Rockstar Games are being pressured by GTA Online players to unban a user who claims they were slapped with a Social Club ban just for taking a selfie.
A user by the name of QrixPL posted their case to Reddit on July 6, saying: “Rockstar banned my Social Club because I uploaded this photo…”
Beneath the text was a screenshot of their photograph in-game, showing the player saluting with a message on the wall behind them. It reads: “Vote for nobody… Nobody really cares about Los Santos.”
Given the fact that this is content Rockstar themselves added, the ban has caused confusion. The post itself has recorded over 3,800 upvotes, with hundreds of comments calling for the decision to be revised.
It is unclear how long this ban will last for – though it means the Reddit user cannot share photos with the rest of the community.
According to the developers, they say: “If a Rockstar Games Social Club account is temporarily suspended from online gameplay, that account will not be able to access online play for that title from the moment the account is suspended until the suspension expiration date; the suspension expiration date will be displayed on the in-game splash screen upon return to Story Mode play.”
These bans, or suspensions, typically occur when there has been a violation of their EULA or Terms of Service.
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Players rally behind banned GTA 5 player
One user, with over 1,000 upvotes, said: “Appeal it. Get it reversed.”
The poster replied: “I asked R* support why I was banned on SC. They respond that they cannot inform me what was deleted and why. I know that is that picture because I compared my SC profile with in-game gallery. This is the only one missing from my profile.”
Another user said: “The ‘we can’t give any further information’ is obviously just a copy-paste answer and I think even if they wanted to explain, they most certainly aren’t allowed to. Maybe look at the terms of service or what it’s called and see if there is something about political stuff.”
A third person added: “This is self-censorship. More importantly, they are censoring the very content they themselves created.”
Whether or not the campaign to have QrixPL’s ban overturned will cause a change in decision remains to be seen. At the time of writing, the developers have not commented publicly on the ban.
