If one of your New Year’s resolutions involved finally exploring Liberty City in the Steam version of Grand Theft Auto 4, we’ve got some bad news for you. Earlier today, Rockstar pulled the game from the PC marketplace, making it unavailable for purchases directly from Valve. The game’s store page is still up, but the option to purchase has been removed and there’s no notice explaining why that’s the case.
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As is the case with all Steam delistings, existing owners will still be able to play the game they purchased, although that’s made tricky by the lingering effects of its Games for Windows Live integration that Rockstar never truly excised. It’s unknown at this time if that’s why Rockstar pulled the plug, although there’s some initial speculation online that it’s instead due to music licensing issues, which have plagued PC ports of GTA games in the past.
For what it’s worth, the game’s DLC (packaged together as Episodes From Liberty City) is still on sale as of this writing. The Grand Theft Auto 4: Complete Edition which packaged all available content is similarly delisted. You can purchase existing Steam keys for the base game from retailers like Humble while they last, although it’s likely that those will go quickly if the game is truly gone for good. There’s no indication that this affects the Xbox version of the game either, which is backward compatible with Xbox One.
Around the release of Red Dead Redemption 2 on PC, Rockstar put out their own launcher, and that is also missing Grand Theft Auto 4. While it’s possible that they’re relaunching the game with better services tied into a more modern program, it’s also possible that they’ll let players migrate to the more lucrative Grand Theft Auto 5 and its expansive online mode. Whatever the case, let’s hope that this is some sort of oversight and that Grand Theft Auto 4 can return to PC storefronts in some form in the near future.
