Actually "creators" get 25% of the profits from the mods. Some of the mods posted have been from people who have taken them off of Nexus and sold them, as their own, or made their own mod but used another one. And at least has been pulled down for stealing. Because there is completely a way to tell who is who because there is a large modding community, and coders usually stick in somewhere that they did a thing.
Other than that it's really buyer beware. There is no more guarantee that they will work on Nexus when they are free than they will on Steam. Sure people are going to put their mods up for unreasonably high prices because they feel 25% isn't fair... and when people don't buy them the prices will come down.
The Major points for why this is a BAD THING, so far as I can see are as follows:
- It's causing people who don't want to make money from their mods removing them for free as well so people don't take them and use them.
- Because some of the modders are game devs and can't actually sell anything because of non compete contracts.
- One of the biggest mods that everyone else uses in their mods hasn't been updated in 2 years, and has removed permission from people to use it and sell it in their own mods. When it was free he used to take donations, but now that it get be put up for a price other people can't use it!
- But with a donation system you got ALL the money, not 25%!
- Some modders don't like money and even refuse donations, so no mods should be sold.
Next will be the inevitable, people posting the mods on torrent sites or something to protest or something.