GTA IV patch is coming

By David Hollingworth
16:43 Dec 10, 2008 | 7 Comments
Tags: gta | iv | patch | rockstar

As is, oddly enough, Christmas.

The masses have spoken, and Rockstar Toronto has answered - with a the announcement that a patch is coming, and the re-iteration of their stance that less than one per cent of GTA IV owners are experiencing difficulties. In fact, in the words of Rockstar Games Technical Support: "We've been reading the forums and understand that several of you are experiencing difficulties with Grand Theft Auto IV PC..."

Several... Yeah. Right.

Anyway, here's the important details, straight from the buggy horse's mouth:

We are working on making a patch available in the next few days. Since Grand Theft Auto IV is a Games For Windows – Live game the patch must be certified by Microsoft before release. The patch is already at Microsoft and we expect a speedy approval.

The patch contains a variety of fixes including:

-A fix to the crash after legal screen that some German customers were reporting.
-Numerous improvements to the video editor: Smarter naming of videos, improved rendering quality, better fx during replays
-Fix to bowling while using certain sensitive mice
-Fix for ATI 1900 shadows
-Overall savings to memory
-Graphic improvements to particle systems and mirrors
-Multiplayer character settings are preserved
-Support for DirectInput controllers. Note: The current hack way of supporting these controllers may not work with the improved functionality. So we recommend you remove the hack before upgrading to the patch.

Issues with power management software have also been fixed (slow speed, double speed issues). Even after the patch comes out setting power management software to maximum performance is recommended. We’ve seen cases where power management software does not detect the game is running and puts the CPU in green mode.

That last bit is the most interesting, and there's many more 'we're fixing X, but we still think you should do Y' comments in the original post.

Other upcoming fixes and tweaks include better ATI support (once ATI releases a new set of beta Catalyst drivers), a major fix for NVIDIA 7900 series cards (again, once NVIDIA solves the issue), and news that Rockstar's "eliminated" the Mma10 error for those trying to use theRockstar Social Club... eliminated, that is, except for those people still experiencing it, in which case Rockstar "would like to know as much info as you can about it."

Grammatically incorrect, but sadly indicative of the whole affair.

Behind the scenes with Mass Effect 3! GTX 560 VGA round-up! Essential Skyrim tweaks to improve your game! Plus reviews, news, hardware, more games, and easy to following modding guides for PC builders. ON SALE NOW!

Ads by Google

7 Comments

atramentous Dec 10, 2008 5:13 PM	ive never had a problem with the game, 9600gt, xp sp3, 2gb ram, q6600... great frame rates and lovely graphics... its nice not to be part of the 1%...
Hawkeye Dec 10, 2008 5:21 PM	I'm sure the people having issues are a minority, but I think it's more than 1 per cent :) It certainly isn't just 'several'!
R4nd0M Dec 10, 2008 6:28 PM	I don't know where they got that 1% figure from as everyone MMA10'ed at one point before they read (or figured out) to log out of Social Club. Hopefully this, along with non-beta 8.12 cats assist in providing a smoother game experience.
SceptreCore Dec 10, 2008 7:47 PM	If the it was only several then we wouldn't have seen such a speedy fix to the problems! A curse on all your houses employees of Rockstar North!
nukejockey Dec 10, 2008 8:03 PM	I've never had the MMA10 error, I just pull shit frames with an e8600 @ 4.5, a 4870x2 and 4gb ddr2 800 on vista 64 -.- I'm rather tempted to try it on winxp.
Takoma Dec 10, 2008 8:39 PM	My god, I hope they get it sorted. Playing the game the last few days, even in its current state, I am astounded with its potential. This game is crucially good, and it'd be an absolute crime to have to keep playing it like this. Or worse, on a console. With thumbsticks. Urgh.
R4nd0M Dec 14, 2008 1:49 AM	Patch has seemed to make the game a tad smoother but I've encountered the zombie-invisible-head texture bug once again. Only happened once out of a few hours of play though.

Comments have been disabled on this article.

Latest Competitions

Thermaltake kicks off your gaming year with a BANG
Thermaltake has started off the new year with a bang by giving away a Tt eSport Theron Laser mouse to not one or two, but TWENTY lucky Atomicans!

Atomic Magazine

Issue: 133 | February, 2012

Atomic is a magazine aimed squarely at computer enthusiasts, gamers, and serious PC upgraders.

Every month we bring you the latest reviews of new technology and PC components, in depth features on everything from overclocking to console hacking, and gaming previews and interviews.

What's in this issue?