Can a MOD ever become official?

[=gRiJ=Roman-]

I was wondering if the Devs consider that a MOD is a good addition for the game, is it possible that it can be part of the official sim?

Has something like this ever be done in other sims? In the IL2 1946 for instance? 

Edited December 18, 2018 by 15[Span.]/JG51Spartan

[Art-J]

It's been done in others, yes. In DCS for example, Mustang's terrain texture mod from May 2015 comes to my mind first, becoming official Caucasus retexture when v1.5 of the game came out. Same with some slingload cargo types for the helicopters later. I don't even mention some community airplane skins being adopted.

 

All Team Fusion's additions to CloD have kind of become "official" nowadays as well.

 

I haven't flown the old '46 for a long time, but I recall the were similar examples over there too (Solomon Islands map, updated P-40 models, some Ki-43 skins...).

 

I guess depending on producer's and publisher's policy, it might happen one day in BoX series as well.

 

Edit: now that I think about it, didn't the free online maps in this series start as some sort of modder's effort?

Edited December 18, 2018 by Art-J

[Jade_Monkey]

Maybe not exactly what you are saying but some things that users created  as mods here ended up being re-woked by the devs in the official game.

 

I can think of some smoke effects, gunsight improvements, etc.

[Danziger]

4k skin and normal map mods have been officially implemented on numerous occasions.

[Dutch2]

Yep some do as a sample the Sikorsky bomber in the Sikorsky game from 777/1c, was original started as an DIY project from one guy, same as the later introduced Sikorsky scout in RoF.  

The only problem is that most of those DIY projects are containing design faults like you see in both Sikorsky planes or the bad made Roland 2seater, on which I still suspect, as not being made by the 777/1c design team, but taken over from a RoFmember. 

 

More less the same on the Vanderplas campaign pack, in RoF, very talented guy in making missions, that combined as an campaign pack was swapped into the game. 

[yogy]

The maps I worked on for IL-2 1946 were kind of MODs, as we did them for free (no money or any other from of payment):

- Kurland

- Bessarabia

- Italy DF

- Africa DF

The same is valid for Slovakia and "Northern Germany DF" and of course all stuff which came through "Team Daidalos".

 

I hope that can happen with mods from here as well  .

[Juri_JS]

The Velikie Luki map started as  a 3rd party project and was officially added to the game, so obviously it's possible. Too bad that none of the other 3rd party map projects (Murmansk, Odessa) was finished.