Technical and social skills are needed to create a mod. A few mods become very popular and convert themselves into distinct games, with the rights getting bought and turning into an official modification, or in some cases a stand-alone title that does not require the original game to play. Some are very limited and just include some gameplay changes or even a different loading screen, while others are total conversions and can modify content and gameplay extensively.

Many mods are not publicly released to the gaming community by their creators. Popular websites dedicated to modding include Nexus Mods, Mod DB, and Steam Workshop.Ĭustom character models such as Kratos, Carl Johnson and Snow White in Guitar Hero World Tour are a popular form of modification, allowing fans to come up with their own humorous fictional crossovers. Popular games can have tens of thousands of mods created for them. This has led to the rise of artistic video game modification, as well as machinima and the demoscene. This can include recording in-game actions as a film, as well as attempting to reproduce real-life areas inside a game with no regard for game play value. 'Vanilla Minecraft', for example, refers to the original, unmodified game.Īs early as the 1980s, video game mods have also been used for the sole purpose of creating art, as opposed to an actual game. The term vanilla is often used to make this distinction.

In cases where mods are very popular, players might have to clarify that they are referring to the unmodified game when talking about playing a game. People can become fans of specific mods, in addition to fans of the game they are for, such as requesting features and alterations for these mods. Mods have arguably become an increasingly important factor in the commercial success of some games, as they add depth to the original work, and can be both fun for players playing the mods and as means of self-expression for mod developers. Modding a game can also be understood as the act of seeking and installing mods to the player's game, but the act of tweaking pre-existing settings and preferences is not truly modding. Mods may range from small changes and tweaks to complete overhauls, and can extend the replay value and interest of the game. Video game modding (short for 'modification') is the process of alteration by players or fans of one or more aspects of a video game, such as how it looks or behaves, and is a sub-discipline of general modding.

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