Mod Skips God of War Ragnarök’s PSN Requirement

A God of War: Ragnarök mod allows PC players to bypass Sony‘s controversial PSN login requirement only a few days after release.

Although the creator, Nexus mods user iArtoriasUA, made the mod to strip “the PlayStation PC SDK runtime requirement for God of War Ragnarök” to avoid errors, players have used it to circumvent Sony’s PSN policy.

The installation is fairly easy; download the mod from Nexus, copy it into the game’s folder, and play.

Although iArtoriasUA made it clear on the mod’s page that it’s not intended to encourage piracy, it may very well do so inadvertently and bring about Sony’s legal team knocking. However, if Sony’s decision obstructs the use of a purchased product, is it still piracy?

If not through legal action, and no matter how unplayer-friendly it is, Sony might patch the game to enforce their policy.

The mod works relatively well at the time of writing, but if it gets patched, modders might be in for a long game of cat and mouse.

Sony’s Troubled PC Scene

The shoehorning of PSN into PC games has been a headache this year.

Back in May, Helldivers 2 players were surprised by a mandatory PSN login requirement that kept them from playing the game they’d bought.

Sony’s decision, which came a few months after Helldivers 2‘s release, was regarded as an attempt to inflate their numbers and caused an outcry from the community. Eventually, the publisher backpedaled, and silently removed the game from regions that didn’t allow PSN, blocking future purchases.

It seems that God of War: Ragnarök won’t be a repeat. The Japanese giant hasn’t wavered in their decision yet, despite the game’s Steam reviews sitting at “mixed.” Still, out of the six thousand reviews, only two thousand are negative.

To be fair, a significant portion of these reviews complain of a poor PC port that rendered some heavy-duty rigs powerless. Being strong-armed into joining a service only to be met with horrible framerates is generally the recipe for a mad PC gamer.

Even those willing to budge against Sony’s demands have reported errors with account creation, leading to PSN requesting government IDs and pictures. With their track record of data breaches, Sony might be asking for trust they haven’t earned.

As this console generation reaches its expected halfway point, Sony is slowly losing favor with its loyal fanbase. From price gouges to the absolute trainwreck that is Concord, Sony fans have had a tough year.

It’s unclear if Sony will crack down on players’ workarounds in future patches or somehow reach a compromise. One thing is for certain, however, the harder they push, the harder the PC community is going to push back.