StrangerFromTheInternet

The difference is that before, we were still able to pretty easily create mods, even without official mod support. Mod support would've been nice-to-have, and with Hinterland changing their stance on modding, we would've finally been able to talk about it on this forum without having to fear the ban hammer. But now, with them switching their scripting backend from Mono to IL2CPP, modding is pretty much impossible, so we'd need an official modding API to get anything substantial done. Heck, even with some fabled modding API, I don't see how people could feasibly create large mods as long as all the game ships with is native binaries.

Just because we violated copyright law by creating unofficial mods doesn't mean we suddenly become amoral beings and start writing malware. The way we've done things is that basically all mods were free, open-source software. That means that the mods' source code was freely available, e.g. on GitHub. Anyone can see what a mod does, and the code of all mods was checked prior to being included in any lists. Moreover, most mods used very permissive licenses, which allowed anyone to copy, modify, re-release, etc. these mods. And no, I really don't think the backlash would've fallen on Hinterland if something would've ever got past these checks and a malicious mod would've been spread around. I've seen this back in ye olde Minecraft modding days: never have I ever seen Mojang get blamed for the actions of any mod. And if you think about it: As long as the mods are unofficial, why would Hinterland get blamed if a mod did something stupid? If anything, Hinterland would be more likely to be blamed if a malicious mod had used their official API.

Hi Raphael! I was really surprised when I heard that The Long Dark would be removed from the GOG store. Can you shed some light on what made you take this decision?

Last I heard, mod support would be considered after Wintermute has been completed, which could still take a long time. But honestly, I'd be very surprised if TLD ever got proper mod support. I think it's much more likely that this will end up the same as Minecraft, where mod support has been promised over and over again, but nothing was ever delivered. I'm pretty pragmatic about this whole issue. If you want to make or use mods, the tools are available right now. They may not be official, but they work, and they work well.