Customer Reviews

Grand Theft Auto IV

5 star:		(81)
4 star:		(53)
3 star:		(31)
2 star:		(32)
1 star:		(239)

 

 

We all know the game. It's Grand Theft Auto 4. Enough has been said about the game itself, love it or hate it. The PC version could have been great, but it's crippled by poorly optimized code and forced bloatware.

My PC lets me run any game I want. Most modern games run at 720p, 60 frames-per-second, 4xAA on my 46" HDTV. This includes Fallout 3 and Dead Space. Other games, like Far Cry 2 are more taxing, but I still manage to crank out a solid 30 frames-per-second. GTA4, simply put, performs horribly. I am only getting 15 to 20 FPS on average. I can't picture someone without a hardcore gaming PC getting anything close to a playable experience with it.

Also, to install the game you're forced to also install Rockstar Social Club, Games for Windows Live, the SecureROM service (DRM). Plus you need a Windows Live account to even save your game. Terrible, terrible port. Shame on you Rockstar.

As a fan of the Grand Theft Auto series since it was a 2D top down perspective game for the PC nearly 11 years ago, I was very eager to try the latest episode as I'd heard great things about the console version.

I thought GTA III, Vice City and San Andreas were superb games that were funny and entertaining with a good mix of shoot'em up, adventure/quest and interactivity to suit most tastes. Those titles stayed on my hard drive for a long time and provided me with much entertainment.

I'm sorry to say that GTA IV lasted on my hard drive for about 6 hours. The vast majority of which was spent trying to get the thing to work.

I'm sorry I didn't come on Amazon and check out the negative reaction that this game has generated before shelling out my hard earned cash for this incredibly disappointing waste of time and money. The sheer number of 1 star reviews here would have warned me away from the game, like the plague.

Like many other reviewers here, I feel cheated out of my money by "Rockstar" games and I'm very angry about it. "Rockstar" have gone about their business in a very underhanded way. There should be clear stickers on this product declaring that various online accounts are needed to play the offline game. I and I'll wager the vast majority of users don't want a "Windows Live" account, nor do I particularly want "Rockstar Social Club" account either. The "Windows Live" account is mandatory, to enable the user to save their progress! Never in my many years of PC gaming have I come across such an idiotic and deal breaking device before. I'd love to have been at the meeting where that "feature" was suggested.

On top of that, the user is required to download and install Windows Service Pack 3 for XP users. Why? I don't know. I've no idea why any PC game would need a Windows Service Pack to simply run. Obviously this is at Microsoft's insistence, but it is yet another reason to leave the game on the shelf. There are some people who just don't need, or want Windows Service Pack 3 on their machines. I was one of them until I bought this game. Oh, by the way, "SecuROM" is included too! The "SecuROM" anti-piracy spyware, like "StarForce" before it, is something I just don't want on my machine.

What I and every other PC user would like to do is simply install the damn game and play it. A game like the GTA series is primarily designed for Offline users and that is the target audience, so why is "Rockstar" trying to push Online to the games detriment? GTA is, in essence, a story based adventure game for a single player.

After the irritation of trying to install the game, the real show-stopper makes its appearance. I'd heard that the game was resource hungry, but really, that's an understatement. My current PC exceeds the recommended requirements by some degree and I had a lot of difficulty getting the game to even accept my assigned display preferences, even in 1024 x 768! On top of that, there were missing textures from the start of the game. So much so that the game was unplayable. I've run recent releases which are heavy, like Fallout 3 etc, with no problems. But GTA IV is just ridiculous. After much messing about, included unloading NVidia drivers and installing new ones, then fooling about with the preferences again, I finally got the game to run. But it was far from the experience I was expecting. I could barely get it to run at 20 frames per sec, which would plummet to about 8 or so in a car. So, in short, it was pointless.

According to Gamespot, "Rockstar Games insists that the problems experienced by users are extremely low". I simply don't believe them. They are lying and a casual overview of the reviews on Amazon proves that very clearly. "Rockstar" have stated that they were trying to `future-proof' the game! But this is bunkum. Games should be designed to run on current hardware, not some rig that won't exist until 2014, when few pwople will be actually playing this title.

The simple fact is that "Rockstar" have simply rushed out a lazy port of the console version for the Christmas sales and they don't give a toss about the public doing the buying. It comes across as extremely badly optimized code and the end result is an unsatisfying whole, to what should have been this years masterpiece. There may be some hope to rescue this sinking ship with patches, but at the moment I am not holding my breath and GTA IV has been deleted from my Hard Drive. I've lost 6 hours of my life and 40 Euro and have had to put up with an extremely frustrating and ultimately miserable experience that just wasn't worth the hassle.

I've never said this about a producer before, but I can honestly say that I will never by another title from "RockStar Games" again, nor anything that has "Games for Windows" emblazoned across the box.

Buyers beware - The PC version is not a better choice than the console version, this time around. As a faithful GTA fan for years, I was eagerly awaiting this game - only to find out that it's a poorly coded console port that fails to deliver satisfactory performance even on a modern system. In addition, the product is crippled by bugs, requires two separate online accounts to play (even to play offline), and installs invasive, difficult to remove SecuROM monitoring software into your computer.

Rockstar, shame on you.

To anyone considering this game, I highly suggest you pick it up for the 360 or PS3 instead - and that is the very first time I've ever made that recommendation about any game before.

I was taken aback when I found that I could not save ANY progress in single player mode without signing up for Windows Live. It says that these "services", such as Live and the Social Club, are only required for multiplayer mode. They lie on the box and again during the install.

It is only after you wade through their registration requests, the insistence upon registration requests, refusal to even load the game until you update windows live, you finally get to playing.

Then it tells you you cannot save any progress unless you sign-in to windows live. What a shaft job.

I called Take2games and they confirm that you cannot save unless you sign-in.

What a let down. I have uninstalled the game and am now working on a refund. lol.

I have played every GTA so far, mostly on PC. I have GTAIV on the PS3 and was looking forward to playing on the PC with great graphics.

I do not like a company who seems like a spyware vendor out to capture my machine.

Despite reading the negative reviews on amazon and elsewhere, I stubbornly bought the game thinking none of the issues would apply to me - Boy was I wrong!

Be prepared to undergo a whole evening of jumping through hoops just to get the game to work properly. Microsoft has obviously done some mischief here by FORCING people to upgrade their computers to Windows XP Service Pack 3 as well as FORCING people to use their lousy Windows Live system. If that's not worse, you are required to register and activate the game via the Rockstar Social Club and then link it to the Windows Live For Games network. Unfortunately, the links don't work at all. Their database system is screwed up.

Failure to properly register online with their broken systems prevents you from saving your game progress.

After giving up trying to properly register online, I try running the game. The game is still insistent that you update it to the latest patch (which is known to cause even more trouble).

So after about a whole hour of installing and updating, I finally get access to the game. Next thing I realize is that all the optimizations that hyped about in the game are down right lies. Despite having a a mid-high range system, the game performance is appalling. There is no multi-core optimization or SLI/CrossFire capabilities. Heck, the game even goes on to pester you about owning an XBOX 360 Gamepad for the PC to even play the game. The controls are terrible otherwise.

Come to find out, the game was never ready for release. Despite the problems, the game was rushed out too fast in order to make it for Christmas. The game is so bad, that even STEAM (who offer the downloadable version of GTA4) is offering refunds for it on a case-by-case basis.

I've decided to uninstall the game. All is not over though. My computer is much slower, full of clutter, and is a victim of the sleazy SecuRom/DRM malware that came with the game. I'm sticking the game on my shelf until something is done about it. I suggest you do the same and AVOID AVOID AVOID!! I can't emphasize this enough - AVOID PURCHASING THIS!

Let me preface my review with a brief story: When GTA IV came out in May for consoles, I purchased a brand new PS3 just to play it. To this day it's the only game I own for my PS3, which sits largely unused but as a testament to Rockstar's masterpiece. I'm not much of a console gamer, but Sony and Rockstar made well over $500 from me on the release of GTA IV alone... but after seeing this incredible mess pushed out I do not think I'll ever purchase another Rockstar product.

I suppose it's also important to say I have not actually purchased GTA IV for PC, although I do have firsthand experience with this travesty. A good friend of mine called me over the weekend and asked if I wouldn't mind taking a look at his computer, because according to him, his rig was running GTA IV very slow. When I arrived I could hardly believe this product was from the same company I gave my money to.

Everything you read here is accurate. SecuROM, with or without "teeth," is always to the detriment of honest consumers and here it is in full effect. But not satisfied with that, Rockstar apparently made it possible to play the game if and only if you agree to Byzantine Windows Live and Rockstar Social Club contracts. That is frankly unacceptable by any standard. And to top it off, on a computer with a Quad-Core, two 8800 Ultras in SLI, and 8 (yes, eight) GB of RAM the game runs worse than it ever did on my PS3. And it looks about the same. For a game developer, the words "code optimization" mean very little to Rockstar.

Perhaps the most heinous injustice about this whole shameful affair is the warning included that, summarized, warns "... most current hardware will not be able to run this game at high settings." Unbelievable. When did releasing games, especially games which ran acceptably well on inferior consoles, incomplete with a requirement to spend hundreds more dollars on future hardware become acceptable? To me that is the lowest form of terrible work ethic and is the main reason I feel I cannot buy another Rockstar product ever again. Is it not enough to completely ruin a product by making the consumer sign away his privacy just to play it? When did Crysis, whose infamy cannot even measure up to this abomination, become the golden standard for a successful game release? If the market into which you're releasing your product is "unprepared" for the "requirements" of said product, then there is something wrong with your product, not the market.

But here Rockstar really shot itself in the foot because the game has already been proven to run, with over 10 million witnesses, on inferior hardware. I told my friend to get his money back and now I'm thinking of selling my PS3. The most successful PC games have always been the ones that are not laden with malware and actually run on consumers' PCs. PC gaming is in dire straits if the biggest developers think people actually want to have to deal with insurmountable mountains of red tape just to play a video game. It's a video game- nothing less, but especially nothing more. Playing GTA IV on PC is worth far less to me than the actual time it would take to accomplish said goal.

I consider myself a Grand Theft Auto fan. I played GTA IV an unhealthy amount over the summer. But merely seeing this stillbirth of a title that Rockstar threw onto PC gamers makes me realize I can live without. Do not purchase this under any circumstances. It is far cheaper, in terms of money and life lost in frustration, to buy a new console to play GTA IV. If you want a new PC game, I recommend the excellent Left 4 Dead or any other title by Valve. I beseech you not to give money to companies who treat their costumers like this.

Rockstar, you have released an utterly pathetic excuse for a personal computer game. I hate to say this is another nail in the proverbial coffin for PC gaming, but even I feel a little dismayed that almost every new title for computers is burdened with SecuROM, doesn't run well on hefty hardware, or is some unholy combination of the two. In short, Rockstar has taken everything that is "killing" PC gaming and mixed it into one completely miserable experience. Caveat emptor.

This review will be short and sweet:
1) I read the reviews here on Amazon and felt folks were giving R* and GTA IV a bad rap
2) I bought the game anyway giving them a chance.
3) My rig is "current gen" which plays top games at highest settings smoothly.
4) After going through the nightmare install, I finally got into the game
5) Massive slowdowns, missing textures, game crashes.

Wouldn't recommend this game to anyone. Terrible, shameful and R* should be sued over a release like this.

...Unbelievable...

this is a crap release, never have I been so disappointed in a game. I played GTA IV on PS3, and have all the other GTA's on PC. My computer far exceeds the requirements, so I was stoked for the release. Should have waited and read the reviews! This SUCKS! You have to use the stupid Rockstar social club, Windows live and all that other BS, and you can't install on multiple machines even if using original disc, and most of all the graphics and playability are unusable. At the lowest levels it is buggy, freezes up, the controls are horrendous, and it looks like crap. NOTHING like the other Vice Cities. What the hell happened Rockstar? You need to hit the drawing board on this one and give me my damn money back!

Rarely has the over-used cliché "caveat emptor" been more applicable to a game than to this one. Fortunately, I was able to avoid losing my money more than temporarily; and, even more fortunately, I noticed and did not install the game, and so saved myself from a malware infection. And yes, despite the varied exaggerations by enthusiastic - if ineloquent - folks scattered around the Internet, this really can be legitimately classified as malware.

Many critique the posting of reviews by those who did not complete a full test of the product in question. Most of the time, I would agree with this criticism. However, in this specific instance and others just like it, the warning about the SecureRom is more than sufficient to justify an exception to that rule. It is sufficiently problematic and damaging to the purchaser's computer that a 1-star rating on amazon.com is absolutely appropriate without even delving further.

If Rockstar Games comes out with any sort of reasonable alternative edition in the future, I will not only leap at the chance to purchase this game, I will also try to have my negative review removed from amazon.com. However, in the meantime, my 1-star rating is perfectly fair without a full product trial, since the SecureRom is a show-stopper in and of itself. I AM reviewing the product, and I DO have sufficient information on it to warrant a perfectly legitimate 1-star rating. SecureRom is part of the product; enough in my estimation to overrule any other factor (and "estimation" is what reviews are, so I'm not wrong in doing so).

It breaks my hard to rate the PC version of the GTA4 title a 1/5 stars, purely because the game itself is so much fun.

The game designs, aesthetics, story, screen acting and voicing, are all professional and top-notch. In fact, it may be the pinnacle of modern storytelling gaming.

However, the only thing I dreaded most was the fact that my above-average gaming rig, consisting of a Core 2 Duo 6300 processor, a Nvidia 8800 GTS and a 2gb RAM, failed absolutely at handling the game at the 'medium' quality level. In fact, even hardcore PC gamers with 3-grand rigs even bragged about not being able to run the game at a smooth rate, and were bogged down by shabby FPS and a subpar graphics quality, which, contrary to what Rockstar had proclaimed, that the PC version offers "stunningly detailed, high res graphics".

Obviously, if one couldn't even get by with the wholly technical flaws and issues (hardly the consumers' fault), maybe the developer ought pay more attention to beta-testings and quality check before releasing their product for the PC market.