Game mods can now be sold on Steam

Valve Corporation has expanded its online store to allow the sale of community-created content.

People who make modifications for games, known as ‘mods’, can now sell their work on the Steam game service and receive a 25% cut.

Mods for the game Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim will be the first available for sale. Valve said that mods for games will be available to sell soon.

“With the launch of paid mods in Skyrim, you can now support mod authors that are creating top-quality items and amazing new experiences for your game,” Steam said in a blog post.

Before this, creators of mods on the Steam game service only got free downloads in return for their work.

Steam has approximately 125 million active users.

According to Steam:

“When an item is sold via the Steam Workshop, revenue is shared between Valve (for transaction costs, fraud, bandwidth & hosting costs, building & supporting the Steam platform), the game developer (for creation of the game and the game’s universe, the marketing to build an audience, the included assets, and any included modding or editing tools), and the item creator (including any specified contributors).

The percentage of revenue an item creator receives from direct sales of their item in this Workshop is 25%, as stipulated in the Supplemental Workshop Terms.”

People who create popular mods could end up making a decent amount of money. Valve said that it paid out over $57m (£37.6m) to 1,500 people who made mods for games in January.