It's not often we see Microsoft taking action against mods for all sorts of popular games, but clearly the company feels a new Counter-Strike 2 mod overstepped the line, issuing a DMCA notice against something called "Project Misriah".
The focus behind this mod was to bring a Halo 3-like experience to CS2's multiplayer, introducing maps and assets from the Halo series in the process. You can see some footage up above, and it certainly looks very impressive.
Nevertheless, the mod's creator took to social media this week to explain how it had been taken down by Microsoft, and that they have no plans to work on it any further.
"Hey guys, this project has unfortunately been taken down by Microsoft, and will not be worked on or uploaded in the future. but hey, it was fun while it lasted. thank you to all of the players and supporters of project. we will use the knowledge and skills obtained from this to cook up something else!"
Interestingly, they also go on to claim that the DCMA strike was issued through AI, with a follow-up screenshot showing how "Tracer, on behalf of Microsoft Corporation", had flagged the mod for featuring "Halo 3 game assets, such as maps, weapons, and characters".
Now, we can understand the frustration from the CS2 community and the creator of the mod over this situation, but we can also understand Microsoft's position in not wanting Halo 3 assets to be utilised freely in fan projects.
It's not like they've never given their blessing for something like this — just a few months ago, it was revealed that the Halo fan game "Spartan Survivors" would be getting an official release with Microsoft's permission.