Content Summary

We will describe the copyright lawsuit filed by Take Two for Grand Theft Auto III and Grand Theft Auto Vice City, whose source codes were reverse engineered by their fans.

Rockstar Games is a company that has written its name in game history with golden letters. This billion-dollar game company; It is one of the only organizations that enables the birth of a new genre with the plays it produces and successfully carries the bravest and most innovative decisions into its works. Unfortunately, these are not the only well-known aspects. Although the company has game series such as Grand Theft Auto, the most profitable game in the world, and Red Dead Redemption, which has great storytelling, it is a company that attracts reactions with the contracts it offers to its developers in the game world and its unusual overtime.

Overtime is one of the serious problems in the gaming industry.

It is possible to say that overtime is a tradition in the game world, and the developers know this and almost accept it and start these works, but sometimes the situation in Rockstar turns into an ordeal beyond what is described. (Details on the subject can be found on Kotaku. Jason Schreier’s book Blood, Sweat and Pixels is also a good choice for reading these stories.)

Rockstar Games has one more feature. He usually doesn’t take kindly to mods made by gamers and is often a priest with pirates, modders and indie developers. However, Rockstar Games is not at fault in this latest case.

A visualization of the lawsuit between Take Two and GTA Enthusiasts. (source)

You know, Grand Theft Auto III and Grand Theft Auto Vice City are distributed by Take Two. Take Two is suing independent developers for the unauthorized release of the source codes of these two games by their fans by reverse engineering and has these codes deleted on Github. This means blocking of mods and improvements that can be made by game enthusiasts.

A screenshot from the legendary game Grand Theft Auto Vice City.

However, a New Zealand developer alone opposes this situation, which people regret and sues Take Two. He says that the company has no ownership rights over the game’s source code and therefore cannot claim copyright. Even Rockstar, the producer of the game, claims that Take-Two does not have such a legal right, while he has not undertaken such a job. He also wins the case. On top of that, the source codes are available again on Github.

It reminded me of the Kirby case that nearly destroyed the Nintendo company. He had a similar copyright case to the movie King Kong.

A screenshot from Grand Theft Auto III

I am glad that the case was won. Now Take Two can also file a counterclaim, but then it will turn into a judicial struggle, which is thought to be a case where the distributor will not do such a thing in order not to lose the players.

Rockstar Games Logo

Ownership of these digital works is a very unusual subject, dear reader. For example, years ago, Apple also opposed jailbreaking iPhone phones, but after a user picks up the phone, I can jailbreak it if I want to break it with a stone.

Take Two Interactive

I always say, without hesitation to repeat myself again and again, I will state it again. Games are works of art of the 21st century. These are works that have been put forward with a serious effort, with million-dollar expenditures, in which billion-dollar companies, some of which are full of deep, some only immersive games, appear. Of course, it is positive that they do not take a step back about copyright. However, it is a pointless effort to try to prevent mods and similar developments to be made by enthusiasts who may even increase their sales figures after making a lot of money.

I know that the release of the source code of the game also means breaking it, but at the point we have reached today, we have to understand that whether to buy a broken game or not is a problem of morality and possibility. It is not possible to prevent the games from breaking. Game companies also need to determine their marketing strategies, knowing that this will happen a few years after the game is released.

The points reached by Cyberpunk, which does not come out with any crack protection, and the reputation and money gained by independent developers in the game industry, who look from their window instead of filing a lawsuit against cracked gamers are obvious.

As you can see, a single person can direct and influence the multi-million dollar market in the modern world where the judiciary is strong.