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The mod industries? The industrial logic of non-market game production

University of Amsterdam, d.b.nieborg{at}uva.nl

Shenja van der Graaf

Berkman Center for Internet and Society, Harvard Law School, shenja{at}cyber.law.harvard.edu

This article seeks to make the relationship between non-market game developers (modders) and the game developer company explicit through game technology. It investigates a particular type of modding, i.e. total conversion mod teams, whose organization can be said to conform to the high-risk, technologically-advanced, capital-intensive, proprietary practice of the developer company. The notion 'proprietary experience' is applied to indicate an industrial logic underlying many mod projects. In addition to a particular user-driven mode of cultural production, mods as proprietary extensions build upon proprietary technology and are not simple redesigned games, because modders tend to follow a particular marketing and industrial discourse with corresponding industrial-like practices.

Key Words: first-person shooter • game engine • proprietary experience • proprietary extension • total conversion modification

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