Help with Grand theft Auto IV PC

Hey guys,

We've been reading the forums and understand that several of you are experiencing difficulties with Grand Theft Auto IV PC, and we are committed to doing everything we can to help resolve these troubles. We are working on a number of solutions, outlined below, and over the next few days we will be responding to questions posed on this forum in an effort to get your game up and running as quickly as possible. Please continue to check the list below for updates.

Driver News
We’re pleased to announce that in co-operation with Nvidia a new driver has been released that improves performance and fixes a major issue with 7900 series cards. If you haven’t gotten the driver yet download it here: http://www.nzone.com/object/nzone_gtaiv_downloads.html

ATI has now released Catalyst 8.12 download them here: http://game.amd.com. Expect significant performance improvements when using this new driver.

Patch Is On The Way
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.

Besides the patch we’ve also improved the way the Social Club handles data this should have greatly reduced or eliminated the Mma10 error. If you are still receiving this error after logging in and out of Social Club we would like to know as much info as you can about it.

Information Needed For Troubleshooting
We want everyone to experience Grand Theft Auto IV on the PC the way it was intended. To that end, we will continue to monitor the forums for any and all issues users are having, and respond whenever possible. We would greatly appreciate it if people with unresolved problems could post some information about their PC configuration in this thread for us. Please include the following information:

-Where exactly in the game you experienced the issue (start screen, while playing the game, etc.)
-What version of the game you have (retail, steam, other online store)
-What is your OS
-Benchmark info or DxDiag is also helpful


Rockstar Games Social Club Application Info
Due to the high volume of new Social Club users, some users may have experienced periods of time where they are unable to log into their Social Club account using the Rockstar Games Social Club application. If you are unable to log in using the Rockstar Games Social Club application, please skip the login process by clicking "Skip Login" or run in offline mode by clicking "Start in Offline Mode". This is meant as a temporary solution to allow users to play GTA IV PC, so please continue to periodically retry your login as we are working hard to promptly address any lapses in service.

A small number of users have reported the Rockstar Games Social Club application encountering a fatal error, preventing them from playing GTA IV PC. One possible solution is to uninstall the .NET Framework (from Add/Remove Programs) and reinstall it by downloading it from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details...&displaylang=en. If you continue to run into fatal errors in the Rockstar Games Social Club application, please contact Rockstar Games support.

Thank you for your patience as we continue to work around the clock to resolve these issues. Support updates will continue to be posted at www.rockstargames.com/support as soon as they are available, and we will update this thread with any new information as well. Please send any inquiries about non-support issues to mouthoff@rockstargames.com.

Thanks,
Rockstar Games

UPDATE - Since this thread is already getting so long we are asking everyone to post in this newly setup forum:
http://www.gtaforums.com/index.php?showforum=233

This way we can better keep track of issues and have things be better organized.

This post has been edited by Rockstar Toronto on Wednesday, Dec 10 2008, 16:30

you show your face, at last. good to know you're on the case.

edit: does the 'overall savings to memory' mean the memory leak is sorted? oh, m-soft has to certify it first? that's it, we're screwed.

This post has been edited by slowrider on Saturday, Dec 6 2008, 02:06

Thank you so much for the update. I hope you are keeping a tab on all the errors which are popping up here. My main concerns right now are:

- Shadows
- Anti aliasing

I hope the patch is released by the end of this week.

so patch is out by next week?

Thank god, much appreciated.

"ATI 8.12... Expect significant performance improvements when using this new driver. "

Excellent news!

QUOTE (Rockstar Toronto @ Dec 6 2008, 02:01)

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.

There is no mention of any code optimization regarding the graphic performance. Which seems to be the number one complaint among everyone.

The official word is that this is a "Next Gen" game, and only newer hardware will improve the performance. However, in the game's current state, many people can get the same (albeit, low) framrates regardless of detail settings, which means that something is not right.

Also, from personal use, I can see that this game is not pushing the video card to it's full potential. Any other newer game I play (COD4 & 5, FarCry 2, etc.) run the temp of my 9800GT card up to 85c - 90c while I am playing. GTA IV never heats the card up past 75c. Which means the card isn't running as hard.

Any response to these issues would be greatly appriciated. Also, thank you for taking the time to fill us in on what's going on, and letting your loyal fans know that you guys are trying to make the game more enjoyable for everyone.

Will the issue where the scenery is redrawn everytime you turn around be addressed? Currently, if you turn around, and turn back again, you can see buildings, trees, bushes etc being redrawn each time, and can see the LoD models fading from low res to high res.

This is occurring on my

Q6600
8800GTS 320meg
2 gig ram

Windows XP

Retail boxed copy

QUOTE (Rockstar Toronto @ Dec 5 2008, 22:01)

ATI has also agreed to officially release Catalyst 8.12 which will release on Dec 10th from http://game.amd.com. Expect significant performance improvements when using this new driver.

What're the odds of a set of AGP hotfix drivers for this one? The 8.11 drivers never had one.

Wow. Suprised to see someone from rockstar really post here. guess they do care somewhat atleace..

But yea, please fix the AA and Shadows.
Does the new drivers improve performance that much? I would like to know before I install beta drivers.

QUOTE (Sub12 @ Dec 6 2008, 04:04)

Thank you so much for the update. I hope you are keeping a tab on all the errors which are popping up here. My main concerns right now are: - Shadows - Anti aliasing I hope the patch is released by the end of this week.

It was mentioned over at Guru3D forums that the new Nvidia 180.84 Beta driver allows forcing AA in GTA IV.

QUOTE (Apo-TTCC @ Dec 6 2008, 02:15)

QUOTE (Sub12 @ Dec 6 2008, 04:04) Thank you so much for the update. I hope you are keeping a tab on all the errors which are popping up here. My main concerns right now are: - Shadows - Anti aliasing I hope the patch is released by the end of this week. It was mentioned over at Guru3D forums that the new Nvidia 180.84 Beta driver allows forcing AA in GTA IV.

Yup, I saw that. That's just one person though, I am waiting for a clarification from some other gamers.

But the shadows are terrible, they need to be fixed ASAP. I hope by "X1900 shadows" they mean those shadows in general.

Also, the patch is ready and being approved by Microsoft, so I hope it's released today or tomorrow.

incredible i thought they did not care!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

QUOTE (Sub12 @ Dec 6 2008, 02:17)

Also, the patch is ready and being approved by Microsoft, so I hope it's released today or tomorrow.

that's what worries me. microsoft. i'm sure that we'll get it soon enough, but the fact that they have to process it is just pointless.

I think the patch will available exclusively on GFW - Live

Thanks for informing us, it's nice to see that R* games are acknowledging our reports.

When can we see the NVIDIA driver for M GPU's - that driver does not work on laptops

Specs:
Vista SP1 32b
8600M GT
C2D 2.0GHz

(get avg of 20-30 FPS, game quite playable // all settings on the lowest possible, looks a lot like san andreas )

This post has been edited by iashraf on Saturday, Dec 6 2008, 02:28

yea rockstar...wat bout other issues eg. dual core optimization, graphic performance, AA ??

do you plan to release a second patch later?

do reply rockstar....

PROPER SLI SUPPORT PLEASE!

Does the overall savings to memory means that you will fix the memory leak? I HOPE SO.