Modding tools like Oxygen for OPF2

[IceFire]

I remember an old controversial debate regarding the release of the "Oxygen" tools which can be used to make OPF mods in the first place.

Those of us who were opposed to it warned of every dick tom and harry making their own mods and therfore being a high number of low quality mods everywhere where everyone is doing their own thing.

The supporters of Oxygen argued that it would be like Darwins theory of survival where all the bad mods would be swept away while the good ones will last.

Well I think we have been proved right about the dangers of releasing modding tools to players.

Now there are so many mods out there most of us cannot even keep track of it. It is so overwhelming for me that I have only yet downloaded the Operation Frenchpoint mod. I just don't know what else to try. There is TOO much out there and that is why we have this chaos.

I think for OPF2 only the developers should be able to make additions to the game in the form of patches.

All official, and all fully compatible.

[ozanzac]

How many crap mods have you seen with a full release?

What is this chaos you are referring too? Whilst yes, it can be chaotic to keep up with the user made content that is being released, would you prefer absolutly no content at all, or minimal at best? The fact that content is still being released, shows that the OFP community is still very active.

Sure, BIS did release a few addons, but behind those addons were from people who recieved dividends from those releases, and support would eventually be forced to wind down, so then resources could be focused on other, more important projects.

After that point, if there were no avenue for user content and expansion, & nothing on the horizon from BIS, I would have walked away from the game before resistance even hit the shelves.

I beleive you are highly misinformed. Mods tend to be created by groups, rather than individuals. I've yet to see a mod which has been created solely by one person, and managed to get released.

While I don't doubt you that there is crap out there, sorting the good from the bad is the users problem, and all content is downloaded at the users peril. If you can't accept that, simple: get a console, or don't download addons.

Therefore, to answer your question: I would much rather prefer OFP II to be open to the community for modding, as there's a very slim chance that such a diverse range of addons that we have now could be attained via a developer only approach...unless of course, BIS decides to employ all the gifted content makers out there to create one hell of an addon making machine...but then again, that would all be just a pipe dream.

[Colonel_Klink]

I have to agree with ozanzac on this. As one of the original people who first received Oxyge, I dont recall myself ever thinking that anything bad would come from the release to everybody who wanted it. In fact the opposite. In my opinion, believe it or not, the release of Oxygen was intrumental in keeping OFP alive .

Before Oxygen the community had the pioneer attempts of new content makers using existing OFP models and the famous setpos scripting commands. This was great and kept interest in the game. Then come the conversion of OFP models into obj files and the moving of vertexes to get the very first Huey. But the community wanted more.

Pre Oxygen release saw people designing new content in what ever 3D program they had in anticipation for the official tools.

Since then I have seen many people with absolutely no modelling or texturing experience take Oxygen and over time create some stunning content. While some content has been a bit dubious (my first attempts included) I still applaud anybody who takes the time and effort to create these addons no matter how realistic or how well made they are.
Often these people have had to take harsh criticsm for their attempts and many have gone on to other games.

There have been many additional things done with OFP that I am sure even the game creators have been amazed by. While there have been a lot of OFP supporters come and go there still remains a fairly hardcore base that will keep adding to the game for years to come.

By not releasing modding tools with OFP2 would be a backward step and I am sure the developers know this. Three years on and OFP1 is still strong, 3 years from the release of OFP2 I believe the community will still be strong; only if the community has the ability to add to it.

[Heatseeker]

Well Icefire, i dont understand your concerns seeing has you gave up on gaming and OPF .
I dont think theres too much out there, we are actualy missing some basic new units and especialy missions and campaigns that take advantage of the nice addons.
Keeping track of the addons is a small price to pay, its actualy great to know that addon makers keep updating their units.
I hope it wont take long for modding tools to arrive after OPF2 .

[uiox]

3DS max 6 = 1089 € per licence
Oxygen = 0 € per licence

OFrP exemple
Mirage 2000 with O2
Jaguar with 3ds
Puma with O2
Fennec with 3ds

I doesn't see big difference, so I can say O2 is a good program.

More visitor now.

I only hope for OFP2 new tools (or solve some actual problems) cause it will be lucky to have this.
All work of addons maker is free, I know, but it's not a reason for order BIS a release of tools.

[Nephilim]

well i think theyll stick to oxygen
as they have created vbs1 models with oxygen

besides oxygen is in my opinion the best "pure" modeling program around

even maya sucks when it comes to modeling
i can model in oxygen 3times faster then in maya
anyone who has maya knows why

any most people simply dont know all functions of oxygen

i´d only wish it had such an easy animation tool like maya has, cuz aniamting with maya is easy as pie....

hope BIA will release an updated oxygen or so...

btw is there an .rtm plugin for maya 5.0?
anyone know?

[hardrock]

Oxygen is great, but one thing I'm really missing is an extrude-function. it's very annoying when you create points, copy them a few times and have to do all the faces in between by hand.

[Munk]

How many crap mods have you seen with a full release?

*cough*TcM*cough*

[Nephilim]

@ hardrock
have u tried the split function?
well i dont know if it works on single points but hell....

maybe there wil be a oxy 2 or sth when ofp 2 is relesed

[Silent N Deadly]

What chaos are you refering to? There is no chaos. Oxygen was the best thing that happened to OPF. Most of the addons are good. Some are just amazing. What confusion? Go to ofp.info and pick the addons. You can tell which are good. If you have 56k then there is confusion because you don't know what to download. On cable just try everything. What you don't like delete. What you like keep. Simple as that.