GTA owner settles lawsuit against creators of Vice City reverse-engineering project before case reaches court

GTA Vice City — (Image credit: Rockstar Games)

Rockstar parent company Take-Two has ended its legal dispute with the modders that reverse-engineered GTA 3 and Vice City.

As spotted by Twitter user @videotech_, both parties have agreed to settle the case out of court and yesterday, April 3, filed a stipulation of dismissal with the Northern District of California Court. Although the lawsuit is officially over, the terms agreed upon by both sides aren’t known, and if protected by an NDA, could forever be a mystery. Also, as the user also points out, this isn’t entirely the end of the matter, as Take-Two is still seeking to take action against the “remaining unnamed defendants” that were involved.

NEW: In 2021, Take-Two Interactive initiated legal action against a team of mod developers who had developed a project that involved reverse engineering Grand Theft Auto: Vice City and Grand Theft Auto III, shortly after the developers launched a counter strike on GitHub. As of… pic.twitter.com/mP5wytTcV4April 4, 2023

This dispute dates back to 2021, when, as reported by Eurogamer, a group of GTA fans fully reverse-engineered GTA 3 and Vice City. The projects re3 (GTA 3) and reVC (Vice City) offered a range of improvements for both games, including bug fixes, visual enhancements, improved loading, and widescreen support, to name but a few. Both projects were available on GitHub before Take-Two intervened with a DMCA takedown notice claiming copyright infringement.

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The modders argued “any code in this repo that is similar to code or other content owned by Take-Two is either unprotected by copyright or is permitted under fair use,” and shortly after, both re3 and reVC returned to the site. This led to Take Two suing the project’s developers, and the reverse-engineered GTA3 and Vice City were once again taken offline.

Updated versions of GTA 3 and Vice City were included in GTA: The Trilogy – The Definitive Edition, which launched in late 2021 but was widely criticised for its many technical issues. The PC version arrived on Steam and Epic Games Store earlier this year, and unfortunately, it was just as broken on these platforms.

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Originally from Ireland, I moved to the UK in 2014 to pursue a Games Journalism and PR degree at Staffordshire University. Following that, I've freelanced for GamesMaster, Games TM, Official PlayStation Magazine and, more recently, Play and GamesRadar+. My love of gaming sprang from successfully defeating that first Goomba in Super Mario Bros on the NES. These days, PlayStation is my jam. When not gaming or writing, I can usually be found scouring the internet for anything Tomb Raider related to add to my out of control memorabilia collection.