The creator of the Cyberpunk 2077 VR mod CD Projekt lately hit with a DMCA strike has mentioned individuals at the moment are pirating it to “punish” him for breaking the developer’s phrases of service.
Luke Ross, creator of the R.E.A.L. VR mods for video games similar to Elden Ring, Days Gone, and Far Cry, reportedly earns $20,000 a month by way of Patreon, which acts as a paywall for his work.
Ross prolonged his VR conversion framework to assist Cyberpunk 2077 in February 2022. Just a few months later, he contacted CD Projekt to ask if the Polish studio was keen on turning the mod into an official port. It declined, Ross advised IGN.
Then, on January 9, 2026, Patreon alerted Ross to CD Projekt’s DMCA discover for the elimination of the mod, which it had already taken down. “I had completely no say within the matter, as a result of as is the norm in these circumstances (no less than for Patreon), the Patreon group had already complied with the request and brought down my mod of their very own initiative, making it inaccessible,” Ross mentioned.
Ross then bought in contact with CD Projekt to, as he put it, “negotiate a mutually useful answer.” CD Projekt then replied to say Ross wanted to adjust to its phrases of service. “No negotiation, no feedback on my proposals, no curiosity for occasion in realizing what number of of their customers can be affected by the sudden elimination.”
The state of affairs hit the headlines this week when Jan Rosner, VP, Enterprise Growth at CD Projekt Crimson, tweeted to say the corporate issued the DMCA strike as a result of Cyberpunk VR was a paid mod, which violates its fan content material pointers.
“We by no means enable monetization of our IP with out our direct permission and/or an settlement in place,” Rosner mentioned. “We had been in contact with Luke final week and knowledgeable him that he wants to make it free for everybody (with optionally available donations) or take away it.
“We’re massive followers of mods to our video games — some of the work out there was nothing brief of wonderful, together with Luke’s mod for Cyberpunk 2077. We’d be completely happy to see it return as a free launch. Nonetheless, making a revenue from our IP, in any kind, all the time requires permission from CD Projekt Crimson.”
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Ross responded to Rosner’s tweet to take challenge together with his work being characterised as fan content material. Fairly, Ross insisted, it’s impartial software program and thus doesn’t infringe on CD Projekt’s IP rights.
“I am sorry however I do not imagine you might be inside your rights in demanding that my software program wants to be free,” Ross mentioned. “It shouldn’t be ‘by-product work’ or ‘fan content material’: it helps a big quantity of video games which had been constructed upon completely different engines, and it comprises completely zero code or property out of your IP. Saying that it infringes your IP rights is equal to sustaining for instance that RivaTuner violates sport publishers’ copyrights as a result of it intercepts the pictures the sport is drawing on display screen and it processes them so as to overlay its statistics.”
IGN adopted up to ask Ross if he has plans to make the Cyberpunk VR mod free, thus complying with CD Projekt’s phrases of service. Responding, Ross mentioned that whereas he wouldn’t rule out doing so, it could be quite a bit of work.
“I don’t rule out releasing the mod free for everybody,” he mentioned. “However it could take time, as a result of my software program helps 40+ video games and numerous utterly completely different engines, which makes making a model that particularly helps solely Cyberpunk 2077 a non-trivial process. Additionally, the individuals who have voluntarily given their cash to me so as to assist my improvement efforts for the framework won’t be completely happy about seeing the mod being given away all of a sudden to everybody simply because I have been bullied into it.”
At this level, Ross mentioned that making the mod free had develop into a moot level as a result of individuals had been now pirating it — and publishing abusive feedback directed at him.
“Anyway, it is form of develop into a moot level, as a result of following to the surprising DMCA strike, after the mod was forcibly faraway from my Patreon, individuals afraid of shedding VR assist for their favourite video games have began pirating and illegally exchanging the mod all around the Web, openly saying that since I used to be not complying with CDPR’s ToS, my work is now honest sport and I ought to be punished by having it stolen. So in a way CDPR already bought what they needed,” he mentioned.
The next is a snippet of the response to the DMCA strike and Ross’ feedback about it.
“Ehhh, with out the sport the mod is ineffective. I’m glad some individuals have discovered methods to pirate his shitty mods, he deserves it,” one particular person mentioned on social media.
“I’m presently engaged on transferring this man’s mod recordsdata to my PC. I’ll look by way of and do some tweaking, after which I’ll launch his VR mod for Cyberpunk for free,” mentioned one other.
“What actually bugs me is that as an alternative of simply releasing it for free and persevering with improvement with donations, which Take-Two already permits and which might nearly positively nonetheless herald the identical cash from the VR neighborhood, he selected to kill the mod fully as soon as he couldn’t promote it anymore,” added one other. “That’s the half I don’t respect. He already made his cash, he had choices, and he nonetheless selected the nuclear one. Finish result’s gamers lose the one actual Cyberpunk VR expertise, VR modding takes one other hit, and publishers get painted as villains once more although this consequence was form of apparent.”
The next is a remark posted on Ross’ Patreon web page:
“Upon studying extra about this case: they gave you a means to maintain it alive, and also you determined to be a grasping little bish about it so I am cancelling my Patreon subscription to you and giving all of your mods to anybody I do know for free any further (additionally there’s locations on-line to discover all of your mods instantly after launch for free, I used to be selecting to pay you, however now you are being a dickhead so I will simply steal your mods any further and inform everybody the place to discover them).
“You have made 20k a month for years, for modding these video games — they’re asking you to make ONE OF THEM free — for a sport which is essentially accomplished updating and can be model locked.
“Actually gross by CD Venture Crimson, and by you — reveals the place your priorities are you grasping little proud man.”
It appears unlikely that CD Projekt will again down right here, which leaves Ross with a call to make: ditch the Cyberpunk 2077 VR mod for good, or launch it for free, as CD Projekt requests.
Ross restated to IGN that he’s open to discovering “artistic options,” and that his work to make AAA video games playable in VR fills a void, however he has but to affirm plans to launch the Cyberpunk 2077 VR mod for free.
“I don’t modify the content material of the video games, or strive to promote an expertise which is in competitors with what the IP creators are producing,” he continued. “To play in VR you all the time want to personal the unique sport, and the one factor that adjustments is that the expertise is extra immersive, visceral and memorable, which might solely profit the IP house owners. In the long run, when players are enjoying for instance Cyberpunk in VR, they aren’t enjoying my mod. They’re enjoying Cyberpunk, and loving it. How this might ever harm the writer and set off free-or-kill reactions nonetheless baffles me.”
Wesley is Director, Information at IGN. Discover him on Twitter at @wyp100. You’ll be able to attain Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.