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Why is Sony Afraid of the Mod Scene?

Why is Sony Afraid of the Mod Scene?

Those fans of Fallout 4 playing on the PS4 have long been waiting for mod support, as Bethesda promised it would work out the issue with Sony. It seems, however, that all was for naught. The news came from Bethesda itself: After months of discussion with Sony, Bethesda regrets to say that while it has long been ready to offer mod support on PlayStation 4, Sony has informed Bethesda it will not approve user mods the way Bethesda believes they should work: where users can do anything they want for either Fallout 4 or Skyrim Special Edition . Bethesda is clearly disappointed by Sony’s decision given the considerable time and effort it has put into this project, and the amount of time its fans have waited for mod support to arrive. Bethesda considers this an important initiative and it hopes to find other ways user mods can be available for its PlayStation audience. However, until Sony will allow Bethesda to offer proper mod support for PS4, that content for Fallout 4 and Skyrim on PlayStation 4 will not be available.

It’s quite disheartening news to be sure, especially since Microsoft has been supporting mods for quite some time. The process for Fallout 4 mods on the Xbox One is remarkably uncomplicated. One must simply log onto the Bethesda website, peruse the selection of user created mods there, download, and voila! There is your mod, have fun! Of course, there are limits to what mods will be allowed by Bethesda and Microsoft, but game director Todd Howard has stated that Bethesda will try not to be too heavy handed about it. Bethesda wants to stick its usual rules, which means no nudity, porn, or taking assets from other games. Which is fine, those have been the rules for awhile now and they’re incentive to be creative.

But why won’t Sony allow the mods if Microsoft has? Could those rules not be enough for Sony? My theory, based on Sony’s behavior as of late with censorship (ie No Man’s Sky and PS4 Pro/Slim leaks) is that Sony is getting hung up on the legalities of mods. Mods toe the line of copyright law to be sure, but in the case of Fallout 4 , the developers themselves are giving full permission. In fact, even Howard has stated that Bethesda doesn’t want to stop people from breaking the game if they so choose. There are safeties in place for the console, of course, but the encouragement is there. Perhaps the PS4 does not have such capabilities, which sounds as odd as the PS4 Pro not having a 4K Blue-ray drive. Nonetheless, this could be one of the legalities Sony is worried about.

Why is Sony Afraid of the Mod Scene?

However, “breaking” the game doesn’t really affect the console itself. For that matter, the act of downloading a mod and running it does not magically unlock scandalous trade secrets only a true hacker should be able to find. Sony is clearly afraid of something, but what is it? Bethesda moderates its mods to a reasonable extent in my opinion, there is nothing that Sony should be concerned about in that regard. I say that with the ESRB in mind, as I think Bethesda is keeping it in mind as well. Or so I hope – the ESRB can get touchy if it wants to be. That said, it’s still possible that ratings is another legality Sony is hung up on.

Somewhere between ratings and misunderstanding how mods work, Sony’s decision to not support mods is a confusing one. Judging by Sony’s recent crackdown on leaked content, it would not surprise me if the company was paranoid enough to come to the conclusion that mods would somehow infringe on the copyrights of the PS4 or that mods would violate the ESRB.

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