If you’re a PC gamer who even sometimes considers installing user-made mods, you’ve almost certainly visited Nexus Mods. There are other sites, sure, and Steam has incorporated mods directly into its client via the Steam Workshop, but Nexus Mods remains the place where the modding community congregates – where awe-inspiring ambition and somehow even more awe-inspiring horniness give rise to countless feats of ingenuity. Yesterday, Robin “Dark0ne” Scott, who founded the site 17 years ago, announced that he’d sold his pride, joy, and source of near-constant stress. Little would change, he claimed, but provided few concrete details beyond that – not even the name of the company that purchased the site. So the community went digging, and they did not like what they unearthed.
Nexus Mods’ new owners, as it turns out, hail from a company called Chosen. If nothing else, it bills itself as a less-terrible alternative to venture capital and private equity, but it still very much speaks in terms of scale and monetization. According to PC Gamer, Nexus Mods users were also dismayed to discover that the LinkedIn page of one of Chosen’s founders, Victor Folmann, featured a “Gaming Startup Monetization Cheat Sheet” littered with red flags: blurbs on ads, pay-to-earn, pay-to-play, microtransactions, and NFTs.
Ensuing panic led to a response from one of the new owners, seemingly Folmann going by the handle Foledinho, on Scott’s original announcement post – the comments section of which has been disabled multiple times since the post went live yesterday. In it, Folmann shoots down a barrage of accusations, saying mods will remain free, creators will continue to own mods, free accounts won’t be restricted in any new ways, and that while ads are a “necessary trade-off to keep the site running,” he hopes to “reduce them over time, not increase them.”
In terms of overall monetization, Folmann said he believes Nexus Mods did it “right” back in the day with premium memberships, saying there are no plans to “change the core of how premium works.” But he added ominously that “hosting billions of mod files and running the infrastructure behind Nexus Mods isn’t cheap” and, in response to a question about additional monetization, did not shoot down the idea.
“Monetization is hard and Nexus Mods is a complex platform,” he wrote. “What matters most is continuing to support mod authors, delight users, and keep the lights on. We’re not changing the core model. No aggressive monetization. No paid mods. If anything, we’re aiming for fewer ads, not more. We’ll take a community-first, listening approach, and we won’t compromise on what’s made Nexus Mods special.”
Speaking to PC Gamer, a Nexus Mods spokesperson echoed the business-as-usual sentiment: "Our focus is on continuity, not disruption. We have a very experienced team here of 40 highly talented people, with tons of modding experience and a deep history with the community and this is not changing. The new owners are here, embedded in the team, working with us all directly, not sitting in a distant tower, remotely directing us all towards some nefarious goals."
This mirrors what Scott said in his original announcement post:
“Behind the scenes, I’ve already been stepping back bit by bit,” Scott wrote. “Over the past few years, the team has taken on more of the weight and the site’s been doing better than ever. What’s changing now is simply the formality of it, making sure the right people are in place to guide Nexus Mods into the next era. … In terms of new faces, you’ll also be seeing more of Foledinho (Victor), Rapsak (Marinus) and Taagen (Nikolai), who’ve come on board to lead this next chapter. They’ve got deep roots in gaming, tech, and most importantly, they give a damn; about the site, the community, and the future we’re trying to build here.”
So then why not even mention Chosen by name prior to community inquiries? The new owners say they wanted to give Scott – who will, confusingly, still sort of be around in what sounds like an advisory capacity – a proper sendoff.
“This post wasn’t about Chosen,” wrote Folmann. “It was about Robin and the legacy he built over 24 years. We’re the new owners and ultimate decision-makers at Nexus Mods. We’ll share more about ourselves when we’ve earned that right. For now, we’re focused on listening, learning, and making modding even easier, and yes, you’ll see us around in the community being active. Trust takes time. We're committed to putting control back in the hands of creators, players, and communities. We’ll get back to building now.”
The “putting control back in the hands of creators, players, and communities” line could be a general statement of intent, but it could also be referencing a whole other course in this can-of-worms feast: the Nexus Mods community’s years-spanning debate over diversity and inclusion, specifically in regard to its ban on mods that remove inclusive elements, like pronoun choices, "when the removal is clearly to be divisive or cause hostility within the community or marginalize specific group(s)."
Nexus Mods put its foot down on the issue back in 2022 following a mod that removed Pride flags from Spider-Man Remastered, with Scott writing at the time that “We are for inclusivity, we are for diversity. If we think someone is uploading a mod on our site with the intent to deliberately be against inclusivity and/or diversity then we will take action against it.”
Ever since then, the site has been under fire for supposed “censorship” from vocal (though not necessarily representative) members of the modding community, as well as the usual suspects like Asmongold. This despite a relatively middle-of-the-road stance from Scott, who, for example, recently pointed out that the removal of a Donald Trump Marvel Rivals mod corresponded with the same action being taken against a corresponding Joe Biden mod.
“We also removed the exact same mod with Joe Biden's head at the same time… to ensure there was no bias and because we don't want to handle all the nutjobs that come out the woodwork whenever these mods get posted. Funny how the outrage-bait YouTubers don't mention that, isn't it?” Scott wrote in a thread on the Nexus Mods subreddit in January. “It's so dumb, and these people are so dumb, that I really cannot be fucked with it. I'm not expecting any of my staff to have to handle these whackjobs any more than showing them the door either. So we delete all the mods we see/that get reported to us on the topic, and all the people this upsets can trot-on because it's really not worth our time or effort to care about.”
The question now is, will Nexus Mods maintain these sorts of hardline stances without Scott at the helm? At the moment, it’s unclear. Aftermath reached out to two of the site’s new owners, as well as multiple official email addresses and one moderator, for more information about future plans. Update 6/18/25: In response to Aftermath's questions about whether Nexus Mods' approach to moderation would change under new leadership, a Nexus Mods rep said the following:
"We're fully committed to ensuring the site continues to be a welcoming place for as many users as possible. The Nexus Mods community is incredibly passionate and varied. As a hub that connects countless sub-communities (both on-site and off-site), it naturally becomes a space for both collaboration and, at times, confrontation. Our users span the globe and bring with them a wide range of cultural, political, and ideological perspectives, which inevitably shape the conversations and interactions that happen here. Our plan is one of continuity and our focus on bringing value to mod-creators and mod users alike will keep moving us forward."
In the meantime, the site’s moderators continue to open and close the comments section on Scott’s sale announcement thread each day in the name of “healthy debate.”
"We appreciate the thoughtful and (mostly) respectful discussion that took place here around this news announcement," a Nexus Mods moderator posted today. "It's always good to see people engaging with different perspectives, even on hot-button topics like moderation and censorship. Unfortunately, the thread has gradually crossed from spirited discourse into spirited chaos. Some comments have gone off the rails, some have gone off-topic, and a few tried to jump the rails entirely. While some of you have appreciated a lighter touch in this comment section, others have expressed dismay that a heavier hand has not been applied. Regardless of your view, thanks for the always interesting and often insightful views being shared. Rather than let this carry on through our night unattended, comments will be disabled temporarily, but the gates will open once again tomorrow."
