Czudak
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[This one is going to be presented in English since I don't want to drop a botched Google Translate monstrosity. Also, since there's more space on a forum than in a newspaper ad or on Twitter, here goes a little introduction before the "meat" of the post.]
The golden era of Gothic modding is over. Anyone who's actively invested in the topic is well aware of that. My quick research based on numbers from:
- Google Trends
- Alexa (with free trial premium account)
- SpyFu
- Act-On
- SEMrush
For:
- worldof(players/gothic).ru & rpgrussia.com (for Russian side of Gothic modding scene)
- worldof(players/gothic).de (for German side of Gothic modding scene)
- themodders.org & bractwospolszczenia.pl & druzynaspolszczenia.pl (for Polish side of Gothic modding scene)
Reveals that for a fact. Each year aggregates less visits, less interest, and less traffic in general, while the biggest percentage of the resulting traffic is directed towards those "mega" mods of The Returning, L'Hiver, Odyssee or their translations (plus mods from "Destiny" Polish series, plus a generally "super modded" {QP, CM, CP, CPU and etc.} Gothic 3 for all). Additionally, via another swift investigation one can safely conclude that most of new content that pops up appears to be recycling of the same (I'm adding to the problem with my YAUP modification). Finally, modding efforts for Risens, Arcanias, and ELEX is basically non existent in comparison to that of Gothics.
Partially it's because of the worn Gothic concepts and ideas, partially it's because of the "splintered main departments" of the fandom at large (the clear division of Russian, German, and Polish sides, with seemingly micro participation of all interested other languages), partially it's because forums lost ground to places of scattered agitation like Facebook, Discord, Reddit and such, partially it's because of natural entropy of Internet communities.
On the other hand, places like Nexus Mods and Steam Workshop and ModDb experience another era of revival and renaissance, getting more and more titles every day, while gathering large audiences concentrated around modding. Clearly, profiled (sub) pages for games, dedicated clients that make installing mods easy (only NM and SW at the moment, because ModDb has nothing of sort), plus English as the local language help a lot in making them attractive.
At the moment, English mods for Gothics, Risens, Arcanias, and ELEX are only a tiny slice of titles available on the mentioned sites. That creates a niche. Niche I want to use, but I can't do that alone.
ENTRYWAY
My ad is addressed to all those interested in creating and developing a modding team which:
- will focus on Piranha Bytes' games of:
A) all Gothics (including the third iteration)
B) all Risens (apparently the first part of trilogy is still considered the best PB game of all time, but the two others are somewhat recognized as well)
C) Arcania(s) (it's high time to actually create a quality mod for this game {and/or its addons})
D) ELEX
- will release everything in the modern Latin of English language as to reach a much bigger international audience, but not machine translated via Google Translate or some other broken shit; as a side note, localization to other languages wouldn't be of any interest to this team to avoid losing energy and momentum with something that other interested fans could perform
- will release their stuff on dedicated mod pages localized on ModDb for the primary site, Nexus Mods and Steam Workshop for the secondary sites; Nexus Mods and Steam Workshop would require initial effort to actually set up working (games and mods) pages for PB games hence why they are going to be the supplementary sites
- will have a Patreon site and a Discord server, where both places would work as main communication channel with (involved) fans and "patrons"
Before stepping into the another paragraph, a short explanation: yes, this team is going to "earn" money via regular donations (regular by default, because there are other models of receiving donations on Patreon or outside of it). But that's not for them coins to end in the members' pockets (that can be arranged if there would ever be any serious money) but as funds to support development process of mods (dubbing, scripts, graphics, stuff like that).
Furthermore, with money one can gauge the level of interest and (enough) interest always motivates, where so called "hype" benefits the creator(s), supplying them with the inertia needed to finish their work. Plus, one requires attentiveness if they want to last longer than a few weeks in the today's Internet; the place is littered with ruins of those who didn't have any tangible notice and regard for their endeavors. Of course, at the beginning there won't be much scrutiny for the team, but it *will* grow substantially with time, since there's nothing like this happening at the moment (and I'm 95% sure there won't be in future).
TENEMENTS
What is needed of potential "contenders":
- general technical knowledge of Piranha Bytes' games, with independent and self sufficient (de)compilation and basic edits of games' assets and files, like scripts, graphics, models, sounds, music etc., and is the fundamental requirement for the modder; the modding tools are readily available already (for Gothics, Risens and ELEX, but I'm not so sure about Arcania)
- general knowledge of story and fictional essentials of Piranha Bytes' games (nothing specialized and/or obscure); as one of the driving points, this team would be focused on actually delivering content and will shy from prolonged and boring disputes of what is "canon" and what is "fanon" and is it "lore" enough
- general ability of handling written English on at least B1 level (spoken is another story)
- general knowledge of:
A) writing dialogues, stories, scenarios, and abstract concepts
B) creating raster graphic elements with Photoshop, GIMP, Clip Studio Paint or whatever
C) modeling with Blender or 3DS Max
D) editing video with anything
E) editing sounds and music with anything
F) Union
Would be most desirable and appreciated.
BLOODFALLS
What I offer myself:
- general knowledge of written English C1 tier and spoken B2 tier
- general good knowledge of ModDb, Nexus Mods, and Steam Workshop and their communities
- general fair knowledge of modding PB games:
A) (de)compilation and basic edits of games' assets and files (scripts, animations, textures, sounds, video)
B) very good 2D raster graphic editing in Photoshop for graphics and textures
C) initially intermediate 3D graphic editing in Blender (models, objects, worlds, animations)
D) basic editing of sounds and video in Photoshop and Premiere
E) non existent editing of music
F) non existent ability to handle Ikarus, LeGo, Ninja and Union
- general fine knowledge of Patreon and its dealings
- general work sheets for all quality mods for PB games in Google Docs format (I came thoroughly prepared in this section)
- general assistance in modding PB games
***
I'm conscious of this project being very ambitious but this isn't some "Hai, I have some great suggestion, letz do a mod!" idea I pulled out of my ass without any prior reconnaissance. This model of modding well known, acclaimed games, like The Elder Scrolls, Fallouts, C&Cs, games of Id Tech 1 or Europa or Infinity Engine, and many others is successful on Patreon since 2015 and that part of it is only going to grow. This is the best moment to make so for Piranha Bytes' games as well.
Feel free to drop criticism, feedback, recruit counter propositions, or whatever.
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) и Элекса.
