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Hot Coffee's Effects on the Mod Scene
At the far end of the spectrum, however, illspirit echoes Patrick’s concerns about those who have left the scene. “[There] are people who feel totally betrayed that either just hang out for the community side and could care less about GTA anymore, or have left altogether.” Among those that illspirit claims have left is “Barton Waterduck”, the modder who found the first bits of Hot Coffee in the PS2 version of the game. “[He] pretty much came to the conclusion that Jack Thompson and company were right about Rockstar being heartless, greedy, exploitationists and quit. And that guy had been around since the days of alt.games.grand-theft-auto on usenet.”
Some modders were reluctant to talk publicly, even using pseudonyms, about the effects of Hot Coffee on the mod community. One modder who had been involved in creation of the original Hot Coffee mod feared that he’d lose his job if his employer found out that he was involved in something so controversial. Others didn’t want to give Rockstar or GTA: SA any more press than they’d already had. The bitterness from the early days of the controversy were still fresh. “The idea that they'd even shut us out like that, plus the fact they don't talk to anyone anymore, not even to give us promotional screenshots for fansites, has left behind a mixture of resentment and apathy,” says one. “I mean, sure, I understand why they need to lay low and all, but explaining and defending the situation is tiresome. For instance, every so often, people will pop up in forums and such asking why mods won't work with their new copy of the game. And when people buy the game just to play one of our mods, I can't help but feel guilty for inadvertently helping to sell them something which doesn't work. Doubly so when they had previously owned a console version.” The controversy also had what illspirit calls a “chilling effect” on content. To the surprise of many, the mod community is censoring itself. “Not only do we have to worry whether anything remotely sexual will cause another media firestorm, but pretty much everything else,” he says. “There's even been a couple of purely technical mods scrapped for fear the luddites would assume they were features ‘hidden’ in the game. All it takes is one moron from Miami seeing a new feature, user-created or otherwise, to start screaming about ‘hidden content’ and send the ball rolling downhill again, especially in an election year.” In the end, Illspirit summed up the community’s feelings. “As a whole, I'm not sure Coffeegate has really affected how I or anyone else play or buys games. In general, most of us wouldn't buy games before that didn't allow modding. So all Coffeegate would have really affected in that sense is the possibility of more games to avoid.” |
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