Rockstar Games Launcher goes down for hours as GTA Trilogy PC gets pulled from sale [updated]

[Update – November 15 @ 12:45 PM ET]: Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – Definitive Edition is now available to purchase and play via PC. The Rockstar Games Launcher is also up and operational. Rockstar has confirmed that GTA: The Trilogy was temporarily unavailable to “remove files unintentionally included in these versions.” 

The original story, published on November 12, is as follows.

Yesterday, Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – Definitive Edition launched. And for console players, things seemed to go rather well (discounting the weird-looking characters). On PC, however, the situation has been far more dour. Last night, the Rockstar Games Launcher went down, and it’s been that way for nearly an entire day. Following its collapse, the GTA Trilogy was pulled from sale on Rockstar’s store. Things have certainly been better for GTA, so grab a hot coffee and let’s dive in.

We felt something was amiss yesterday as we tried to get the game running. The plan was to play the game for some impressions, which will be published at this very site. But things were not meant to be. Announced on Twitter, Rockstar Support said that services for the Rockstar Games Launcher were down, and it “will return as soon as maintenance is completed.” At the time of writing, that was more than 21 hours ago. It later followed up about seven hours ago, thanking players for their “patience and understanding.” Since then, Rockstar has claimed the launcher went down for “scheduled maintenance.” Brave, considering this happened at the moment of a major game release.

The Service Status page at Rockstar’s support site is grisly. All support for PC services are dead. Consoles and Stadia support is, however, thriving. And that’s super. Oh, at least we still have the Social Club up and running. It’s not all bad, folks.

GTA Trilogy gets pulled from sale amid launcher woes

Even with the Rockstar Games Launcher shitting the bed, you’d probably think you can buy the GTA Trilogy and wait. Well, yes, but actually no. Rockstar has pulled the PC version of the GTA Trilogy remasters from sale on its online store. You can still purchase it on console, even for the Nintendo Switch. But, at this time, the game cannot be bought on PC.

The reason it’s been pulled may be a twofer. Of course, it makes some sense to keep people from purchasing a game for a launcher that’s busted. However, as reported by VGC, a dataminer dug into the PC version of the game and unearthed what they called the “holy grail” of developer files. Cut content, programmer comments, and nearly all the music removed from the trilogy have been discovered. Apparently, Rockstar still included all the cut music, held behind a simple script. I imaging that any modder worth their salt would be able to get the full track list running easily. This is just speculation, obviously, but it’s strange to see it happening all at once.

Vice City is a VERY interesting choice, the stations have been split up at key points to allow tracks to be dropped in or out denoted by track number, for example, ALL of Flash FM is here except for Track 03, Billie Jean. (yes even Running With the Night) pic.twitter.com/ymjWCr7DGe

— Ash R. (@Ash_735) November 11, 2021

It’s a weird time for GTA fans. Many have implored Rockstar for remasters of their favorite games. And what they got not only looked disappointing in some aspects, but now you can’t even run them on PC. At least, not until Rockstar fixes its launcher.