most bugs that were already identified and fixed through the community were then squashed by Obsidian's first patch. Now, Fallout 3 and Oblivion are still filled with nasty errors, hundreds for F3 and even thousands for Oblivion. I think that Beth actually stopped bothering once the community began fixing the game themselves.


But mods can improve what a game developer does not need to improve on. The debate about the graphics in Skyrim is quite jarring, really. Most people shout "gameplay first, graphics later", but now that Beth focuses on the former, PC gamers still complain that Beth should polish and include more features and such things, where this clearly does not help the game - making it based on the most recent tech would even hurt sales. That's where mods can, and should, help.

@ OP You are right that mods can't be the answer to every defect.

What's also right is that BSG can't create a game that's exactly suited to our individual tastes. In these cases, mods do "fix" it, but not because Bethesda has done something inherently wrong. That said, this mentality has some objective limits. Eg the PC userface in Oblivion. It's quite obvious that they didn't give one thought about it. That's not a very good practice for the company. It generally won't stop people from buying the game since they can overcome the problem through the mods, but it's not a good policy,

For me as a buyer, right or not, having the mods is a reassurance. It really limits the chances of one annoying thing destroying the game for me. And this is great because, as I explained, it may not even be something inherently bad.

While i agree, It's never a good idea to dis Oblivion on this forum, no matter how [censored] it was compared to Morrowind...

I agree with this one.

I've been doing that for years and I haven't noticed any backlash, at least not anything I've taken seriously. Oblivion dissapointed me, I'm not going to pretend to like something I don't.

You gotta realize, by th Time Skyrim was announced, -alot- was finished as is. and then the new blood poured in and some of the old blood woke up, saying I want this and I want that, when Wants at this point don't apply because the game is so close to completion. They can't add everything everyone wants at any point in any game, and especially not now. Mods can do that, Mods are apart of the Culture on the Majority of this forum. there really is no point in taking it in any negative sense, no one is saying nanananana We have mods Mods are the answer to everything and you lucked out. its just the thought that if the Game doesn't have a certain feature(s) Mods can potentially address that, besides if you really -enjoyed- Beths TES Games This whole mod thing shouldnt be a bother, I hear people clocking 400-800+ hours since the games release on Consoles.

That is Love for the Game.

What do you expect? 85% of the posters on this site are PCs. Probably 75% or more of them are active mod users.

It's like going to a Star Trek convention, trying to discuss politics and wondering why Klingon/Romulan diplomacy keeps coming up.

So true. Console players like me are definitely a minority on this forum, but we're the majority the people who play Elder Scrolls in total (Oblivion at least). It's weird how it works out that way

Being a 360 gamer, all I can say is that PC gamers are spoiled. However, I'm pretty satisfied with Oblivion and don't really get the PC gamers and their complaints; they can just take some time and remove whatever issue they have, I simply have to tolerate the issue and accept that it just is that way.

I know for myself, the only things I say "there will be a mod for that" are on things that have little to no effect on the game, or have a two way split in the community.

"I want there to be nudity and gore"

"I don't want there to be nudity and gore"

Whatever bethesda decides to do, there will be a mod for that.

Heh, I remember playing my first female character in New Vegas and waking up buck naked on Doc Mitchell's bed...yeah, nothing suggestive about that. Sure made the intro more interesting though. :hubbahubba:

Plug n' play not good enough for you?

You get what you pay for. A 300 dollar, 6 year old architecture machine isn't paying for much.

PC users get more because we have the tools to use what they can let us use.

PC gamers are spoiled. They complain over things they can fix. In the end, they have nothing to complain about since the issues can be dealt with.

First of all, there will be bugs. Not all of them will be fixed. Mods will fix them. That is inevitable and the same for every game except the last part, which is mostly unique to TES.

Second, when we anticipate mods fixing things, we mostly mean that they will correct design decisions we don't agree with. Like level scaling.

Most of my mods were for unoffical patches. I think the gaming industry are so sick at the moment of poor coding/buggy games that reviewers will directly comment on a poor gaming experience if it has bugs. being pretty no longer cuts it when getting a good review where as 5 years ago if it looked pretty it got a good review.
However I am only running 1 mod for new vegas and it is not a patch. I think Oblivion should have been patched more.