Closed Mods are killing freelancer

Tue Feb 27, 2007 5:24 am by Quercus

I have to post this because I am so frustrated with what this community has done to Freelancer.
All the modders have been working hard for months and years to enhance the basic experience of the game, much to their credit.
But ... unlike almost any other modding community I can think of for any other game, there is an obsession here with keeping mods private and only releasing the client files so that the maker can restrict the server(s) they run on.
Why?
The reasons given for this are to keep their preferred server populated or to help them with bug fixes, but the practical effect is that many fans of the game will never get to see the mods because of the conditions they must accept in order to play them.
I enjoy playing Freelancer and love playing with my friends, but I much prefer running a small private server that doesn't have PvP and where new players can be given a boost to avoid the slow startup (especially for veteran players trying a new mod or version of a mod).
If a closed server admin was willing to accommodate myself and my friends that would be great, but somehow I can't see it happening.

For the best part of a year now I have been watching TLR post news of mod after mod after mod and almost all of them are closed mods, so all of them are mods I will never be able to play (or even test).
There are only a handful of fully released decent mods out there (WTC, Evolutions and TNG spring to mind) and now even Evolutions has been taken over by a different modding team who are making it a closed mod.

Not only that, but just to compound the problem, when an open mod does release server files, individual modders often change it, adding their own tweaks or enhancements and then make that variant a closed mod to run on only their server! So even if you are using a popular mod, there is a good chance that you would only be able to play on a small number of servers running that mod anyway.
The whole situation is ridiculous.

How popular do you think Counter-Strike would have become if you could only play it on two servers, or if each server running it was completely different, with its own version of the mod requiring a different installation?
Freelancer will never gain popularity outside the hardcore players with all these individual closed mods shortsighted attitudes within the modding community and without external popularity, any notion of a proper sequel is doomed.

Tue Feb 27, 2007 7:00 am by SWAT_OP-R8R

the problem is that the ppl which want to run those servers are exactly those which mostly come with disrespect to the original work
they want to change things but in fact the original creator did create the mods in the way he wants it

it is his/her work... and nobody else has the right to do changes

another reason for those mods being puplished for just one server is that this way big communities can be build instead of the 3-4 ppl that would play on 10 servers with the same mod

there are MANY reasons .... good reasons to limit the usuage to a choosen group of servers.

a short list of arguments:
- big communities have better chances to survive
- some servers are financed by the players which are playing on them... if there would be many servers out there then ppl simply would move to other servers and the original community which developed the mod would die (the death of the mod, no further development... no support... nothing)
- better abilitly to develop the mod
- higher quality due to the fact that there is just one official version
- less confusion for the players because there is just one server that does run just one version of the mod
- copyright issues
- and much more

not long ago a server called AFL did rip the code of my mod... removed the copy protection... the anticheat and many features....
they did this without permission and they almost destroyed my mod with their changes
they broke a very long list of agreements and fortunatly that server does not exist anymore

one thing you should never forget... those mods dont grow on a tree where you just need to climb up and get one
there are ppl coding them and put a very large amount of time and work into (partly even alot of money)
some of them coded their mods just for one single purpose.... to have something special for their own server... for their community members... and this is what you should respect

Tue Feb 27, 2007 8:04 am by Quercus

I appreciate and accept the many reasons why people keep the code to themselves, but I still think it is strangling the support for this game and the community as a whole.

The end result is that you may well end up with a single server populated by 20-40 people on a regular basis, compared to dozens of servers with anything from 6-20 people on them.
The maths aren't difficult and I again refer you to really popular mods for other games as an example.

Look at Tenagi's Treasure. A closed mod but they have always said that anyone wanting to run a server should email them and they will release (or not) the server files. So I did. No response at all. I mailed them again. Nothing.

I am a big fan of Freelancer but with no new mods around that I can use for my server I can't see myself playing the game again, which means your community has just got smaller.

It can't just be me though - with all these competing closed mods (required fresh installs of the game and access to specific servers), how big is the current FL player base compared to a year ago? How many servers are there running unique closed versions of the game? How many players on those servers?
This game is dying and the modding community is only quickening that fate.

Tue Feb 27, 2007 8:29 am by Preacher0815

the problem is that the ppl which want to run those servers are exactly those which mostly come with disrespect to the original work
they want to change things but in fact the original creator did create the mods in the way he wants it

it is his/her work... and nobody else has the right to do changes

So in turn all modders don't have the right to change what the programmers put into the game, because the programmers did it the way they wanted it.

another reason for those mods being puplished for just one server is that this way big communities can be build instead of the 3-4 ppl that would play on 10 servers with the same mod

All those who don't have a good connection to the offering server(s) are excluded. How good is this in improving a Mod's community's size?

there are MANY reasons .... good reasons to limit the usuage to a choosen group of servers.

a short list of arguments:
- big communities have better chances to survive
- some servers are financed by the players which are playing on them... if there would be many servers out there then ppl simply would move to other servers and the original community which developed the mod would die (the death of the mod, no further development... no support... nothing)
- better abilitly to develop the mod
- higher quality due to the fact that there is just one official version
- less confusion for the players because there is just one server that does run just one version of the mod
- copyright issues
- and much more

1. agreed
2. survival of the fittest. If your mod is good, you don't have anything to be afraif of, except a better mod
3. which could still be improved upon if even more folks had access to it
4. see 3.
5. agreed to some degree. can't make sure an altered mod gets a new version number
6. pardon me?
7. Yes, lots of stuff.

not long ago a server called AFL did rip the code of my mod... removed the copy protection... the anticheat and many features....
they did this without permission and they almost destroyed my mod with their changes
they broke a very long list of agreements and fortunatly that server does not exist anymore

This is always a risk, but there's nothing you could about it if someone decides to "reverse engineer" based upon the files he can get (client) and observing what the original server does.

one thing you should never forget... those mods dont grow on a tree where you just need to climb up and get one
there are ppl coding them and put a very large amount of time and work into (partly even alot of money)
some of them coded their mods just for one single purpose.... to have something special for their own server... for their community members... and this is what you should respect

This is the only reason I can fully agree with. Something exicingly special for the own server, and just for the own server.

Edited by - Preacher0815 on 2/27/2007 8:31:32 AM

Tue Feb 27, 2007 8:58 am by w0dk4

I think he got a point there.
Though I wouldnt base this on the closed mod things only, but on the general closed-minded (engl <-> open-minded) FL community because of the rivalry of the servers. Somehow thats sad but thats the way it is. You can only give a good example, thats all.

Tue Feb 27, 2007 10:36 am by H.Q. Victor

There has been problems in the past with people modfiying others mods with out permision and without giving credit. I easily see only allowing client side only posts as the server mod, if you like that particular mod, should not be available to change. As that is the only reason to want it. As to having it on several servers? Whats the point in that. One per mod should be enough.

Tue Feb 27, 2007 7:44 pm by richard s

i made a mod for my server because i got a wierd obsssion with the order so my mace gave me permission to modify his game broken oath . so i put a couple of jump holes in the mod changed the alliances of some of those bases that i felt needed to be changed. also made those bases actually sell stuff . also i added some good mod script from other modders giving credit to everybody who made those mods and you have the order mod. i tell if you want to run it i just released the iron cross data files . its a great mod to run on a small server or a lan party and if you want you can edit the muti player file that comes with the mod to change who you are allied with and your starting money and where you start from. the mod also opens all the jump gates and jump holes.

Wed Feb 28, 2007 12:52 am by Trucidation

I agree with Quercus and Preacher0815. So what if some lameass rips your mod and changes it? If you run a good server the players will stay. There's only so much you can change to the game, the player experience depends a lot also on how you run the place and how the other players behave.

If some dick really stole your stuff (didn't credit you, changed it, and claimed it as his own), I don't expect that kind of person's interest in the game to last long anyway - you yourself said those AFL people went away. Lamers like that always do. They'll go back to aimbotting and wallhacking counterstrike.

Finalday: what happens when your server goes belly up, or you lose interest, or you can't play anymore, etc etc. Nobody can play it anymore. And how many people can even experience a mod if it's on a single server? Not everyone has nice pings to you, there do exist countries far away that make lag unacceptable.

So yeah, we do without... and we don't consider closed mods anyway. When I look at mod lists, I ignore everything closed server. They might as well not exist since I can't play them anyway.

Edit: You know, there exist people like me who just want to play with friends, and not random strangers; we don't want to mess up the code, we just want to PLAY the damn game. And in all possibility, since we're that kind of nice people, we'll even drop the mod creators a line or two, and maybe even make a new friend or two in the process. I've done this before for other games.

Not everyone sees server code and thinks "zomfg STEAL WINNAR", you know.

Edited by - Trucidation on 2/28/2007 12:59:07 AM

Wed Feb 28, 2007 2:33 am by Quercus

It's nice to see that some others here share my view.

Trucidation - your last paragraph about playing with friends is exactly what I want from a mod. Indeed any mod I play and like, I tend to get involved with the creator's community and give them feedback on it.

The point I'm trying to make is that while I can understand the reasoning behind someone who has busted their balls making a mod wanting to keep it under their control, ultimately the decision to restrict it to a single server has the practical effect of killing off any chance it will ever have of becoming popular amongst the Freelancer community and if all the new and exciting mods are the same, of ultimately killing off the game itself.

You have to face facts guys, your mods (however good they are), will ONLY ever become popular if everyone who plays Freelancer can play them when they want and where they want. Just look at the most popular mods within the game, the ones that everyone knows about and in most cases have played - are they restricted mods only available on a single server somewhere, or are they open mods that allow any server to host them?

The idea of closed mods is something (as far as I can tell) unique to Freelancer. No other modding community I have heard of or dealt with keeps creating mods that are not for general release. It just doesn't make any sense.
Counterstrike only became so popular because anyone could play it on any server. Thus more people played it and were able to tell their friends how good it was. It became so popular that it had a direct and dramatic impact on sales of the basic game (Half-Life) and even caused Valve to sit up and notice what was going on.
The same is true with Desert Combat for BF1942. There were more servers running the DC mod than the basic game itself, so DICE picked up on it and used the modding team when they came to develop Battlefield 2.

The same will NEVER be true of any mod created for Freelancer though, because pretty much all of the mods of any quality are all locked down. So you will never get a large player base, you will never get the majority of the hardcore Freelancer players behind your mod and therefore you will never get anyone else playing the game.

This isn't to say you shouldn't be able to create a private mod for your own use, that is of course your choice, but that TLR shouldn't publicise that sort of mod the way it does currently because it isn't available to the community as a whole. Indeed TLR needs to encourage more open mods for the benefit of the community, as closed mods benefit nobody except the people who make them.

There is a petition for a Freelancer sequel at the top of this very forum, but the only way you will ever convince Microsoft to even look at this is if the game is still selling and looks like being financially viable.
And that will never happen with a million and one single-server mods.

Edited by - quercus on 2/28/2007 2:44:58 AM

Wed Feb 28, 2007 2:39 am by DwnUndr

It is nice to see other people agree with the way I think! This is the first public notice of a mod that myself and teammates are working on. The theme will remain a secret until release, but it is a total conversion mod and will have role-play unlike much of what you have experienced before. Our first alpha test was on Christmas day (with 7 systems and custom factions) and had 20 people playing over a 24 hour period with no server reboots (or crashes). The second alpha test was a month later (this time up on Ioncross with 6 hour reboots). Again. no crashes with 40 systems and many of us playing 6 hours straight. We are about to have our 3rd alpha test soon. Very exciting to see something like this coming together! I will be honest, it is still 3 to 4 months before a release, making this an 8 or 9 month project incorporating some 25 people.

My attitude is this...I won't be playing games with hidden server files. Anyone who registers on our BB and downloads the mod will be able to host it (except needing the ioncross files which they can simply ask for). My first restraint will be to ask them to wait until our server is populated and overflowing before they start theirs. The second restraint is that we have immense custom music and the copyright author of it will have to give permission before they can host it. In return they will get a banner link to their BB on our website and early notification of future updates. In addition I will take recommendations from their communities for future updates. The third restraint would be that they can't make modifications of it for their community without permission from us, which probably would not be given unless we stopped hosting and playing it ourselves.

The only problem with this open-ended type of mod is that a clan can't 'buy' a base or system and name it after themsleves. Not with several communities using the same mod. No big deal in my book. I would personally love to have a dozen servers hosting this mod, why build it otherwise?

http://rbb.ripteam.com/Default.aspx

Edited by - DwnUndr on 2/28/2007 3:01:10 AM

Wed Feb 28, 2007 2:52 am by Quercus

DwnUndr - nice to hear your thoughts.
I agree that clan systems are a bit of a problem but ultimately shouldn't stop the server files being made available. In some ways it s better if systems and bases have neutral names anyway and clans just purchase a particular one. After all, if a system is named after the [Bt8Xsive clan and that clan subsequently fades away, what are you going to do with the stupid sounding system?
Whereas (for example), the Acranis system sounds better as a name and can be used by a number of successive clans.

By the way, you mentioned about being willing to release the server files once your server was overflowing, so what in practical terms would that mean? If you have a 32 player server with 23 people regularly on it and I request the server files, would you say no? Because all mod makers ideally want their own servers to be fully populated but this restriction may be unobtainable and could effectively render your mod as inaccessible as any closed one.

Edited by - quercus on 2/28/2007 2:58:25 AM

Wed Feb 28, 2007 3:27 am by DwnUndr

"Releasing server files". This is a misnomer. Anyone who downloads the mod could host it (no hidden files), but if you have custom weapons, etc, these must be specifically entered into Ioncross by additional files. If I have the foresight for this, they will be included in the zip anyway. Otherwise the custom stuff simply won't show up for use (and may crash the server). I won't stop anyone from wanting to host it, but I will ask that they get permission because of the music that one of our members put in there. He has copywritten it.

About your player numbers,,that is a bit complex to answer. We will have a 100 player server (I assure you, it will handle it). The trick is the factions, but again, I don't want to give too much away prematurely. If someone agrees to those above conditions and simply wants to LAN it or host it in another country where they get horrible pings to us, they are almost guaranteed to it from the beginning. But you must agree, we would wish to populate our server well first. I agree with you worrying that that would be a restriction which could lead to no one else hosting it, but I assure you that is not my purpose in spending so much time building this mod. Visit the linky below to see if I have been restrictive before.

http://rbb.ripteam.com/Default.aspx

Edited by - DwnUndr on 2/28/2007 3:28:59 AM

Wed Feb 28, 2007 6:06 am by SWAT_OP-R8R

hmmm

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the problem is that the ppl which want to run those servers are exactly those which mostly come with disrespect to the original work
they want to change things but in fact the original creator did create the mods in the way he wants it

it is his/her work... and nobody else has the right to do changes

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So in turn all modders don't have the right to change what the programmers put into the game, because the programmers did it the way they wanted it.

would you think that MS doesnt agree to modding after the official lancers page (lancersreactor) does support modding of FL and SL?
or would you think MS is not aware of those mods after coming to this page or being sponsor for the MOTY-Awards where FL mods were presented?
MS is fully aware and does support modding... but that does not mean that modders need to agree that their code can be used

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another reason for those mods being puplished for just one server is that this way big communities can be build instead of the 3-4 ppl that would play on 10 servers with the same mod
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All those who don't have a good connection to the offering server(s) are excluded. How good is this in improving a Mod's community's size?

right but you cant please every person on this planet and history did show that regional servers had to go offline because of not enough ppl online

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there are MANY reasons .... good reasons to limit the usuage to a choosen group of servers.

a short list of arguments:
- big communities have better chances to survive
- some servers are financed by the players which are playing on them... if there would be many servers out there then ppl simply would move to other servers and the original community which developed the mod would die (the death of the mod, no further development... no support... nothing)
- better abilitly to develop the mod
- higher quality due to the fact that there is just one official version
- less confusion for the players because there is just one server that does run just one version of the mod
- copyright issues
- and much more

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1. agreed
2. survival of the fittest. If your mod is good, you don't have anything to be afraif of, except a better mod
3. which could still be improved upon if even more folks had access to it
4. see 3.
5. agreed to some degree. can't make sure an altered mod gets a new version number
6. pardon me?
7. Yes, lots of stuff.

2. i think you missed the point here... the mod can be the best... but if the community of that mod is splitted... then development is going to be very hard and the original server might go down (in fact this did happen with several modded servers and good mods in the past)... all this has nothing to do with other mods
3. more folks with access to it does not mean that the different servers and communities would share their experiences and work together.... in fact if a bug is known on one server there is no guarantee that its reported to the developer or that the servers work together on the development
6. mods and their content are copyrighted (every intelectual work is -> copyright law 2004)

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not long ago a server called AFL did rip the code of my mod... removed the copy protection... the anticheat and many features....
they did this without permission and they almost destroyed my mod with their changes
they broke a very long list of agreements and fortunatly that server does not exist anymore
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This is always a risk, but there's nothing you could about it if someone decides to "reverse engineer" based upon the files he can get (client) and observing what the original server does.

wrong... those guys broke a legal binding licence agreement and the code, the models, the images and many other parts of the mod are copyrighted
not to mention that my mod came with a tool that was copyrighted aswell but removed by those guys
what they did was theft of intelectual property by breaking licence agreement and copyrights
in such cases the host of such a server can even be forced to shut down or remove the mod (ive seen this happen 2 times already)

DA + MS agreed on modding as long it isnt used in a commercial way (thats why we are still here and enjoy the game)
but the mod creators have every right to restrict their work in the way they want or to publish it for everything (it is their decision)
people which violate licence agreements or break copyrights should be aware that the mod creators will find it about it and can initial legal treatments IF they think it is needed

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