This isn’t Larian’s fault, obviously. It’s an industry-side issue that’s down to Sony, Microsoft, etc. gatekeeping their stores. I don’t think it’s a fair bargain when the barrier to mod support for consoles seems less a matter of technical considerations and more a product of big corporations not knowing how to monetise or control fan-made content. I’m a console gamer because I’ve made peace with the lack of Mac support. Feels like the industry wants to punish non-PC gamers sometimes.
I don’t think it’s a fair bargain when the barrier to mod support for consoles seems less a matter of technical considerations and more a product of big corporations not knowing how to monetise or control fan-made content.
Console makers have been famously strict about controlling their platforms ever since the glut of awful games in 1980s that gave some consoles a bad reputation. That bit of history is surely a significant factor, if not one of the most significant.
It’s also worth acknowledging that modding and homebrew game development come largely from people who already have the tools for the platform they use, which usually means PCs. (It’s one of the great advantages of general-purpose computing, after all.) Improving the situation much on consoles would require not just lifting the restrictions, but making console development kits good, cheap, and available.
If those two things came to pass, it sure would be interesting to see the results.
