I am disappointed that I don’t have time to update the Around the Community posts.
It’s always nice to have a round up of the latest news about mods that interest you, especially if there is intelligent discussion associated with it.
I am thinking about various ways I could do something like this and I keep coming back to the idea of a monthly video round up.
There’s some interesting work going on and it might be nice to cover that activity.
The question is how interesting would it be for you?
To be honest, I much prefer to not know anything about the “In Development” mods, as I hate spoilers, but it’s good to see what others are doing.
Modders spend a lot of time (perhaps too much?) on promoting their unreleased mods these days that any extra coverage is welcome.
Let’s be honest, the only consistent pre-release coverage is done by ModDB and no matter how much you like the site, it’s not good that they have almost monopolized Mod promotion.
Yes, I see the irony of that statement.
Anyway, I have some ideas I’ll play around with.
I’m interested to hear you thoughts on following mods. not just whether you want me to cover them more but more about why you do it, what you look for, do you comment etc.
I follow few and scattered in the time, I mean i’m not allways there following them all the time, actually the ones I like to hear some news are BMS, OPF2, AND OP BLACK MESA, also I like Missing information, and mods like CASTE that want to recreate the lost files in HL2 Universe…, also the latest superb HL1 engine or Gold SCRS mod relevant developments as ARRANGEMENT, I also track curiously Cry of Fear untill it was finaly launched recently.
I usually scan through ModDB three or four times a week checking on HL mods in development and for older ones that have new content or have new versions.
Every now and then I scan through the entire HL2, and to a lesser extent, the HL list to see what’s what. Which is how I found out “Strider Mountain” has a third version and “Cry of Fear” was for HL! So I will be replaying and playing those soon.
I think it would be nice if Phillip could post an update when a new mod version is released of a mod he’s posted here. Like a headline saying, say “Strider Mountain third update available now!” or “G-String 2.0 Released” for example. Something along those lines with a link, etc. maybe the same for mod fixes and extras if it is not too much trouble.
Although ModDB and Planet Phillip make a great duo as is!
Definitely the bottom option. PlanetPhillip is generally the first time I find out about most HL2 mods. I don’t care to follow in-development mods. All that matters to me is the final product, which should speak for itself. The majority of mods don’t make it that far anyway.
For me it’s easy: for mods in development, I follow them on Moddb. for mods already released, I see them being review on this site
I almost never bother to look for updates on “In Development Mods”. The simple reason is that many are, in the words of John Cleese, dead parrots.
There is no doubt that ModDb is a quality resource for finding (upcoming Mods/Maps) new stuff but how many have ” TBD” in their listing and have done for a long time? If I followed every Mod that piqued my interest I’d have little time for anything else!
About once every few weeks I’ll resign myself to the inevitable disappointment of what I know is to appear in my browser and just go have a look at BMS, and prove myself right, sadly yet again….
Apart from that while I don’t mind hearing about them, mods in the pipeline aren’t worth as much (of my time) as mods that are available and ready to play now.
The sad fact is that at least from what I’ve seen along the way, so many fail to make it to release. This site, if I remember correctly, had a section on “lost mods” that Phillip was encouraging mappers & modders to pick up and run with, but I don’t recall how many actually made it to release(?) I seem to think that some seemed very interesting, and it was a shame how much work had gone into them to just casually let them fall by the wayside. Still, not being either I’m just grateful for those creative types out there who help feed my HL1 & 2 addiction…..
Every single day. Especially Black Mesa.
I don’t want to miss interesting but not too much advertised mod’s (such as the interesting the Intern Story) so I check, I track, every day.
The only mod I “follow” is the one I am making
so I guess I don’t follow mod development.
Right now I’m Following The Other-Life Universe of Mods…the first released being CUBE V2 is OUTSTANDING!
And work is going smoothly on HATCH 18…and just getting started on OTHER-LIFE.
Looking forward to G-String 2.0…and Black Mesa Source.
Always checking out Moddb for more.
as a active modder/mapper myself I am always interested in what is made by others, and therefore I do check Moddb daily for what is going on on development. but I too agree with that way to many modders seems to fill 90% of there time with advertisement instead of really making there mods.
personaly I hate all those modders who seem to think it is necessary to post each day a new screen, or show time after time screens of there weapon models, sometimes even without skin and or animation.
i can’t imagine that a lot of people are interested in that, time after time.
personaly I post about every 4 to 6 weeks a very large new update about my new mod “Episode 3: The Closure” on Moddb, I always have at least 10 screens to show, all from completely different mapparts, and sometimes even from 2 new maps. Beside those screens I always have a new trailer or teaser to show from new gameplay, and those are about 3 to 6 mins long. Takes about a full day to make such a news update, but I think it is worth it.
I place those updates ofcourse to show people what I have been doing, but that is not the main reason when I am honest. Because with placing news updates every month or so I hope to reach out to as many as possible gamers, so they are aware that a new mod is in the making, hoping that they will track it. Just so I can be assured of that when the mod is released a lot of gamers will know about it and play it. Also is it always a real pleasure to read the comments that are made on the updates. As mentioned above, making large mods takes a silly amount of time and effort. So as modder you want to know that it is apriciated what you are doing.
The list of names of mods that I am tracking is way to long, I can easily say that I track about every HL2 mod that is in the making. I would like to track mods for other games to, but should I do so then it would take me even more time to track them all because now it takes me about a hour or so each day to read all new updates.
I no longer follow mods, unfortunately. When I had more spare time I would usually track mods on moddb.com, but now I barely get to visit the site.
I did however start tracking this site, but not as much for maps or mods but for other game related articles. For example I loved the “7 ways to do beta testing” article.
I always get a little excited whenever I see some hl1/hl2 mods on moddb but I do follow some few old and new ones. Black Mesa should be banned from moddb LoL! Mods should be done within a decade and black mesa and hl3/episode 3 won’t be out in our lifetime probably haha! Kidding of course!
But I do hope they will soon be done within this decade.
I follow a few, but have lately been wrapped up in my work and my own Mod to pay too much attention to others. I pretty much stick to the best Mods to track, like Titan XCIX and G String etc. Im more into total conversion/ not HL2 Source mods but I keep an eye on a couple HL2 mods as well.
Ive only played Dissolution, some of Titan XCIX, some of G String, and a bit NMRIH. All were great Mods. None were in the HL2 universe.