Anyone involved with the enduring modding scenes for games like Skyrim and Fallout knows there's unpleasant tension between free mod creators and developer Bethesda's official Creations mod marketplace. But that doesn't seem to worry Bethesda director Todd Howard, who's eager to expand what he views as a big win for everyone.
He discusses Bethesda's approach to mods with YouTuber Mortismal Gaming in a recent interview. First, Howard establishes, "We've been really fortunate that our modding audience has been with us for a really long time." Then, he declares that Bethesda's most recent iteration of its Creations paid mods marketplace is "healthy."
"I think the good news there is it's a really healthy community," Howard continues. "I think when you go into paid mods – and we've had a couple of stabs at it, with some success and some issues – we really like where we're at. [...] We're really, really happy with that program, how it's going for both free stuff, and paid stuff, and our own stuff."
Howard says, "Our issue now actually is getting that content in front of more people because we think it's so good." He wants mods to be easier to download and use, it seems, and says Bethesda's official mod channels still have "a little bit of friction in making it easier to get that stuff and play it for our audience."
But as Howard plans the future for paid mods – as well as those Bethesda-approved and Bethesda-made mods he mentions, fans predict their free mods' untimely deaths. A comment with over 700 upvotes in one Reddit thread on the subject summarizes their fears: "The modding communities that exist today for these games would not exist if they were pay walled."
