Earlier this week, Rockstar removed Grand Theft Auto 4 from Steam. Yeap, you read that right; the game is no longer available for purchase on Steam’s digital service. And according to a Rockstar spokesperson, its removal was due to GFWL (Games For Windows Live).
As Rockstar’s spokesperson told The Verge:
“Grand Theft Auto IV was originally created for the Games For Windows Live platform. With Microsoft no longer supporting Games For Windows Live, it is no longer possible to generate the additional keys needed to continue selling the current version of the game. We are looking at other options for distributing GTAIV for PC and will share more information as soon as we can.”
Our guess is that Rockstar will remove GFWL from the game and re-release it. However, it remains unclear whether the new version will return on Steam. Perhaps Rockstar will make this new version exclusive to the Rockstar Launcher? And what about all the current Steam versions of GTA4? Will Rockstar remove GFWL from them via a new patch/update?
Stay tuned for more!
John is the founder and Editor in Chief at DSOGaming. He is a PC gaming fan and highly supports the modding and indie communities. Before creating DSOGaming, John worked on numerous gaming websites. While he is a die-hard PC gamer, his gaming roots can be found on consoles. John loved – and still does – the 16-bit consoles, and considers SNES to be one of the best consoles. Still, the PC platform won him over consoles. That was mainly due to 3DFX and its iconic dedicated 3D accelerator graphics card, Voodoo 2. John has also written a higher degree thesis on the “The Evolution of PC graphics cards.”
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