[quote who="Faust.br" reply="600" id="2779655"]

. The most sucessful mods in the history of gaming were created using Valve's engine, so I can't understand how do you say that Valve's STEAM is destroying the mod scene!
[/quote]

So what criteria are you using to make this very bold claim. Also know, i don't really have an issue with Steam and mods, although I think we're goin too be DLC'd to death with Civ.

Not only the fact that I need to be online just to play single player, it is also that cost vs the number of playable hours of the game that I find that turns me off from buying games

TBH, the best value from a game purchase was the Valve's Orange Box. Team Fortress 2 alone have been played for more than 300+ hours, and I haven't even mastered the game.

Of course, the second most played game on my computer is Sins which I bet if Impulse logged hours, it would probably read in the hundreds. Even audiosurf has it value, where I logged 50 hours.

Yes mods were created using valve's engine pre-steam times. Counter-Strike, Team Fortress, Natural Selection etc were all fantastic mods that boosted the popularity of Half-Life. Correct me if I'm wrong but ever since the implementation of Steam I have not seen any popular mods come out for their games like Half-Life 2. Team Fortress 2 you had to pay for, Portal you had to pay for, and every other mod that used to be free suddenly became pay to play games. Even the "Episodic" approach was just a way for them to pilfer money out of consumers by charging for "mods" for the game since they didn't add much to the game besides some new textures and content here and there.

Similar thing occurred with Total War games. When Rome TW came out there were a lot of mods for it, you never got bored of playing the damn thing because there was always another mod to try. Medieval 2 came out and same thing occurred. Then came Empire TW on Steam. After you got sick of the vanilla game that was pretty much it. Modding community had a few mods but the technical know-how to implement them in your game was as fun as trying to figure out how to "Jailbreak" an Iphone but at least with the Iphone you knew you would get more functionality so I never bothered to waste time with Empire. Later on I also found out the community made "Special Forces" units (you had to pay for) were not possible to mod into the game unless you hacked your copy of Empire TW. Suffice to say I haven't bothered with any modding with Empire not that there were many mods to choose from in the first place. Neither did I pay for any of their "Content" packs no matter how cheap they were. To me they signified their successful murder of the modding community for Total War series.

Correct me if I'm wrong but I have yet to see any Steam released game to have any popular mods that come close to the popularity enjoyed by mods made before Steam days.  Looking at games like SOSE and Elemental however I see a bustling modding community trying to completely reface the games with additional content because it is easy to mod and implement those mods by casual players like myself. Everyone keeps saying Steam is easy to mod, perhaps I'm looking in the wrong places but I have yet to figure out how to mod half my games in Steam if they have mods at all.

With Left 4 Dead, we created new levels and plug-ins for admining and gaming which could change game play quite a bit.

Still not a fan of Steam though. Steam is 4 vegetables. 

Your assuming causation where it does not exist.  You can mod half-life 2 as much as you want, you can mod any game which uses steam DRM assuming the developer of the game wants you to.   What you are seeing is developers have stopped worrying about supporting the modding community in recent years.  It makes no sense for them to support it after all, it has been proven that DLC sells, so why allow the community to extend your game for free when you can push out cheap updates every 2-3 months.   Yes mods extend the life of the game, but the developers and publishers don't care about that, they don't want to have to support a game for that long because the number of sales have dropped drastically after the initial few weeks. 

In any case I don't see the issue with steam, I buy all my PC games on it now (other then impulse only games), it is convenient and works.  I was actually disappointed when I couldn't buy SC2 on steam, in fact I generally won't buy PC games unless I can get them through steam.   It is faster, works more reliably and is cheaper then buying physical media, so I've migrated completely. 

Some funny posts here... Wintersong -  "Still waiting for companies to force me to give blood samples each time I launch a game (while being online) to check for my identity as the true owner of a license for their game" Hahahaha by far the funniest (and yet scariest) remark  i have seen all year!

Anyway, so i take it Civ5 will only be released on Steam?? That is rather odd? Surly they know games need on the shelf advertising in stores? Thats how i find half my games!

I've followed the Civ games for a while as well.  I got Civ IV for Christmas, with the expansions.  Gotta say the game bored me right out of the gate.  I liked the old interfaces better, and I just couldn't get excited about the new 'features'.

So, I wasn't planning on Civ V anyways.  Now Alpha Centauri, that was a cool game!  Too bad the rights went into limboland and there won't be a sequel (at least not an official one).

I'll always have GalCiv II if I feel the need for 4x fun.  Or Elemental, although it doesn't feel at all like a traditional 4x.

Hmm, I don't like that kind of thinking.  Basically it is treating customers as receptacles of cash that must be emptied.  If Elemental really takes off I think Stardock will do quite well out of it.  I wonder if Civ IV would have had continual sales over such a long period if all mods were costed and you couldn't get any extensions apart from DLC?

Well, we'll soon know.  If Civ V goes the DLC route (which it already looks like it's doing) it will be interesting how long the game sells for.  Civ IV has continued to be sold for how many years?

Best regards,
Steven.

Who cares about DLCs? Civ5 will be modable so we can add just as good or better content. I am already part of grout that is planning big WW2 mod.

Well, at least as long as the free modding lasts (and as long as people can keep their Steam collection alive, ie. no mistakes or heavy-handedness by Steam).

I'm not going to be supporting Civ V at this time.  Exclusive distribution through Steam is just the last straw.

Best regards,
Steven.

Its not Steam exclusive, retail is selling boxed version and D2D is selling digital download (Steam CD keys).

You do need to always have the Steam client running.  2K Games have already said that all Civ 5 will have Steam DRM.  I prefer no additional programs that have to run just to get my games running.

Best regards,
Steven.

I keep Steam running 24/7 so it isnt problem for me.

Also not true, in the case of Civ 5. It supports Steam's offline mode.