Rockstar has withdrawn Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – The Definitive Edition from sale on PC, apparently due to ongoing issues with its Rockstar Games Launcher service that make it unplayable.
At the time of writing, the PC version of the GTA Remastered Trilogy is not available for purchase from the Rockstar website. Those who have purchased the game on PC cannot play it because the Rockstar Games Launcher – which is required to play the collection – has been offline for around 15 hours.
Just a few hours after the collection was released, Rockstar Support Twitter Account explained, “Services for the Rockstar Games Launcher and supported titles are temporarily offline for maintenance. Services will return as soon as maintenance is complete.” This means that GTA Trilogy, as well as games like GTA 5 and Red Dead Redemption 2 cannot be played on PC at this time.
14 hours later, the account provided an update, saying only, “We thank you for your patience and understanding as we continue to work on service restoration for the Rockstar Games Launcher and supported titles.”
It’s unclear what caused the need for maintenance or how long that maintenance will take, and Rockstar hasn’t officially confirmed that the game has been pulled from sale due to downtime. We reached out to Rockstar for comment.
As you might expect, the response has not been good, with players being upset that their new collection of single player games is made unplayable by an issue with a separate program:
I think @Rock star games pleaded today for two things
1) Simply put your game on Steamn
2) Linking a SOLO game to an online launcher is more than stupid.You dropped so many balls today Rockstar. I’ve been a fan for so long, but I find it hard to defend this level of failure.
– Kreyg (@Kreyg) November 12, 2021
The Rockstar Games Launcher was up long enough to take my money, but now I can’t play the GTA trilogy because their services are down lol pic.twitter.com/PZigmdit1F
– Sweet Lu (@LCMendez) November 11, 2021
I think it’s time for Rockstar to come back to Steam. The Rockstar Games Launcher has been down for almost 10 hours and I can’t access the games I paid for.
Frustrated with it all …
– Ben (@videotech_) November 12, 2021
We haven’t been able to review the GTA Trilogy yet, as Rockstar didn’t send any codes before release – you can probably expect our verdict next week.
Joe Skrebels is the executive editor of IGN News. Follow him on Twitter. Any advice to give us? Want to discuss a possible story? Please send an email to [email protected].