Games with level creation/modding

[Elcura]

Doing some research, but I can't think of a lot of good examples of games where you can create your own levels or modify them. Obviously you have things like LittleBigPlanet, but what other games are there that have or allow for a good amount of user generated content?

[Elesirdur]

TES III and IV (Morrowind and Oblivion) both have the level editor/creator tools actually used by the game programmers available for free. Morrowind came with it packed onto its CD, and the Oblivion Construction Kit is available at Bethesda's website. Some amazing stuff has been created for these games, from total conversion projects (even including a project that allows Oblivion to read the .ESM and .BSP files from Morrowind - ie. you can play Morrowind in the Oblivion engine) to thousands of new quests, items, skins, bug fixes, and massive game overhauls.

The SDK's aren't all that user friendly, but they are very powerful and allow for full scripting.

[Callisto]

Excitebike.

[Kyo]

Far cry 2 has a nice level builder.

[SephYuyX]

Unreal games.

[Kaylia]

Starcraft/warcraft...but I'm just stating the obvious.

[Krandor]

Neverwinter Nights bitches

[Beckwin]

Neverwinter Nights

Timesplitters

did the Tony Hawk games have level editors?

[Krandor]

From 2 on I think so (@ Tony Hawk)

[Avanarius]

I think this sorta falls into two different groups. There's user generated content that's developed by a game engine released with the game separately, and then there's user generated content that is developed within the game itself that is usually a much more simplistic method of developing.

There are quite a few examples for both of these categories in more recent games

[Zosi]

In terms of maps, you have practically every RTS game released since the mid-1990s. Warcraft II and Starcraft were arguably the biggest success in that regard, due to a large community and good tools. FPSs also got in on the ground floor with user-created maps, back in the Doom/Duke3D era, and third-party maps remain popular nowadays.

Quake was largely responsible for the popularization of user-created mods that actually changed the game mechanics through tools released by the developer. Mods like Team Fortress and Capture the Flag literally revolutionized the FPS genre, and modding in recent games continues to lead the way in innovation. It's branching out into other genres as well, free-form RPGs tend to be moddable, and NWN/NWN2 deserve special mention for their support for entire custom worlds in multiplayer.

There's a few oddballs, like MMO UI modding and making furniture for your Sims, but I think the majority of games fit into one of the two categories above. You could argue that Spore and LittleBigPlanet are part of a newer effort to make *creating* user-generated content more popular with players rather than just using it, but it remains to be seen how well that will work.