Journal #5418

Late, I know, but whatever; I think Valve is really making an great effort to put the source modding community on spot like it once was with goldsource, yet they stimulate the current development of modding which I think is a somewhat negative development. For the simple fact they give mods a oppertunity to be hosted on steam and so opening them for a larger audience than they would have had when they weren't hosted I give them my thumbs up. However, the mods (5 atm, 5 more to come and perhaps more) that get hosted are big, populair and mostly total conversion mods with well-known concepts done so much before. That raises the modding standard once again which, for me, is a negative development. In the 'modding scene' there has been created this feeling of releasing a total conversion mod at first release. This is stimulated by gamers. Mods with a great concept but with stock HL2 enviroment won't be played anymore (unless it's something revolutionary), no, everything has to be custom at start, only then it is worth a play.... that's basicly the thought nowadays. This somewhat dissapoints me, because this puts many great ideas to sleep. Don't get me wrong, I like all those incredibly custom mods that get released (well, a lot I don't like actually, to name 2.... Insurgency is again a releastic middle-east shooter, Zombie Panic is sigh yet another Zombie game - I swear that people are fascinated with zombies) but I miss all those wacky smalltime mods people all gave a try back in the goldsource days. So yeh, i'm on a bit of hate-love feeling about the hosting of mods on Steam.

On a other note, Jailbreak! released a bunch of media from 0.5 - it is now a total conversion. Dinosaurs versus Robots, how random and brilliant is that! I'm a beta tester (woot, in one of the screenshots I make a comment in chat under 'Freshy Fresh' - LULZ, I R FAMOUS BIATCHES!) and I saw the mod grow. There have been quite a bunch of gameplay changes aswell, but all for the better i'd say. Personally, i'm a big fan of this mod (simply for the arcadish lulz supported by solid competitive gameplay) and hopefully it will be one of the next 5 mods to be hosted on steam. Anyhows anyways, you guys should give it a try when 0.5 releases. The community is very friendly and always welcoming newcomers. http://www.jailbreaksource.com/Hehe, I think this has to be one of my longest posts on TWHL ever.