Why are mods dying?

[TheBus]

I notice, as time goes on, that mods are starting to die out. One of my favorite mods, the Montana Mod, was left by the founder of the mod. Control of the mod was taken over by the co-founder. This is because the founder aged out, got a job, and was no longer able to create content. This game was released 11, almost 12 years ago. so many of the 8-12 year olds that had their parents purchase this game or bought it with their allowance are at least 20 years old now. So much of the fan base for this game has grown out of it, or just doesn't have time anymore. This game is such a niche game to start with, and now people who once loved this game are aging out. I, now 16 years old, 17 in January, find this game much more fun to play now that I understand the complexity of this game. The time management, the multitasking involved. The more I look into mods the more intrigued I get, craving the greater complexity that comes with mods like the Montana Mod, which pitch you into a rural/ small town setting. Or like the Mayberry mod, where fires spread much faster than in vanilla 911FR. I see so many mods now that are either works in progress or haven't been updated in 4 years. As I search for new games, like 911 Operator, I find myself coming right back to this forum, just searching for a new mod. Hoping to find the mod I fell in love with, the Montana mod, with some sort of open to the public version; possibly even a post that reads "This mod is close to being finished, we plan to release it xx/xx/xxxx. There's nobody new to this game, as the only place you can get it is to download it from amazon. Our last hope is the people like Itchboy, who continue to tirelessly work towards a new, complex modification for the masterpiece that is Emergency 4.

[Squad 65]

13 hours ago, TheBus said:

I notice, as time goes on, that mods are starting to die out. One of my favorite mods, the Montana Mod, was left by the founder of the mod. Control of the mod was taken over by the co-founder. This is because the founder aged out, got a job, and was no longer able to create content. This game was released 11, almost 12 years ago. so many of the 8-12 year olds that had their parents purchase this game or bought it with their allowance are at least 20 years old now. So much of the fan base for this game has grown out of it, or just doesn't have time anymore. This game is such a niche game to start with, and now people who once loved this game are aging out. I, now 16 years old, 17 in January, find this game much more fun to play now that I understand the complexity of this game. The time management, the multitasking involved. The more I look into mods the more intrigued I get, craving the greater complexity that comes with mods like the Montana Mod, which pitch you into a rural/ small town setting. Or like the Mayberry mod, where fires spread much faster than in vanilla 911FR. I see so many mods now that are either works in progress or haven't been updated in 4 years. As I search for new games, like 911 Operator, I find myself coming right back to this forum, just searching for a new mod. Hoping to find the mod I fell in love with, the Montana mod, with some sort of open to the public version; possibly even a post that reads "This mod is close to being finished, we plan to release it xx/xx/xxxx. There's nobody new to this game, as the only place you can get it is to download it from amazon. Our last hope is the people like Itchboy, who continue to tirelessly work towards a new, complex modification for the masterpiece that is Emergency 4.

Mods are dying because people dont have alot of time and modders go to newer versions of Emergency

[jonnyhappyfeet]

On 12/3/2017 at 8:46 PM, TheBus said:

There's nobody new to this game, as the only place you can get it is to download it from amazon.

this game is also available on steam and is sold as "911 First Responders" - http://store.steampowered.com/app/323610/911_First_Responders/

[TheVolume]

On 2017-12-04 at 2:46 AM, TheBus said:

I notice, as time goes on, that mods are starting to die out. One of my favorite mods, the Montana Mod, was left by the founder of the mod. Control of the mod was taken over by the co-founder. This is because the founder aged out, got a job, and was no longer able to create content. This game was released 11, almost 12 years ago. so many of the 8-12 year olds that had their parents purchase this game or bought it with their allowance are at least 20 years old now. So much of the fan base for this game has grown out of it, or just doesn't have time anymore. This game is such a niche game to start with, and now people who once loved this game are aging out. I, now 16 years old, 17 in January, find this game much more fun to play now that I understand the complexity of this game. The time management, the multitasking involved. The more I look into mods the more intrigued I get, craving the greater complexity that comes with mods like the Montana Mod, which pitch you into a rural/ small town setting. Or like the Mayberry mod, where fires spread much faster than in vanilla 911FR. I see so many mods now that are either works in progress or haven't been updated in 4 years. As I search for new games, like 911 Operator, I find myself coming right back to this forum, just searching for a new mod. Hoping to find the mod I fell in love with, the Montana mod, with some sort of open to the public version; possibly even a post that reads "This mod is close to being finished, we plan to release it xx/xx/xxxx. There's nobody new to this game, as the only place you can get it is to download it from amazon. Our last hope is the people like Itchboy, who continue to tirelessly work towards a new, complex modification for the masterpiece that is Emergency 4.

1 Time
2 Life problems, school, work, and your own future
3 No desire to complete mod

4 That's probably enough to answer your question

[bama1234]

On 12/3/2017 at 7:46 PM, TheBus said:

I notice, as time goes on, that mods are starting to die out. One of my favorite mods, the Montana Mod, was left by the founder of the mod. Control of the mod was taken over by the co-founder. This is because the founder aged out, got a job, and was no longer able to create content. This game was released 11, almost 12 years ago. so many of the 8-12 year olds that had their parents purchase this game or bought it with their allowance are at least 20 years old now. So much of the fan base for this game has grown out of it, or just doesn't have time anymore. This game is such a niche game to start with, and now people who once loved this game are aging out. I, now 16 years old, 17 in January, find this game much more fun to play now that I understand the complexity of this game. The time management, the multitasking involved. The more I look into mods the more intrigued I get, craving the greater complexity that comes with mods like the Montana Mod, which pitch you into a rural/ small town setting. Or like the Mayberry mod, where fires spread much faster than in vanilla 911FR. I see so many mods now that are either works in progress or haven't been updated in 4 years. As I search for new games, like 911 Operator, I find myself coming right back to this forum, just searching for a new mod. Hoping to find the mod I fell in love with, the Montana mod, with some sort of open to the public version; possibly even a post that reads "This mod is close to being finished, we plan to release it xx/xx/xxxx. There's nobody new to this game, as the only place you can get it is to download it from amazon. Our last hope is the people like Itchboy, who continue to tirelessly work towards a new, complex modification for the masterpiece that is Emergency 4.

While it's true that I handed the mod over to Itchboy, we do in fact plan to release some version of the mod in the future. I can't say how soon because, well, I'm not in control of it anymore. But I can say with certainty that Itchboy is doing good things with it and he has made more progress than I would be able to, with everything I've got going on right now.

I'll tell you the reasons for the way things have changed... for me personally, it's because I'm in Paramedic school and working in EMS full-time on top of that. That leaves me with barely enough time to get enough sleep each week. This will change eventually as school comes to a close and all I have to worry about is a job. I might then have more time on my hands for doing some modding. But anyone who's been through it will tell you, especially combined with a job, Paramedic school is a long, arduous process. This is a similar story for a lot of the modding veterans around here, whatever their careers or schooling may be. People have families and lives to worry about, too.

On a broader scale... Well, many of us were excited for Emergency 5. The graphics looked like a huge improvement, and they were. The developers promised easy modding, and... well, we didn't exactly get that. At all. Almost nobody on here knows how to mod Emergency 5, because the system is way different from 4, and that's fine, except the devs only bothered to throw together not even a quarter-assed attempt at instructional videos and tutorials. Not to mention that they added almost nothing new to gameplay, didn't implement any of the things that people loved from the LA mod, in fact gameplay of Em5 honestly felt dumbed down to me. The animation and cutscenes are still cringey, and the game was unstable for a long time upon release although they have patched it quite a bit since then. Because of all these issues, the game is not marketable to very many who were not already a fan of the Emergency series, and it certainly didn't seem to attract very many new modders.

So on the cusp of the release of Em5 a lot of us were super excited for what we'd be able to do with modding. What we got was the exact opposite, the game is not easy to mod at all especially if you're a non-German speaker. And now to add insult to injury the devs seem to just be re-releasing the same game with minor additions and are trying to milk us for $20, $30, etc. again.

All that has caused a significant decrease in morale among us older Em4 modders... we don't see the series heading in a positive direction, so what's the point?

That being said, Em4 still has value and Itchboy and I intend to keep working with it for a while.

[Squad 65]

Ill still work on it too. Bama i argee the newer ones are harder to mod

[nbrown8568]

I'm back so I will continue to work on my Baltimore City Submod (not affiliated with Ladder 49). I don't have experience with scripts, but I study them to make heads and tales of them. I can't make models yet. I don't do lighting, but I am still going to try my hand at it. I had 75% of the mod done, but my health took me for a loop, and my laptop was dormant for over a year and when I turned it on a lot of my files were corrupted and a lot of my game files were missing. So starting today I am going to get my reference photos and redownload paint.net, and get what I need to get to work.

Norm