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The community around PC Grand Theft Auto V modding tool Open IV is up in arms following its removal as a result of a cease and desist.
The developers have pulled the software, claiming that Take-Two had threatened legal action. Open IV can no longer be downloaded and owners who boot it up are now met with a message urging them to uninstall it to avoid possible legal issues”.
Open IV was used for a variety of tasks, including the creation of machinima videos that go beyond the scope of the in-game editor and the addition of extra assets such as vehicles and weapons. Those hardest hit will include YouTubers who use the tool to create content.
We feared that this day would come… And now it’s here. The day, when GTA modding was declared illegal,” the developers wrote. On June 5th, 2017, we had received an official Cease-and-Desist letter. It clearly says, that with OpenIV we ‘allow third parties to defeat security features of its software and modify that software in violation Take-Two’s rights’.
Yes, this letter is illiterate both technically and grammatically (really, they don’t even bothered with proof-reading the text). Yes, we can go to court and yet again prove that modding is fair use and our actions are legal. Yes, we could. But we decided not to.
Going to court will take at least few months of our time and huge amount of efforts, and, at best, we’ll get absolutely nothing. Spending time just to restore status quo is really unproductive, and all the money in the world can’t compensate the loss of time. So, we decided to agree with their claims and we’re stopping distribution of OpenIV.
It was a hard decision, but when any modding activity has been declared illegal, we can’t see any possibilities to continue this process, unless top management of Take-Two company makes an official statement about modding, which can be used in court.”
