What would it take for more players to mod their games?
Each team had its own picture of the player who likes to customize games. Without shared evidence on what drives these players and where they get stuck, teams worked in silos and risked building inconsistent experiences. The study was part of a wider effort to give teams shared user profiles and journeys.
- Questions 1–2 · The modderWhat motivates players to mod, and what frustrates them?
- Questions 3–4 · The journeyWhat are the stages of modding, and how does each one feel?
- Questions 5–6 · Beyond today's moddersWhat do modders play, and what stops other players from starting?
Interviews, an at-home journey activity and a survey
A study of players who mod first-person shooter games was already planned, so I combined the two. One recruitment and one set of sessions served both, on a research platform another team had funded. The interview participants all played and modded shooters; the survey then widened the picture to players of every genre. Combining saved time and budget, at the cost of more complex planning.
In-depth interviews uncovered motivations, pain points and the stages of the journey. An at-home activity then captured each stage in detail, and a survey tested the findings at scale and reached players who don't mod.
Who we interviewedModders with a range of skills: some used built-in game tools with little or no coding, some modded through code, and some came up with ideas for others to build.
Sharing was the reward, but quality held most modders back
Try it: walk through the modding journey Simplified view
How modders felt at each stage, and about their tools.
Tap any stage name to see what modders were trying to do, where it got hard, and what they said. Swipe the chart to see all 9 stages.
Modding is about making the game your own
Personalizing came first, followed by the joy of programming, creativity, a sense of control, better performance and replayability. Novices started with visual changes they could see right away, then moved on to gameplay.
Skills and tools held modders back
As many found modding tools hard to use. Finding playtesters and fixing bugs came next. Many collaborated to fill the gaps, handing stages to friends with coding or art skills.
Interest was there; the barrier was the learning curve
Lack of technical skills and the time needed to learn stopped most from trying. Those who tried and stopped found the process complex and overwhelming.
Most modders also kept their mods to themselves, either because they didn't feel the quality was good enough, or because the mods felt too personal to interest anyone else.
Help modders reach a mod they're proud to share
The creative stages already worked. Modders got stuck on quality: implementing, playtesting and fixing bugs, often without the skills or the people they needed. That gap kept many mods from ever being shared.
- Easy built-in tools for people who don't code
- Interactive, visual tutorials inside the tools
- Help tracking down and fixing bugs
- Built-in collaboration for ideas, design and art
- Help finding playtesters
- Community support and feedback before publishing
A modder profile and journey map for the product teams
I turned the findings into a hobbyist modder profile and a stage-by-stage journey map (simplified in section 03), with needs and opportunities at each stage. Product teams used them to understand the players they were all building for.
Simplified view The hobbyist modder profile
The hobbyist modder
A player who loves games and customizes them, in content, visuals or code, for a better experience for themselves and others.
Skills- A version of the game that matches their taste
- Better performance
- More replayability
- Personalizing the game
- Expressing creativity
- Feeling empowered
- Interactive, visual tutorials for built-in tools
- Access to playtesters
- Collaborators with the skills they lack
- Missing coding or art skills
- Complex tools and time to learn them
- Tracking down and fixing bugs
A gamer who loves games and is drawn to customizing them, in content, visuals or code, to create a fun, different or better experience for themselves and other players. They playtest and troubleshoot their work, and publish mods to share with the community.
- The mod not working, or not landing as intended
- Not getting enough people to playtest it
- Negative feedback on their mods
- Connecting with modding communities for feedback and help
- Collaborating with modders who have the skills they lack, like coding or visual art
- More detailed, step-by-step documentation and tutorials for beginners
- Help from more advanced coders in finding and fixing bugs
- Mod tools
- Built-in game editors, creative modes and custom game makers, plus external creative kits
- Code editors
- IDEs and scripting editors, such as Visual Studio and Notepad++
- Graphic editors
- GIMP, Aseprite, Procreate, Photoshop, 3ds Max
- Mod managers
- Mod hosting and management sites
- IdeateDeciding or brainstorming what to mod
- DevelopEditing code, creating visuals and assets, or adjusting parameters in built-in tools
- PlaytestTrying the mod in real situations, getting players’ first impressions and finding bugs
- TroubleshootFixing bugs and issues, then playtesting again to raise the quality
One picture of the modder
Product teams built on the same profile and journey instead of separate assumptions.
Insights for development
Popular genres, what to mod and what blocks newcomers informed product development.
Shared user artifacts
The profile and journey joined the research team's library of user artifacts, after peer review.
The trade-offs of combining two studies
- Combining has a costOne recruitment served two studies, but screening and interviews had less time, and gaps opened between the sessions, the journey activity and the analysis.
- Order methods on purposeRunning the survey after the interviews let me test the findings at scale, but I couldn't follow up on what the survey raised.
- Check the platform earlyThe research platform's rules on sharing outside files delayed the journey activity. The lesson: check these limits before the study design is final.