The rise of AI tools in game modding could be leading to the decline of the hobby, according to Mgamerz, a modder behind a popular Mass Effect 3 multiplayer mod for Mass Effect Legendary Edition.

AI's integration into the modding community has accelerated in recent months, with tools like Claude enabling full game decompilations and facilitating the creation of mashup mods. While acknowledging the effectiveness of these AI tools, Mgamerz expressed concern that they are contributing to an influx of low-quality content that makes it difficult for users to find functional and well-integrated mods.

"The difficulty of making mods and getting into it filtered out a lot of low-quality stuff," Mgamerz explained. "You see this on stuff like the Switch eShop, I've heard. It's full of slop, because there's no quality control and you can just ship whatever, and then users have to dredge through all sorts of stuff like that."

The process of creating and distributing mods typically involves an ecosystem where mod managers perform checks to prevent users from installing mods that could break their games. AI-generated mods, however, can bypass these safeguards. Furthermore, unoptimized AI mods can negatively impact game performance, with Mgamerz citing instances where unnecessary additions to startup files can consume significant amounts of memory.

Mgamerz suggested that AI tools are introducing new players to modding without the necessary learning curve, potentially leading to a situation where users lack a fundamental understanding of how mods work and interact with game files. This can result in broken games and community frustration, especially when modders who create AI-generated content do not offer ongoing support.

"Getting into [modding]? I feel like modding is kind of dying," Mgamerz stated. "If you come in and you're like, 'I want to just do this, no AI. I just want to cut my teeth, find the boundaries, break over them, have a difficult, challenging task,' you pretty much have to work in secret now."

He elaborated that the speed at which AI can generate functional mods might disincentivize the lengthy development process traditionally required for complex mods. "If you essentially have an idea and someone else is like, 'Wow, that's a cool idea.' And you're like, 'Well, it's going to take me six months.' And they're like, 'I don't want to wait six months.' They can spend 20 bucks and pump this thing out in a day or two, and it'll probably work, but the user will have no understanding of how."

While Mgamerz sees value in AI tools for personal use, the distribution of such mods without proper testing and support poses a significant problem for the modding community. "Once you hand this product over to somebody else, share it with the world, suddenly it can become everybody's problem. And from my experience, everyone that vibe codes stuff, two weeks later, they're gone. They're not supporting it. So the people that stick around have to fix and deal with all of it."

The future of modding remains uncertain, with the increasing prevalence of AI tools potentially altering the landscape significantly, particularly as upcoming titles like The Elder Scrolls VI may not even support modding in the same way as previous games.