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[JWNoctis]

If you personally want to respect Steve's wishes and play the game vanilla only, you're obviously free to do so, but if others want to mod it, that's their own choice.

I'm sure I'm only rehashing points others have already made.

But when there's already evidently a previous blow-up over this, and the developer had explicitly expressed his wish to not have his game modded - However contrary to the mainstream trends on mods, and however impossible to implement in practice, that is - This is only going to escalate things to where few would really want.

[EuchreJack]

Wow, over 24 hours and no update.  Are we reaching a point of stability?  Who knows!

[Lord Shonus]

He spent a big chunk of time dealing with "y u no let me mod" questions on the forum and Discord. That's part of why he's gotten so pissed off about the thing.

[Shooer]

Followed by a bunch of "y u no share code."  The most crass being "You should upload it to git in case you die."

[coleslaw35]

I better download v1.5.1 before he takes Aurora off the internet lol

[JWNoctis]

I better download v1.5.1 before he takes Aurora off the internet lol

And find out what magic -some- modders and reverse-engineers could weave in place? Yes, please.[/s]

Seriously though, I sure hope it won't end this way, but what I'm not sure is what to expect at this point.

[Urist McScoopbeard]

If people keep hassling Steve I have no doubt he'll follow through--that said, alot of this is reddit butthurt kind of stuff so I think it'll blow over pretty soon.

EDIT: Also what kind of backstories are people creating? I might start a Norse theme game, but I'm curious what kind internal RP is going on?

[Salmeuk]

Thanks for linking that night-mode mod, now I can actually play the game without tearing my eyeballs out.

If people keep hassling Steve I have no doubt he'll follow through--that said, alot of this is reddit butthurt kind of stuff so I think it'll blow over pretty soon.

EDIT: Also what kind of backstories are people creating? I might start a Norse theme game, but I'm curious what kind internal RP is going on?

I like to pick a small country and pretend they happened to rise to power through an absolutely ridiculous and unrealistic set of events, and have somehow become the dominant culture of Earth. So, an entirely canadian spaceforce rushing to the stars.

That inspired me to make a dwarven name list for anyone to use, if you haven't made one already. The first names are easy enough to get, but I had to write a short Python script to generate ~500 random last names.

And I have yet to deploy this list, but I have plans for sure. Nicely done Jacen!


Read spoiler if you want an opinion on the mod issue, but after researching it a bit I realize it's a hugely contentious issue on other websites, and it might be best to avoid focusing on it here.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

A quote from the night-mode mod-maker:

I understand that Steve does not wish the game to be modded, but, ... well, I will continue to mod it, and I hope others do too, which is separate for my love and respect for Steve's work. I can't wait to see what amazing mods the community comes up with.

Steve makes some really, really nice clay, which he gives out for free. Many people enjoy the clay as it is, but there are a few who find it difficult to work with, so they add a little water to the clay and it forms a really nice texture that allows them to sculpt amazing things. Steve then says, "You can't do that! Especially not in the privacy of your own home!" Some people point out that, if he is going to so heavily police the composition of his clay, then they can just figure out how to make their OWN clay by studying HIS clay, it is just math dirt after all, and while they would rather not do that, it's certainly possible. Queue anger from fans? Confusion on my part?

I'm sorry but it's not an argument of rights - it's a human thing to not listen to others, and it's also a human thing to take that into account and continue doing whatever you were doing before, despite the annoyances. There are no sides, it's just a bunch of individual actors attempting to create and change what they see in the software, and it sounds like a few of those actors are being big ol' dicks about it.

If it's true that Steve worries about muddied bug reports, there are ways to deal with that, as seen in this thread and in so many new games these days. There is no such thing as bull-headed game development anymore, hell, look at Tarn Adams and those two posts a few months back acknowledging the poor interface, and asking for community input and ideas for improvement. Steve can't just lockdown his community's feedback with a few, tired opinions. I get it, it's his baby, and yet there's enough people that support his vision that he will never fear for lack of 'vanilla' aurora players, no matter how wildly successful the mods get (and oh, how amazing will they be!).

If it's true that people were threatening Steve to release source code, shame on them! Who the heck threatens people over video games?

All I'm left with is the fear that I won't be able to play the wonderful game, if either Steve or the 'militant modders' have their way.

edit: Check out this post on the pentarch forums.

We've been made aware that that Aurora C# uses some assets from Endless Sky, and i decided to check it out.   It turns out there are some *serious* licensing issues.   Now, the content that is taken from Disney's, Games Workshop's and presumably some other IPs is not really my concern - I'm not lawyer enough to determine whether that is fair use or not.   I would simply advise against taking that wager, since it only serves to make your game more vulnerable to copyright claims.
What i am concerned about is the use of licensed free artwork without proper acknowledgement.

I dunno, but this sounds like a much more concrete issue than any mod..

[EuchreJack]

edit: Check out this post on the pentarch forums.

We've been made aware that that Aurora C# uses some assets from Endless Sky, and i decided to check it out.   It turns out there are some *serious* licensing issues.   Now, the content that is taken from Disney's, Games Workshop's and presumably some other IPs is not really my concern - I'm not lawyer enough to determine whether that is fair use or not.   I would simply advise against taking that wager, since it only serves to make your game more vulnerable to copyright claims.
What i am concerned about is the use of licensed free artwork without proper acknowledgement.

I dunno, but this sounds like a much more concrete issue than any mod..

Easy fix, just take out the art assets, they're not vital to the game.  Players can....mod back in the missing art if they like with total deniability.

[A Thing]

The next post in that thread is Steve saying he will remove the art assets in question, and presumably he has, so I'm not entirely sure of the problem there. If you're talking about the other assets based off of star wars and star trek, battletech and so on, I'unno. I always assumed those were fanmade and added in with permission, but apparently not.

[EuchreJack]

I've helped!

Spoilers is a totally free image that can be used without fear of litigation!

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

This is a copyrighted work of EuchreJack, who will sue anyone for 10 gazillion dollars if they should ever allege that it can not be used freely and openly.  And then they're get their dick eaten by a walrus.  It's free, FREE!

[JWNoctis]

I for one always wondered what those are doing in there even back in VB6, since they did not seem to help with immersion much in a game otherwise devoid of graphic luxuries. Maybe it's a carryover from Starfire days?

But to each their own, I guess.

[Urist McScoopbeard]

The racial art assets have been the same for a long time haven't they? Maybe he just forgot about what started out as a WIP thing?

[EuchreJack]

I for one always wondered what those are doing in there even back in VB6, since they did not seem to help with immersion much in a game otherwise devoid of graphic luxuries. Maybe it's a carryover from Starfire days?

But to each their own, I guess.

I liked them, but they were always a bit corny.  I mean, its nice to see something when you look upon an alien race, or your own.

The racial art assets have been the same for a long time haven't they? Maybe he just forgot about what started out as a WIP thing?

Probably.

And here is a free Walrus

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

This is a copyrighted work of EuchreJack, who will sue anyone for 10 gazillion dollars if they should ever allege that it can not be used freely and openly.  And then they're get their dick eaten by a walrus, like the one shown.  It's free, FREE!

[EuchreJack]

for some reason I can't resize the completion date bracket in the research screen.

Aurora pulls the date from Windows, so you can eliminate this problem by changing the Windows display setting. In the Date And Time Settings, click "Change Date And Time Formats" and set the Short Date to M/d/yyyy and long date to MMMM d, yyyy. You should now see the completion date for all tasks, and probably won't notice differences anywhere else.

Doesn't work for me, the format stays the same, at least on the colony Industry tab.  Although I can generally see the end date, so long as its not Wednesday.  Gives new meaning to Hump Day.