Thought as of writing this post Steam is the center for all custom content that can be made ingame, while Gamabanana is the center for game-altering mods - its been surprising for me to find that the BIGGEST custom content/modding hub of the internet with over a 180.000 views a day is being neglected by the Streets of Rogue community and even by the developer/publisher themselves.
One of the most enjoyable aspect of making content for a game, whether that be characters, chunk packs or mods - is to see how my work impacted others, how it made them feel. How it inspired them to pick up the level editor and make content too that I could enjoy as well.
ModDB is an excellent place to get more people interested in the game, to grow the community and also to help out GOG users that miss out on all the cool stuff I might create just because they bought the "wrong version of the game".
Its also extremely resilient. Fun fact: about 15 years ago I made a mod for another game and it was customary to just post it on the local forums to release it. Out of everyone, I was the only one who also posted my mod on ModDB too. Years later I find out that the forums are dead, all the links and uploads are gone and the only mod left alive for that game was the one I uploaded to ModDB. There used to be a hundred mods and only mine survived.
Anyway, ModDB really easy to use too. In this post I go through the process of uploading content to it.
After registering an account this is what the homepage looks like:
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At the top bar, search for "Streets of Rogue" and it'll conveniently give you a list of relevant games that match your query:
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Alternatively just use the direct link:
Then you'll find yourself here, SoR's own ModDB/IndieDB page:
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Sadly Matt or Tinybuild has neglected this place so it'll have 4 massive gifs slowing down the loading of the page each time. If someone knows Matt, please pester him to update this page - as someone who goes to ModDB as the first place to look for mods for a game, I'm sure there are others that do the same and find dissapointment when no one posted anything here - and also get their browser slowed down by huge gifs.
Anyway, all that can change.
From here, there are many thing you can do. As long as your logged into to your ModDB/IndieDB account, you can upload anything you want, regardless if you "own" this page or not. What good a modding site be if only the developer was the only one who could upload mods?
Things any logged in ModDB user can add are listed in the top tabs:
articles
reviews
files
addons
mods
videos
images
All you need to do is to press the little + button over here:
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Any of the above you add will be featured on the Summary page, no permission asking needed at all:
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Whats more, is that if you write impressive enough Articles/News, with images or even video content, properly formatted text and quality effort, it can be featured on the FRONT PAGE of ModDB. Remember the +180,000 views each day? Thats how many people could see your post.
The articles/news can be anything from custom content author progress reports to release announcements or guides on how to make mods or other content for SoR.
The articles will go through a review and be either accepted or rejected, based on how elaborate and quality the submitted article was, whether it had enough interesting images to look at or not.
If you're in the process of making a chunk pack, you'll probably get a good source of cool images/screenshots both from the editor and ingame to add to your articles.
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Using the + button on each category (even the greyed out ones) will open up a submitting form unique to each item type you want to submit.
Since this blog is about Chunk Packs, "addons" seem like the most sensible location to post such files.
To submit Chunk Packs, you'll have to retrieve them from...
C:\Users\Reactorcore\Documents\Streets of Rogue\ChunkPacks
...and create a .zip file or similar so you can upload it to this site.
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Submitting is Chunk Pack is fairly straight-forward.
Upload the Zip file, use any of your screenshots or custom made images for the preview, set category to "Singleplay Map", Licence to Creative Commons.
You can also set the schedule to release with a delay or immediately.
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Tags dont matter much, though if you want, write "Chunk Pack".
Name, Summary and Description lets the potential downloader/player understand what is inside the file they're about to download, making them feel safe and reassured that they're downloading a good file and not a virus or anything malicious.
It also gives them enough information to know if this file is worth their time to try out - is it cool and interesting enough to bother getting or should they ignore it. The more images and information you give (yet keeping it clean, formatted and consice), the better the chances the players will want to get your file.
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These last parts are already set up automatically, just leave them as is.
Once you're done, press the "Save download" button.
If you're new on ModDB, your file may be reviewed by the staff and either authorized or rejected if its porn, pirated content or malicious materials. Since you're uploading a Chunk Pack, this will not be an issue. You'll get an email telling you if it passed or not.
Afterwards you can freely edit, remove or update your upload as much as you want. Just hover your mouse over the different icons the same way you did with the + symbol back then and you're good.
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In this similar-ish way, you can upload content or articles in any of the tabs. Once its uploaded, people can download it, people can comment on it and you'll see the stats of how many times its been downloaded or viewed.
To promote your uploaded content, post about it on the Discord, Reddit, Steam/GOG forums, your social media accounts. Anyone roaming the internet looking for Streets of Rogue mods or chunk packs will home in on your uploaded content through search engines and get to enjoy your labors of love.
It takes some effort to upload, gain traffic and visibility, but once you do the legwork its an avalanche that'll keep feeding itself.