I have all these ideas and wrote some scripts for different mods i might want to develop for source engine but i have very limited resources. I am looking towards sites similar to kickstarter since i live in Eastern Europe and the big guys only invest in certain countries as you well know.

There is one idea involving Gordon Freeman as a super fighter fighting the combine opressors in city 17, meeting charismatic characters along the way, new 3d models for everything, new npcs, and a big boss at the end.

Also there is the possibility of making a complete overhaul for Episode One, all 3d models improved, all textures, a few improvements here and there… i was thinking earlier today that i was annoyed while playing the level where Gordon and Alyx have to fight in complete darkness while waiting for an elevator to descend, maybe i should make a blinking light bulb attached to a generator to give away the position of the enemies every few seconds, ideas, i have plenty.

I do not know if people would be interested in donating for the development of a hl2 mod/ or overhaul. What do you think, what should i do?

PS: I may be posting a scene with improved graphics for ep1 in a few days.

Be very careful when seeking funds while using intellectual property you either do not own or have no rights to use. Beyond that making mods are usually less hassle than developing a game from the ground up.

Best of luck.

If you put it that way, then do trial versions of software count as misuse? Better ask now than get into trouble later. Thank you.

If I understand correctly you asking if you can use what you produce from trial versions for commercial use? You'll have to see their terms of use but most software that I've used will not grant you permission use what you've produced for commercial use without the appropriate license. This is normally all outlined in the license agreement and terms of use for trial versions per package.

Not commercial use, if i ever finish the overhaul, for example it will be for free use. But this makes me think I have to ask for money that imply the usage of such software…

Everything is subject to the terms of use and attached license for the software. If your remake, mod or whatever uses anything that contains another entities intellectual property it doesn't matter if you're seeking money or not, you'll need to have the rights. Remakes and mods have been shut down before such as Chrono Resurrection, and mods like Halo Online which was a fan made mod.

I've seen lots of mods for Half-Life so they might have different rules but I'm not well versed enough to answer that, just make sure you have something that allows you to go forward before wasting your time. You also don't want to risk legal action if you screw up as IP breaches don't require pre-knowledge of doing so, or any intent to make financial gains. Essentially they don't have to send you any notification to shutdown the project, they could just sue you right away and send you a statement of claim but this normally doesn't happen as most companies will warn you first.

Now I understand what you meant by “intellectual property”, using the name valve, half-life… All the mods that I know of that made it to steam were not crowdfunded, they were that good when finished that valve put them on steam for 10 dollars. And it's how it works then with valve. OK.

Seeking any sort of funding is something to be very careful of. Even when the developer does provide modding tools (and generally permission to use their IP for mods/expansions of their own game) they might not allow any sort of financial benefit/compensation.

Valve have some policies around with all their SDK stuff. I think this covers most of it: https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/sdk/uploading/distributing_source_engine

Q. Can I sell my Source Engine game on Steam?

A. Yes, but there are a few requirements:

• You will need to complete an additional agreement for distributing a paid Source Engine product on Steam.
  
• If you are using the RAD tools included with the Source SDK, you will need to contact RAD for information and cost associated with licensing Miles and/or Bink.
  
• For any Source Engine game that charges money, Havok needs to be paid a licensing fee of $25,000 for the physics engine. You will need to pay this fee up front before making your game available for sale on Steam.
  
• You can only sell your Source Engine game via Steam unless you get a full Source Engine license.

Q. I’ve got a Source mod that I want to distribute via Steam….

… Source Engine mods must be configured to require ownership of the base game in order to play. …

Q. Can I use Valve IP in my Source Mod?

A. Yes. However, please make it clear on your store pages that your mod is a mod and not created by Valve. Commercial games and mods that include Valve IP such as characters and story-lines need prior approval from Valve.

For free mods not distributed via the Steam store (e.g. earlier in the development and basically just a zip file on one of the (possible non-Valve) community forums), I am not sure, probably another document around somewhere but I suspect largely the same restrictions. It didn't seem to say directly how they consider crowd funding or other monetary sources.

The really problematic ones I can think of is when people want to take game X and make it as a mod for game Y, or completely standalone. Then the developers/publishers of X tend to get unhappy as people can play your thing without buying X in the first place.

Although there are lots of examples of just using some other wider universe with a few well known elements (e.g. how many Star Wars / Star Trek / etc. mods around for various games?), which it doesn't seem much action is taken against, while some IP holders seem to be much more strict and legally it is in the IP holders favour.

Rutin said:
Halo Online which was a fan made mod.

I never really followed Halo. A quick search led me to ElDewrito which seems to still exist. Looks like there was a takedown from Microsoft for the upload of an original Halo Online file (not a mod, there was a closed beta and people redistributed the closed beta files) which were resolved and ElDewrito is still available (although getting the required Halo Online files to play legally sounds like an issue. Reddit has some suggestions, and I guess Microsoft decided to leave it be).