There’s been a war on fan-service in recent years, and it’s claimed a number of franchises, even Mortal Kombat. Now a bunch of people keep saying stuff like “Even if they developers don’t add sexy costumes to the game, you can always add them using PC mods.” Well that only applies when modding doesn’t get hit with a Digital Millennium Copyright Act notice, which effectively makes PC modding a moot option for bringing back the sexy after developers kowtow to the censorship crowd. That’s exactly what happened to the modding community making lewd mods for Shadow of the Tomb Raider.

Back around April 14th, 2019 modder JOSTAR made a mod called Shadow of the Tomb Raider Nude Mod (Booty Edition). It came with more than 25 different sexy outfits for Lara, who was depicted in various high quality states of undress. JOSTAR ended up getting banned from NexusMods after getting into an altercation with a moderator, and the mod was removed.

Enter Sirius56. He managed to track down JOSTAR and get permission to re-upload the mod to NexuMods. However, on April 17th, 2019, Sirius56 had some unfortunate news to share after users noticed that the mod was gone again and wasn’t going to be allowed on NexusMods.

Neogaf user Rurouni Kenshin spotted a comment thread on a separate Shadow of the Tomb Raider nude mod, where Sirius56 explained that JOSTAR’s mod had to be removed yet again, although this time it was due to a DMCA claim from Crystal Dynamics…

“Well guys I have bad news; even If I’m was able to get the approval from JOSTAR the mod will not come live; apparently the site receive a “DMCA Takedown from Crystal Dynamics”; whatever that is; but the result was a notification from an Admin saying that “even when I was able to get approval the site will not be comfortable hosting it” and so the post was deleted for good. So at this point even If I or anyone create another post it will be taken down. “Not really sure why this only applied to the [Booty Edition]; I was expecting all Nude mode got affected but is not the case. “Basically only the ones that were able to download it the first and second time are the “winners” while the rest of the community will have to wait for something else.”

One possibility for the DMCA could be due to the nude mods affecting DLC costumes in Shadow of the Tomb Raider, or referencing or containing DLC related items. Oftentimes developers (or publishers) are quick to shut down mods that contain premium content. This was one of the reasons Sleeping Dogs mods never really took off.

Alternatively, Crystal Dynamics could be butthurt that the only reason anyone is remotely interested in Shadow of the Tomb Raider after it bombed on the market last year is due to the nude mods, so they’re trying to stifle the community’s interest in nude mods.

You can get a glimpse of what the mod was like courtesy of a NSFW YouTube video uploaded by user Nude Play.

The news managed to travel quickly, finding its way to the Tomb Raider forums, where users began discussing the pros and cons of nude mods, and how developers have a right to block PC modders from making nude mods.

Plenty of users began decrying the need for Lara to be sexualized in any capacity, trying to defend Crystal Dynamics’ attempts to even prevent modders from bringing back her old sex appeal.

Thankfully, there was one user in the thread who exercised some mean common sense, with Yeauxleaux explaining…

“Reboot Lara’s lack of sex appeal is definitely not just about her wardrobe. It’s the whole package. The “feh, kind of attractive” in a girl-next-door kind of way appearance, the slumpy bad-posture in her animations, the socially awkward nerd angle they’ve given her personality, the whiny irritating voice, the total lack of humour. It’s the whole characterisation. Don’t get me started on the stupid haircut. With how drastic the change is and how thoroughly they seem to have removed any modicum of not just sexiness, but general boldness, elegance, style and femininity from her does seem like a deliberate statement, like I said earlier. ”They come off determined to downplay that side of her as much as they possibly can. This isn’t some conspiracy or accusation of an agenda, I don’t know what their motives are and I don’t really care that much about the why, it’s just a basic observation. “I said it before and I’ll say it again, Classic Lara’s charm and appeal shone through even when fully clothed in boxy winter outfits. She had “it” even with a blocky, basic un-detailed character model. She had a way of moving, acting and speaking, alongside her general physical appearance, that made her naturally alluring. Reboot Lara absolutely lacks that quality. I’m sure not even a bikini could make her conventionally sexy to me.”

Well some people just wanted to get their hands on the mod regardless of what they thought about nu-Lara Croft, and thankfully the good folks over at Alienware Arena posted an updated link and instructions on how to download and install the mod.

You can download the updated Shadow of the Tomb Raider Nude Mod (Booty Edition) from Google Drive.

In order to get it to work you’ll need the Kaldaien Speicial K mod.

It’s likely that Crystal Dynamics will DMCA those as well, so you may want to download them as quickly as possible and store them before they get deleted… again.

Alternatively, you can also download the Booty Edition from PlayGround.Ru.

And if that doesn’t work, you can attempt to download the mod from Mega.nz.

The password is: JOSTAR-SOTTR

As always, use at your own risk.

It’s a sad day in gaming when the industry is going gung-ho to prevent the gaming community from appreciating beautiful sexy women.

(Thanks for the news tip Red)