Barely 48 hours left before the moddable GTA trilogy disappears

Rockstar recently confirmed that the three older titles Grand Theft Auto III, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City and Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas launched in a new edition during the autumn. The trilogy is launched under the name Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy Definitive Edition and replaces the old games completely, at least on digital platforms.

In connection with the unveiling of the trilogy, Rockstar also announced that the older titles during the week will disappear from Rockstar’s own gaming client, and from Steam. In addition, only the Rockstar Games Launcher is mentioned as an alternative to the PC version of the trilogy. This indicates that they will not return to Steam, which is also the only one of the two that supports mods.

During the summer, Rockstar’s parent company Take-Two Interactive hit hard against mods for the older Grand Theft Auto titles. The terms of use of the games prohibit users from making their own modifications, but despite this, they have been allowed to live undisturbed until recently. In June and August, several popular mod creators were forced to take down their creations with the declaration that they violate the copyright law DMCA.

Takes-Two seems to have focused on mods where the games have been ported to other more modern game engines. This includes, among others, “Reverse-engineered GTA 3” and “Reverse-engineered Vice City” and the project “Grand Theft Auto Underground”. The latter was intended to combine several different game worlds from both the Grand Theft Auto titles and the Manhunt series. The group behind the mod stated at the same time as they announced the closure that they had experienced one increased hostility towards modders generally.

Rockstar has not confirmed whether it is a slightly refreshed remaster or a real remake. Since all games are from the Playstation 2 era, they were developed in the game engine Renderware. The game engine is now owned by EA, which admittedly honors old contracts. However, Renderware was launched in 1993 and discontinued several years ago. There is thus not much left to work with and Renderware is not adapted to modern platforms. According to previous information, the development will take place in Unreal Engine, however, it is not impossible that Rockstar has chosen its own engine RAGE.

► Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy på Steam

For users who have already purchased the games regardless of platform, they can be downloaded and played even after they disappear from the digital store shelves. Anyone who is eager to mod their game thus still has a few days to hit the trilogy through Steam.

Do you run any of the older GTA titles with mods?

— .