Rockstar Games’ parent company, Take-Two Interactive, has
spent the past week or so using DMCA takedown requests to remove old Grand
Theft Auto mods. The publisher hasn’t explained why it has started this sudden
removal of old mods. Late last week, players and mod creators began reporting
on Twitter and the GTA Forums that old Grand Theft Auto mods on PC were being
pulled. On July 17 it became clear that something was going on. Numerous mods,
including popular Vice City and San Andreas mods, were deleted and were now no
longer available on ModDB. Some of these mods are extremely old. GTA: Liberty
City, a total conversion Vice City mod that ported GTA III to the Vice City
engine, was first released back in 2005. It has now been deleted from ModDB.
GTA Underground, a popular mod that was trying to merge multiple GTA maps into
one massive game, was also removed on July 17. Its developers confirmed via a
Discord message that the mod was deleted as a direct result of a DMCA takedown
notice from Take-Two Interactive.
A community manager and editor from ModDB explained in a
short tweet thread that the site reached out to Take-Two and tried to start a
dialogue in an attempt to find a different solution than just yanking down the
popular mods. Take-Two was unreceptive and ModDB was forced to take down the
content after receiving the DMCA notices. He also warned modders to “tread
carefully” because more DMCA notices might be coming for old GTA mods.
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