Discontent is brewing within the Fallout 4 modding community at the discovery that several mods have been uploaded for Xbox One without the creators' permission.
Teething problems were to be expected, of course—the Xbox modding ecosystem is young and unpredictable. Some instances have been resolved peaceably. The inclusion of DogtoothCG's NCR Ranger Veteran Armor in Spawn Items—Xbox's second-most popular mod—was passed off as an accident and quickly removed, the files purportedly having been obtained in an email exchange.
Dogtooth has announced plans to bring the next version of NCR Ranger Veteran Armor to PC and Xbox, but claims "constant trawling of the web for un-authorized uploads is taking quite a toll on the time available to actually develop."
Other instances are blatant re-uploads. Redditor /u/Bee-Wry compiled a list of egregious examples, with the lift of Senor Pato's Ringo the Flamingo taking the crown. The description has been copied in full, including instructions for installation using the Nexus Mod Manager, which I suspect will be less than useful on Xbox One.
Bethesda has stepped in with a guide for modders on how to have unauthorised copies removed from bethesda.net. Surprisingly, it's the full-blown DMCA process, but some have found success by reporting copied mods directly and alerting the moderators.
Following the fracas around rightful ownership when Bethesda dabbled in paid modding, it's disappointing to see that these problems weren't planned for.
The PC Gaming Show returns to E3 on Monday June 13, featuring game announcements, updates to existing favourites, and conversation with top developers. You can find out what to expect here, and also book free tickets to attend in person at pcgamingshow.com. The PC Gaming Show will be broadcast live through twitch.tv/pcgamer from 11:30 am PT/2:30 pm ET/6:30 pm GMT, but be sure to tune in beforehand to check out The Steam Speedrun, in which one lucky winner will buy as many games as they can in three minutes.
