Mod restrictions holding back UT3 360

by Ross Miller on Aug 1st 2007 12:25PM

Sony's timed exclusive with Unreal Tournament 3 looks to have happened in part thanks to Microsoft. According to Epic Games' Mark Rein (via CVG), unresolved issues with downloadable user mods on the Xbox 360 led the developer to delay the shooter until "some time after the new year." Rein also confirmed this news to Joystiq in an interview to be published tomorrow.

Because of the closed nature of the Xbox Live network, setting up a system for PC users to share mods with Xbox 360 users would be challenging, especially since there is no cross-platform connectivity via Microsoft's Games for Windows Live. "And Microsoft's got a very busy Christmas schedule... We just couldn't get enough attention from them to solve that problem," he told MCV.

"Worst case scenario would be Epic bringing popular mods onto the 360 and putting them through the certification process," Rein told us. "Because that's the way it works today. Or selling them in Marketplace, or convincing Microsoft to let us give some away for free," he said.

"That's the worst case scenario. Hopefully it will be better than that, but we know nothing yet about how that's going to work and that's why we're totally concentrating on the PS3 right now, in terms of consoles," he said.

Unreal Tournament III (PS3)

Source

Tags: epic, epicgames, markrein, mods, PC, unreal, unrealtournament3, ut3, Xbox-360

Reader Comments (54)

Ouch. I was never a fan of the UT games, but this one looked like some hot shit to me. Hope they get all of this sorted out by the time I'm bored of Halo 3...

If there is one series that just doesn't fit on consoles...it's gotta be Unreal Tournament. The controller alone is reason enough. I feel bad for anyone who has to play the PS3/X360 counterparts to this must-have franchise.

@Stevo

Except the PS3 version DOES support KB/M.

These certification and closed network issues seem to be the big negative to Live. I hope Microsoft looks at loosing the reigns a little going forward.

Thank goodness for console competition. Once everybody sees what they can do with user-created content on LittleBigPlanet next year, Microsoft will be dragged kicking and screaming into supporting this in order to keep up. They never would have opened up their network otherwise.

I'm happy I got a PS3 I'm waiting for this, Call of Duty 4, Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway, and Half Life: The Orange Box

Your comment was completely related to the article!

i think the funny thing is that every one of those games is/will be available on the 360, hah!

Why is MS so damn anti-freedom. Give the developers the chance to do what the hell they want with the game.

Dear MS,

Why do you hate freedom?

Sincerely,

Gamers

Freedom is Slavery!

A Tip of the Hat to Epic for shooting straight about this.

A Wag of the Finger to Microsoft for resisting efforts to open their network.

I hope they have the top multiplayer mods hit the download service for free every so often. More convenient than shuffling through mods, and you still get the best of the best.

Will this game have online crossplatform?

no,just mod downloads.

What happened to the big speech before the Xbox 360 launched, how user created content would be a "backbone" of Live. Now, ironically, Sony is giving the user much more freedom than Microsoft. I own a 360, and while I do like it, this is pushing me to the PS3 camp a little more every day.

I did, and Im happy.

This Sucks for the 360!

*Step up to the plate Microsoft*

We want MODS!!

i would consider buying ut3 if the 360 got mods as well.because as it stands ut3 on ps3>60 version solely based on the mods,meaning i wont buy it for 360 XD

So, if they have to get mods certified, does that mean I won't be able to play as a Metroid, Sailor Moon, or Bender in UT3 360? Pass.

I think that will occur if you have to pay for the mods, but that was worst case scenario, so the likely-hood of playing as copyrighted characters is raised, but still not incredibly likely... It's hard to say, really.

I don't think he understands what mods are.

Mods modify the gameplay; A.K.A. new game modes not originally in the game or added to the game by the developers, but rather, created and added by users. This is not limited to game modes, it also includes things like weapon model changes, character model changes, skin maps, user created maps, new vehicles, etc. Every aspect of the game can be changed, and users do it.

Lack of user mods on the 360 is a real liability relative to PC games, and potentially to the PS3 as well. User created mods for a game like Oblivion, for example, fix a lot of bugs and design flaws that Bethesda left in, and user-created content is often far better quality than the "official" stuff, not to mention being free. (Horse armor, anyone?) I own oblivion for 360 because I don't have a fancy PC gaming rig to play it, but I sure miss the mods, and seems like that's a problem for other games as well. Not sure what the solution is, unfortunately.

I own both a PS3 and 360, and the PS3 version of UT3 right now is destroying the 360 version, do we pay microsoft for live so they can continually charge us for maps and limit us to play by ourselves without any maps and mods?

Come on microsoft, User content is way better then that crap you charge for.

Your Friend, a Disgruntled Gamer.

Look it's Cole, Dom and the rest of thr crew from gears of war! Darn mercenaries:)

Unfortunately I can sympathize with MS on this issue. Opening up LIVE could present more problems than benefits. Because LIVE is a closed and monitored network, it doesn't get viruses. Because consoles are not open ended sytems they don't suffer from piracy as much as their PC brethren. So really MS is just trying to cover their own tail on this one. Plus, going through a certification process ensures the mod joe blow concocted in his basement doesn't crash my console or create more bugs than fixes in my game. Plus this way, MS acts as a filter so that only the cream of the crop of mods make it so XBLM. I don't know why this is such a bad thing... It's more like a minor annoyance due to it requiring gamers to do something completely outside of their nature- be patient.

Let's not get all angry here; Mods will come to the XBOX360, but probably as expansion packs instead of a constant flow of new user created stuff. You'll get all the best of the bunch which will probably end up being very polished by Epic. However, I guess that really takes away from the whole idea of user created content b/c you'll get the mods months after everyone else has been using them. I guess Sony did something right by giving developers full reign on the implementation of multiplayer with the option to use the Sony servers. We'll see how important this thing is once the game comes out for PC/PS3. Hopefully, they'll provide to PC mod converter for free and loading mods to the PSN and or directly on your system will be streamline. Otherwise, people won't utilize it.

Personally, I still think it was delayed to avoid Halo 3. The same goes for Haze. Those are both two great looking games that would be lost in the Halo storm. On PS3, they will get the attention they deserve.

I think Rein is pressuring MS to just open it up to them. They are making them look bad publicly to get them to change their ways. Personally, I would prefer that only the better mods make it into Live, because I don't want to waste time going through crappy ones. But if you have to pay for them, forget it. Better off not releasing them at all.

So so this is what that extra money for live gets you. What a joke.

MS is very afraid of anything stealing limelight from their Halo cash cow ... they are NEVER EVER going to allow an FPS to have a ground breaking feature (for a console) that Halo does not have.

God forbid, 360 users start playing another FPS other than Halo.

Uhm, and this is despite the constant "Xbox only has shooters" tagline? Your comment is a joke. Xbox has more shooters than the other two franchises combined. Play Halo or whatever, but shooters are all over that console.

Yes, MS doesn't want any other good shooters on the 360 for people to play other than Halo. That's why there are very few shooters on the 360. That's why they published Gears of Wa...Er, wait, forget that last point. That is why they are FORCING Epic to delay their shooter because they hate awesome Epic shooters.

This has nothing to do with the fact that Halo3 will be superior to UT3 and force people to completely overlook the game and not buy it. I am actually looking forward to UT3, but most people will overlook it on 360, unless it comes out about 6 months or better after Halo 3, which it is.

Don't listen to the PR spin. Just think for yourself. Epic wants to make money, they can't compete with Halo, so they push it out and make an excuse. Their excuse is probably a true statement, but they could have always launched the game and updated later.

god forbid people realize that other fps's are better.

The only reason this game is even on consoles is because PC games are in a slump. You're not playing the proper game unless you are playing the PC version.

Unreal Championship didn't sell many xboxes, and unreal tournament 3 won't sell many ps3s or xbox 360s. it's there to make up for the undoubtedly low sales the pc version will get.

halo > unreal tourny

nuff said

Halo Multiplayer < Unreal Tourney Multiplayer

Better Graphics, Pacing, Weapons and Environments

'Nuff Said

I understand its your opinion, but you really couldn't be more wrong. The only thing halo exceeds in is its story driven Single player aspect. UT is better by far in MP in every possible way. Even UT2003 (which a lot of people did not like) is better then both Halo 1 and 2 MP. The fact that you believe the Halo franchise is better really means you need to try other games.

Nuff said

halo has a great single player and a great multiplayer, unreal tournament has only a great multiplayer

once again

halo > unreal tourny

Comparing console FPS's to PC FPS's is like comparing special olympic athletes to olympic athletes.

Nothing against the special olympic athletes of course.

I still don't know how the mod scene is going to work on PS3(forget about the 360). How will the mods be transfered between players? Will it be similar to the PC experience where you simply join a server and it automatically downloads whatever .utx files needed? Will someone have to create a server for PS3 and share it to all players interested playing?

Still, couldn't imagine playing a twitch shooter (or any FPS :P )like UT with analog sticks over my mouse, but, to each their own.

I have no doubt that user created maps will be possible on Xbox 360. Look at FarCry... Its just they may not be able to be used on Xbox LIVE Marketplace.

Maybe, the creator of every map, can take what they like from what they made, and upload it to a server at Epic for those who like to get new maps can download. That way, you know it is safe.

As for mods, I would like it to be more open, but it being a closed system is definitely a good thing. Thats one of the reasons the Xbox 360 doesn't have a browser (I wouldn't want one)...

I was never a fan of the UT series either, but I have to wonder why they couldn't release a game just because of mods. Is it because of the architecture to access the mods or simply because they didn't get their way so they're being vindictive?

@JustMe

Epic originated on the PC and a big thing about their games was the ability to create FREE mods. Most console kids don't realize this and have been brainwashed by Microsoft into believing that you should pay for stuff that used to be free.

Epic released FREE expansion packs for earlier Unreal Tournaments as a was of saying "Thank you for buying our game". Of course that philosophy is quickly dying because of Microsoft's "charge for everything" philosophy. So you can see why Epic is annoyed - their philosophy of rewarding their customers is conflicting with Microsoft's philosophy of "Death by a thousand micro transactions".

hence the issues with the pricing of the gears map packs. If it was up to Epic, they would have been free.

I honestly don't really care much about mods in UT. Yeah, they can be fun sometimes, and people put a lot of hard work into making them, but usually I'll just want to fire UT up straight vanilla, just so I don't have to download a crappy recreation of ce_dust and a bunch of clown models and textures or something like that 'cause I have a crappy connection. =[

But I do care about keyboard and mouse support...that better be coming to the 360. >=[

360 users won't be sitting around waiting for this game. We'll have Halo 3, BioShock and many more to keep us occupied. I personally think the delay is a good thing.

It's the PS3 that's hurting for FPS games. The 360 has plenty to go around and then some.

Halo 3 > Unreal 3 ; but only according to critical reception, game sales, hours played, general popularity, single/co-op depth, and story. Yes, I am psychic so don't bother with the "they ain't even out yet" argument.

you have no idea what critics will say!
And "game sales" covers everything else you mentioned. This means shit and you know it. Just look at Okami. A work of art, blew away reviewers, and sold like shit.
Every UT game (minus sales) has been better then Every Halo game. UT3 will not be different. Maybe bungie can get some ideas from UT again for Halo4.

This worst case scenario of theirs really doesn't sound so bad if you have ever actually put up with trying to get some UT mods working. There have been plenty of really bad jobs done by mod makers over the years and the last thing I want to have to do on my 360 is edit a damn .ini file.

Sadly though without the mods and more importantly the TC's (total conversions) UT3 really wouldn't be worth the purchase price. The TacOps TC was totally worth the cost of buying UT back in the day.

The DRM Demon strikes again!

Death to the RIAA!

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Mod restrictions holding back UT3 360

Unreal Tournament III (PS3)

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