After Swen Vincke wagged his finger at a Wizards of the Coast DMCA, Stardew's Baldur's Gate 3 mod is back online

Baldur's Gate 3 mod for Stardew, including pixel art Astarion

(Image credit: ConcernedApe, Baldur's Village Mod Team)

Turns out, something gold can stay. In the wake of Wizards of the Coast's "mistaken" DMCA that scoured it from the internet, Baldur's Village is back up on Nexus Mods. It was out of commission for a couple of days after the original takedown took it out on March 29 or, in other words, it was out of commission until people noticed what WotC had done and compelled it to beat a hasty retreat.

If you're not up on the news: Baldur's Village is a mod for Stardew Valley that puts all your Baldur's Gate 3 faves into the game. It inserts "20+ new beautifully drawn characters, 6 new locations, new shops with special items, events, and more." More importantly, it gives you yet another avenue by which you can romance Astarion.

It's a popular thing. So popular, in fact, that it even earned the imprimatur of Larian CEO Swen Vincke when it hit full release early in March. Vincke tweeted that "so much love" went into the mod and called it "amazing work!" Unfortunately, that didn't seem to help the mod when it came time for WotC to fire off its DMCAs (the company later apologised for the takedown, calling it a mistake and echoing Vincke's praise of the project as a "great mod").

Celebrations are happening far and wide, actually. Over on the BG3 subreddit, the triumphant revival of Baldur's Village has scored itself over 5,000 upvotes and a whole bunch of excited comments. "If I didn't already have a reason to want to play Stardew... I do now," says AspenDarke. "We’re so back," says OhSubs.

Astarion smiling with sunglasses on — Astarion is very excited about not being subject to a legal dispute. (Image credit: ConcernedApe, Baldur's Village Mod Team)

And then, well, quite a lot of people unwilling to take WotC at its word that the DMCA was accidental. Baldur's Village might be back up, but after a long string of PR gaffes and fan disappointments, this is just another mark in the ledger against WotC for a lot of TTRPG fans.

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One of Josh's first memories is of playing Quake 2 on the family computer when he was much too young to be doing that, and he's been irreparably game-brained ever since. His writing has been featured in Vice, Fanbyte, and the Financial Times. He'll play pretty much anything, and has written far too much on everything from visual novels to Assassin's Creed. His most profound loves are for CRPGs, immersive sims, and any game whose ambition outstrips its budget. He thinks you're all far too mean about Deus Ex: Invisible War.

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