The chances of getting numerous mods working togther correctly will be rather remote. Skins and such wont really affect mods..however campaign files, ships files and damage just to mention a few will be EXTREMLY hard to get several mods working correctly...it's a bit like NYGM and GW not being compatable due to both mods using thier own files, and if overwritten it renders certain parts of each mod ( Hate saying this )....BROKEN

While I'm not about to get into the "stolen mods" debate re SW:Med, because frankly I have no proof either way (although I would seriously be surprised if anything was stolen this time), I won't be buying it.

Or, let me expand.

When I first saw SW:Med, it sounded interesting. When I read the content at the Combat Planes web site, I decided that I would buy it. I have no doubt that it will provide a great Med experience, albeit presumedly to the detriment of the Atlantic campaign.

But then I thought more about it and took more of an interest in what this community already does. And basically, SW:Med doesn't seem to add anything *new*. I don't mean ships, cities, bases or Flotillas, I mean new stuff that modders can't already do.

Cloned ships?
New ships?
Skinning?
New cities?
New player bases?
New Flotillas?

All can be done by various members of this community.

And whilst I can't d/l for free a Grimsby Class Sloop, I know that I don't need to get SW:Med to be able to add ships, if you know what I mean, and I know that at some point many ships, even if mere clones, will be available for free d/l. And if they're not the same ones as in SW:Med, then I either accept that, or learn to do it myself.

For me, I see buying SW:Med a game limiting move. Why? Well, let's look at a comparison.

Free Supermod (doesn't matter which one, for this comparison let's just collectively call GW, NYGM, IUB and RUb a "supermod")
Advantages:
- free and can be freely distributed amongst players (ie for people that have d/l problems)
- well supported by this community - whilst there are inter-mod issues, at the end of the day, each supermod is well supported by at least its own players. There are NO stigmas attached to any supermod like there are to the SW products
- well supported by the modders - if there's a problem, hotfixes generally are released straight away
- new "finds" or mods by other members of the community tend to consider compatibility - new mods tend to state with certainty "for GW" or "for NYGM" etc. Never seen anything released yet that states "for SW" and can't see that changing

Disadvantages
- requires d/l - although some community members have been kind enough to send CD copies of supermods to players with d/l problems, an advantage over a payware mod
- installation of 7z files (for the supermods that use 7z files) may be confusing for some people

SW:Med
Advantages:
- one-stop-shop - if you want all the mentioned features in one place without the hassle or confusion of d/l and installing individual ships etc. May be a deciding factor for some, especially those inexperienced at modding (sasuming you want to focus on a Med campaign)
- assuming you don't take the d/l option, the product will come straight to your door on CD/DVD, thus no d/l required (except for patches)

Disadvantages
- costs money!
- contains no new "technology" or features that can't already be done by existing modders
- community support is practically nil (well, maybe except for Wulfmann ;))
- a bug? Well, you gotta wait for an official patch to be released or fix it yourself in the meantime
- a new feature created by a community modder? Well, you're on your own for making sure it's SW:Med compatible
- a question? Feel free to ask away...and wait...ignore the flames...and wait...then email combatplanes support
- nothing new outside of the Med
- online play will be limited only to other SW:Med users

NB I've left out common advantages/disadvantages (for example, I'm sure *neither* SW:Med or the supermods suit *everybody* straight out of the box). Also, I doubt that the list is exhaustive - just the obvious a and d's that came to mind. I'm sure others will point out any omissions ITSF.

To me (and I'm being very particular in saying that these are MY thoughts) I think SW:Med will be the "betamax" to the supermods' "VHS". Sounds harsh, but I can't see SW:Med ever being anywhere near as popular as any ONE of the supermods, let alone the four or so that already exist.

But if I may offer a suggestion to anyone who's fencesitting at the moment, with SW:Med, GWX and NYGM2.2 (or 3?) all coming out at around the same time, you may like to wait and see what new features these mods bring, before making a decision either way.

Score 1 for the community modders!
 

You said a mouthful Jaesen!:up: I quite agree, if anyone wants to pay for it so be it, that's his choice! I wont, as I like the give-n-take of the modding community, I enjoy trying out the various mods, helping others where I can and getting help, and experiencing the involvement of the forum community.:D As Jaesen said you can't get this kind of support with the SW team!
If SW was all new stuff & had some common bug fixes then I would buy as well!
Anyway MY supermod is taylor-made for me, courtesy of the community modders.;) and for that ... Thanks!:D

My thoughts on SW:med are very similar to those of JScones.

I would, however, add that the act of burning the mod onto CD and distributing through shops or the postal system implies a high degree of confidence in the stability of the product. You wouldn't do that if you thought that most of these CDs would soon be returned with a demand for a refund of money.

The obvious weakness of all the free Supermods is that (by definition) there can be no money for distribution, retailer's margins or advertising. Thus it is easy to predict that SW:Med is likely to release/sell more copies than any one of the Supermods, and (probably) more than all of them combined. The number of SH3 users who read the SUbSim (or even the Ubisoft official) Forum is probably less than 10% of all initial purchasers.

This raises the rather interesting, and philosophical, point of whether the creators of the SuperMods should charge for their products - assuming, of course, that UbiSoft gave permission. It could result in larger distribution over the whole SH3 community. Moreover, the extent of distribution might even have some meaning. As a famous politician once observed: "demand for anything free becomes infinite". At present, it is likely that many people are downloading the Supermods simply because they are free (therefore it costs nothing to lay them aside within a day or two of use). But that is not very complimentary to the modders.

I am giving up a lot of free time for adding to, and testing, the NYGM mod. I would love to know whether I am wasting my time, but the only real test is whether people would *buy* the mod (rather than download it for free). Doubtless a lot of modders for the other SuperMods would like an answer to the same question.

Stiebler. (Personal opinion only.)

So true. Perhaps I should have qualified my "but I can't see SW:Med ever being anywhere near as popular as any ONE of the supermods, let alone the four or so that already exist" statement by adding "amongst the Subsim or similar communities".

I think SW:Med will appeal nicely to the mainstream players, ie those that are perhaps not aware of this or other similar communities, or just have no knowledge or interest in modding. More people than just those who frequent here will see it on the shelf, think it looks good and buy it. I agree that more people will buy SW:Med than will d/l all of the supermods combined, although I would be curious to know how many copies of the first SW has sold.

Fortunately though (depending on how you look at it) the mainstream player and the player that frequents Subsim are somewhat exclusive beasts, as demonstrated by the rather low number of (admitting) SW users here compared to NYGM, RUb, IUB or GW users. These communities raise a broader awareness of what options are available and I think to a degree dissuade potential SW buyers from doing so (albeit prolly heavy swayed by the "free" options available, which leads nicely to your next comment...).

Yep. Very interesting question and one that pops into my mind whenever the "issue" of paying for a mod comes up. Were any of the supermods on the shelf for $14.95 (that's the cost of SW isn't it?) would people buy them? :hmm: I'd like to confidently (or blissfully depending on mood) think that people would. I mean, everyone has the choice of paying for SW or spending possibly hours d/l between 300 and 700mb of files (depending on supermod). Yet people still persist with d/l (which costs all users one way or another) or donating to Subsim to get the mods on CD. That's reassuring. At least I like to think so, as it's prolly the only way to really test your theory (the ever optimist that I am!). ;)

Whilst I wouldn't necessarily want to pay for a single supermod. I'd happily pay something in the region of 15/20 dollars for GW, your own SH3 CMDR, SH3 Gen and the SH3 Random Weather Generator.

I only paid the equivalent of about 28/30 dollars for the original game, but I'd spend close to that for the enourmous improvement all these mods have made to what is practically an entirely new game.

Off on a tangent here, but next up I'm planning on getting that new moonlight mod. Bit new to SH3 CMDR, so I gather I need to roll everything back before I run the mod in JSGME?

That´s what it costs now, when it came out it costed twice as much. The new SW:Med costs 25€ (32 USD).

That's more than I paid for the original game on the day it was officially released in the UK :huh:

Yes, but that was a special introductory price, the normal price was about €45.

I payed $20USD for my copy of SHIII.... 32 bucks for a mod :rotfl:

At least where I bought it, www.play.com, it's always been that price (18 pounds to be precise). And now it's dropped down to 12 pounds.

Admittedley Play does undersell the competition as it's based in Jersey (like a lot of online UK retailers now) and thus dodges a lot of taxes. But it was fairly cheap even in the high street shops.

JS, well put and I agree with the whole post.
I am a modder and that is part of the fun to me so beating my brains in trying to tweak things to my definition of reality adds to my pleasure, or at least a challenge some what insane!:damn:
My real argument is the few here that degrade someone that feels different about DL-mods etc.
The majority of gamers do not want to reconstruct a game and those few radical fundamentalist sometimes demand they not buy an add on but must believe in their religious modding experience or a Jihad will surely befall them!
By the time SW-Med is out perhaps there will be more variety available that even the added ships will not make it desirable to me. But, there are still plenty of people that have a job, a family etc with less time and would rather just plug and play and demeaning them for feeling this way is what I am against.
Any other opinion as to not buy is the right one just as those that prefer to buy and not mod is right for them.
I still play other games like CoD2 and MoHPA for a diversion and if you asked me to mod those like I have in flight sims and SH3 I would laugh at you. It is just not important enough to spend any time but playing!
An extra $20.00 for hundreds of hours is cheap and one can only spend so much time modding.
Say you don’t want it, say you prefer to mod and support those that generously work hard to provide free stuff like GW, NYGM, RUB and all the others we are so lucky to have increasing our enjoyment.
We don’t have to covert the infidels that choose to buy an add on to enjoy our modded world. Do we?
JS, I think that was the best in-depth objective look at the mod-add on picture.:up:
Wulfmann

JS and Stiebler hit it spot on. Only a different location for "The Hunt" doesn't impress me. And

Here in the States SHIII is was $39.95 the first day it came out at EBGames. Have the sleeve with price on it right in front of me. A mod that costs almost as much as SHIII originally is laughable I'd think. But then again the prices of newer games coming out will be considerably more than what they are now.

So.... what's in yer wallet? ;)

All great points raised. For my 2 cents worth is that it's the person's choice whether they wish to purchase mods or not.

I dont think that price and such was the issue, alot of people are arent buying cause they think that the people who are releasing these supermods are taking mods that other people made, sticking there names on them and selling them

i agree with all the points raised on the benifits of community made mods over payware mods...with one exception....and that is long term you can never have enough payware firms showing an interest in providing add-ons for your favourite sims/game.....it's good for the game and it does absolute wonders for the chances of your favourite game being contuned on into the next generation....payware add-ons for SH3 virtually garantues that there will be an SH4 and so on...this is not to say that the community hasn't allready provided enough eveidence that SH4 would sell to start of with...but ok pay ware add-ons for SH4 will virtually garantue the existance of SH5 and so on..the more pay ware add-ons the healthier the market is and will become for contuneing support of your favourite sim/game...money makes money makes money makes money...and no matter what any one thinks of the current crop of pay ware add-ons for SH3 the very fact that they exist at all shows that commercail interest in the genre has gone up a notch..if we were to get even a tiny fraction of the choice of payware add-ons available for flightsims..i doubt wether we would have any cause for complaint...some we might hate..but some we would love...and none of this detracts from the efforts of the community to produce self made free ware mods...the mod comunity for flightsims is massive allmost un ending in fact....and so is the pay-ware choices available to flight simmers...there is no genuine conflict LONG TERM....

and thats what we all want..a LONG TERM future for the Silent Hunter franchise....the more pay ware around for current versions of the game the more likely that there will allways be future version of the game...
i really can't see any argument that can dis-prove that assertion..

Its not so much the payware issue even
Its the fact that IMHO nothing is changed code wise only additions which we all know we can get here
If there was some real code changes to the way the game plays instead of just additions people may think differently

Sure they add some med sub bases but at the expense of atlantic ones so you have to play the med and not get an all round experience

Myself - I am waiting for GWX :up:
Med and Black sea bases added with no loss of atlantic ones - now thats an improvement

Well.... no way.

Hehe, plus a few others. ;)

Predictable. :88) Whatever, I'll admit the shots are nice but I hope the models are better than in the Seawolves pack.

http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=96748

Especially the Gato sub.

http://image03.webshots.com/3/4/99/9...9Cxhwyh_fs.jpg

No indication there is a big fix for this, apparently there is one. Gotta add a folder.