For all of its existence, consoles have fought against PC for the top of the notch videogame market. The former have their exclusiveness, the latter has game mods without the need of a hacked hardware.

However, it's just been in modern times where mods are being given much more importance thanks to streaming services and social media like Twitch or Youtube. People can suggest a streamer to use a certain mod, and if it exists the streamer will go ahead and show us the gameplay. All the while we might be playing the standard version on our consoles, I should add.

The question then is obvious: are these mods what makes a PC/Steam game superior to its console versions, simply because of better gameplay and expanded content instead of graphic output? Or because mods are fan-made they can sometimes be so wrong they ruin the hype of using them?

I've been wondering this myself ever since I've seen a youtuber do what I just mentioned above with a specific game. He lists the mods used and everything, and when I compared that to my console version of the same game I wondered if I should have a second version for Steam allowing me to go much further than the game developers ever wanted me to go.

I've already played Stardew Valley with mods, and I can say they're truly superior to the standard version. The mods can accelerate gameplay (not too much, otherwise the experience itself becomes diluted), offer other challenges, allow for greater customization... But are mods superior in every genre, or they're just made for specific games or genres with everything else being because we can do it?

I would definitely say mods give a superior option to playing. The main thing I see it adds replayability. However for Skyrim you can kinda get mods on playstation and xbox. Only problem is with the playstation version I believe it is extremely limited.

Another thing with mods people can make stuff that game studios would not even dare do because of too high risks or copyright issues.

To be honest about the only games I play modded is Skyrim and Minecraft so my viewpoint is pretty limited.

I wouldn't say that they work with all games. There's a few games that I've tried mods with and it just took away from the experience of playing that specific game, in the end it just became a completely different game than what it was meant to be. Then you have the games where the mods just enhance the overall experience, like Skyrim and Minecraft obviously, where it allows you to do so much more.

Then you also have a ton of just stupid and silly mods that make you question why they were even made in the first place, and my experiences with those kinds of mods hurt it for me.

I blame the developer model of 'we can put in a half effort', really... but even consoles basically require internet access these days so there's no reason they couldn't get mods or workshop whatsits if someone was willing to put in the effort (they aren't, not without a lot of money pushed their way).

You can't find mods in all genres, as far as I'm aware. Even if you could I don't think they'd mesh well with survival/horror because the usual drive for a mod maker is to make the game easier or more interesting while something like Sunless Sea prefers to be so bare bones because it's easier to slip into existential terror... or if you look at the average review, sanity loss through boredom. For best in show you can't beat the RPG workshops that add entire new campaigns or worlds; Neverwinter Nights through Shadowrun Returns get most of their content from players who were happy to make their own stuff and from what I saw before a critical error made me give up Enderal is bigger and (mostly) better made than Skyrim. Never heard of Enderal? Look it up on Steam. The game itself is free but it requires you to own a copy of Skyrim.

pokemon x : Absolutely agree about replayability. If I didn't have the mods for Stardew Valley I'd probably not be interested in playing several farms or even skim through updates, not because of the expanded content they bring but the easier playthrough they allow.

And yes, the high risks and copyright issues are also something that deprives us from seeing some content in a base game. Another thing, like happens with racing games for example, is the gargantuan number of existing racetracks, historic races and fan-made circuits that exist, which means a certain game can only have so many tracks and mods basically cover for everything else. Whatever content a game is lacking due to lack of space or even effort, mods can bring it to you.

zanderlex : It's not like all games have mods either, as enough people needs to be interested for anybody to actually develop said mod. It's even worse to see that the mods made for a certain game are entirely useless and silly, like you mentioned.

I have to disagree with mods ruining the experience altogether. The problem is not the mod itself, but how you use it. I have a cheats menu for Stardew Valley that gives me infinite resources, but I've barely used it. I could abuse it and clear the game in a single day, but there's no point on that. If a player wants to do it, it's their own choice to do so.

Noyb42 : The instances of half effort are disgusting. However, mods aren't really there to correct that mistake, even if some do. Mods are meant to give a customizable experience to each game and expand on what they already offer, half effort or not.

And yes, mods in some genres don't mesh well. I wouldn't want any mods on my Persona 5, for example, even if they make the game easier or whatever the game is perfectly fine as is and isn't any drag to replay again. Modding Personas into it, building social links faster, adding new worlds or dungeons, anything like that would kill the experience, even if some people don't think like me.

I'm of the belief that if mods make something better depends on the game and what options it allows the pc version to have over the console versions for example I believe Sonic Generations is best played on Steam for the fact of the modding community if said game has a good modding community then the possibilities become near limitless depending on the game and how easily it can be modded. This can also be the other way for some people where because the game can be modded to easily it ruins the exp for some for example Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2 always seemed to have less people playing the game competitively (at least from what I could tell) because the game was known to be easy to hack and have op things and such that made the completive scene pointless when you could so easily run into a hacker that ruins the rankings.

SonicOlmstead : I totally agree. I know of a racing game that even has a special app downloadable from the game's own website to store track mods and such, essentially inviting people to introduce what the developers couldn't, meaning a huge modding community has been built around that game. It apparently seems quite easy to mod too, so it's even more accessible.

And yes, the competitive play thing could be seen in all its might in the hit Among Us. Some hackers even bragged about being able to trap people or not being able to be ejected or things like that. Others directly affected the gameplay as the game was "fighting against the virus" and basically ruined the experience for everyone. All for the sake of winning, and in this game's case absolutely nothing at all other than pissing people off with a false feeling of being superior.