Jhonny Perez, who developed and sold the cheat program Elusive for GTA 5 Online, was sued by Take-Two and sentenced to pay $150,000 in damages plus legal fees. Players think: serves him right!
Cheat developer sued
What happened? Last year, Take-Two requested Jhonny Perez from Florida to stop distributing his self-developed cheat program Elusive, which allowed players to gain unfair advantages in GTA Online. For example, it was possible to acquire unlimited in-game money. Perez complied with the request, but that was not the last word.
Since he was selling his program for money, Take-Two wanted to be informed about his earnings. However, Perez no longer responded to inquiries.
How did the lawsuit come about? Since Take-Two received no more information from Jhonny Perez, the company filed a lawsuit. Take-Two is not known for being lenient in such matters, as other cheat developers have already experienced.
What was the outcome? Perez did not appear for the hearing, and the judge sentenced him to pay $150,000 in damages to Take-Two. According to the judge, he caused irreparable harm to the company, even leading some players to refrain from further purchases. Additionally, Perez must bear the legal costs amounting to $70,000.
Players say: it’s his own fault!
How does the community react to this? The general sentiment on Reddit is that Perez is to blame. He developed a cheat program that caused damage and charged money for it. Thus, he violated the terms of use of GTA Online. While some players argue that Take-Two is making a big deal out of this, the general opinion is that cheating in an online game is unacceptable and therefore a punishment was justified. Whether it should have been this severe is a point of contention.
Moreover, this is just a drop in the bucket, as there are several cheats that GTA Online continually has to contend with – even though Take-Two constantly fights against the developers of this software.
