Rockstar announced shortly after midnight this morn that the PC Def Ed is now back on sale in the Rockstar Store. Yeah, they weren’t pulling it out of shame or to fix it, it’s still as busted as it was. Turns out it was just those files, I guess. Players discovered that as well as songs which weren’t meant to be in this version (presumably due to not having licenses), the download included uncompiled code complete with developer comments. “We sincerely apologise for the inconvenience,” Rockstar say on their support site. “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.” Even people who had bought the game couldn’t play it for a fair while because Rockstar’s whole Launcher client was down. It’s a problem that can strike other stores too, sure, but Rockstar’s is particularly irksome—and the only way to get the game on PC. But yeah, the remasters are still a mess. Still some hella bad art direction decisions. Still lotta characters with horrifyingly jagged skeletons. Still an unpleasant clash of realistic effects and cartoony characters. Still a deulge of glitchy rain. Still lots of obvious typos. Still some wonky physics. Still characters in cutscenes getting murdered by traffic. £55 for a janky version of old games would be less frustrating if Rockstar hadn’t removed the original versions from sale after announcing the Def Ed. This is, apparently, how these iconic games will be ‘preserved’ for posterity. Remasters replacing originals is iffy at the best of times and this is far from the best of times.
