Bully Online, the ambitious mod that brought multiplayer and more to Rockstar's classic school sim, shuts down a month after launch: 'This was not something we wanted'
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We expressed concerns about Bully Online, a massively ambitious mod that promised to bring multiplayer and a host of new systems to Rockstar's classic school sim, when we ran across it in November 2025. It looked great, but the initial release was limited to people willing to pay for it through the mod team's Ko-Fi page, and that seemed like the sort of thing almost guaranteed to attract unwelcome attention from Rockstar's lawyers. Sure enough, just a month after the mod launched, it's gone.
"The Bully Online project is shutting down. Thank you all for playing," a message posted on the website of YouTube and project lead Swegta (via Insider Gaming) now states. The Bully Online page on Swegta's website is already gone, as is the Mod DB page, although it can still be seen through the Internet Archive.
A more detailed message about the closure was posted today on Swegta's Discord server. "The Bully Online project is shutting down forever, which unfortunately means all the following is going to happen in 24 hours: our official Bully Online server (on swegta.com) will be shutdown, development of scripts for Bully Online will stop, the source code will be removed from swegta.com, all our webpages referring to it will be removed, the launcher downloads will taken down, and all Bully Online account data will be permanently deleted."
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We expressed concerns about Bully Online, a massively ambitious mod that promised to bring multiplayer and a host of new systems to Rockstar's classic school sim, when we ran across it in November 2025. It looked great, but the initial release was limited to people willing to pay for it through the mod team's Ko-Fi page, and that seemed like the sort of thing almost guaranteed to attract unwelcome attention from Rockstar's lawyers. Sure enough, just a month after the mod launched, it's gone.
"The Bully Online project is shutting down. Thank you all for playing," a message posted on the website of YouTube and project lead Swegta (via Insider Gaming) now states. The Bully Online page on Swegta's website is already gone, as is the Mod DB page, although it can still be seen through the Internet Archive.
A more detailed message about the closure was posted today on Swegta's Discord server. "The Bully Online project is shutting down forever, which unfortunately means all the following is going to happen in 24 hours: our official Bully Online server (on swegta.com) will be shutdown, development of scripts for Bully Online will stop, the source code will be removed from swegta.com, all our webpages referring to it will be removed, the launcher downloads will taken down, and all Bully Online account data will be permanently deleted."
„The initial release was limited to people willing to pay for it“
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„The initial release was limited to people willing to pay for it“
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We expressed concerns about Bully Online, a massively ambitious mod that promised to bring multiplayer and a host of new systems to Rockstar's classic school sim, when we ran across it in November 2025. It looked great, but the initial release was limited to people willing to pay for it through the mod team's Ko-Fi page, and that seemed like the sort of thing almost guaranteed to attract unwelcome attention from Rockstar's lawyers. Sure enough, just a month after the mod launched, it's gone.
"The Bully Online project is shutting down. Thank you all for playing," a message posted on the website of YouTube and project lead Swegta (via Insider Gaming) now states. The Bully Online page on Swegta's website is already gone, as is the Mod DB page, although it can still be seen through the Internet Archive.
A more detailed message about the closure was posted today on Swegta's Discord server. "The Bully Online project is shutting down forever, which unfortunately means all the following is going to happen in 24 hours: our official Bully Online server (on swegta.com) will be shutdown, development of scripts for Bully Online will stop, the source code will be removed from swegta.com, all our webpages referring to it will be removed, the launcher downloads will taken down, and all Bully Online account data will be permanently deleted."
That's probably for the best any game that glorifies bullying probably isn't great for society.
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That's probably for the best any game that glorifies bullying probably isn't great for society.
Its funny that the game is 20 years old and people still make this assumption from the title alone.
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That's probably for the best any game that glorifies bullying probably isn't great for society.
That's probably for the best any game that glorifies bullying isn't great for society.
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That's probably for the best any game that glorifies bullying probably isn't great for society.
Do you make the same argument for Grand Theft Auto?
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That's probably for the best any game that glorifies bullying probably isn't great for society.
Watching history repeat itself
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We expressed concerns about Bully Online, a massively ambitious mod that promised to bring multiplayer and a host of new systems to Rockstar's classic school sim, when we ran across it in November 2025. It looked great, but the initial release was limited to people willing to pay for it through the mod team's Ko-Fi page, and that seemed like the sort of thing almost guaranteed to attract unwelcome attention from Rockstar's lawyers. Sure enough, just a month after the mod launched, it's gone.
"The Bully Online project is shutting down. Thank you all for playing," a message posted on the website of YouTube and project lead Swegta (via Insider Gaming) now states. The Bully Online page on Swegta's website is already gone, as is the Mod DB page, although it can still be seen through the Internet Archive.
A more detailed message about the closure was posted today on Swegta's Discord server. "The Bully Online project is shutting down forever, which unfortunately means all the following is going to happen in 24 hours: our official Bully Online server (on swegta.com) will be shutdown, development of scripts for Bully Online will stop, the source code will be removed from swegta.com, all our webpages referring to it will be removed, the launcher downloads will taken down, and all Bully Online account data will be permanently deleted."
never attenpt to make money off any company whose trigger happy litigious. projects doa the moment you even have to consider it.
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That's probably for the best any game that glorifies bullying probably isn't great for society.
You probably know this by now, but Bully is a remarkable tale of anti-bullying. You don't play the one bullying others, you play the one who gets bullied.
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That’s my favorite game.
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We expressed concerns about Bully Online, a massively ambitious mod that promised to bring multiplayer and a host of new systems to Rockstar's classic school sim, when we ran across it in November 2025. It looked great, but the initial release was limited to people willing to pay for it through the mod team's Ko-Fi page, and that seemed like the sort of thing almost guaranteed to attract unwelcome attention from Rockstar's lawyers. Sure enough, just a month after the mod launched, it's gone.
"The Bully Online project is shutting down. Thank you all for playing," a message posted on the website of YouTube and project lead Swegta (via Insider Gaming) now states. The Bully Online page on Swegta's website is already gone, as is the Mod DB page, although it can still be seen through the Internet Archive.
A more detailed message about the closure was posted today on Swegta's Discord server. "The Bully Online project is shutting down forever, which unfortunately means all the following is going to happen in 24 hours: our official Bully Online server (on swegta.com) will be shutdown, development of scripts for Bully Online will stop, the source code will be removed from swegta.com, all our webpages referring to it will be removed, the launcher downloads will taken down, and all Bully Online account data will be permanently deleted."
Probably should've asked for donations to support their passion projects or just casually have a donate button to the side. Gamers love supporting a good passion project. See: Stardew Valley and Hollow Knight for two easy examples given how many times people have bought extra copies because it's so good and it's so cheap and it'll be fun to play again on Switch/Xbox/PS/PC/Mobile/Demake/audiobook/choose your own adventure
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That's probably for the best any game that glorifies bullying probably isn't great for society.
Well said, user that glorifies Satan's maggoty cum farts. I'm sure the children reading your post history and considering your opinions aren't influenced in any way whatsoever.
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That's probably for the best any game that glorifies bullying isn't great for society.
The irony of using Steve Harvey of all people to make your point....
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We expressed concerns about Bully Online, a massively ambitious mod that promised to bring multiplayer and a host of new systems to Rockstar's classic school sim, when we ran across it in November 2025. It looked great, but the initial release was limited to people willing to pay for it through the mod team's Ko-Fi page, and that seemed like the sort of thing almost guaranteed to attract unwelcome attention from Rockstar's lawyers. Sure enough, just a month after the mod launched, it's gone.
"The Bully Online project is shutting down. Thank you all for playing," a message posted on the website of YouTube and project lead Swegta (via Insider Gaming) now states. The Bully Online page on Swegta's website is already gone, as is the Mod DB page, although it can still be seen through the Internet Archive.
A more detailed message about the closure was posted today on Swegta's Discord server. "The Bully Online project is shutting down forever, which unfortunately means all the following is going to happen in 24 hours: our official Bully Online server (on swegta.com) will be shutdown, development of scripts for Bully Online will stop, the source code will be removed from swegta.com, all our webpages referring to it will be removed, the launcher downloads will taken down, and all Bully Online account data will be permanently deleted."
for the umpteenth time, quit making mods for games that are developed by asshats. Take Two/R* very clearly don't want a healthy community surrounding and supporting their games as evidenced by virtually every decision they make regarding community modding efforts, stop trying to give them one; spend your time making mods for better games. Or better still, go from modding games to creating them and you could develop your vision without the constraints of someone else's IP. But for the love of fuck stop giving time and effort to these people who will deliberately squander it.
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Probably should've asked for donations to support their passion projects or just casually have a donate button to the side. Gamers love supporting a good passion project. See: Stardew Valley and Hollow Knight for two easy examples given how many times people have bought extra copies because it's so good and it's so cheap and it'll be fun to play again on Switch/Xbox/PS/PC/Mobile/Demake/audiobook/choose your own adventure
Rockstar also kills off mods that are free. I don't even know how exactly I'm not a lawyer. The GTA V pcvr mod is one example
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That’s my favorite game.
So you're a hypocriteand a prejudiced imp. Fantastic combo.
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So you're a hypocriteand a prejudiced imp. Fantastic combo.
I see nothing hypocritical about that there isn’t any bullying in any of the grand theft autos.
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I see nothing hypocritical about that there isn’t any bullying in any of the grand theft autos.
So a blind hypocrite and prejudiced imp then?
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So a blind hypocrite and prejudiced imp then?
One that’s being bullied right now by all you people who learned your world views from games that glorify bullying.
