Originally Posted by kaffis
Modding tools and map creation tools make sense in a peer-hosted (or publicly hosted server) environment.
This is neither. There will be a limited number of servers to select from, and so there isn't room for servers serving up mods and community content for a niche subset of the market to either enjoy or shop around for a better offering. In addition, you only need to find 11-31 (depending on the game and map) other players who share your unique mix of preferences to have a thriving game on that server.
The key to mod/custom map content is that if I don't like what a server's running (because it's crap or catering to a fringe playstyle that may or may not be at odds with the rest of the game's design principles), I can move on and select from hundreds of other ones that choose to run something more akin to my tastes. SOE can't afford to run that many, nor fragment its userbase that far even if it could afford to, since it needs to pack thousands of players into each server-space to provide the player density to support its massive game edict.
|
I don't mean fragment the user base. Just so that SOE make tools for people to create a continent with and then submit to the dev's, so that they can choose which to put into the game. I wouldn't want it as open as you're saying for it to be. They will have to add continents either way, this is no different. It would save them the time to focus on other parts of the game, if they made tools for people to use.
Threaded Mode