Why is this forum going downhill?

I need to give a huge shout out to all of the modders who have made many enjoyable maps/vehicles/skins/configurations over the last 3 years.
I do not think this forum or the modding community is dying AT ALL. It is merely adapting in various ways to the current whims of what is required.

The current crew of modders has a level of proficiency that is just as comparable to the grandaddies of yore and watching noobs gaining knowledge
and making truly awesome stuff in all categories is living proof. No, it isn't dying. Think about it, if the current level of quality is any indication of what
can happen when BeamNG is at "1.0" then we are all in for a hell of a show and a level of fun that I can barely imagine right now.

Just because the current trend is in "configurations" or "skins" does not mean there isn't a pent up demand to make awesome full fledged vehicles
and maps. I for one am so damn hungry to learn jbeaming I can barely stand it, all because of a modder somewhere! I am also being patient and
learning alternate programs and skills for the "big show".

I will take this opportunity to graciously thank every modder who has ever released anything, whether "bad" or "awesome", it doesn't matter.
The creativity and energy behind some of these mods is exactly why I am here and able to do what I can. PERIOD. Without the help of specific
modding individuals and the community at large I would have collapsed in fatigue and frustration a long time ago.

It is clear new blood is finding their niche' in these forums at a steady pace, been here 3 years and have seen it. Don't panic, as BeamNG
grows the "cycles" that modders will follow are but mere reflections of any particular level that the main program is at. Someone somewhere
is right now learning how to make an awesome high quality mod that we all in the future will be raving about.

Sincerely,

your resident BeamNG psychologist

UP THE MODDERS!

 

Tbh all my cars are still thermals-free, and using slidenode steering and the old non global wheel setup because I'm too lazy to update them all. Literally just waiting for development to stabilise somewhat so my work isn't obsolete with every update.

Even when it does, the thought of releasing the cars and babysitting like half the forum should they have issues repulses me. Plus they're all still untextured because I'm a donut.

 

A lot of the new features are actually pretty easy to add in. Thermals is like 4 lines of code plus adding a radiator (aka copying one from another vehicle)

Same here and congrats man! It's crazy to think what started for me as "I wonder how hard it is to make a powerful but realistic engine for the Sunburst" turned into what it is today with 30k+ downloads. And I didn't even model the engines! (I might get around to that or someone else will be passionate and generous enough to do it for me)

 

See.. This is what everyone means.
This place is now all about the downloads, even though it doesnt generate money like youtube does it seems to be the same concept, if someone releases some really minor mod, even if its well done, its still a minor mod, for some its good and for some its useless.
Take skins for example, they look cool. thats about it.. Now onto engines, someone makes a more powerful engine for some car, people like to go fast, then they get bored and never use it again. Now configurations, ooooh now we get the same cars with a bunch of mixed up pieces that go in weird places. Thats a configuration. Now onto the little oddities like RC and weird concepts that are not jbeam or model intensive, Good job thats an interesting concept, rc cars were never meant to be in the game, but they are so good job. 5 days later it gets boring for nearly everyone and you move onto something else.

Now onto the big ones. Full cars such as the amazing but highly outdated ones from the racing pack. Those things used to be used so much back in 2014-2015 that some people didnt even want more mods at the time, even now i am realizing the importance of old work like that, wanting to update the hell out of them by setting options correct and pressure wheels and all that other jazz. Even the 1920s car by Miura brought alot of variety and oddity into the car selection, i prefer modern cars as a whole but that was very well made and i appreciate something like that. Making a jbeam from scratch is a very hard and time consuming thing. So many modders have quit so many amazing projects for lack of time or interest and those decisions have directly impacted the players in many ways. The only solutions to making better content have been hiring great modders into the game to make more official vehicles or the idea of paid mods. The ladder sounds like it would be very hard to regulate but if it existed it would be a great way for modders to have some motivation towards modding because otherwise they would be "wasting" countless hours doing something that people will only use for maybe a few months and without direct reward. Pirating would be a real issue and unless mods were encrypted or only accessable to trusted sources that would certainly happen and the whole thing would be useless.

Just my thoughts, i believe i left out alot but whatever... cant think of everything.

 

Modding is more of a hobby/passion it is not a payed practice for the simple reason that no one wants paid mods, no offence but look a what happened with skyrim on steam when paid mods where introduced, that's why this is a terrible idea.
As stated above beamng is still growing, modding should always be non-profit as it has many variables that could cause alot of damage to beamng it might also put a bad reputation on beam for doing such.
The concept on paper seems great but in reality it's a very corrupt system, As I have stated above No one is forcing you to make mods It is a thing that you choose.
Even without mods beamng is still a good game, There is no high demand for mods,Beamng is still growing, Payed modding is flawed, And my final reason is if modding is paid for then it's really just offical content, if beam has to pay for more people they have to raise the price of beamng this would lower the amount of new players and would cut off new modders and would shrink the modding community.
No one wants to pay for mods, this game is not run by EA.

 

Im not encouraging it, dont put me on that train of "fuck all of you im a big company that makes useless shit that people will buy lets make everyone pay for everything ever" this is beamng, a community, a very cheap game to run for what it is, why do people like modding beamng? all i see is complaining from those who do it on how they get no rewards or any satisfaction for doing it, also nobody has to pay for official content updates like DLC. "Even without mods beam is a good game" of course it is, but this is one of the best games for modding i can see. There is ALWAYS a high demand for mods here, virtually infinite amount of vehicles can be made, and even more of an infinite variety in maps. Beam doesnt need FEATURE mods, only content ones at this moment. Features are currently good enough in the base game as they are also always improving. Im tired of someone throwing another under the bus just because ideas are mentioned and thoughts are thrown out there. Im not saying the internet is a safe and happy place but making it worse is not a thing anyone wants.

 

There are no tutorials/explainations to making bigger mods because they are an ass to make and and become outdated soon. The small number of actual modders is because all of the people that are able to make them gained the knowledge themselves, through trial and error, mainly, and not by reading tuts or being told how to. Of course, a person can explain a detail, but you have to learn most of the stuff yourself from your own will, there is no magic wand that will make you a bugatti, it doesn't work that way and the system is too complicated for it to be possible, if you ever want to make anything you'll have to put some effort into it and just do whatever. If you are lazy to spend time and use a little brain, you're not getting anywhere.

 

I think it would be extremely useful if the devs created a jbeam plugin within Blender itself. There is a plugin someone in these forums has made somewhere, but it's not really that good. It would be nice if a jBeam plugin for Blender would also have physics simulation where you could test how the vehicle would deform.

It would still be best to have a better in game editor though where you could test the physics and edit the jbeam on the fly.

 

IMO that plugin is pretty useful for the first creation of a n/b since it's even capable to export faces as coltris. It's just missing the opportunity to import again and tweak a jbeam that way.
And an ingame editor would be great!

 

Well, all the noobs seem to be gone and other stuff you are criticizing has never been a problem for me, so even if it is going downhill, it is because someone up high assumed small mods are bad and they are too lazy to scroll through RP threads.