All Right, I'll try to keep this as organized as I can, I just had this hit me tonight, but yeah.... So Anyways, Neutrino(and the rest of the Uber Team of course!), as I modder I'd love to see the ability for us to create "Mod Launchers", What is that you ask? Well, imagine that someone(like say myself) used PA's Engine to create a whole new RTS Game-thing(often called a "Total Conversion" or "TC" as well) via modding(Like say a Tower Defense game or Survival Type thing), The Mod Launcher would basically be a shortcut to launch the game from desktop with that Mod Enabled, hopefully with the option of allowing a custom Main Menu and graphics for said mod(should they be needed/applicable) instead of the 'stock' menu/graphics normally used for PA. Admittedly this would basically be all vanity(assuming TC type mods are already being accounted for by you guys) but I think it would be something really neat that would help not only make the Mods(which are traditionally only played by a small fraction of online partaking players[which is usually already a small fraction of players who have bought/played the game]) more approachable to Non-Mod players by making the process of playing the mod(once installed[thought this hurdle is a separate topic all together]) much more streamlined and user friendly. I also think it'd make PA the first RTS Engine that does this(to my knowledge, if I'm wrong please politely let me know) and really help make the engine more attractive to modders to those big projects that tend to get that kind of 'cult status' among players and get players to buy games for the mods, which lets admit, is win-win for everyone! Annnnd I think I've said everything I can think of.......I'll prolly be doing some edits/updates as ideas and discussion kicks off......I hope... Mike
OrangeKnight makes a good point. This would definitely be a handy capability to have in PA. One way I've seen this implemented is through Quake-based games, where data is kept in pak files, which are essentially zip files with the game subdirectories (data/other assets) inside. The game loads up its own pak file by default, but new, added pak files allow the engine to override which subdirectories it uses, allowing for both simple mods and full conversions, depending on how much of the content it overrides. A method like this would allow mods to be distributed in a simple fashion (just download a single file), and allow for a good number of modding possibilities. A simple, command-line argument would allow the user to select individual, or even multiple mods to apply. A mod launcher would simply allow the user to have a pretty GUI on top of this existing system, not only to load the mods (through commandline), but also to keep track of the available mods, and (as the community implements it) to prevent mod conflicts. I'm not too familiar with how mods are dealt with in games these days, but I thought I'd mention this, just for reference. [EDIT]This is meant for more large-scale, game changing mods. Simple mods for the UI, or basic mutators would probably be implemented in a more basic way.[/EDIT]
I know there are some RTS mods with shortcuts or standalone exe files, do they count as launchers? Off topic: I'm really interested if the developers will allow the commercial mods like mynn to happen again, perhaps Uber could draw a percentage of profit from them?
Well how does licencing of the Unreal engine work? I assume the Unreal people get a percentage of the game's profits, or just a big lump sum up front.
I would suggest, OrangeKnight, that a better solution would be to have a regular launcher which promotes mods / has mod spotlights, details available, etc, and then has the capability of allowing users to go "Hey, that looks cool, let me click 'Play Mod'" and then it downloads all the files required and launches the game. From there the in-game menu / splash screen / whatever can be modified / total conversioned as the modder desires. Point being, you don't want to make people go launch another shortcut to play your mod - keep those people in the loop, expose them to other mods, and above all, give the user a click-once-play experience.
Pawz, the way I look at it we're talking about different(but relevant and valid) things, I do agree Uber really should work to make sure mods are something everyone is exposed to, and there are several options available, but What I'm talking about here is a means to streamline the experience of playing my Mod/TC/Thing, this wouldn't be the standard for all mods, you'd still have a 'basic' mod enabler. Mike
FA can does that, even it's not well documented. The whole interface is LUA and replacable files, and you can launch a "mod" as it's the real game with the /init flag. (like featured mods in FAF).
Lua is Portuguese for Moon. Since we all passed first grade, we all know Moon is a proper noun so it's given a capital letter. This also applies in Portuguese.
You're right, you're talking about one level up from the standard 'modify my game a bit' mod. I'm kind of envisioning a mod environment which allows the user to choose a TC, and then also choose mods that are compatible with that TC, or whatever, and then the whole thing configures itself and launches. If they're *really* smart Uber could do a setup with configured instances (all the mod files, configuration, and exe in a folder) that mod authors could point a shortcut to - from there it'd be easy to distribute your 'instance' with an installer to put the shortcut on the desktop. You could then start the main PA launcher and browse for mods compatible with your TC, or just start the TC's shortcut.
Well in theory you could do that in the same way you'd load mods into 'Stock' PA. Like say, every mod _info(using FA as an example) had a field declaring it's "Parent Game", now by default it would be Planetary Annihilation, but when you make a TC you give it a name for the "Parent Field" as well, so you could set in the regular mod what 'Game' it works for, then in TCs you would load/enable them in the same manner you would in 'stock' PA. Mike
Yeah that would work. Actually, just having a clear API for mod authors to plug into, with options for describing compatibility ( and dependancies!) with other mods as well as automated version updates, would make me perfectly happy
There's a few Company of Heroes super-mods that come with their own installers and launchers, such as Blitzkrieg and Eastern Front. Those mods can also auto-update themselves from the launcher as well as setting a few command-line settings (like vsync, skipping intro movies) with easy check boxes. Homeworld 2 also had shortcuts to launching mods. Make a new shortcut to the exe, add in some "mod=blah" to the target field (which is generally all in one large file), and it loads up the mod specified. Of course, the only thing built-in to the game for both cases are extensive command-line triggers for loading mods and stuff, and I'm assuming you're talking something a little more in-depth.
http://youtu.be/nCRA1ae5WWQ?t=15m14s this sounds like the best idea to me. a model where at the single click of a button you're in a mod, just like faf.
