GTA 5 Liberty City Mod: Legal Shutdown Initiated

Summary

• A GTA 5 mod featuring Liberty City was discontinued after "speaking to Rockstar Games."
• Many players suspect that the modders were pressured to halt the project.
• Despite this setback, the modding team remains committed to continuing their work on the game.

An exciting Grand Theft Auto 5 mod that allowed players to explore Liberty City again has been sadly discontinued. This disappointing news comes after the mod gained significant attention in 2024.

While some game developers, like Bethesda, embrace community mods, others, such as Nintendo and Take-Two Interactive (Rockstar Games' parent company), often take a hard stance against them. Despite the legal challenges posed by some publishers, modders continue their efforts, and even with this setback, the team behind the mod expresses a desire to keep modding for GTA.

The team at World Travel, responsible for the GTA 5 Liberty City Preservation Project, announced the mod's discontinuation on their Discord channel. They cited "unexpected attention" and a conversation with Rockstar Games as reasons for pulling the mod. Although no specifics were provided about the conversation, the team reaffirmed their passion for modding GTA.

Another GTA Mod Bites the Dust

Though World Travel did not explicitly say they were forced to stop, many in the community believe that the discussion with Rockstar might have hinted at potential legal repercussions, such as a DMCA takedown. Given that most mod projects are run by volunteers without legal support, such threats often lead to quick project closures.

Fans of the Liberty City mod have expressed their frustration on social media, criticizing Rockstar and Take-Two for their aggressive stance on mods. The outcry is intensified by the fact that GTA 6 is set to revisit Vice City rather than Liberty City, leading some to speculate that Rockstar's actions may be driven by fears of the mod affecting GTA 4 sales. However, this argument is contested by many, as GTA 4 is aging, and playing the mod still necessitates owning GTA 5. Despite the reasoning behind Take-Two's actions, the mod is no longer available. Fans can only hope that future projects from World Travel fare better, though it seems unlikely that Take-Two's approach to mods will change soon.