"Steamworks"-like store for community made decals and paintjobs

[omega9380]

"Steam Workshop"-like store for community made decals and paintjobs

I think the title says it all. IMHO a "Steam Workshop" like system for community made paintjobs and decals is needed. Don't get me wrong, the FD store has some amazing artwork for your ship, and I enjoy this game enough to support FD thru purchasing those works (got the OH livery and the paint pack for my Cobra), but I have seen what a community can do with the proper tools. Look at Skyrim, for example. With the modding tools available, and a little creative perusing of the Nexus, Skyrim can be a completely new game strictly thru community content. From browsing the forums, FD is hard at work adding major content to the game, which is great, I'm loving the Wings update. Offload some of the work for the minor stuff (like paint and decals) to us! We would LOVE to get our hands on some texture files. I have ideas for my Type-6!

Now, admittedly, this would probably require a revision of the Livery tab in Outfitting (maybe a complete overhaul of the Outfitting interface altogether) to avoid content overload, but trust me, there are HUNDREDs if not THOUSANDs of players out there chomping at the bit to put airbrush to hull metal, I guarantee it .

The reason I mention a "Steam Workshop" like store is because, while a great majority of you will gladly release your work for free, there are some starving artists out there that would like to be compensated for their work. I believe Steamworks has the ability for a creator to charge a fee for their content.

Just my 2 cents. Thanks!!!

 

[Ancipital]

I'm really not sure how many times it is necessary to repeat this, but UGC (user-generated content) is a complete minefield and nowhere near as easy as people seem to keep assuming. Even if you're giving stuff away for free, but particularly if you're charging for it, if FD are hosting it, they'd have a legal and regulatory exposure, for very little benefit. Human moderators would be required to check everything to screen out profanity, obscenity, trademark/copyright violation and goodness knows what else.

This sort of thing is labour-intensive and thus certainly not cost-neutral to do, especially if you're a commercial entity. When the first lawyergram comes in because someone made a Hello Kitty skin for a Cobra Mark III, it'd probably already be a losing proposition overall. Unlike with Skyrim, FD are also keen to keep ED broadly family-friendly.. something that certainly wouldn't happen if the general public were allowed anywhere near conent generation.

 

[Sewer Shark]

I'm really not sure how many times it is necessary to repeat this, but UGC (user-generated content) is a complete minefield and nowhere near as easy as people seem to keep assuming. Even if you're giving stuff away for free, but particularly if you're charging for it, if FD are hosting it, they'd have a legal and regulatory exposure, for very little benefit. Human moderators would be required to check everything to screen out profanity, obscenity, trademark/copyright violation and goodness knows what else.

This sort of thing is labour-intensive and thus certainly not cost-neutral to do, especially if you're a commercial entity. When the first lawyergram comes in because someone made a Hello Kitty skin for a Cobra Mark III, it'd probably already be a losing proposition overall. Unlike with Skyrim, FD are also keen to keep ED broadly family-friendly.. something that certainly wouldn't happen if the general public were allowed anywhere near conent generation.

Planetside 2 managed to do it all just fine, so I don't really think "It's hard " is really a reason not to.

 

[kislany]

Planetside 2 managed to do it all just fine, so I don't really think "It's hard " is really a reason not to.

Stole the words from my mouth I buy decals and helmets from the Player Studio all the time, all stuff made by other players, sold at the official marketplace.

 

[omega9380]

I meant "Steam Workshop" not "Steamworks", sry. Steamworks is the API for developers to add Steam features to their games.

And as for legal issues, I am not a lawyer, nor am I familiar with UK law (home grown American boy here, go Steelers), but I belive in the States here, as long as the creator of content that derives from copyrighted works does not claim is as original, nor benefits financially from its distribution, it is legal under a "parody" law (i think thats what its called, dont quote me). Even if we ignore the suggestion for charging for the content (I figure most people just want to show of thier stuff anyway), I dont think FD would run into any legal issues. Again, and I stress this because I am not trying to start a flamewar here, I am NOT a lawyer, nor am I familiar with UK copyright law AT ALL. Just my two cents, thanks!!!

 

[Zeeman]

I'm really not sure how many times it is necessary to repeat this, but UGC (user-generated content) is a complete minefield and nowhere near as easy as people seem to keep assuming. Even if you're giving stuff away for free, but particularly if you're charging for it, if FD are hosting it, they'd have a legal and regulatory exposure, for very little benefit. Human moderators would be required to check everything to screen out profanity, obscenity, trademark/copyright violation and goodness knows what else.

This sort of thing is labour-intensive and thus certainly not cost-neutral to do, especially if you're a commercial entity. When the first lawyergram comes in because someone made a Hello Kitty skin for a Cobra Mark III, it'd probably already be a losing proposition overall. Unlike with Skyrim, FD are also keen to keep ED broadly family-friendly.. something that certainly wouldn't happen if the general public were allowed anywhere near conent generation.

And, I am really not sure how many times it is necessary to rebut all those useless excuses.

Technically speaking, user generated skins have been part of consoles for at least as long as Forza has been available on Xbox (10 years+?) - I have yet to see anything offensive.. They seem to do quite well without moderation, however, let us run with this excuse for a bit...

How long does it take an artist to draw a skin? Just a single skin? How much are FD paying said artist, and how much are they charging for said skin?

Now, in that amount of time, how many user generated skins can someone look through to "moderate" them?

If each of those skins is then charged at a rate that is similar to the FD made skins, the process will, at the very very least, cover it's own costs. At best, if the skins are then sold by FD in the store, the artist also making a cut (perhaps all user skins can be "limited editions"), it means FD are making significant amounts of money for about 2 minutes of "moderation" (if that long) per skin. The store would be flooded with skins for sale for ALL ships, and people like me would pay for many, many skins. It has huge potential for additional income.

The problem is not the problem , attitudes such as those noted above to the problem are the actual problem.

Z...