JK2 suffered from some problems that kept it from acheiving its multiplayer potential. Regardless of how people felt about the game balance, options, fighting system, or general fun of the original game, most of them stuck to the official version because they were unaware that there were other (sometimes better) options available. If Raven/LA wants to avoid making the same mistake this time, then they need to pay attention.

The issue that needs to be addressed is a central, highly visible site which makes user-created content easy to access and browse through. Lucasfiles.com and jkii.net are great, but where are the reviews? Can you go to their site and know within a few seconds exactly what you want to download, if anything?

But then, actually being able to find a download on either site is a moot point if you don't know about the site to begin with. Everyone who owns JK2/JA needs to be made immediately aware of the community that supports their new game. How much time would it take to add a couple of links on the main screen to lucasfiles.com and jkii.net (or another site)? Take it from someone who knows the code: not much. Yet, the rewards to the community would be huge. Imagine what would happen if the options on the main screen read:
- Single Player
- Multiplayer Player
- Setup
- JK2/JA Community
- Quit

Specifics:

1. Create a link inside the game engine directly to the user-content site. That would bring people there in droves. Even better, allow browsing and downloading of the file database within the game itself or within a linked tool of some sort (like the autoupdater).

2. It is all-important to coerce people into reviewing their downloaded files. Currently, review sites rely on nothing but users' goodwill to get their reviews. I would propose the site giving points for every review that you do, and based on the number of points in your account, you can do things like turn off advertising, submit editorials and articles, create larger numbers of threads in the forum per day, use more graphics in your reviews/forum posts, etc.

3. Add functionality to the game itself where all user-created content is broadcast to the master server. I realize this would be a large addition, but I'm speaking of ideal circumstances. Think of how unreal tournament's engine handles and broadcasts which umods it's using.

4. The front page of the site (lucasfiles, other?) should be a listing of New, Highest Rated, and Most Popular download for the Day, Month, and All-Time (no, their current sidebar is not sufficient). It should show specific numbers, so that you can say, "Damn, this file's been downloaded 5 times as much as the next highest, and it's rated 4.5 out of 5 stars by 4000+ people." It should also keep statistics on live servers that shows how many servers are using any particular file (this would be difficult with smaller files, but with mods this should be easy). This would end the problem of people saying, "What should I download?".

5. Don't set the autodownload option to false in servers by default. Don't set the autodownload speed option to rediculously low levels (~3k/sec) by default. Have an option to redirect autodownloading to another server on the web, so that high-speed transfers are possible without killing current users' gameplay experience.

Completely true. People need to know where to get community created things. Also, there has to be some sort of review system to better the skills of the general community.

The Admiral's Command Chamber, a review site that has long been for JK and MotS, has opened space for JK2 (this is old news). They will probably open space for JK3 as well.

www.commandchamber.net)

Also, there are a lot of MP maps made that became nothing more than works of art. They need to be hosted on servers. People should be aware of this and take some interest.

It's such a shame that so many people, me included, spent so much time and effort creating something only to have no way of letting everyone know about it. The site you mention, for instance, was one I never knew of. Someone who is more casual about their gaming, and who doesn't participate in forums will likely never hear about it.

All we can do as a community is work together to share as much information as we can amoung each other on the forums and IRC.

I agree a central based non biased review site would indeed be nice.

Sadly, in many ways, LA does continue to hold us (the fan community, of which LFN is just one part) at arm's length.

I figure they do this for legal reasons. Perhaps they fear fan backlash, or don't trust us always. Perhaps they are afraid that somebody will try to sue them or tarnish their good name.

For whatever reason, LA chooses to acknowledge the fan community, but often appears not to respect us, or doesn't pay attention to us as often as we'd like.

This is in contrast to Raven, who have done just about everything they can to try to connect with us and help us out (when not restrained by LA of course). They got us the editing tools we wanted, they helped us out with editing and tech (they even compiled LivingDeadJedi's level for him) and posted on the forums with all sorts of info. They posted strategy guides they'd written for free, etc. A lot of console commands I never knew existed were made known to me by Raven guys posting on these very forums!

In recent times, LA has finally put up links to fan sites (for example JediKnightii.net off the Jedi Outcast thing) but with HUGE disclaimers about how they are not in any way supported, unofficial, etc etc. Legalese. I'm sure Aristotle, being a lawyer, could tell you all about the headaches involved. They've hosted more chats, posted more polls, and made more interviews. They've been gracious to us at E3 several years running.

I agree I'd love to see more support, but I think its a slow process...


Previous Jedi Knight games have included an EXE file (with pretty icon) that sent you to the MSN Gaming Zone. Something similar could be done to send you to the LucasArts page that links to the Fan Sites (the disclaimers intact). Putting in links to an IRC chat in the control panel (much as Unreal Tournament had) would be nice too. I don't expect that to happen though, since they'd have to add it to the Q3 engine, but who knows.


As for putting up reviews, it's a big job, so let's see some volunteers. Seriously.

LucasFiles does have a "rating" form for each download. Sadly only 3 people have voted a rating for the current JA video, although 200 have downloaded it.

If you're asking Raven or LA to review maps, that is asking a lot of them, but didn't that one guy (CliffyB?) from the Unreal Tournament team have a site to review the best maps? They could pay somebody or find somebody who's a big enough fan to do it. ; )

Maybe everyone should post links here to their favourite review sites for mod content, so we can compile a comprehensive list of sites to visit... Just an idea.

Also...if a comprehensive site is lacking, maybe it's time to make one...

I agree we need more information regarding the community, but Raven/LA can only do so much. If they actually added some community links to the engine, then wouldn't someone have to get paid for it? Unless the owners of the sites signed a contract or something of that sort in which said that they volunteered the service for free. If they blindly added community links to their game without asking, then they'd probably face legal issues.

That comprehensive site can be made with www.jediknight3.com) if there is going to be one.

There should be a community assessment page of some sort showcasing links to editing resources, download sites, fan sites, and mp organizations.

I had no idea there was such thing as www.jk2files.com) until about 2 months ago.

All this could have gone under my thread about improving the future JA editing community.

Originally posted by Obi-Wan X
I agree we need more information regarding the community, but Raven/LA can only do so much. If they actually added some community links to the engine, then wouldn't someone have to get paid for it? Unless the owners of the sites signed a contract or something of that sort in which said that they volunteered the service for free. If they blindly added community links to their game without asking, then they'd probably face legal issues.

Nobody would need to be paid for putting links to their sites within the game itself. Remember, site owners want hits! That's what allows them to sell advertising, etc. If Raven/LA put these links into the engine, then I certainly don't think any of the site admins would be complaining!

Originally posted by Kurgan
Sadly, in many ways, LA does continue to hold us (the fan community, of which LFN is just one part) at arm's length.


Trust Kurgan to reply to one of my long-winded threads. :]

Originally posted by StormHammer
Maybe everyone should post links here to their favourite review sites for mod content, so we can compile a comprehensive list of sites to visit... Just an idea.

Also...if a comprehensive site is lacking, maybe it's time to make one...

I don't think the sites that are lacking, it's Raven/LA's willingness and ability to integrate their product with the community that supports it. Jkii.net, lucasfiles.com, jk2files.com, massassi.net, etc.--that's plenty of sites, but who the hell knows about them? We know about some of them, obviously, but someone who goes out and buys jk2/JA isn't going to know squat until they get on the web and start doing web searches. Why have the extra barrier to overcome before entering the community? Just put links to the big sites in the damn game and make it easy! Nobody's ever bitched and moaned about something becoming genuinely easier to do.

Remember, this isn't hard to do technically. It's just a matter of getting them to do it.

Some developer or publisher is going to figure this out one day, and I can't wait to see it.

Well in addition to "fan" or "mod" sites, competition sites such as ogl, twl and cal (which will be supporting JA ladders) need to be made public as well.

People who play games like rtcw, counter-strike and quake 3 generally are gamers who are for the most part, aware of these places simply through years of gaming online.

However a lot of people I met in the year and a half of playing JK2 were simply not aware these places even existed.


Actually quake 3 is a perfect example.

Those of you who have it installed, click your start button > programs > quake 3 arena > q3a community.

There is a whole list of links (a lot are dead now since they were from 1999) for mod communities, patches, clan listings, leagues and ladders, the works.

The thing is none of it was "incorporated" into the game (like in the actual menu interface or application itself) so to speak, yet it's all there for easy access.

Also I could not agree more with what Kurgan said about Raven trying (with hands tied by Lucas legal) to be as supportive as possible.

I am fairly active in the SoF 2 community as well and much like id software, Raven gives as much support to the communities who follow their games as they can.

People generally wanted to point the finger at Raven for everything and anything that they did not like about JK2 but in reality even if they wanted to fix a problem; there was nothing they could do without the approval from Lucas legal.

While lack of community support on LA part was a contributing factor to many people leaving JO, i think a bigger part was the entire 1.03+ debacle.
I personally (as in friends i see everyday) know 5 people that stopped playing after 1.03 because the game changed in such a bad way. Nice solid 100% among those i know. That sort of thing happened countless times when people switched to 1.03.

If a lesson is to be learned, it should be that releasing patches which alienate a gigantic part of your playerbase - and those being the ones that tend to play the most and make the community happen - is a bad idea. If people are whining about ANYTHING in JA, take it with about six doses of salt and really think about whether completely remaking the multiplayer component is called for.

Laz

P.S. Any plans on making a promod academy, Art? :)

Originally posted by FK | unnamed
Well in addition to "fan" or "mod" sites, competition sites such as ogl, twl and cal (which will be supporting JA ladders) need to be made public as well.

People who play games like rtcw, counter-strike and quake 3 generally are gamers who are for the most part, aware of these places simply through years of gaming online.


Yeah, I caught on to TWL not long after my clan (FF GUNS RULES!) for JK2 started getting into the competitive field. The JK2 competitive community was really poor. There were some great talents (DSBr and khz are priceless examples), but the community was rather split and muddled. I am hoping the MP is more suitable and siege mode gives something more to offer. I play ET now.

While it sounds great im kinda iffy about making custom maps more common. For the most part, custom maps are garbage. There are exceptions but i get tired of spending 5 minutes downloading a new map (lot more time for jedi outcast) only to find out its a piece of garbage.

I prefer the original maps for the most part, rarely have I seen a player made one that was just as nice. And when its easy to use custom maps and get them then everyone tends to run their own favorite map in which case you get a ton of empty servers or crappy games.

You're hearts are in the right places, I think.

But for practical purposes that is part of the problem.

You need to prove to LEC, likely in a highly organized, professional and otherwise presentable manner, that these improvements you propose stand to make them more money than they would without them.

The people holding the reins of the company in question likely don't care about you beyond your signifigance as a potential dollar sign. The don't. Givva. ****. They are out to make money, money, and also more money.

Contact employees of the company to open a dialouge and nuture a relationship. This is one instance where nerds will require social skills to make any progress in addition to lots of prepartion and perseverence. Ask some of the staff members here for numbers and email addresses of LucasArts PR staff. They have them.

Just making LEC aware of these ideas isn't enough. They aren't going to pick your ideas just because they'll make a better game or a better community. They'll pick up your ideas only if it can be proved that a better game and a better community via these ideas will clearly make them more money.

Is this really necessary? Should things really be this hard? Absolutely and the world is a messed up place, respectively. Don't expect some of things to be done because they are the right thing to do. Barking up the morality tree where a corporation doesn't have a treehouse is not going to do you or anyone else any good.

You wanna get the ball rolling for the community? You've gotta play LEC's game in more ways than one. There is your answer.

ArtifeX,

I am the admin of LucasFiles and I appreciate your input. I would like to discuss some of your ideas.



[B]
But then, actually being able to find a download on either site is a moot point if you don't know about the site to begin with. Everyone who owns JK2/JA needs to be made immediately aware of the community that supports their new game. How much time would it take to add a couple of links on the main screen to lucasfiles.com and jkii.net (or another site)? Take it from someone who knows the code: not much. Yet, the rewards to the community would be huge. Imagine what would happen if the options on the main screen read:
- Single Player
- Multiplayer Player
- Setup
- JK2/JA Community
- Quit



LucasArts is actually supporting LucasFiles officially. On the one side that is a great thing, but along with the offical sanction comes the legal burden. The website is full of legal disclaimers. Some people may have wondered if they need a laywer to download or submit files to and from lucasfiles. LucasFiles wasn't too successful so far because it is lacking files. The reason is simple: We don't get a lot file submissions and I personally don't know why. Having his map or mod on LucasFiles should be considered a good thing. If LucasFiles would have more files, traffic and attention LucasArts would support it more on the official LucasArts website.

Maybe some of you mod / map creators can tell me about your concerns. I really would like to here them. We (You guys and I) do all this for fun and because we like what we do. It is not like we're earning money with this, can work full time on this and have it all figured out already.


2. It is all-important to coerce people into reviewing their downloaded files. Currently, review sites rely on nothing but users' goodwill to get their reviews. I would propose the site giving points for every review that you do, and based on the number of points in your account, you can do things like turn off advertising, submit editorials and articles, create larger numbers of threads in the forum per day, use more graphics in your reviews/forum posts, etc.


What would you prefer? A review or comment function within LucasFiles? A seperate website? On JK.net?
I like the idea of giving reward points to writers. How important is a comment / review function of a filesite to a file author? Would you rather send it to such a site than to one without this kind of functionality?
I am considering to integrate a comment/review system into LucasFiles. Maybe you guys can give me some suggestions.


4. The front page of the site (lucasfiles, other?) should be a listing of New, Highest Rated, and Most Popular download for the Day, Month, and All-Time (no, their current sidebar is not sufficient). It should show specific numbers, so that you can say, "Damn, this file's been downloaded 5 times as much as the next highest, and it's rated 4.5 out of 5 stars by 4000+ people." It should also keep statistics on live servers that shows how many servers are using any particular file (this would be difficult with smaller files, but with mods this should be easy). This would end the problem of people saying, "What should I download?".


Good idea. I admit that we need to improve the right sidebar or rethink it. I will think about :)

Thank you for your suggestions!

Vis

Originally posted by Visac
ArtifeX,

I am the admin of LucasFiles and I appreciate your input. I would like to discuss some of your ideas.




LucasArts is actually supporting LucasFiles officially. On the one side that is a great thing, but along with the offical sanction comes the legal burden. The website is full of legal disclaimers. Some people may have wondered if they need a laywer to download or submit files to and from lucasfiles. LucasFiles wasn't too successful so far because it is lacking files. The reason is simple: We don't get a lot file submissions and I personally don't know why. Having his map or mod on LucasFiles should be considered a good thing. If LucasFiles would have more files, traffic and attention LucasArts would support it more on the official LucasArts website.

its a two-way street. if people don't know about the site, they won't visit it. i personally didn't know about it until yesterday when artifex made this post. lucastarts wants it to be more sucsessful? then they have to get it advertised or linked to in a place where people will know about it.

its simple, to get traffic, you have to get the name to the people. and LA obviously dropped the ball for lucasfiles (if they were even trying...)

I think if us as fans need some sort of central database for files, it is up to us as fans to see that it is done. As Kurgan stated previously, some volunteers will be needed. And I can't think of a better place to recruit those volunteers than these forums. Maybe a new forum should be created, or even using an existing forum, so people can post news of their work, where to download it, so our happy volunteers can downlaod the file, review it, then post it to a central site for all fans to download.

I don't think JO suffered that problem at all. I think JO suffered from an overall crappiness factor that simply scared away a lot of players and developers. Getting the mods isn't the problem. Making them is. People are capable of getting off their ass and using Google, spending a whole six seconds to find some sites. The original Jedi Knight didn't have this, and it always had a very strong community with all sorts of mods.

On a tangent, Massassi.net has, I think the best level and commenting system on any site. You click on the link, it brings up the page for the file. Comments and ratings are right in front of you, and screenshots and the download links are visible. There's no navigating through half a dozen pages and going through FileFront or something just to download a file. Files are posted as long as people send them in.

Originally posted by Emon
On a tangent, Massassi.net has, I think the best level and commenting system on any site. You click on the link, it brings up the page for the file. Comments and ratings are right in front of you, and screenshots and the download links are visible. There's no navigating through half a dozen pages and going through FileFront or something just to download a file. Files are posted as long as people send them in.

That's a very good point. Streamlining is extremely important, IMHO, and not having to click through several pages to get to all the information you want on a particular file can really, really help. I prefer it when I can view everything about a file on the same page, including screenshot thumbnails, a brief description by the author, all the files details, ratings/popularity, how many times downloaded, and brief user reviews/comments underneath (and at the bottom of existing user comments a simple form to post your own comment and rating for the file), among other things. It would also be nice to see some regular articles on particular mods, FAQs about modding/editing, and interviews with some of these mod crews/authors. If this could all be tied together in a more cohesive way, and the site was advertised a great deal more, it would be great for the whole community.

It might also be an idea to have a section for particular mod authors to showcase all of their work on a single page. Think of it like some of these online artist galleries, where the author becomes a member of the site, and is allocated a page where they can upload their own content, and receive comments on particular pieces of work from their peers and from users. This sort of thing could help to 'bind' the community together a bit more.

As for advertising LucasFiles...maybe there should be links to it from the forums, as well as from the main sites. After all, I know many people only visit the forums, without visiting the main sites at all, so some really prominent links to LucasFiles from LucasForums could potentially attract more users.

And perhaps the Showcase Forum also needs to be advertised more. Just some thoughts.

During JK2's wild ride I was involved in 2 or 3 projects that flopped hard, and was greatly discouraged by the lack of success that projects that reached completion experienced.

The biggest problem that I found is that just when the coding community started gearring up and working together, this site lumped the coding forum, the skinning, and modelling forum in to one General forum, and more recently changed over to the new 'jk series' format, which puts editing questions for all jk games in to the General Editing forum.

This really annoyed me, stifled my ability to confer with other coders, and ultimately I released no mod for JK2.

Another thing was servers don't run enough custom mods and maps, so it seems that we will have to find server admins and encourage them to run community created content. I think more editing groups should be formed to create custom content and release it in 'packs' so that server admins will find it easier to download and run these.

Another thing, is competition. There ought to be some. Competition inspires creativity. Perhaps jkii.net or some site out there should run some competitions, if only for the glory of being the best.

I completely agree with Emon. This click here, click there, agree here, agree there crap really annoys me. Just click to view info and screenies and one more click under a disclaimer should be enough to start a download.

Also, jkii.net STOPPED posting new files in January, only 9 or 10 months after JK2's release. Doesn't seem too bad, right? Well, massassi.net STILL posts jk content TODAY, and it's been what, 6 years since jk was released? I think you see my point, 'nuff said.

Wudan...I agree with all the points you just raised. Holding competitions, making packs of the 'best maps' out there, etc., helps other games to achieve better notoriety and more on-going support from mod authors. It would be great if Raven could actually get involved by releasing a few new maps down the line, together with their 'pick of the best' from the user community, in a pack. That's what Epic did for UT and UT2K3...and it might be a greater incentive for more servers to carry a wider range of popular user-made maps if they have sort of a rubber stamp of authority from the developer. From a players perspective, I would also be more inclined to d/l a pack of the 'best' maps as viewed by the developer.

An even more radical step would be for this community to somehow pull together to actually provide a dedicated server to showcase 'maps of the week', run tournaments on them, and get player feedback that can also feature as comments on the pages where those files can be downloaded. Constructive criticism from a wider player base should eventually raise the bar in terms of quality where mod crews are concerned.

As for the structure of the editing forums...if there is a general concensus that they need to be improved, then certainly that needs to be debated, and any constructive suggestions put forward. ;)

Yes, Massassi had an excellent file downloads model, and they were very strict about their file submission policy (requiring description/author text file(s) and 2 screenshots zipped).

Originally posted by Lazarous
...If a lesson is to be learned, it should be that releasing patches which alienate a gigantic part of your playerbase...

Oh damn, don't you even get me started...

P.S. Any plans on making a promod academy, Art? :)

I'd really have to be a masochist to get that started again. I can't imagine how many hours I spent on that. If I find myself with a bunch of extra time and a computer on my desk, then maybe.

Originally posted by Visac
...We don't get a lot file submissions and I personally don't know why. Having his map or mod on LucasFiles should be considered a good thing. If LucasFiles would have more files, traffic and attention LucasArts would support it more on the official LucasArts website.

I'd love to see some reliable statistics on how many game purchasers ever visit the lucasarts website. I'm still getting emails from people trying my old mod for the first time who weren't even aware that there were any official patches for the game!

My point: put the links to the site(s) in a highly visible place within the game--the main screen. Nothing else will channel so many hits as that will.

What would you prefer? A review or comment function within LucasFiles? A seperate website? On JK.net?
I like the idea of giving reward points to writers. How important is a comment / review function of a filesite to a file author? Would you rather send it to such a site than to one without this kind of functionality?
I am considering to integrate a comment/review system into LucasFiles. Maybe you guys can give me some suggestions.

Mod writers/Content creators write create their work for one reason: recognition. If there is a site out there that will host their work and allow them to receive that recognition more easily from the community, then more people will create content and submit it for posting there.

Grease the wheels between the author and the player. Remove any barriers that prevent the two from communicating. Having a separate central community forum (lucasforums) and filebase (lucasfiles, etc.) is a barrier. Integrate the two. Figure out what you can give player-reviewers as a reward for well-written reviews (I named a few) and put the mechanism in place that will give it to them. Figure out what makes authors' work super-visible and put that in place (community link in the game engine). Form a JK webring with other fansites, and make that visible! Anyone playing the game for the first time should be slammed in the face with, "Damn, this game's got a huge support community!", not, "I wonder if there's any sites for this game (types URL of search engine into browser)."

Good idea. I admit that we need to improve the right sidebar or rethink it. I will think about :)

Thank you for your suggestions!

Vis

No problem. I like to drop in every couple of months and stir the pot a bit.

Oh, and don't misunderstand what I wrote... I think a lot of ArtifeX's ideas are great, and surely will help, but I don't think lack of them is why JO wasn't very successful. I don't think I've ever seen a game that links you right to the files, except maybe Ghost Recon where a mod author can store a URL that gets displayed on a failed connection due to lack of the mod.

The original JK didn't have it, and it's editing was a tremenous success, especially for every tool, document, specification, being entirely user made. JK had no help from LEC (except file comments), and despite its small size, it was still in its prime in 2001, and is still edited today. So I don't think help from LEC or Raven is really necessary. All we need is a really good game that inspires people to mod it, and a good enough mod base to make things easy, and from what we've seen, JA looks to be just that.

Artifex:

I have the upmost respect for you and your work, but there will be no link. JA went gold sometime last week, and I doubt even if LA were receptive to us that they would bother to add it now. We should concentrate on how to get things done ourselves. That said...

Suppose we were able to get a site with large bandwidth to host a page that just has news on mods and maps for JA and JA alone. From there all we need to do is inform the new players. As I've said, LA isn't going to put a link in the game, so we should start thinking of ways to make people aware of where this site is (whatever site it might be).

Aside from a link on the main screen, the next best way I can possible think of to advertise to the general JA public (and is something we can actually manipulate ourselves without actuall modding the game) is to create a server that shows up at the top of the list alphabetically, is running a popular map, and has the web address in the title as well as brief info in the MOTD, and has more info on the location and content of the site in that thing that spams text on the screen at certain intervals. Maybe if a few such servers were created, we would be able to direct some more people toward this new community.

If someone were to create a bunch of servers that aren't actually accessible (so as to reduce bandwidth cost of having such a large amount of servers) you could serve enough to intersperse the site address throughout the server list. yes, yes, I can see Kurgan and a few others charging my way shouting about how that could be seen as a misuse of the list and may very well open up a can of worms somewhere along the line, but its the only way I can think of that comes close to the effect that Artifex wanted.


Emon:

There is one thing different about JK1 from JK2 that relates to what you are saying. The prequels were not released yet. In 1997 the Star Wars game buying population was different. I don't think I'll elaborate more on that, I'll let you all think that one through for yourselves.


All:

I realize that diversity is a good thing, etc, but another problem was that there were a lot of mods out there that duplicated features, or didn't really add much to the game. In certain situations, we had some real talent in the community split across different projects. Thats going to happen; thats the nature of things. But why don't we hold a sort of 'modder's summit'. Get together people that are interested in modding the game and working on some big project. Have someone moderate the whole thing. If all the modders were to sit down and discuss what it is they want to do/fix, we might very well find that we could combine the talent of such people to create better projects. Don't try to moderate it too much, don't try to grant approval over someone's idea, etc. Just let it happen, and see what comes of it. I think we may be pleasantly suprised to see a couple of organized large scale projects come out of it. I think it would be especially effective if a certain time limit was given on the meeting, say an hour, and have it recur every week or every other week on a certain day. This could even be incorperated into the site in the form of a chatroom (you know one of the scripts that will connect to one of the major IRC servers and join a predefined channel). This could also be easily done with a forum dedicated to the same task. I tend to think that a forum might be more practical.

I remember in the JK1 heyday, we had a great program called "Patch Commander" to run the gob/goo (the container files used by JK1/MotS) files easily.

The program also had a small built in FTP program to connect to "patch repositories".

The problem was the author only got sent a very small number of patch repositories submissions, so he quit the feature. But it was a great idea.

Too bad JA won't have that built in. I am always of the mind to download and install mods myself rather than download them off a server (slow... no support files, installs them in the wrong directory, etc).

A lot of people got confused by the emote mods too, because they'd join my regular server and ask why they couldn't amsit or whatever. ; p

I was thinking about SP maps for a second and I realized something. Some people created maps that you would have to use console commands to open. Others created maps that would be activated by selecting it in the "Mods" setup directory in game. Map activation should be standardized somehow.

Jo was very successful from a market point of view, it was the best selling game in alot of countries.

yeah but, and this is only the impression i got, it didn't seem to hang around very long at the top of the charts. That is the advantage to the publishers... if a game has a big community and loads of mods then it stays relevant a lot longer. People are still buying Half-life so they can play mods.

Im thinking of buying UT2003 just cos of that new SW mod.

The sims is still going strong because of all the expansions and the fact people can add their own characters.

Emon - part of the problem these days is that it is no longer as easy as it once was to make these mods. What used to be single user creations requiring a few free tools and a little bit of knowledge of a few areas now require a whole team, often with expensive modelling software and lots of skills in high polygon modelling, lots of texture maps and so on. By the time a lot of these large scale mods get close to completion people have already stopped playing the game... that is if they don't get bogged down before they are finished.

Edge (http://www.edge-online.com) (UK games mag) did an excellent article on the evolution of Modding in their August issue.

I played around with JKed and made a few levels back in the day, but i wouldn't have the time to attempt something decent for JO these days. However, the mods and levels for JK never really approached the quality of the Q2 ones that were around at the same time. :(

Originally posted by ArtifeX
I'd really have to be a masochist to get that started again. I can't imagine how many hours I spent on that. If I find myself with a bunch of extra time and a computer on my desk, then maybe.

I really liked the saber play in ProMod, as someone who doesn't like saber play in general. I was a coder for AotCTC and I was upset that they never really grabbed hold of it.

I'd really like to see you stop by jk2coding on quakenet, or jkacoding (which is where we'll be going shortly) to talk to you about what you think is required for a mod for JA (especially if you don't plan on doing one). I think your ideas are very solid.

This will probably make a few people unhappy but oh well, I'm going to say it anyways.

One of the huge problems with JK2 was there were no "true" mods ever made (the gladiator mod kicked major ass but it came very late in the game and it was sp only). I know there was to be (unless they came out and I missed them) an AotC & DF TC's but I don't think either were finished.

Now when I say "true" think Counter-Strike for Half-Life or Urban Terror for Quake 3 or Tactical Ops for Unreal Tournament.

Granted we can sit here and argue over the difference between a total conversion and a mod all day, but I think my point is pretty clear.

Basically every mod made for JK2 fell into one of two categories:


"This is my version of how JK2 should be."

Or

"Now you can do cart wheels and have double bladed neon pink sabers and a 2 foot tall yoda."


And to make it worse it was not just one or two of those types of mods, it seemed as if every week a different mod came out that basically did nothing more than add one or two new emotes thus adding more confusion to the already similar looking batch of mods out there.



No disrespect to the people who made those mods, but let's not kid ourselves, no one is going to buy a copy of JK2 just to play those types of mods.

Forget about major TC’s like the AotC/DF projects and take a look at mods that tried to introduce new game modes.

Hydro ball was one (pretty fun too) and umm… can’t really think of any more…

Remember CTF started out as a mod as did Team Fortress, and both proved to keep people interested you don’t have to make a “new game” out of the existing one for a mod to succeed in breathing new life into a game.


Bottom line is while I agree all kinds of links and official support from LA would be good for the game, as far as mods go, if noting more than "this is how JA should be" or "JA with new and improved emotes" is ever made, once the initial "freshness" of the game wears off it will die just as rapid a death as JK2 did if there is noting radically different (from base game play) there to keep people interested.

Originally posted by FK | unnamed

No disrespect to the people who made those mods, but let's not kid ourselves, no one is going to buy a copy of JK2 just to play those types of mods.


Invalid, since there exists at least one (me) that bought the game with exactly that type of mod in mind (making the game the way it should be).

OSP for Q3 was not one of these ubermods you speak of, yet it was very popular. Same goes for Rocket Arena.

I respectfully disagree that a mod has to be basically a TC in order for it to 'work'. Dark Forces 2 went on forever because it had great gameplay to start off with. So if you can take flawed gameplay and make it great gameplay, then it stands to reason that you can increase the life of the game simply by *shocked* making it balanced and fun! You don't need to make the lightsabers into swords, change all the models, and leave the Star Wars universe with a one way ticket to ancient Rome to do that either.

I do agree that the major problem was that there were too many similar mods made. See the last section of my above post for my suggestions on that.

Psudo-quote from my previous post

I realize that diversity is a good thing, etc, but another problem was that there were a lot of mods out there that duplicated features, or didn't really add much to the game. In certain situations, we had some real talent in the community split across different projects. Thats going to happen; thats the nature of things. But why don't we hold a sort of 'modder's summit'. Get together people that are interested in modding the game and working on some big project. Make this happen on a forum. If all the modders were to sit down and discuss what it is they want to do/fix, we might very well find that we could combine the talent of such people to create better projects. Don't try to moderate it too much, don't try to grant approval over someone's idea, etc. Just let it happen, and see what comes of it. I think we may be pleasantly suprised to see a couple of organized large scale projects come out of it.

As far as I know they're still working on the DFTC though it's moving somewhat slow. Don't get me wrong, I think it's better they do it slowly and bugfree than fast and full of game-killing bugs.

As for the AotCTC I don't know... You know, I'll take a look at their site now...
They seem to be in for a release, be it only a beta one very soon so I'd not say they're cancelled.

And lastly I have to say Raven have supported JO brilliantly. Esecially compared DA/MS do/did to Freelancer... Only the modding community keeps that game alive... BTW I think MS are lousy at supporting their games at all :P

Very nice post Artifex.

You're 100% right. To extend the life of any mp game, it has to have a thriving community. Part of that community is from the competition side where leagues like TWL, OGL and CAL come in, but the majority is the people that just play the game on public servers. You have the duelers, the CTF players, and in JA, you'll have the siege players. In all the pubbing I did in Jedi Outcast, I didn't see alot of talk about the community. Mods, maps, competition etc. Word of mouth is probably the only way to reach people who don't hit forums, fan sites, etc. I've always viewed those 'community' links on the loadup screen the same way I view the 'help' links. They are just there to take up space :)

As members of the community, we need to spread the word. Play some different gametypes, talk up the fun that being a part of the community is. Competition, mods, custom maps - they all bring the game to life after you've exhausted the singleplayer and stock multiplayer.

Find a popular server and talk about it. Word of mouth is the number 1 way to bring new players into the community.

Originally posted by Garath
Very nice post Artifex.

As members of the community, we need to spread the word. Play some different gametypes, talk up the fun that being a part of the community is. Competition, mods, custom maps - they all bring the game to life after you've exhausted the singleplayer and stock multiplayer.

Find a popular server and talk about it. Word of mouth is the number 1 way to bring new players into the community.

Word of mouth is the easiest way, but it isn't reliable. We need to almost advertise things.

I felt glum that a lot of custom MP maps weren't hosted. Yeah, there were favorites around like Bespin Towers, but for example when were the Cloud Cartography Pack maps ever hosted anywhere? Those were great maps!

There is so much around, but people have to take interest in it.

Originally posted by toms
...
Emon - part of the problem these days is that it is no longer as easy as it once was to make these mods. What used to be single user creations requiring a few free tools and a little bit of knowledge of a few areas now require a whole team, often with expensive modelling software and lots of skills in high polygon modelling, lots of texture maps and so on. By the time a lot of these large scale mods get close to completion people have already stopped playing the game... that is if they don't get bogged down before they are finished.
...

Good point. That's why I always stuck to changes that altered gameplay rather than cosmetics. Better game now, pretty later.

Originally posted by Wudan
I really liked the saber play in ProMod, as someone who doesn't like saber play in general. I was a coder for AotCTC and I was upset that they never really grabbed hold of it.

I'd really like to see you stop by jk2coding on quakenet, or jkacoding (which is where we'll be going shortly) to talk to you about what you think is required for a mod for JA (especially if you don't plan on doing one). I think your ideas are very solid.

Thanks man. I'd love to stop by, but I'm computerless at home right now (currently looking at building another), and my work firewall wont let me into irc.

Would like to know what's going on with AOTCTC, since they're the only ones I ever gave my source code to.

Originally posted by JaledDur
Artifex:

I have the upmost respect for you and your work, but there will be no link. JA went gold sometime last week, and I doubt even if LA were receptive to us that they would bother to add it now. ...


It's inevitable that there will be a patch. Adding a community link to the main page would be laughably easy. There are two possibilities why there's not one there already: they don't want to put one there, or they didn't think of putting one there. I'm simply trying to take care of the second case. Nothing to be done about the first one, especially when hard-nosed LA is involved.

Originally posted by JaledDur
Invalid, since there exists at least one (me) that bought the game with exactly that type of mod in mind (making the game the way it should be).

OSP for Q3 was not one of these ubermods you speak of, yet it was very popular. Same goes for Rocket Arena.


I'm sure if I looked hard enough I could find a guy who bought jk2 because he saw a pic of a Lando bot in PC gamer and thought it would make a good father figure/role model for his children.

The initial statement was what many refer to as a broad generalization.

And while you may have bought the game for the mods you saw, I think it's safe to say the overwhelming majority of pc gamers who picked up jk2 after it had been out for a while did not do it solely because they wanted to play mods that let them /amsit in a 3d game.

Remember CTF started out as a mod as did Team Fortress, and both proved to keep people interested you don’t have to make a “new game” out of the existing one for a mod to succeed in breathing new life into a game.

I agree (like I stated above) that a game does not have to be an "uber mod" or total conversion to breath life into a game.

Problem was the 99% of the mods we got really didn't change much other than aesthetics (model sizes, emotes, new saber colors etc.)

The one exception to that would be pro mod.

And while I agree with the majority of changes made in that mod and really do admire the thought put into the refinement of the combat system I also understand why people pretty much ignored it

It made massive game play changes and effectively became a “separate version/patch” when compared to base jk2.

While this may have pleased some people, a lot of us didn’t really bother with it because we had no desire to learn two separate versions of what was essentially the same game.

Another thing, FK | unnamed... ProMod also made it harder for certain...types of players... to win. And there are a lot of that type. And a lot of them, I am sure, were of the mind that if there was a mod that made it harder for them to "own" people, then said mod was not for them. Probabky because 'fun' for them is feeling superior, not the same is what is fun for me, which is a close pitched battle where I had to use every scrap of what I know to win.

<sarcasm>
Also, Promod, in its authors supreme ignorance, left out features that would allow its users to live vicariously through the internet.</sarcasm> But, frankly, Promod's gameplay, as of 3.1 (was it 3.1?) was just about a hair's breadth from totally badass.

But I see what you mean -- if the mod doesn't offer something that is totally new, there is no incentive for people that otherwise dont CARE about the game's balance (or rather what may be *wrong* with it) to download and play that mod. There needs to be a hook. Several, in fact.

Originally posted by JaledDur
Another thing, FK | unnamed... ProMod also made it harder for certain...types of players... to win. And there are a lot of that type. And a lot of them, I am sure, were of the mind that if there was a mod that made it harder for them to "own" people, then said mod was not for them. Probabky because 'fun' for them is feeling superior, not the same is what is fun for me, which is a close pitched battle where I had to use every scrap of what I know to win.

<sarcasm>
Also, Promod, in its authors supreme ignorance, left out features that would allow its users to live vicariously through the internet.</sarcasm> But, frankly, Promod's gameplay, as of 3.1 (was it 3.1?) was just about a hair's breadth from totally badass.

But I see what you mean -- if the mod doesn't offer something that is totally new, there is no incentive for people that otherwise dont CARE about the game's balance (or rather what may be *wrong* with it) to download and play that mod. There needs to be a hook. Several, in fact.

Whoa, wait a minute, you're not actually taking the same side of an argument as me are you?? Are you forgetting you're supposed to be the devil's advocate around here? :]

Originally posted by toms
Emon - part of the problem these days is that it is no longer as easy as it once was to make these mods. What used to be single user creations requiring a few free tools and a little bit of knowledge of a few areas now require a whole team, often with expensive modelling software and lots of skills in high polygon modelling, lots of texture maps and so on. By the time a lot of these large scale mods get close to completion people have already stopped playing the game... that is if they don't get bogged down before they are finished.

I disagree. For JK, we had to make all the tools ourselves and figure everything out on our own. Most mods were made by just a few people, rarely did any kind of huge conversion ever suceed.

With JO, on the other hand, almost everything is given to us. Expensive modeling software? That's not a problem. More player models appeared for JO in two weeks than than have appeared in JK's six years.

Modding for JK was a hell of a lot harder, especially for the first two or three years. But that didn't make people quit. It's got nothing to do with how hard or easy it is to make them. It all lies within the quality of the game itself. JO just wasn't good enough to attract and maintain enough modders, ane especially enough players. I know several guys who did JK for years, but were not inspired to edit JO.

Originally posted by Emon
Modding for JK was a hell of a lot harder, especially for the first two or three years. But that didn't make people quit. It's got nothing to do with how hard or easy it is to make them. It all lies within the quality of the game itself. JO just wasn't good enough to attract and maintain enough modders, ane especially enough players. I know several guys who did JK for years, but were not inspired to edit JO.

While I agree to an extent, I think there are other factors that contribute to this kind of situation. You have to remember that when Jedi Knight was released way back in 1997, there were not a great wealth of games supporting MP on the market.

Since then, as you know, practically every FPS released has had some kind of MP elements, and we've also had dedicated MP games in the form of Q3 and UT (and it's sequels), BF1942, among others. The entire gaming vista has changed, and there is a great deal more choice available regarding where modders can apply their talents.

Perhaps you're right in that JO was not as popular as some of these other titles...and it certainly has it's own flavour of gameplay style...but there must also be a situation where mod crews are simply spread more thinly across a range of different games. It must be increasingly hard to target a particular game asyour mod development platform, when you know that a year down the line (after you've finished your mod), the community around that game may have dwindled considerably and moved onto something else. So it makes more sense to support the vanilla mainstream, on occasion. Basically, Star Wars and a mix of melee/gun combat is not to everyone's taste.

Personally I think there is quite a good community around these newer games in the JK series, and some remarkable talent associated with some of the better mods out there, but I know they also have problems attracting more people to their teams.

Hopefully, the new Siege mode in JA will attract more of those people who prefer that style of play (like Enemy Territory for Wolfenstein). As long as the engine is more mod-friendly and flexible enough, it could revitalise part of the community.

Yes, that was another problem. JO's MP rendering engine just sucked. A lot. The addition of AI and scripting right in MP gives ordinary level editors more freedom without having to code new entities.

Originally posted by StormHammer
While I agree to an extent, I think there are other factors that contribute to this kind of situation. You have to remember that when Jedi Knight was released way back in 1997, there were not a great wealth of games supporting MP on the market.

Since then, as you know, practically every FPS released has had some kind of MP elements, and we've also had dedicated MP games in the form of Q3 and UT (and it's sequels), BF1942, among others. The entire gaming vista has changed, and there is a great deal more choice available regarding where modders can apply their talents.

Perhaps you're right in that JO was not as popular as some of these other titles...and it certainly has it's own flavour of gameplay style...but there must also be a situation where mod crews are simply spread more thinly across a range of different games. It must be increasingly hard to target a particular game asyour mod development platform, when you know that a year down the line (after you've finished your mod), the community around that game may have dwindled considerably and moved onto something else. So it makes more sense to support the vanilla mainstream, on occasion. Basically, Star Wars and a mix of melee/gun combat is not to everyone's taste.
...
Hopefully, the new Siege mode in JA will attract more of those people who prefer that style of play (like Enemy Territory for Wolfenstein). As long as the engine is more mod-friendly and flexible enough, it could revitalise part of the community.

I was going to write a post along these lines, then read this one. Suffice to say:

^
|-------What he said.

I'm not sure if this has been posted, but what they need to do is the Warcraft 3 effect, where their are high speed p2p downloads ingame. That makes it a lot easier for customs to be intoduced into the comunity