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The PC version of Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – Definitive Edition has returned to the Rockstar Launcher, three days after it was taken offline (via VGC).
The game was pulled from PC just hours after its release on Thursday, after players were left unable to play it for over 12 hours.
Rockstar confirmed in a statement that the game is once again available for purchase, and responded to fan complaints about the technical performance of the trilogy.
“We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience,” said Rockstar. “We are also working to improve and update overall performance as we move forward. We would like to thank everyone for their patience as we resolve these issues.”
Following the game’s release, the Rockstar Launcher was taken offline for “maintenance,” only to return later without the remastered GTA Trilogy – as Rockstar worked to remove “unintentionally included” game files.
Those unintentionally included game files included, according to data miners, developer notes, unlicensed music and even files relating to the infamous sexual mini-game “Hot Coffee” found hidden in San Andreas’ files.
The unlicensed music may be a particular problem for Rockstar – the files included music that featured in the original GTA Trilogy, but whose licenses expired prior to the re-release. While the songs were normally inaccessible during the game itself, they could easily be re-enabled by savvy players.
The Hot Coffee mini-game also makes an unexpected return – the sexual mini-game was a canned feature from San Andreas which was nonetheless included in the original release’s files, and ended up costing Take-Two over $20m in legal costs.
Even outside of all these problems, the Definitive Edition has been widely criticised by both press and fans. The Switch version of the games in particular suffer from performance issues and bugs, while some of the remodelled characters and artistic changes have not been well received.
