AI-Powered GTA 5 Mod Shut Down by Take-Two Interactive

A new AI-powered Grand Theft Auto V mod has been taken down by Take-Two Interactive. Grand Theft Auto V is one of the biggest games in the world and while it’s largely because of how Rockstar has been heavily supporting an already amazing game, part of it also stems from the modding community. Grand Theft Auto V has an incredible modding community that allows people to truly transform the game. This even led to spawning a very successful roleplaying scene for the game. The minds responsible for creating the GTA modding tools known as FiveM were recently acquired by Rockstar Games, signaling a huge win for that community. However, that doesn’t mean there aren’t still some modding dilemmas within the community.

Recently, a creator known as Bloc announced a new GTA V mod known as Sentient Streets. It promised to utilize AI to create an open-ended story mode where characters could have ongoing conversations using AI text-to-speech and such. It was a pretty interesting idea, but it was quickly killed by Rockstar’s parent company Take-Two Interactive. Bloc had their video showcasing the mod removed from YouTube by Take-Two and the mod was also killed on other platforms. Bloc noted on YouTube (via IGN) they could challenge this as they felt like the video was unfairly removed, but due to the fact they’re just one person going up against a major entity, it would essentially be futile.

“Whether you like it or not, or dislike the idea of having AI in video games, is one thing,” Bloc said in a statement. “However, while the mod itself does not appear to be violating anything, removing the video and issuing a copyright strike without any communication is another matter.”  

In a follow-up on YouTube, Block said this: “If you have a channel that contains any footage from GTA, RDR2, Manhunt etc, you are in the hands of Take-Two IP sharks, and they can basically take down anything they want even the entire channel, regardless of how fun or how ‘unique’ your videos are. Basically, Take-Two decides which video is ‘Ok’ and which video isn’t, YouTube doesn’t care.”