this post was submitted on 23 Jan 2026
239 points (98.0% liked)
PC Gaming
13302 readers
748 users here now
For PC gaming news and discussion. PCGamingWiki
Rules:
- Be Respectful.
- No Spam or Porn.
- No Advertising.
- No Memes.
- No Tech Support.
- No questions about buying/building computers.
- No game suggestions, friend requests, surveys, or begging.
- No Let's Plays, streams, highlight reels/montages, random videos or shorts.
- No off-topic posts/comments, within reason.
- Use the original source, no clickbait titles, no duplicates. (Submissions should be from the original source if possible, unless from paywalled or non-english sources. If the title is clickbait or lacks context you may lightly edit the title.)
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Learn your lesson : Don't sell mods.
Yeah, there's enough enshitification already in the world with all sorts of monetization trying to turn everything into subscriptions.
If someone wants subscription revenue that much they should release their own game rather than turn mods into yet another subscription hell hole.
Sim racing is full of paid mods, and it's working out fine. We acknowledge when someone puts effort into development, probably because majority of sim racers aren't teens and have worked jobs.
If a mod marketplace works for some games, that’s cool, but I think CDPR has the right to not approve of that model when it comes to their IP. An open source model benefits everyone and can also be viable for mod developers :)
If someone puts their own free time and effort to make a mod, they should be allowed to sell it. If you want to spend your free time copying that mod, please do.
You're not entitled to free labor, because you feel like it. It's a game mod, it's not a life necessity, playing games with out mods works as well. You are telling me that people that pay several hundred dollars for a VR headset can't afford to give someone 10-20$ for their work.
If you want to make money for your effort, Dev a game. The idea that you should be able to piggyback off the work of another dev team and profit from it is BS. It's like saying you should be allowed to walk into Starbucks and start selling custom mugs to their active customers; no way they would allow that
You people live in a fantasy world, how the does one who can't make a game make a game. That's a lot of work, what is the issue with piggybacking from another ones work if it benefits both parties.
Give me a scenario where it hurts the original developers, a real scenario.
I don't really care about the developers tbh, what I care about is the community, and paid mods hurt the community. Well-received mods have always been thanked by donations, and there's nothing stopping that system from continuing today, but the idea of monetizing the community sandbox is toxic and should be wholly rejected.
In what way was it good for the community when they removed the mods that you had to pay for? It's not like the developers of the mods will do it for free, and no is stopping you from making a free version of said mods.
If they won't do it for the love of the game, then they aren't part of the community.
How is wanting to get paid and loving the game mutual exclusive. They are more part of the community than 99% of the community, you make it sound like it's easy, they have invested their own time and skills to make mods that people are willing to pay for.
Stop being so judgemental, you don't know them or why they are developing mods. Maybe they want to make a living or extra money by working on something they like. You don't have to buy the mods they develop if you don't like paying for mods or if it goes against your own principals. They aren't trying to force you to buy their mods. I myself never play games with mods, because it's a hassle and doesn't make my gaming experience any better.
Exactly the problem. I don't want my hobby spaces to be filled with entrepreneurs looking for a revenue stream, I want them filled with people who love the hobby enough to sacrifice for it. And when those spaces do get filled with money-makers, it pushes the people with the actual passion out because they aren't interested in competing in another fucking competitive capitalist space.
You want everyone else to make sacrifices but not you, you just want shit for free. What competition exists in the modding community? No one is stopping you from or anyone else from making a VR mod for cyberpunk for free. Surely it would be more popular than the paid version, but why doesn't it exist? Because it requires maintenance and active development and knowledge about how VR works, and no one is interested in spending that time making a free VR mod for cyberpunk, you would have to be an autists to feel it's time worth spending.
If you can't see how paid mods have already enormously increased toxicity in the modding scene, you're either blind or ignorant. And people will always make things they love for free. Graffiti will always exist. There's no reason to pretend art will only exist for the profit motive, or that it is better for it.
Why? If I'm a mechanic and upgrade a car that someone else made you wouldn't care at all. I've always thought it was crazy that people act so entitled to software being free.
Hell cyberpunk itself wouldn't exist if it weren't for decades of work by Windows and console devs. Everything is built on top of someone else's work so I don't buy that as a reason for modders to go uncompensated.
You're also not entitled to modify (which is what mod is short for) someone else's work and sell it. If they allow you to then great, go for it if you want. However, you don't get to complain when they say no. They can still ask for donations, which is what most modders do.
You should be, what's the difference between selling modification to other things that people do all the time. Cars, instruments, music, phones, software and 5 million other things.
They are not selling their work, they are selling their own work, they are not selling the game with the mod, their are selling a mod to the game.
It's just that gaming companies are dickheads and want to have exclusive rights to having a market around their products.
Of course you get to complain, why shouldn't you complain if you don't like something and think it's unfair. Wether it's legitimate or not you should complain, then if someone listens or not thats another question.
You don't have to buy mods, dude there are plenty of mods that are free, but if someone wants to sell it why not. The only thing that will happen is that you will have more quality mods, paid or free. Then there's the question if you have exclusive rights to a mod, I would say no, anyone should be able to copy your mod.
The difference is the game developers have put in extra work in order to make their games easily moddable. Your car didn't. Developers don't have to add mod support, but then it usually becomes incredibly difficult to modify.
They put extra effort in to allow people to create stuff using their game. It's like using any other software as a tool; you need to follow their rules for using it. This could mean paying a licensing fee, or it could mean making it open source, or whatever else they may decide. You're using their tools, so their rules have to be followed.
What are you talking about, have you ever heard of after market products. There's a reason why certain industries design there products to allow third party vendors to sell after market components, it makes them more popular by consumers.
Dude you are just making shit up as you go, what you are saying makes no sense.
I extend functionality of existing software products for B2B as a living, no one would buy their products if they didn't allow them to be extended.
Let's take your assumption to the end result; the developer has no control over mod distribution. Let's make up a hypothetical (which has happened before) where someone is distributing malware with their mod. Does the developer have no authority to take it down?
Mods, whether you like it or not, do reflect back on the developer. If there's a scandal of bad behavior, it'll effect their sales. Also, if payed mods become the standard it'll effect their sales, as people will be less likely to deal with modding. I have no issue with mod developers making money from their product, but they must also recognize that it's with the support of the developers of the game. If they decide to remove your mod they can, in many ways.
What kind of argument is this, spreading malware is illegal. And how does that reflect on the game studio; none at all. The mod you are proposing is illegal, no you are not allowed to spread malware via mods, what do you want me to say?
For arguments sake spreading malware via mods is legal, does it reflect bad on the game studio? No, not if you are older than 10 dude, if you don't know the difference between original content and user made content, you will probably have a hard time installing a mod.
If I spread malware via images of La Lakers, does that reflect bad on LA Lakers.
You do realize that cd projekt red are doing a DMCA request, because it's a logical economical choice for them, and has nothing to do with the quality of work. Because the mod is only enabling people to play with VR. And CD project red has the benefit either A modder gives it out for free, CD project red gets free content, B they can after a while release their own paid version of Cyberpunk with VR (like 50 other game titles).
There's no legal basis for the DMCA, the guy says he can't afford a legal battle with a huge company.
No one's saying they're entitled to free labour. But you can't make money off somebody else's work, that's not fair to them, not if they haven't already given agreement.
Making money of someone else's work is the whole economy, that's not an argument. I can understand if it's taking money from the original developers but is definitely not the case.
In what way is it not fair? The game developer has full control over the game and the API it allows modders to use to make mods.
Is it that you are taking the money from the developers? Because you still need to buy the game, if anything the modding community makes the game more attractive to buy.
So what is the unfairness in the case of a modder wants to sell his mods?
How is it not fair? Cyberpunk is the platform for their mod just like Windows or PlayStation is the platform for Cyberpunk. Everything we do is built on someone else's work.
PlayStation is not a platform that you build on top of it's the operating system runs the game it's a totally different concept.
You don't modify the operating system to make the game you make the game in such a way that the operating system can understand but you create your own code. Modine is literally modifying somebody else's code.
Sure, in the sense that you get fewer quality mods. Is that what you meant by “benefits everyone”?
Sim games are sorta their own beast when it comes to mods.
Oh really? Why can't other games be the same beast when it comes to mods? Does the VR mod take sales away from CDPR?
In sim games you usually get the game and then get a vehicle you want to specialize in. You may put hundreds or thousands of hours into that vehicle and you know the ins and outs.
Mod development wise you may have to model the vehicle from the ground up. The vehicle has to have functioning gauges, be tuned to handle and behave like the vehicle in real life, fail like the real thing and basically BE the real thing. Take DCS for example. The game itself is actually free but the modules are paid. The detailed modules can go for around $70 or so dollars like the F16. You can use the real life flight manual for the F16 to learn how to use it in game. Train sims are similar. If you are real particular about a specific train you can find the module for it and expect probably pretty damn good detail down to nameplates and specifications
You arent going to get that sort of involvement in a game like Skyrim, Fallout, or Cyberpunk. You could maybe go down to that level of detail but that level of detail may not be able to be appreciated in a game that doesent simulate things like aerodynamics or how tire grip changes depending on temperature.
Mods are and should be a passion project. The moment you implement mods as income stream people and companies are going to exploit the shit out of it. See: Roblox, Skyrim, etc
@Nindelofocho@lemmy.world You seem to essentially be saying the sim mods take a lot of work so it is okay. But that can easily be the case and I would argue has been the case with this VR mod for Cyberpunk 2077 for example.
I think what's really going on here is that the sim devs recognized even paid mods are in their interests and didn't go after them. It may have played a factor that they're generally not been these giant devs raking in endless money.
Curiously, in sim racing the most stable and profitable companies are iRacing Studios, which has their main game accessible by subscription and additional cars and tracks behind a one-time payment (but the game is very hardcore, and for example Max Verstappen uses it between actual races); and Kunos, who are very lax about mods and whose 2014 game is still among the most played in the genre thanks to literally thousands of mods, from which they derive no other profit other than the sales of the game itself (which costs a few bucks for the past five years at least).
In comparison, rFactor 2 is more modern than Assetto Corsa in every way, and has official cars and tracks as pricey DLCs — its dev Studio 397 was bought by Motosports Games, obviously not because of doing too great. MG promised a lot, got licenses to several real racing disciplines, delivered nothing except a buggy game on the side, lost the licenses, and its future is in question.
In games you usually get the game and then get a mod that you want to play. You may put hundreds or thousands of hours into that mod.
Mod development wise you may have to create models from the ground up. A mod has to have functioning logic, be fit to the game but modify it in a significant way, feel like a change to the game.
You are seriously trying to say that a VR mod doesn't take effort to build?
Irrelevant. The only relevant thing regarding the quality-price consideration is whether a player is ready to pay for a particular mod.
Arbitrary nothingburger claims. You just described how paid mods work in sims, so why don't people ‘exploit the shit’ out of mods in sims?