Quote:
Originally Posted by dcb
Deh, stii vorba aia... Iadul e pavat cu bune intentii. (Romanian proverb)
In terms of moddability, the series went downhill since SH3.
SH3 had a very active modding community because it could be easily modded by the guy with average computer skills. It still has the highest number of mods and supermods of the franchise, and this has nothing to do with it being the oldest. SH4 was a setback with this regard, with fewer modders involved and fewer supermods.
As for SH5, yes, it may be more moddable than the previous games, as you say, but modding its core (I don't mean sounds and visuals) is only accessible to the most technically competent people, skilled with Python and machine code. And this special breed of modders is not very common to any gaming community. The moment you decided to get into scripts, you turned away most of the modders that worked miracles with the previous installments.
For the latest game in the series, it was a lifesaver having TDW and Trevally obstinately committed to SH5, else the game would have been unplayable, the way Ubi pushed it on the market. Just remember the half-baked campaign it came with, and the fact that you hadn't even programmed a rudder control in the initial interface.
You say: Not everything turned out ok, esp. with technology change things go to hell...
True! Any technology change should have in mind the skills of the public it addresses. It is my personal opinion that, had you decided to stick with the technology of SH3&4, improve it and incorporate the features demanded by the community in the already tested (and tweaked) engine, the end result would have been the masterpiece we all awaited. And the modding community would have thrived as well.
Best regards,
dcb
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Dan, I can't agree here.
I think you're confusing modability (the technical part of the game that allows mods) with modding - the extent to which a game is modded or popular with modders.
Modability went downhill from SH3 to 4 probably because:
-in general less players were interested in SH4 (US boats) than in SH3
-many people were spent after modding the hell out of 3
-modding SH4 (or 5) meant starting much from scratch, which is hard to justify to yourself after spending months, years of your life on the previous game
There are still a bunch of great mods available for SH4 and have always been, but many people have no interest in them. And there's also a bunch of people that will say that "with SH3 + mods they have no need for SH4/5". Of course, part of the failure in the communication plan of Ubisoft is that we didn't convince these people otherwise. Now SH4 was a project that was also buggy, but so was 3! People just forgive a lot when thinking of SH3, as it came after the long hiatus from SH2 - which was generally considered not so good - and brought a great technology step forward!
Now, we can discuss technology a lot but anyone would be hard pressed to prove how using hex editing and 3rd party built programs (that you have to wait for to be developed) is somehow more accessible than simple scripting? Show me what mods were done for SH3 that can't be done for 5 ... except ships hacking, I can't think of any.
Hell, I know at least one person that got the SH3 internal tools from me and worked with them ... most had to rely on excellent tools that were built by other people. With SH5 - you got them in the release version!
There are some technology issues with SH5 mods, but in general, it was the same for 3! It's just that with a less successful product and the huge base that SH3 already offers, there's less drive to work on it.
However, I see a very active forum of SH5 modders, some great work already done and some very happy players. I'd just say people THINK its not as modable ?!
Now, the technology changed was needed as the old one was buggy, original code writers were gone, code was not extensible. Sure it could have been done much better, and in general its hard to defend SH5 technology as being awesome and well done ... but some if it truly is!
Also, "the road to hell is paved with good intentions" is not strictly Romanian 
Hope you don't get me wrong and I might sound a little aggressive, that's not the intention, I'm just going after some facts and misconceptions. We can always have a beer and chat. Remember I'm no longer in the Ubi office / email, though.
Dan