Garry's Mod Is Removing "All Nintendo Related Stuff From Steam Workshop"

Before people go crazy, it is highly likely that Nintendo isn’t actually involved in these takedowns and it’s most likely a fraudster.

Edit: According to Facepunch (the developers for Garry’s Mod), the takedowns are from Nintendo.

@Shepdawg1 But it's fine either way though. Many game companies already prohibit the use of their assets in other games.

Unless Nintendo gave permission here, nothing to go crazy over. They are well within their rights to have the assets removed.

Glad to see NintendoLife at least acknowledge that it's within the realm of possibility that someone other than Nintendo has been issuing these takedowns, whereas every other outlet has covered the news in a reactionary manner. It's not clear what the situation is, but it's not impossible that a fraud masquerading as Nintendo has been issuing these takedowns given some background dating back to February, and Facepunch/Valve is none the wiser.

If nothing else, I hope my Hugh Neutron-dressed-as-Luigi player model survives...and that I archived my saved Nintendo related content properly in a way that will let me restore it on my end. Especially the Wuhu Island map I mess around on a lot whenever I do fool around in GMod. At the very least, though, it seems like the community is already working to get as much Nintendo content as possible offloaded onto third-party hosting sites, though I've seen some members express that they no longer really trust Facepunch because of their apparent handling of the situation. Hopefully they release some kind of followup statement tied to further investigation of the claims, because I'm sure Nintendo is going to remain silent either way.

But we still get Skibidi Toilet, right?

That is a very interesting thumbnail.

Fake or not, it's a one way ticket to start drama again for the preservation crowd. The fingers will be pointed soon.

I agree that this indeed nothing more than a ridiculous, harmful prank from an impersonator named Aaron Peters. There's already evidence/history pointing to this person over the past month where he makes false DMCA's to scare users into taking down Nintendo related work, and I hope users who see this, especially the folks at Nintendolife read into this and take full consideration into this.

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P6mNpVlUJjM&pp=ygULY3Jpc3B5dG9hc3Q%3D
• https://twitter.com/brewsterkoopa/status/1756767363112763649

The oddest part about this is the last edit they made on that post
“ EDIT 4: I unfortunately have bad news. Facepunch just made an announcement TODAY stating that it is not "Aaron Peters" and it is actually Nintendo. While I understand that the company has every right to take down content which belongs to their IP, there is ZERO justification for what "Aaron" is doing. If it really was Nintendo, they would have issued a real cease-and-desist letter, not cherry-pick several mods. But, good news is we reached out to a LOT of influential people and they have taken notice. We'll do what we can to ensure that the Google Drives, the Mega Drives, and the Pastebins stay up. Please spread the word if you can; it doesn't matter what platform you prefer to use. Just make sure EVERYONE knows the truth. Facepunch may not believe us, but we have evidence to prove them otherwise”
I can’t tell if they are saying Facepunch is lying about this or if the poster just doesn’t care about this development and only cares about winning some petty war over ripped models they don’t own. That thread actually hurts my brain a little, they really treat being able to use Nintendo’s copyrighted game models like it’s a civil rights issue, for my sanity I’m just gonna assume the bulk of posters there are children.
@DanukiDalmatian
Alternatively this led to Nintendo being informed about the fake requests leading them to just making it happen for real. The troll was also likely informing Nintendo so they could have a more permanent win.

https://fxtwitter.com/brewsterkoopa/status/1780255004747595782?t=wOEHCiZlDx1AxdMbSZrlEQ&s=19
Another interesting Tweet of relevance. The Pokemon Company International, everyone - based in Boise, Arkansas!

There’s no way the old farts at Nintendo are suddenly aware of GM’s existence.

And now we wait for all the "Nintendo is a horrible company" comments on a Nintendo fansite.
Shame they are being removed but it is within their rights.

....Do people make money off of these uploads or something? Why would Nintendo target this? I never bothered with Garry's Mod, are you able to buy stuff people make in that thing?

@Joeynator3000 Workshop creators cannot charge for their addons on Steam. You could argue that Gmod, which you can buy on Steam, benefits financially from the Nintendo content on the workshop, but I doubt many people are buying Gmod exclusively to play Nintendo content.

@Joeynator3000 Nope!

Someone has actually put forward a theory that Nintendo has hired some company called Tracer that uses AI webcrawlers to find traces of their IPs and mark them as copyright-striked, because the address listed in this tweet - https://fxtwitter.com/brewsterkoopa/status/1780255004747595782?t=wOEHCiZlDx1AxdMbSZrlEQ&s=19 - can be traced back to them in Boise, Idaho (you can see their logo on Street View, though looking them up takes you to an address in Salt Lake City), and some other platforms have also reportedly seen random odd copyright strikes from Nintendo in the last few months.
https://fxtwitter.com/AdBmaster/status/1783279247466885337
https://fxtwitter.com/AdBmaster/status/1783289175392846284
Would not have thought that Nintendo would've jumped on the AI train for any reason, but if true...that's disappointing and alarming when considering the potential implications.

@PikaPhantom Well, I mean I see nothing wrong either way. Alot of models in Gmod aren't original creations. They are ripped models from other games.

Gmod is already in a gray area as is. You are taking licensed property and using it without consent from the owner.

@GooseLoose1 Are you saying Gmod is already in a gray area because of the fact that it itself is a mod or because of the workshop?

They're within legal rights as far as I know, still, not wise. It's like taking down tournaments and free fan games. Another thing that's only good for Nintendo. They need to let things slide every now and then.

@LikelySatan One of the risks you take on with letting things slide is bad actors who will unfortunately take advantage and see how far they push things until it's ruined for everybody.

Nintendo's once again the bad guy here until the shoe is on the other foot and your own likeness is used in something sketchy for the sake of entertainment.

@Arkay Is anyone still denying how horrible they (the business side) are, apart from this story?

Nintendo does not know the meaning of ‘community’, which is one of gaming’s greatest achievements. So what they did or didn’t do in this case is irrelevant.

@PinderSchloss Every business has horrible parts. That's just how things work in the world.

Nintendo is a company, not a person. A company whose job it is to sell you a product. Not be your BFF. We live in a world where everything is driven by profit. Not charity.

Are we meant to know what Gary's Mod is?

@GrailUK Yep

As it turns out, it's not the real Nintendo who asked for this.

@GrailUK Garry's Mod is a mod for Half Life 2 that opens up the game as a physics sandbox with many tools to spawn in creatures and props from the original game, as well as do physics shenanigans like attach rocket boosters and ropes to things. The workshop is a popular way for users to provide content that you can load into the game, like character models you can apply to yourself, maps, props, weapons, vehicles, and NPCs. Some people create and upload mods that contain content from other franchises, like Nintendo's, and the rest is history.

@Joeynator3000 I think the money part probably comes from the fact Nintendo's models are being used a lot in for profit YouTube videos.

If GMod removes them it does stem the tide of infringement at the Source (engine lol) than chasing after individual creators.

I find it hard to believe Nintendo would suddenly care to have Garry's Mod content taken down now. Has to be some copyright troll.

@SteveDaSteve Thank you for explaining what this Garry's Mod is. Nintendo Life really should've put a similar explanation in the actual article, it's not like everyone knows about these things.

@GoshJosh “This is how liberty dies. With thunderous applause”

I would certainly hope it's not Nintendo, even though they say it is. As it is, Garry's Mod has had Nintendo-related content in its Steam Workshop for years. My avatar in the game is Krystal from Star Fox (my favorite video game character of all time). I would be absolutely devastated if that was taken down.

My question is, if Nintendo is truly behind this, what took them so long to finally crack down on this? They had ample opportunity to do it years ago, but it is only just now that they are taking action against it. It just doesn't add up, if you ask me.

@Shepdawg1 Quite the turnaround in your post there, chief 😄

If you want Nintendo stuff, pay for Nintendo stuff. If you want to paddy-out over not being able to have Nintendo stuff without paying for it, good luck with your life.

@gcunit I hope you don't listen to Nintendo music on YouTube.

I sure do hope if you want to listen to the 3D World Soundtrack, that you buy it from 3rd party sellers on eBay for $60-100! And I sure do hope that you don't dare think of listening to game music that never officially got released.

If you ever wanted to listen to the Double Dash, Pikmin, or New Super Mario Bros soundtrack, I sure hope you didn't look it for for free!.

Wonder when they will stop new born babies being called Mario, Luigi or Charizard

@MorganaBus If you want to listen to free music uploaded on youtube, sure go for it. When Nintendo decides to strike it down, so be it. You aren't entitled to complain about it's removal because it shouldn't have been uploaded in the first place without permission.

@sikthvash Mario and Luigi are real names that predate the videogames characters. Nintendo couldn't do a thing about anyone naming their kids Mario or Luigi.

Charizard however is an original name, and while I doubt Nintendo would go after parents over it, unless they're profiting off the name; said child should immediately removed from your care as clearly you don't care enough about the child's well being to give them such a ridiculous name to begin with.

@MorganaBus Don't worry your lovely head...

Do you see that one in the middle?

@Quiet2down Charizard would be a kickass name for any kid. I'm gonna start warming my kids up to the idea for one of my grandkids.

Nintendo was not behind this.

@RubyCarbuncle No, the NDF is not out in full force. It's just how things are. Some people in the community think they are entitled to do what they please with licensed property.

Surprise, they aren't. You don't have to agree with it, but it's Nintendo's right to remove stuff that belongs to them. If you don't like that fact, create something that is originally yours.

NDF applies when Big N is actually doing something anti-consumer. This nothing more than a company claiming rights to their own property from people who using it without consent.

If you want to use the models, then ask Nintendo. Oh that's right, you won't. You won't because you know the answer will be a big "No".

For those who are once again hating Nintendo for this, it is their right to protect their intellectual property and prevent it from being used by others. I also can't build a website and publish pictures others made, on my site.

I am shocked by the way some people think. Really shocked. Just because people say it's a "fan project" does not mean they can use stuff they don't own. And because Nintendo is a big company, people think they can steal from them because they don't make money with it.

They will never take down my Picachu in UT2K4 fighting Sailor Moon, Bender and Eva01 with his Rocket Launcher.
Same for Quake 3.

Old Games are gold Games

FYI, there's been an article on Know Your Meme for the past month or so detailing that these claims come from a DMCA-abusing troll who goes by Aaron Peters. Garry from Facepunch clearly never bothered to verify the origin of the claim. That guy should be facing jail time for impersonating a corporation, but apparently it's super easy to get away with this stuff since the law is never enforced. It's beyond messed up. Either way, I already uninstalled GMOD because of this. I haven't touched the game in years anyway, so this was a good enough reason as any to free up some space on my PC.

Edit: I find it odd how these supposed "legit" takedowns come along only shortly after a bunch of false claims were submitted. If these are indeed real claims however, I interpret this as Nintendo getting sick of the constant comparisons of Tears of the Kingdom to GMOD and deciding to go straight for the source. That's a low blow, even for Nintendo.

@gcunit @heisnbrg

When i was a Kid my Mother made me a couple of Times a Teenage Ninja Hero Turtles Cake.
The Cake was shared with others that came to my Birthdays.
With the Logic you mention, this would be also forbidden, as she used the IP without paying for it.

Modding exists since the Dawn of Computing and People are creating all kind of fun Stuff.
From the former mentioned Models in Games as Quake 3 to full blown Mods as Bid for Power.

The World would be very boring, if we go the very restrictiv Japanese "Copyright Infringement" Way.

That is why many Countries develope some kind of fair use Law.

@Azuris Nope. You are wrong about that. No one stops you from making a video game with Nintendo's IP if you are not sharing it with the public.

"Modding exists since the dawn of computing" - Yes, but also stealing and murdering exists since the beginning of humanity. But still both are illegal today.

Gary's mod is sold für 9,99 on Steam. So there is even a company behind it what makes money from it.

In your case, it's like your mother owns a bakery shop and sells Turtles cakes without a profit. That would be illegal. She could not say "But I sell it without a profit".

"That is why many Countries develope some kind of fair use Law" - wait, so that means Sony could put a Super Mario skin pack in the next Ratchet and Clank because that would be "fair use"? I'l doubt that.

@heisnbrg

You are comparing fan art with murder, lol.
Don't you see a difference between free created art based on an existing IP and theft and murder?

You are also comparing fan art with an "what if company x would".
We aren't talking about a coorporate thing here, we are talking about private persons that don't earn money from being creative.

Btw. You yourself are using a profile picture of an IP you do not own.
A modder creates something from ground, even if based on an IP, you just copied that picture

With such strickt thinking, no one of us would be allowed to use such profile pics.

@Azuris

"the team behind Gary's mod" removed it. So the company what makes money from it had to remove it. Not a fan. Can you spot the difference

Nintendo makes video games, someone sells a video game an offers the option to add Nintendo's IP in it. You really can't see the problem here?

The fan who made that mod can still have it for himself and his friends. But not share it online.

I repeat myself. I'm shocked how many people think, that they can do everything they want with others people property, as long they are not making money from it.

@gcunit I have a cousin called Magikarp

@Quiet2down I do hope my sarcasm wasn't lost on you 😜

Why must the content trolls ruin everything? I was intent on making a model of my usernamesake, using a Yoshi as a basis, but now I have to change my basis to that of a Digimon! Either that or just be original, I lack any creativity! I can't even create a Sonic Fan Character to represent me! I'm not even as creative as JCThornton! All I can create is a censor bar and a Grid Light thing for SFM.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3034457244 - Pair this up with any of JC's Models like Hamton J. Pig, or eventually, Rocko.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2796578431 - Grid Lights.

B..but I was told by certain influencers that Nintendo was considering porting their games to Xbox, PC and PS5!!

You mean to tell me that Nintendo are still extremely protective of their IPs?

@ShadowofTwilight They are. If they wanted to, they could make their own brand of computer, with their own OS, and their own browser, but they are a game company first and a content creator second.

@sikthvash Nope, sarcasm is noted which is why the response is in jest.

@Quiet2down cool cool! My bad / my tired brain ^_^

@RubyCarbuncle It's not arguing, it's discussion. Why engage in an open forum, if you aren't prepared to have someone challenge your opinion?

Insta blocking those who challenge your opinion, and only engaging with those who agree is not good.

Nobody hates Nintendo fans more than Nintendo does. I really wish people didn't love their products and IP as much as they do because if any other company did the things that Nintendo do, the pitchforks would be raised. Just don't love them too much or Nintendo is going to have a bone to pick with you.

@PinderSchloss them protecting their IP is not "horrible".

@gcunit

Slam dunks like this are very satisfying.

Although, I must admit that I am a huge hypocrite and would definitely listen to the soundtracks on YouTube.

Oh boy. This is gonna be interesting. I hope that SMG4 doesn’t get affected by this.

@CazSonOfCaz Ow, my bad then.

@SteveDaSteve Thanks mate

Nintendo, the company of no fun allowed.

@heisnbrg

So, if you are serious, would you please delete your profile picture now?
It is copyright infringement and you are actively sharing it here with others.
Nintendo could get aware and contact Nintendolife to get rid off every picture that is uploaded by fans as a profile picture and has its characters in it.

@RubyCarbuncle

You are right

@TheMenaceToSociety Thats one of the official garrysmod thumbnails on steam. Iv been playing it since 2009 lol Im hoarding my pikmin mods in garrysmod before Nintendo takes it away lol

@SteveDaSteve I have like 500 hours in gmod I love it lol.

I'm just here for the analogies. I love seeing what everyone comes up with on why this is or isn't a respectable decision. But on the plus side I finally know what Garry's mod is.

Turns out Nintendo DID do it! In other news the sky is blue and water makes you wet.

People need to realize that companies aren’t our friend. Especially not Nintendo.

@Azuris

Tbh on the bright side we'll see less of those ugly splatoon models where ppl slap on every splatoon asset to an inkling model and call them ocs....

If Ninja they can post the DMCA with names redacted to show it was from Ninjas doing so.

@DripDropCop146 your social credit score has gone up!

It would be a sad existence if every company "protected their IP" as religiously as Nintendo do. Please do not dress up as Mario or Luigi for Halloween because you could be looking at a lawsuit.

It's been said to death at this point, but I'll say it again: The creative development side of Nintendo will always have my admiration and respect...the business side...I wish would seriously re-evaluate their priorities, because this is just sad.

It really disturb me to see some people still defend Nintendo possibly doing this just because it's "their IP". It's sad that the concept of Copyright law has been misused to the point of making some people think it's a human right when it's not and never even was intended to be.

Copyright is too long, and I don't see any harm with many of the gmod Mario asset existing in it alone. Just because Nintendo can take certain stuff down, doesn't mean it's automatically morally correct nor does it mean people can't lawfully call it out. I wouldn't be surprised if some people defended Nintendo going after inncoent fan art or even go after a carving of a normal picture of Mario on a good grave stone just because "they are just protecting their "intellectual property" .

I hope many popular people lawfully call Nintendo out on this if Nintendo was responsible.

Please note that I don't want to name names here because I don't want this comment to be seen as some kind of fighting. I'm mainly just want to spread my take.

@Azuris That'd be a good way for Nintendo to lose a good deal of their fan base...

I don't even care if this is verified. Nintendo would never do this- the numerous low-quality quick buck Mario games on there are a better target. They would stop GMod, and not the specific content. This is a fake- end of story. No, I don't care that they did this with Dreams years earlier, that was one whole game. This is a game across a whole platform. I am not defending Nintendo- anyone who says so didn't read the whole thing.

also I'm surprised Anti-Matter hasn't realized that GMod isn't a modded Nintendo game, it's a mod of Half-Life 2. Nothing is illegal here.

With Garry Newman saying it's legit, the big question now is why Nintendo is doing this after so long. After all, it's been many years since people have been putting Nintendo-related content into Garry's Mod, and Nintendo never went after it until now, at least to this degree. Surely they would have known about it years ago and took action back then.

@AstroTheGamosian Nintendo leadership admitted many years ago that they didn't pay any attention to what their own competitors (xbox and Playstation) were doing. Why would they have paid attention to Gary's mod? Likely, someone (or something) has been tipping them off.

Yet through all this, Garry hasn't contacted Nintendo once. If he had, he would have said as much, right? What would he have to lose?

Will Nintendo be sifting through Steam Artwork pages for fan art with Nintendo characters next? I guess the legal issues are for Valve which is why modding should be kept as an unofficial underground thing.

I’m surprised it lasted this long

@amongtheworms Id hardley call it a slam dunk, as I know for a fact for every CD that Nintendo has officially released, there are dozens more that have never gotten a proper release.

Super Mario Wonder
The entire New Super Mario Bros. series
Mario Kart DS
Mario Kart Super Circuit
Mario Kart Double Dash
The entire Metroid series
The entire Pikmin series
Every Remix in Super Smash Bros Ultimate
The Mario and Sonic Olympic Games Remixes

Going to infer that he supports Nintendo by buying the CDs officially, which don't get me wrong, I do too. I have the physical CD for Pokemon Diamond/Pearl, OoT, and a few others lying around. But if Nintendo does not supply a way for me to listen to their music, I will go out of my way to do so. So yes, I will buy that Forgotten Land CD, but I'll also freely enjoy a flac rip of Pokemon Mystery Dungeon Explorers and Wario Land 4. People who say that I'm breaking the law will try to demonize me for stealing money from a mega corporation, but I'll be listening to the Smash Remix of Treasure Trove Cove.

@amongtheworms I don't think that in itself is overly hipocritical unless you would either complain that people were using nintendo assets in Garry's Mod to begin with, or loudly complain were nintendo to issue take downs to those soundtracks.

But now Garry himself is saying that he is unsure if it was real or not in his latest tweet. He is really giving the community mixed responses here. And why would he ask the public for help in the first place and not his legal team? Why not ask Valve for help. This just seems so fishy and full of holes that I'm surprised nobody is questioning this.

Nintendo is definitely going to win the hearts of the public by issuing out DMCA to a decades old sandbox game that can still run on my Windows 7 laptop.

We can't even use Nintendo's characters which we can simply port into the game of own will? What's next, banning GIFs?

This type of draconian activity will only leave a bad taste in people's mouths who are not familiar with the greatness of our lord and savior, Nintendo, and will only encourage people to continue pirating their stuff. Color me shocked.

@gcunit The reason for the turnaround is that the situation was developing. Edited comments are typically only made when new information is brought to light.

As for Garry’s Mod, I couldn’t care less. I don’t own it, have never played it, and don’t intend to. Have a nice day!

@MorganaBus

I wasn’t trying to demonize you, just fyi! I would totally listen to the tracks on YouTube. I simply enjoyed the “well check this out” moment of a photo of the CDs being uploaded.

Nintendo going after Garry’s Mod must be second most pathetic corpo-behaviour I’ve ever seen in this industry … second after people defending it.

This made me really shocked when I saw youtube videos on it (barely any), as a fan of splatoon who got SFM because of people making animations/posters on it. Note that this isn't JUST effecting Gmod but also SFM which has models on Nintendo IP. They're removing these and one of the videos I saw had the user saying they were going to quit and that they were feeling depressed over it since it was a bigger deal to them, who were making a series on Gmod. Many others will be affected, popular or unpopular. (i.e SMG4, Maeka Enderfox, Faloliver, and MANY more.) This was some people's careers or hobby, so seeing it crumble devastates me. Note on how many people did this kind of content and how they'll have to backup the assets or quit their content unless the assets are reinstated, which I doubt it will unless it was a troll. Imagine you are one of these people, you'll have to either get backup versions on the assets or quit altogether.

If you read all this thank you for reading me ranting about how annoying this is.. :'[

Anyone gullible or foolish enough to even think Nintendo legitimately sent those DMCAs out and not some abusive fraudsters abusing DMCAs like a madman that should rightfully be hauled off to prison and there being more evidence of such VS one literal who dude that's just salty and got spooked and such really needs a reality check.

Thank goodness I got out of the habit of playing Gmod. Congratulations PC. You lost your one good exclusive that isn't an edutainment game.