I believe that the mod vault for FAF should work in the same way as "Nexus Mod Manager". I'm sure that many of you are familiar with that system, and how easy it is to know whether or not there's a newer version of a mod.
Here is an examples of the current system:
Search for "blackops" in the mod vault. The top result when the mods are arranged by rating is a mod called "BlackOps Unleashed V8". From the name alone, you might beleive that this is "version 8" of the mod... but hold on... what's it say there in the description? "Version 5.2". Huh. That's confusing.
Let's keep this confusing information in mind when looking at another upload of BlackOps. Further down the list you can find a mod called "BlackOps Unleashed V6", but the description says that the version is 6.0. I'm no math genius but this is some pretty damn conflicting information.
So which mod is the newest version? How can we find out? Oh! I know, let's see when the mods were uploaded.
BlackOps Unleashed V8 (Version 5.2) Uploaded 2014-04-13
BlackOps Unleashed V6 (Version 6.0) Uploaded 2014-04-13
f***. My. Life.
So I recently tried playing a game with BlackOps Unleashed V8 (Version 5.2) and everyone in the match desynced. Why? Because we all had different versions of the game. How the HELL does this even happen? If I try joining a player's game, and he has a mod enabled that I do not have - The game tells me... and I can go download that mod. It used to ask me and download the mod automatically.
The game does not allow me to join the match if I do not have the mod - So why can't it tell me that we don't have the same version of a mod?
If I look at Nexus Mod Manager, I can see the exact version of every mod that I have, when the mod was last updated, and it tells me if a newer version of the mod is available. If the modder wants to make a change to their mod, such as fixing a bug, they release an update and everyone gets it - ensuring that everyone uses the same version without needing to re-download the mod.
What am I requesting?
#1 A complete rehaul of the mod vault system within FAF.
#2 Mod creators need to create very clear and precise descriptions of their mods or LINK to a forum post where we can find such descriptions.
#3 A range of new features for the mod vault. Look at NMM for inspiration, give us a NMM-style mod managing tab, and a new tab to find new mods. Sort every mod into a category. The category system as it is now sucks major ass, you get to choose between "Big", "Small", "UI", and "Sim".
So how can we get these things done? I'm not a programmer and I'm not going to pretend to know how much work this is. I also appreciate the work that is already being done and of course, the people who pay to keep the servers running. I heard recently that the FAF servers cost $2,000 a month to run, and even with donations I'm sure that a pretty chunk of cash is being taken out of someone's wallet to keep everything running.
What do you guys think about what I've said? Do I have a point? And if so, what can be done about it? Fundraising the money needed to update the mod-vault? That's something that I would back.Statistics: Posted by AaronD — 03 Mar 2016, 04:41
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