While Sony has made several blunders in the current gen console war one of the biggest was allowing Call of Duty 4 to go multi-platform. The game has become such a runaway success that it could have single-handedly changed the face of the war as we know it. Perhaps equally as big was allowing Grand Theft Auto 4 to go multi-platform. Although the game sold about 45/55%  on the PS3 and Xbox 360 respectively, there are rumblings that the next installment in the GTA series may become a Playstation exclusive by default.

Wait, what the hell are you talking about?

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This weekend, get your hands on some good old fashioned murdering and street racing in the Rockstar Collection. Everything inside is also separately discounted too Bar GTA1, GT2 and Wild Metal, so if you’re just looking for your GTA4 fix then look no further because this is probably the cheapest you’re going to get it, and with the recent patch stated to have increased performance somewhat significantly, it’s unlikely there’ll be a better time.

Just for the unsure the collection includes GTA1, GTA2, GTA3, GTA Vice City, GTA San Andreas,  GTA IV, Manhunt, Max Payne, Max Payne 2, Midnight Club 2 and Wild Arms.

It’s not all of it – I know, but for the low low price of £38.49/$69.99/€69.99 it’s hard to not buy it.. except for our European bretheren, you might want to find a good trusted friend from either the US or the UK to gift it to you and you send them the money.. Steam is kind of skewed against the europeans at the moment.

Click Here to buy it.

And click here if you feel that 1€ ≠ 1$

What do you mean it doesn't fit in the drive like this?

You’ve heard it all before, I’m sure, but the DRM battle still rages on, and Rockstar bring it to a whole new level of illogical thought process. There is plenty of past material to talk about on the subject, but rather than dig into the past(yet) I decided to start with the draconian drama du jour.

Quick aside, I’m sick of the word “draconian,” but it worked too well with that alliteration, don’t expect to see it again this article.

GTA4 is attached to our old friend SecuRom. If you’re hopelessly out of the loop on that, SecuRom is a spyware tool commonly used by game companies to prevent people from using their product. It usually installs irremovable components at the kernel level of your operating system, renders legitimate hardware and software unusable, and sends unspecified information back to Sony and possibly the game publisher. They say it’s used to prevent piracy, but so far, the only people that have been stopped from playing are people that bought the software.

Spyware really is the only thing you can call this stuff. That said, the first anti-virus company that adds DRM schemes like this to it’s definitions will have a lifetime customer in me.

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One of this gaming generation’s greatest titles has made the jump to the PC, and as some of us are finding out, it’s not quite the perfect package we’ve been expecting. Graphical glitches up the wazoo, jarring program crashes and even installation-halting errors have been experienced by the thousands of fans expecting to play Grand Theft Auto IV on their rigs. It’s a bit strange, seeing as Rockstar has never really had this issue before,  with the PC versions of the previous Grand Theft Autos getting released without any sort of hiccups whatsoever. But the biggest issue is that even those whose PCs are packing enough power to run  Crysis on Very High are forced to play on the game’s lowest graphical settings. What gives, then?

Rockstar’s explanation for all this commotion? That the PC version of Grand Theft Auto IV has been optimized for “future generations of PCs with higher specifications than are currently widely available.” This means that even if your rig can play Crysis at very high settings, you’ll have to contend yourself with playing Grand Theft Auto IV without it looking its best. Huh.

As for the bugs, Rockstar has this to say:

We are working to help solve these [issues] as quickly as possible.

Let’s hope so, Rockstar. Let’s hope so.