Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – The Definitive Edition wasn't just an awful title for a collection of otherwise stellar games: it was an awful launch so broken that it rivaled Cyberpunk 2077. AI-upscaled artwork turned bolts into donuts, stripped-back fog killed the atmosphere and made the maps feel tiny, and despite being decades-old games, they suffered from broken physics, frequent crashes, and abysmal framerate. In fact, on PC, the trilogy was literally unplayable, because the Rockstar Games Launcher went offline at launch.

Grove Street Games boss Thomas Williamson isn't denying that the game was a mess, but he insists that people still enjoyed it. "I agreed with most of the people's reactions," he said in an interview with wccftech. "But unfortunately, I feel like we did not agree with how the game was released and the response to it from a development side, and I think that would have changed the narrative significantly. However, at the end of the day, looking at the behind-the-scenes metrics on those games, there were a lot of people who were playing them and really enjoying them."

I don't doubt that a lot of people played a remastered collection featuring some of the most popular and influential games in the medium's history—but to say they enjoyed it? I'm less convinced. Between the crashes and stuttering, you had to contend with uncanny models and AI-upscaled hallucinations, not to mention the blinding rain coating the screen in thick white lines. Maybe it's more accurate to say people suffered through the trilogy to enjoy the masterpieces underneath all of the mess that had been piled on top.

"There Was No Way To Make Everybody Happy"

via Rockstar

Even with all the fixes rolled out, it's hard to look at the GTA Trilogy with anything but disdain. The original games were delisted from most storefronts, which means that Rockstar views the remasters—even in their butchered state—as replacements, which they categorically are not. The only way to play the originals now is to either have bought a digital copy beforehand, or to find a physical copy instead. Still, Williamson understands that frustration, and looking back, he argues that Rockstar should've taken them on in-house.

"There was also a lot of people who wanted more, and I don't blame them," he continued. "We all view these games as these really, really important milestones in gaming history, so I'm grateful to have had the opportunity to work on them. I'm also in agreement that I don't think there'll ever be a perfect redux of those that's not done by Rockstar proper. If their Rockstar North team took it on and did some crazy thing, that would be awesome. But the reality of what it was also kind of mixed with people's nostalgia.

"You don't see these remasters coming out very often and getting complete praise, especially with really complicated, big gaming milestone projects like that. It's a really hard thing to do and we were cognizant of that when we were working on it. We knew that there was no way to make everybody happy."

Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy

Like Open-World Systems Released November 11, 2021 ESRB M For Mature 17+ Due To Blood and Gore, Drug Reference, Intense Violence, Sexual Content, Strong Lyrics Developer(s) Rockstar Games, Grove Street Games Publisher(s) Rockstar Games Engine Unreal Engine 4 Franchise Grand Theft Auto
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