Petition for DICE

[Careless]

How about asking other BF2 Vanilla mod communities to do the same?
I don't know how active it is..

I mean, I think Forgotten Hope could use some of the things that could be hardcoded now..

Just sayan..

[SIDEKILL3R]

just signed to show my support as always

[camo]

Signed, how many are we up to?

[kingarthur]

/signed, even tho I dont think DICE will do anything about it... at least from what I can tell after seeing the BF3 forums

[PFunk]

I'm going to have to completely disagree with everything PFunk said though. Sensationalist drivel that relies on the belief that people higher up in the company are simply incompetent idiots that can not see the merits of communities. All evidence is in fact to the contrary, mod support in almost all games is increasing, not the other way around. Communities directly bring new players into a game, generate purchases, argue with naysayers and profess the virtues of games online. It's not even based in any evidence at all, it's just a really silly explanation that popped up on the internet and gained tonnes of steam because everyone likes to attack the big bad companies rather than have an intellectual understanding of the situation grounded in evidence.

Right, its sensationalist. The fact that BF3 shipped without dedicated server code available for clients to host. The fact that EA will never let us have mod tools for Frostbyte because apparently its so advanced the community that they apparently so believe in would never comprehend it enough to use it. The fact that the upcoming CoD Ghosts, the natural rival to BF3, is on the fence as to whether it will have dedicated servers at all (Watch this space on Call of Duty: Ghosts dedicated servers • News • Eurogamer.net). The fact that the drive in the industry these days is to push relatively fast product turn arounds and as such the reliance on fixed communities based on mods that don't port to games they won't give us mod tools for are a hindrance to moving the player base forward. The fact that free community based mods are in direct competition with proprietary pay-for DLC.

All of the above is sensationalism? Maybe you should wake up and smell the coffee. The gaming industry has been gravitating away from mod friendliness, at least in the console focused triple A scene for quite some time. For god's sake if you listen to how major publishers talk about PC gaming they often characterize it like the PC is a dying platform, but numbers in at least one source I've seen show it as being roughly 1/3 of the market with the other 2/3 shared evenly between Xbox and Playstation. They don't like PC because it furnishes the consumer with a freedom of choice that limits their ability to direct us to buy more ****. DLC has revitalized the PC end of gaming in their eyes because its recouped a lot of what was lost to pirating, and since they hate pirating for obvious reasons they would then hate the freedom the platform which is mother to pirating for that very reason - that its easy to steal from them whereas on Consoles you can't even decline to patch your games without being cut off from the internet.

Everything I've reasoned is sensible from a marketing perspective. If you think that I'm saying there are idiots in charge of EA just because they have a plan that maximizes profits at the expense of us minority mod users who never really put a lot back into their products then you must have a different definition of incompetent. Fact is though that the people who run EA are actually rather incompetent, or at least a lot of them seem to be. If you knew anything about EA's recent history and the resignation of its CEO you wouldn't presume to defend them as brilliant. If you research whats been going on with EA the last couple years you'll see a pattern of strange acquisitions that ultimately lead to John Riccitiello effectively falling on his own sword to save face ahead of what would otherwise be an ugly ouster of his thus far peculiar reign.

Its not that they don't see the advantage of communities, quite the opposite. I never said they didn't either. Its that they want to control them more, just like they do on consoles. Just look at the way EA rolled out the new rebooted Sim City. It had an always online component in a game that didn't need multiplayer, and they gimped the entire game based on this feature that was created just to justify the always online DRM, and then on launch day they didn't have enough servers for people to play. So you'd be in a queue to play a single player game. Then on top of it all they basically said that they aren't going to release mod tools til later, maybe, who knows. I wouldn't be surprised if they never do. They have lots of nice DLC that they'd rather you buy. Why arm the community with tools that will compete with your own pay for product?

If you can't see how this all forms a coherent strategy then I guess you're incoherently optimistic or something.

[SilentNoobAssasin]

signed.

[Skitrel]

Right, its sensationalist. The fact that BF3 shipped without dedicated server code available for clients to host. The fact that EA will never let us have mod tools for Frostbyte because apparently its so advanced the community that they apparently so believe in would never comprehend it enough to use it.

Stopped right here. You need to stop reading angry forums that want to throw abuse at "the big bad company" and start actually listening to the real issues. People have been repeating that one incredibly poor answer in an interview with a developer that wasn't even sure if he was allowed to give the real answer. He made a **** decision with his response, but it's one god damn interview.

You want the real issue? Frostbite's usage in BF3 (and BF4) isn't entirely owned by EA or DICE, BF3 and BF4 both use a number of licensed technologies for many things. One of those things for example is Enlighten. But they also use a number of licensed techs for voip, network communication, and server tech.

BF3's map creation development pipeline requires the use of 20 different programs to reach the final outputted map, to put it bluntly, the inhouse tools are poor right now, not owned by them, or outsourced.

What this creates is a legal hellhole. You can't simply release code to the public that holds the intellectual properties of other entities. The issue isn't that they WON'T give you mod tools, it's that they literally can not.

---

You can stop here, but I'm going to go into more detail perhaps unnecessary on WHY they took this path.

Why did they make these decisions? Your answer is call of duty, unsurprisingly this is also wrong.

The answer is in fact - Ubisoft.

EA and Ubisoft are in an arms race right now. Ubisoft are on top of the game these days, technologically. They have a phenomenal engine that they're using across absolutely all of their games, the benefit of using a single engine across many games is obvious, studios can share code between one another and standardise development, outputting far higher quality products. Take a look at Far Cry 3, compare it to Assassin's Creed, a game obviously of a very different genre. FC3 has a tonne of obviously shared code and mechanics.

EA realised what Ubisoft were up to far too late and have been playing catch up for a while. It's necessary for them to catch up with this strategy else Ubisoft will be taking the lead down the line. You're talking about call of duty in the NOW, companies aren't thinking about the now, they're thinking about the title they're releasing 3-5 years from now that you don't know about, where a poor strategy and a failure to have the foresight of the future means lagging behind. Call of Duty is old hat that has been massively technologically surpassed by multiple other titles. Activision know this, Ubisoft know this, EA know this. Activision hedged their bets on Bungie knowing that Call of Duty isn't likely to last too much longer. EA are hedging their bets in Battlefield and Respawn, Ubisoft are betting on Far Cry, Watch Dogs and their Clancy title.

Of all these companies, Ubisoft is in the best position here. In terms of tech Far Cry 3 is seriously impressive. Almost their entire development staff is housed alongside their engine staff within one complex at Ubisoft Montreal, with 2000+ employees, sharing code is a case of heading to the offices at the other end of the building. EA on the other hand have their studios spread across the world. It's not so easy, they know this, and the fact that they were caught out by Ubisoft has meant they've been playing catch up.

In conclusion. The reason they licensed all the tech (at great expense it should be noted, it's not cheap at all) is because they need to catch up with what the real competition is doing. Not with call of duty. With Ubisoft.

Modability will reenter the BF franchise when it no longer requires the licensed tech. That will probably occur with the release of Battlefront, which is going to spur a tonne of new tech development.

---

The argument you've regurgitated (not yours, simply something you've read a hundred times from teenagers on angsty forums) is baseless speculation. The above is speculation based on the simple fact - licensing is the reason modding isn't available. The only reason they'd license tech at great cost rather than use their own is the belief that others have much better that they must compete with, nobody is under the delusion that call of duty is high tech any more.

This probably comes off with a harsher tone than intended. If that's the case I apologise. Ignore any tone, assume it as merely the product of writing not being great at inferring things like body language or vocal tone.

[Heavy Death]

Ye, Skitrlel. But EA, iirc, actually said that the engine is too much to handle for us plebs. Why didnt they just said" Due to licencing, modtools won't be avaliable."

And IW/Acti saying that women on Quake engine are impossible due to limitiations. Like... what the actual fuck?

[Arab]

Stopped right here. You need to stop reading angry forums that want to throw abuse at "the big bad company" and start actually listening to the real issues. People have been repeating that one incredibly poor answer in an interview with a developer that wasn't even sure if he was allowed to give the real answer. He made a **** decision with his response, but it's one god damn interview.

You want the real issue? Frostbite's usage in BF3 (and BF4) isn't entirely owned by EA or DICE, BF3 and BF4 both use a number of licensed technologies for many things. One of those things for example is Enlighten. But they also use a number of licensed techs for voip, network communication, and server tech.

BF3's map creation development pipeline requires the use of 20 different programs to reach the final outputted map, to put it bluntly, the inhouse tools are poor right now, not owned by them, or outsourced.

What this creates is a legal hellhole. You can't simply release code to the public that holds the intellectual properties of other entities. The issue isn't that they WON'T give you mod tools, it's that they literally can not.

---

You can stop here, but I'm going to go into more detail perhaps unnecessary on WHY they took this path.

Why did they make these decisions? Your answer is call of duty, unsurprisingly this is also wrong.

The answer is in fact - Ubisoft.

EA and Ubisoft are in an arms race right now. Ubisoft are on top of the game these days, technologically. They have a phenomenal engine that they're using across absolutely all of their games, the benefit of using a single engine across many games is obvious, studios can share code between one another and standardise development, outputting far higher quality products. Take a look at Far Cry 3, compare it to Assassin's Creed, a game obviously of a very different genre. FC3 has a tonne of obviously shared code and mechanics.

EA realised what Ubisoft were up to far too late and have been playing catch up for a while. It's necessary for them to catch up with this strategy else Ubisoft will be taking the lead down the line. You're talking about call of duty in the NOW, companies aren't thinking about the now, they're thinking about the title they're releasing 3-5 years from now that you don't know about, where a poor strategy and a failure to have the foresight of the future means lagging behind. Call of Duty is old hat that has been massively technologically surpassed by multiple other titles. Activision know this, Ubisoft know this, EA know this. Activision hedged their bets on Bungie knowing that Call of Duty isn't likely to last too much longer. EA are hedging their bets in Battlefield and Respawn, Ubisoft are betting on Far Cry, Watch Dogs and their Clancy title.

Of all these companies, Ubisoft is in the best position here. In terms of tech Far Cry 3 is seriously impressive. Almost their entire development staff is housed alongside their engine staff within one complex at Ubisoft Montreal, with 2000+ employees, sharing code is a case of heading to the offices at the other end of the building. EA on the other hand have their studios spread across the world. It's not so easy, they know this, and the fact that they were caught out by Ubisoft has meant they've been playing catch up.

In conclusion. The reason they licensed all the tech (at great expense it should be noted, it's not cheap at all) is because they need to catch up with what the real competition is doing. Not with call of duty. With Ubisoft.

Modability will reenter the BF franchise when it no longer requires the licensed tech. That will probably occur with the release of Battlefront, which is going to spur a tonne of new tech development.

---

The argument you've regurgitated (not yours, simply something you've read a hundred times from teenagers on angsty forums) is baseless speculation. The above is speculation based on the simple fact - licensing is the reason modding isn't available. The only reason they'd license tech at great cost rather than use their own is the belief that others have much better that they must compete with, nobody is under the delusion that call of duty is high tech any more.

This probably comes off with a harsher tone than intended. If that's the case I apologise. Ignore any tone, assume it as merely the product of writing not being great at inferring things like body language or vocal tone.

Also Ubisoft released their CryEngine 3 SDK engine ages ago, while EA and Dice doesn't give a shit about releasing their engine because EA has too much of a capitalist mindset, and you know what they say: Too much of one thing is a bad thing.

So really, EA and Dice. Wisen the fuck up, and give back to the community.

That Frostbite 1/2/3/Whatever not being modable is just a half-lie, half-marketeering lie. They are basically saying 'Because this engine is so awesome and graphical, it cannot be modded for the awesomeness it contains', which isn't true because already people have hacked their own server for up to 120 players within days after the BF3 release, and people have already started to add features like spectator mode in Bf3, and even someone ported a Jet for Battlefield Bad Company 2, and modified physics. That's with reverse-engineering and .exe hacking

The community is much smarter than that, but that company just want people to stop answering the question and focus on their products because EA is a cigar-smoking, fat, piece of shit company that swims in it's own money and don't care about setting themselves apart from the competition by not releasing mod-tools. I think even Dice wanted to release mod-tools Dice said, though EA doesn't permit them from doing that since they agreed on a license/deal/contract like most game companies. Unlike most game companies, they release mod-tools so as to prevent the fear of people making custom games and then selling it as their own because it's company patented.

I don't think Microsoft will allow Bungie to release the engine used for halo, nor Activism for Call of Duty (Even though it's just a Quake Engine modification which you can download). Bungie released Halo CE which is Halo Custom Edition which allows it to be more moddable, and Call of Duty is moddable too, but not the big title called Battlefield 3.

EA's decision has already bitten them in their ***, and their *** is going to have more marks the more time they be so stubborn as to not release mod-tools.

I'm all in for mod-tools as a fan of mods, but this is a big let-down. Sure, the gaming industry isn't as strong as it use to, but that's no excuse. What EA is doing is counter-productive by axing mod-tools. People want to buy a game online for a mod, how is that difficult to understand?

Oh, because of DLC. Well, DLC + Mod-Tools would be great for both consumers who like to pay for extra content and for those who want to experience a whole new game that's based on Battlefield 3.

Anyways, back to life...

[Darman1138]

Also Ubisoft released their CryEngine 3 SDK engine ages ago

Uh...CryEngine 3 is owned by Crytek. Ubisoft has nothing to do with it.

[Steeps]

Uh...CryEngine 3 is owned by Crytek. Ubisoft has nothing to do with it.

Yeah I stopped reading his post after seeing that.

[carmikaze]

Yeah I stopped reading his post after seeing that.

So did I, lol.

[Psyko]

It will never happen. It's just how this world works.

I have heard this over and over from Developers the last couple of years....its such a cynical view. And ultimately incorrect in my opinion.

[Skitrel]

That Frostbite 1/2/3/Whatever not being modable is just a half-lie, half-marketeering lie. They are basically saying 'Because this engine is so awesome and graphical, it cannot be modded for the awesomeness it contains', which isn't true because already people have hacked their own server for up to 120 players within days after the BF3 release, and people have already started to add features like spectator mode in Bf3, and even someone ported a Jet for Battlefield Bad Company 2, and modified physics. That's with reverse-engineering and .exe hacking

You didn't read my post. A special TL;DR for you - it's not because it would be too difficult, it's because they legally can't do it because they don't own all the tech used in the game.

[Bluedrake42]

I'm going to post this to my channel

[matty1053]

Also, I think that if Dice did release a modkit, it would be so darn limited....

[Bluedrake42]

[matty1053]

I am sharing this video.

Plus, I am telling everyone of my facebook friends (Approx 1,582) to Sign this petition.

[karambaitos]

snip

BF3 Voip? WHERE?


your argument makes sense from a business standpoint, but me as a consumer, i could care less about what they do and how, or what their problems are, i will state what I want in a product that i would purchase, if they don't do it, i will not buy it, simple as.

And i want a proper explanation as to why they cannot do what i want, and many other potential buyers want, so that i may consider whether to buy the product or not, what no one wants is excuses like these "OH HUUUR DUUUR GAIZ, YOU TOO DUMB FOR DIS AND YOU DONT HAVE THE RAAAMZ YOU NEED TA RAAAMZ".

Or what ever other kind of completely stupid excuse they pull out of their asses at that given moment.

Also, I think that if Dice did release a modkit, it would be so darn limited....

Still better than nothing at all.

[Skitrel]

BF3 Voip? WHERE?

Don't disagree at all. The only thing I could speculate on here is that they made some very poor decisions. The Voip in BF3 was outsourced through Battlelog, which was developed by ESN (more licensing). This wasn't under the control of DICE, who as we know in the past included excellent voip solutions in all their BF games.

The problem with outsourcing is that, ultimately, things aren't usually as good as they are in-house. We can only assume that DICE didn't have the time to develop the systems they wanted, so it needed outsourcing.

Good news is - ESN is owned by EA these days. So it's not outsourced anymore. Expect the issues with BF3's voip to be eliminated in BF4.

ESN | Creators of the real-time web framework Planet

your argument makes sense from a business standpoint, but me as a consumer, i could care less about what they do and how, or what their problems are, i will state what I want in a product that i would purchase, if they don't do it, i will not buy it, simple as.

And i want a proper explanation as to why they cannot do what i want, and many other potential buyers want, so that i may consider whether to buy the product or not, what no one wants is excuses like these "OH HUUUR DUUUR GAIZ, YOU TOO DUMB FOR DIS AND YOU DONT HAVE THE RAAAMZ YOU NEED TA RAAAMZ".

Or what ever other kind of completely stupid excuse they pull out of their asses at that given moment.



Still better than nothing at all.

Time and development decisions, ultimately. It's hard to pinpoint certain aspects, but communities often underestimate just how long and how hard development of some of these things is, especially when they're doing a lot of work at the cutting edge. The PR community understands this in some part thanks to the communicative team here often explaining in explicit detail just how long even the simplest sounding things can take to develop.