rec.autos.simulators

> Going back to IndyCar Racing and the original NASCAR Racing, Papyrus
> worked
> hard to discourage mods.  I presented Kaemmer with evidence that the
> (wholly
> unintentional) "modability" of Microsoft's Flight Simulator actually
> encouraged that sim's growth.  Eventually, Papyrus embraced the idea.
> But,
> like SimBin, which started out as modders and now discourage it in GTR
> (they
> shut down a promising BMW M3 expansion car and won't even permit mention
> of
> 3rd-party tracks on their forums), Papy's legal and spiritual successor,
> F1RST, has joined the ranks of the Blue Meanies.  They don't seem to have
> learned anything from the mods of games like Half-Life and Battlefield,
> which would prolly have ceased to exist w/o mods like Counter-Strike and
> Galactic Conquest.  It's been the salvation of racing sims in an era when
> console games and ring-tones for cells almost wiped PC *** off the face
> of the earth.  Even Unreal Tournament is on board, promoting modding with
> contests like Make Something Unreal.  Kaemmer may be Master of the Physics
> Engine, but abt. what makes the *** world go around, he ain't gotta
> clue.

>> > These guys are not merely ripping off somebody else's whole shtick,
>> > they're bragging about it.  Talk abt. hacking the executable....

>>     I only remember that Papyrus was ENCOURAGING mod groups when the
>> 1.201
>> patch was released.  THey were almost begging for modders to help stave
> off
>> EA's juggernaut.  Now I know FIRST is NOT PAPYRUS legally, but they are
>> close enough in my mind that it feels like FIRST is going back on
>> Papyrus'
>> promise.

>> dave henrie

> If this mod dispute landed in court, F1RST would win in a walk, but not on
> the merits of the case, but because Kaemmer's financial muscle (the owner
> of the Red Sox) would crush the individual modders who ply their trade for
> the love of the game.  Too bad Mr. Kaemmer doesn't realize that the very
> people he is stomping on here are the core of his future audience...that
> is, if he ever gets a product out the door that these people might
> actually otherwise want.

> > Give FIRST a chance to actually produce something that you might like
> > straight out of the box before complaining that you can't alter it to
suit
> > your needs.

> The majority of the mods you mention there, Steve, extend the current code
> and do not alter the actual core code and that's where FIRST is drawing
the
> line. FIRST is only going after mods that alter the .exe. While I'm not
> especially happy about it (I was looking forward to the 1970's mod and the
> 2005 update) FIRST not only is fully within their rights, I wouldn't be
> surprised if they legally have to. I can't remember what flight sim it was
> where some airline had a cow about people putting replicas of their
> airplanes into it. Let's say one of of the car manufacturers that were in
> the original GTP mod decided they didn't like their cars in the mod and
went
> after Redline over it. If FIRST did not do anything to prevent Redline's
> original mod then I'm sure some lawyer out there could twist it that they,
> too, were culpable.

> > Going back to IndyCar Racing and the original NASCAR Racing, Papyrus
> > worked
> > hard to discourage mods.  I presented Kaemmer with evidence that the
> > (wholly
> > unintentional) "modability" of Microsoft's Flight Simulator actually
> > encouraged that sim's growth.  Eventually, Papyrus embraced the idea.
> > But,
> > like SimBin, which started out as modders and now discourage it in GTR
> > (they
> > shut down a promising BMW M3 expansion car and won't even permit mention
> > of
> > 3rd-party tracks on their forums), Papy's legal and spiritual successor,
> > F1RST, has joined the ranks of the Blue Meanies.  They don't seem to
have
> > learned anything from the mods of games like Half-Life and Battlefield,
> > which would prolly have ceased to exist w/o mods like Counter-Strike and
> > Galactic Conquest.  It's been the salvation of racing sims in an era
when
> > console games and ring-tones for cells almost wiped PC *** off the
face
> > of the earth.  Even Unreal Tournament is on board, promoting modding
with
> > contests like Make Something Unreal.  Kaemmer may be Master of the
Physics
> > Engine, but abt. what makes the *** world go around, he ain't gotta
> > clue.

> >> > These guys are not merely ripping off somebody else's whole shtick,
> >> > they're bragging about it.  Talk abt. hacking the executable....

> >>     I only remember that Papyrus was ENCOURAGING mod groups when the
> >> 1.201
> >> patch was released.  THey were almost begging for modders to help stave
> > off
> >> EA's juggernaut.  Now I know FIRST is NOT PAPYRUS legally, but they are
> >> close enough in my mind that it feels like FIRST is going back on
> >> Papyrus'
> >> promise.

> >> dave henrie

> > I'm not objecting to what F1RST might or might not produce; I'm

> FIRST. Not F1RST, which is a completely different bunch of guys.
> Let's face it, FIRST don't give a toss whether mods improve sales of
> NR2003, because I doubt they get anything from any sale of NR2003 in the
> shops.  They bought the rights, not the money it's already made.

> Any talk about how Papyrus/Vivendi were happy for mods to come about has
to
> be taken in the context that it was FIRST, under the guise of PWF, that
> engineered the situation to put CTS/TA/Busch code in the nr2003.exe,
giving
> the illusion that exe modding would be ok, because papy did it for people
> anyway.

> Then DK+PWF > FIRST.

> A canny manouver, for sure.

> cheers
> John

> > If this mod dispute landed in court, F1RST would win in a walk, but not
on
> > the merits of the case, but because Kaemmer's financial muscle (the
owner
> > of the Red Sox) would crush the individual modders who ply their trade
for
> > the love of the game.  Too bad Mr. Kaemmer doesn't realize that the very
> > people he is stomping on here are the core of his future audience...that
> > is, if he ever gets a product out the door that these people might
> > actually otherwise want.

> I agree. In reality the niche group who mod and play mods probably isn't
> going to make a difference to John Henry's bottom line so embracing the
> modders or eliminating them "just in case" doesn't really matter.

> However, it doesn't feel like the developers playing nicely with their
> greatest fans does it nor come across particularly well in demonstrating
> Henry as an "avid participant in the auto racing simulation community"?

> It seems a bit like a car manufacturer going after one of its enthusiast
> owners clubs members for modifying their engines, a tiny percentage of
> customers but hardly good PR.

> Quite how the developer run "Federation of International Racing and
> Sanctioning Trust" will work remains to be seen.

> > If this mod dispute landed in court, F1RST would win in a walk, but not
on
> > the merits of the case, but because Kaemmer's financial muscle (the
owner
> of
> > the Red Sox) would crush the individual modders who ply their trade for
> the
> > love of the game.  Too bad Mr. Kaemmer doesn't realize that the very
> people
> > he is stomping on here are the core of his future audience...that is, if
> he
> > ever gets a product out the door that these people might actually
> otherwise
> > want.

> Too bad you don't realise that the sims are more important than the mods.
> Sure the mods are important, but you can't mod something that doesn't
exist,
> and if the community puts the creators in a position where they are no
> longer financially interested in creating the sims in the first place the
> whole community loses out anyway. Don't bite the hand that feeds you.

> If it's good enough we'll buy the sims anyway whether they can be modded
or
> not. There is a compromise as I stated earlier that the lack of mods may
> restrict sales a little (I wouldn't have bought F1C or F12k2 were it not
for
> the mods, I only bought NR2k3 & NR4 to pay my Papy tax) but if restricting
> the mods allows DK & buddies to secure a better financial footing &
> therefore produce more sims then that benefits us all. Maybe in the future
> 'if we behave' we'll be given something that can be legitimately modded as
a
> reward, as we were with the extra code in NR2k3.

> Some people may want mods for the sake of it but mostly what I think the
> community wants are sims that model what they are interested in. Would you
> rather have that sim made by DK or the modding community? Both can produce
> great stuff but given the choice between buying a sim then modifying it to
> suit my needs, or buying a sim that suits my needs in the first place I'll
> go with the latter every time.

> Malc.

> > > Give FIRST a chance to actually produce something that you might like
> > > straight out of the box before complaining that you can't alter it to
> suit
> > > your needs.

> OTOH, I told Kaemmer years ago that instead of going to corporations,
> hat in hand, and begging for their permission to use their products
> in games, that he should go to them like a movie company and ask for
> money for "product placement."  Ford will pay movie producers up to
> $100,000 per vehicle to get a Ford Expedition, say, in a film (even
> if it's irrelevant to the plot).  What exposure do they get out of
> this?  Usually no more than one "impression" (viewing) per customer.
> I used to work as a marketing consultant.  Marketeers pay per
> impression.  Now take, say, Firestone.  If one of their billboards
> appears trackside in, say, NASCAR Racing, they reap the benefit of
> THOUSANDS of impressions per viewer over the life of the game.  In
> any marketing research, this would be worth thousands to Firestone,
> and they should be willing to pay the developer multiple thousands of
> dollars for such free advertising.  Nowadays, of course, this is
> becoming the norm (and will only get more instrusive), but 20 years
> ago, Papy's licensing manager threw me out of her office for
> suggesting such a radical idea.

> > > > Give FIRST a chance to actually produce something that you might
like
> > > > straight out of the box before complaining that you can't alter it
to
> > suit
> > > > your needs.

> The only problem with this analogy is....what if you have a situation
> where one brand is cleaning the clocks of all the other brands in real
> life.  E.g. the way Firestone was crushing Goodyears a few years back
> when the two competed in CART.  Let's say Goodyear pays a sim maker for
> "product placement" in a CART sim but then everyone who plays the game
> chooses Firestones because the Goodyears are accurately simulated as
> being ***by comparison.

> Product placement is a 'neutral' concept where the brand is in your
> face.  I seriously doubt that the company would be eager to pay for
> "placement" where they were made to look bad because they were failing
> in the real life competition as well.

> Randy

> > OTOH, I told Kaemmer years ago that instead of going to corporations,
> > hat in hand, and begging for their permission to use their products
> > in games, that he should go to them like a movie company and ask for
> > money for "product placement."  Ford will pay movie producers up to
> > $100,000 per vehicle to get a Ford Expedition, say, in a film (even
> > if it's irrelevant to the plot).  What exposure do they get out of
> > this?  Usually no more than one "impression" (viewing) per customer.
> > I used to work as a marketing consultant.  Marketeers pay per
> > impression.  Now take, say, Firestone.  If one of their billboards
> > appears trackside in, say, NASCAR Racing, they reap the benefit of
> > THOUSANDS of impressions per viewer over the life of the game.  In
> > any marketing research, this would be worth thousands to Firestone,
> > and they should be willing to pay the developer multiple thousands of
> > dollars for such free advertising.  Nowadays, of course, this is
> > becoming the norm (and will only get more instrusive), but 20 years
> > ago, Papy's licensing manager threw me out of her office for
> > suggesting such a radical idea.

> > Tell that to Epic Games and Atari, the sponsors of the "Make Something
> > Unreal" contest, which put up a million dollars to encourage modders.
> They
> > prolly know better than either of us what the modding community is worth
> to
> > their bottom line.  You might even say they're feeding the hand that
bites
> > them (from FIRST's perspective).

> If you bite the hand that feeds you, you are going against their wishes
you
> fool.

> Malc.

> > > > > Give FIRST a chance to actually produce something that you might
> like
> > > > > straight out of the box before complaining that you can't alter it
> to
> > > suit
> > > > > your needs.

> The only problem with this analogy is....what if you have a situation
> where one brand is cleaning the clocks of all the other brands in real
> life.  E.g. the way Firestone was crushing Goodyears a few years back
> when the two competed in CART.  Let's say Goodyear pays a sim maker for
> "product placement" in a CART sim but then everyone who plays the game
> chooses Firestones because the Goodyears are accurately simulated as
> being ***by comparison.

> Product placement is a 'neutral' concept where the brand is in your
> face.  I seriously doubt that the company would be eager to pay for
> "placement" where they were made to look bad because they were failing
> in the real life competition as well.

> Randy

> > OTOH, I told Kaemmer years ago that instead of going to corporations,
> > hat in hand, and begging for their permission to use their products
> > in games, that he should go to them like a movie company and ask for
> > money for "product placement."  Ford will pay movie producers up to
> > $100,000 per vehicle to get a Ford Expedition, say, in a film (even
> > if it's irrelevant to the plot).  What exposure do they get out of
> > this?  Usually no more than one "impression" (viewing) per customer.
> > I used to work as a marketing consultant.  Marketeers pay per
> > impression.  Now take, say, Firestone.  If one of their billboards
> > appears trackside in, say, NASCAR Racing, they reap the benefit of
> > THOUSANDS of impressions per viewer over the life of the game.  In
> > any marketing research, this would be worth thousands to Firestone,
> > and they should be willing to pay the developer multiple thousands of
> > dollars for such free advertising.  Nowadays, of course, this is
> > becoming the norm (and will only get more instrusive), but 20 years
> > ago, Papy's licensing manager threw me out of her office for
> > suggesting such a radical idea.

> > > Tell that to Epic Games and Atari, the sponsors of the "Make Something
> > > Unreal" contest, which put up a million dollars to encourage modders.
> > They
> > > prolly know better than either of us what the modding community is
worth
> > to
> > > their bottom line.  You might even say they're feeding the hand that
> bites
> > > them (from FIRST's perspective).

> > If you bite the hand that feeds you, you are going against their wishes
> you
> > fool.

> > Malc.

> > > > > > Give FIRST a chance to actually produce something that you might
> > like
> > > > > > straight out of the box before complaining that you can't alter
it
> > to
> > > > suit
> > > > > > your needs.