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Petition to include all 2013 purchases for free DLC

CjStaal

By CjStaal
in KSP1 Discussion

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PETITION TO INCLUDE ALL OF 2013 FOR FREE DLC!  

276 members have voted

  1. 1. Should all of 2013 be allowed the free DLC?

    • YES
      43
    • NO
      222
    • Include to August 2013
      11

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memes in space

memes in space

Posted
Posted
1 hour ago, monstah said:

Whoa, another one right while I was typing.

So, where exactly did you check that?

Logic.

Take Two shuts down GTA V modding because they hate mods and creativity and anything more than boring vanilla games.

Why wouldn't they do the same for KSP? Take Two fully owns KSP now. So since they hate mods enough to kill them on GTA, ya think they wouldn't kill them on KSP?

Quote

Uh whoops, your mod adds parts from the real world historically, our DLC does that too. We're shutting you down, k thanks bye

 

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Galileo

Galileo

Posted
Posted
4 minutes ago, tater said:

The complainers here should spend less time on the forums and more time working since $20 seems meaningful to them.

To anyone living in the Austin, Tx area, come wash my car or mow my lawn, and I will gladly buy you a copy of the DLC when it releases.

 

im not kidding. It's freaking hot outside.

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Snark

Snark

Posted
Posted
1 hour ago, memes in space said:

Logic.

I understand your concern, and I can't blame you at all for being worried.  I can see how I might be worried, too, in your position.

However, speaking as a professional software engineer who's been shipping software for a living for a variety of companies for more than 20 years, I gotta say that this is speculation, not logic.

1 hour ago, memes in space said:

Take Two shuts down GTA V modding because they hate mods and creativity and anything more than boring vanilla games.

With all due respect, speaking as a professional shipper of software, this is nonsense.

I'm not blaming you-- for someone who's not in the business, I can see how this is an understandable emotional reaction, especially when it involves something as near and dear to one's heart as KSP.  Look, I'm in the same boat as you--  I adore playing KSP.  Outside of family, it's by far the biggest consumer of my free time.  It occupies me to the exclusion of all other computer games, and has done so for the past three years.  KSP is practically a way of life for me.  (Yeah, I know, I'm a nerd.)  And mods are a huge part of the reason for that.  If they killed all mods, I'd get bored and wander away.  I don't just use them, I write mods, and I have a ball doing so.  I've got just as much skin in this game as anyone, and if there were a strong reason to be worried, I'd be one of the first ones breaking out into a sweat.

But the above sentiment has little to do with how companies actually think and plan things.

Companies exist to make money.  Successful companies are smart about making money, and stay in business a long time, and grow.  Stupid companies that make foolish decisions are bad at making money, and tend to implode fairly quickly.  I think that we can agree that T2 is a reasonably successful company, so let's just dispense with the "they do things because they're stupid" theory off the bat-- obviously they're not, or they'd be long gone by now.

Successful companies do not "hate creativity and anything more than boring vanilla games".  I've been doing this for decades, and I assure you they don't.  Why?  Because "hating creativity" or "wanting to be boring" would be irrational-- those have nothing to do with business.  That's not to say that companies never do irrational, foolish things-- but companies that make a habit of doing that tend to go out of business pretty fast.  And I can say that it's extraordinarily rare for a company to do something genuinely irrational.

Companies act on a case-by-case basis.  They're always looking at the bottom line.  Different games have different target audiences, and different cultures that grow up around them, and different business models and economics.  So they're always looking to do the thing that will create the biggest benefit.  And if they're smart companies, they do the thing that has the biggest long-term benefit.

When I see companies that have made really dumb decisions, it's never because "they're just crazy or stupid."  There's generally always some plausible explanation.  The two most common causes I've seen are short-sightedness (e.g. going for short-term gain at the expense of long-term benefits), or poor forecasting (e.g. badly underestimating how technically difficult something turns out to be, or how expensive to develop, etc.)  None of those involve completely irrational things such as "hating creativity".

1 hour ago, memes in space said:

Why wouldn't they do the same for KSP?

Several reasons, elaborated below.  But they boil down to "because doing so would be stupid, and the evidence indicates that they're not stupid."

  1. Because they haven't actually done that to GTA V.
  2. Because the mod they shut down in GTA V was doing a thing that KSP mods generally don't.
  3. Because everything's case-by-case.  Just because they do a certain thing in one place doesn't mean they'll do the same thing in another.
  4. Because T2 exists for the same reason that Squad does-- i.e., to make money-- so there's little reason to think they'll do things that differently.

Let's take this one point at a time:

They haven't "shut down modding" on GTA V.  I don't follow this closely, since I've never been a GTA player and have no interest in it, but I gather that they shut down a particular mod (admittedly, a popular one) due to licensing violations around reverse engineering or somesuch.  But my understanding is that other mods for GTA V continue unabated.

Most KSP mods don't do the thing that got the GTA V mod shut down.  I gather that it was straying outside the allowed bounds by reverse-engineering or something along those lines.  I can't speak for all KSP mods, of course, since there are uncounted hundreds (or even thousands) of them, but I'd say that the vast majority of them don't do this.  Certainly none of my mods do, since I'm scrupulous about following the rules.  So there's no reason to suppose that T2 would have a problem with this.

Everything's case-by-case.  KSP is not GTA V.  The KSP community is not the same as the GTA V community.  KSP players don't want exactly the same things as GTA V, and the things that drive KSP sales are not the same as what drive GTA V sales.  So unless T2 is stark raving stupid-- which evidence indicates they're not-- then they're not going to do exactly the same thing to KSP as they do to GTA V.  They want to make money out of KSP, and the way you do that (if you're not an idiot) is to figure out what the business conditions are around that property and then cater to it effectively.

T2 and Squad aren't fundamentally different.  They have the same motives.  They both want to make money.  It's what they're for.  T2 isn't the devil, and Squad aren't saints.  They're just businesses, that's all.  Squad has been doing things the way they have not because they're altruists or philanthropists, but because they've hit upon a successful business model that appears to work.  "Hey, what if we make a really open game and go out of our way to make it really moddable, including doing dev work on patch updates to improve things that don't affect the stock game at all but make it easier to mod?"  Do you think they do that simply out of the goodness of their hearts?  No, they do it because it works for them, as in $$$.  And do you think T2 bought KSP because they're evil and they see an opportunity to ruin things?  No, they bought it because they see a business opportunity and they want to get them some o' that.  That doesn't mean they couldn't make a decision to change directions, of course.  But presumably they bought KSP beause they can see that it has a model that works, so let's not go automatically jumping to conclusions that they're going to totally munge it.  My own guess is that basically what happened was that they saw "KSP is a little game by a little company that's making a good ROI, but it's small, so let's buy it and then throw money at it to magnify it so we can make boatloads of money."  I don't know that that's the case, of course, but that's the one that makes the most sense to me as a developer.  And if that's what's going on here... seems to me that that has the potential for a pretty good upside for KSP players.

 

1 hour ago, memes in space said:

So since they hate mods

Evidence please.  And when I say "evidence", I mean actual evidence, not emotional over-extrapolation from one particular case that's then projected onto the whole world, such as you've been doing up to this point.

Companies have legal/licensing requirements around folks who use their products, including modders.  Everyone does, this isn't special to T2.  Squad does, for example-- and always has.  Go look at the modding guidelines for KSP-- they've been around since forever, and they explicitly specify "no reverse engineering or accessing private data" (rule 8), which I understand is the same thing that drove this event that happened with GTA V.

So, KSP is already in the same boat as GTA-- even before the T2 acquisition-- and has been, for years.  Hasn't stopped a vibrant mod-producing community from springing up, and flourishing, and continuing to flourish.

 

1 hour ago, memes in space said:

ya think they wouldn't kill them on KSP?

Quote

Uh whoops, your mod adds parts from the real world historically, our DLC does that too. We're shutting you down, k thanks bye

 

That's correct.  Based on 20+ years of doing this for a living, and based on the thousands of interactions I've had in the KSP forums, and based on what I've heard about the current situation with T2, I think they wouldn't kill them on KSP, yes.

And by the way-- that's not how it works with mods.  Mods don't necessarily take money away from for-pay DLC, because unless a company's incompetent or stupidly stingy in development, paid DLC has lots of advantages over free mods.  Certainly if I were running a company in such a position, I'd be ecstatic that people are modding, including modding in areas that may overlap with my DLC.  Why?  Because mods drive sales, IMO.  The presence of a vibrant mod ecosystem can make a game very appealing.  And even where the areas overlap, a mod can whet people's appetite for something "real" from the company itself.  (And it can also really help the company by letting them gauge interest in a particular feature, before taking the risk of spending lots of money to develop it.)

Look at CommNet in KSP 1.2.  The RemoteTech mod had been around for ages before KSP 1.2 came out.  Squad had no problem with that existing, and they also had no problem with spending lots of time / energy / money to develop CommNet in stock.  (It's a big feature, that's a major investment of engineering effort.  Unless you're certifiably thick-skulled, you don't do that sort of thing unless you're pretty sure it's a revenue generator.)  I played RemoteTech in the past, and enjoyed it... and I was ecstatic when CommNet got added to the stock game, at which point I gleefully jumped on it and never looked at RemoteTech again.  And I'm pretty sure there are a lot of players like me who love CommNet and are happy it got added to the game, which is good for Squad (and now T2).  And there are also lots of players who love RemoteTech better, and guess what?  They don't have to have CommNet shoved down their throats if they don't want it-- the presence of RemoteTech gives them the ability to continue to enjoy the game the way they want, and to stay engaged with KSP.  Which also means more $$$ for the folks selling the game.

 

...So, yes, I think mods will continue to be a thing for KSP.  Mods are such a big part of the KSP experience, and always have been, that it would be incredibly ill-considered to kill them off, given the community around this game.  I don't think T2 are dolts.  They're motivated by making money, and killing off KSP mods wouldn't boost the cash flow.  Quite the opposite.  So, I think we're fine.

That doesn't mean it's impossible that T2 might make some decisions that not everybody likes-- but then, there's no evidence that Squad, or indeed any company on the planet in any industry ever, wouldn't do that, either.  There are no guarantees in life.  Bad things are always possible, sure.

But unless there's actual evidence for it, perhaps let's not go jumping to conclusions?

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Starman4308

Starman4308

Posted
Posted
47 minutes ago, memes in space said:

Logic.

Take Two shuts down GTA V modding because they hate mods and creativity and anything more than boring vanilla games.

Why wouldn't they do the same for KSP? Take Two fully owns KSP now. So since they hate mods enough to kill them on GTA, ya think they wouldn't kill them on KSP?

 

What you presented is extrapolation, not necessarily sound logic.

The takedown of OpenIV was done because it allowed cracking into protected assets.

This does not imply they are evil and hate fun or creativity. It implies they care more about maintaining their EULA and business strategy than about mods. They are almost certainly indifferent, not evil.

For KSP, attempting to crack down on mods would be a disaster. Numerous copies of DRM-free KSP exist, and given the much higher fraction of PC players, more of their customer base would raise a fuss. Furthermore, it would anger the primary development team, who can perfectly well quit and denounce Take Two at the expiration of their current contract.

Nor do mods threaten their likely business model as did OpenIV. It would be far too much hassle to add DRM or microtransactions after the fact; I doubt they'd bother.

And now most of what I'm saying was said better by @Snark. I blame typing on a mobile tablet.

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eddiew

eddiew

Posted
Posted
11 minutes ago, Snark said:

I ... evidence?

All well put.

It would be utterly irrational to shut down KSP's modding community. KSP can draw people in on its own, but when the initial thrills of stock fade after a few weeks, mods keep us glued here month on month, year on year. Prospective buyers see this enthusiasm and it makes them feel more confident about making a good purchase.

And it gives the dev team ideas! They can (and do) use modders to test the waters for what's popular and adopt the best things for official updates. Cities Skylines and Minecraft do the same. As a development model it's genius and I'm surprised by games that don't have moddability in mind from day one.

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regex

regex

Posted
Posted (edited)
1 hour ago, Starman4308 said:

For KSP, attempting to crack down on mods would be a disaster. Numerous copies of DRM-free KSP exist, and given the much higher fraction of PC players, more of their customer base would raise a fuss. Furthermore, it would anger the primary development team, who can perfectly well quit and denounce Take Two at the expiration of their current contract.

This, exactly. Shutting down modding in KSP would sour the PC playerbase to the brand, damage the community, and that's what Take Two bought: a brand, an IP, and a passionate playerbase. And while I don't for a second believe Squad still has ultimate free reign to develop the game the way they want (they've got to continue making Take Two money, after all) I do believe they've got enough autonomy to continue on as they have been, making profits off a strong indie game.

Future products in the "KSP brand" may be different but I doubt it. The KSP brand implies customizability and PC products, at least, will likely be eminently moddable.

Edited by regex
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Deddly

Deddly

Posted
Posted
3 hours ago, memes in space said:

Logic.

Take Two shuts down GTA V modding because they hate mods and creativity and anything more than boring vanilla games.

That is a far cry from "Last I checked they are going to shut down modding in KSP". 

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klgraham1013

klgraham1013

Posted
Posted (edited)
4 hours ago, Snark said:

snip

That post should be mandatory reading when signing up for an account on this forum.

5 minutes ago, memes in space said:

Alright, I believe you. I'm not as worried, but I'm still backing up my KSP copies in case they do decide to be idiotic

I still have game zips and mod collections going back to 0.24.2.  Nothing crazy about that.  Maybe a little crazy.

Edited by klgraham1013
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memes in space

memes in space

Posted
Posted
11 minutes ago, klgraham1013 said:

That post should be mandatory reading when signing up for an account on this forum.

I still have game zips and mod collections going back to 0.24.2.  Nothing crazy about that.  Maybe a little crazy.

I used to have them, but I deleted them because my old computer's hard drive space was only 500GB

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Snark

Snark

Posted
Posted
21 minutes ago, memes in space said:

 I'm still backing up my KSP copies

Well, that's certainly always a great idea-- I like to keep copies around, myself.  Mainly so that if there's an update in the middle of a career game, there's zero chance of breaking me when Steam auto-updates.  I let Steam have the "real" install, so it can update to its heart's content, but I play out of a separate copy so that it's nice and stable.

Plus, I'm OCD and I just like to keep a copy around of each version in case I ever want to go back and compare how things work.  Which I never actually do.  But why not.  :)

 

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razark

razark

Posted
Posted (edited)

This thread is way off topic!  Shouldn't we be sticking to the point of the thread, which is "some people want the DLC offer extended", and not talking about Take Two and modding?

Edited by razark
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  • 2 weeks later...
JAFO

JAFO

Posted
Posted
On 6/22/2017 at 7:44 AM, memes in space said:

I used to have them, but I deleted them because my old computer's hard drive space was only 500GB

Ever heard of backing them up to CD/DVD? :wink:

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JAFO

JAFO

Posted
Posted
2 minutes ago, memes in space said:

I don't even know if my computer has a CD-RW drive. (Probably though, but I never bothered to check)

The vast majority do, these days..  (and blank CDs are easy to obtain)

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