Sony has lost a court case it brought to stop third-party firms from altering its games without express permission.
An EU court has found that Datel's cheat-inducing software for MotorStorm was operating legally.
A European court has ruled that game-changing software sold or distributed by a third-party does not infringe copyright. That effectively means that a game released on console or PC can legally be altered through cheat software and mods without the original copyright holder's permission.
The case was brought by PlayStation, which argued that UK firm Datel was breaching copyright rules when it marketed and sold software that adapted Sony's MotorStorm to add cheats, such as infinite boosts.
However, the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg ruled that games can be legally adapted temporarily.
"The directive on the legal protection of computer programs does not allow the holder of that protection to prohibit the marketing by a third party of software which merely changes variables transferred temporarily," it said in a statement (via EuroNews).
"The directive protects only the intellectual creation as it is reflected in the text of the computer program’s source code and object code."
As Datel's modifications don't alter the source code and only change "variables" running in the game's working memory, they have been ruled to be doing so within the law.
Sony's own take on it is that such software "latches on... like a parasite".
Of course, the argument is based on a game released many years ago on a long deceased console – the PlayStation 3. However, the ramifications of the ruling could be wide-reaching.
It effectively opens the door to other companies releasing their own cheat-code add-ons for PS5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch and PC games – in the EU, at least. As long as they don't touch the source code, it seems it's all fair game.
