mod.io, the cross-platform Steam Workshop-like service that's independent of any store just today officially launched a very useful sounding plugin for the Unity game engine. Some news that will hopefully be interesting for any game developers following our news.

"Just as cross-platform play is gaining momentum, and developers have more stores, streaming and subscription services to reach new players, games that are better at uniting their community will stand out and find success," said CEO and co-creator Scott Reismanis.

I spoke directly to Scott Reismanis, the Founder of mod.io (also Mod DB and Indie DB) who confirmed to me that this plugin does support Linux. In fact, Meeple Station is already using it. Aground and 0 A.D. also use mod.io but they wrote their own mod.io wrapper.

Features:

Platform agnostic , supporting 1 click mod installs on Steam, Epic Games, Discord, GOG, itch.io with plans for full-console support.

, supporting 1 click mod installs on Steam, Epic Games, Discord, GOG, itch.io with plans for full-console support. Standalone , our API is not dependent on a client or SDK, allowing embedding everywhere: in-game, launcher, homepage, discord bot.

, our API is not dependent on a client or SDK, allowing embedding everywhere: in-game, launcher, homepage, discord bot. User Management , allowing for synchronized subscriptions, mod rating, and content submission.

, allowing for synchronized subscriptions, mod rating, and content submission. Powerful and flexible default UI, providing a solid and extensible mod browsing interface to facilitate easy integration.

I think what they're doing is great, especially since it's cross-platform and their SDK as well as the website design itself are both open source under the MIT license. Not just that though, the convenience of the Steam Workshop is obviously lost when you get a game from other stores like GOG and itch.io, so if more developers opt to use mod.io they can give everyone a better modding experience.

You can find the Unity plugin here and the official mod.io website here.