Rockstar has announced that it has a new game launcher for PC. The new Rockstar Games Launcher allows PC gamers to download Rockstar’s PC games directly from the company’s launcher.
The announcement for the new launcher came via a tweet on September 17th, 2019 by Rockstar, who revealed that the launcher is currently available with a free game.
Download the Rockstar Games Launcher for PC and get Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas FREE: https://t.co/nt1B0PsH7t pic.twitter.com/1AW6gQKUNj
— Rockstar Games (@RockstarGames) September 17, 2019
The launcher comes with Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. The free game is only going to be available for a limited amount of time, however, so you’ll have to work fast if you want to get a copy of a game nearly everyone, their mother, their brother, their cousin, and their gay uncle’s cucked boyfriend have owned since 2005.
I have no idea how a free copy of the 15-year-old title will convince anyone to download the Rockstar Games Launcher, but maybe there are some gullible people out there who have never played a game in their life, nor have any idea how to navigate a computer, and are bent on creating frustrations for themselves by indulging Rockstar by downloading the launcher.
So what does the launcher offer beyond a free copy of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas? Well, other Rockstar Games, including GTA V, L.A. Noire, Bully: Scholarship Edition and the previous GTA titles that came out before San Andreas. There are cloud saves and automatic updates… basically the same thing available as Steam or EA’s Origin.
Obviously there’s no appearance of Red Dead Redemption or Red Dead Redemption 2, so there’s literally zero benefit to the launcher other than having yet another PC launcher on your hard drive to take up space.
Some people have reported that the launcher does little more than crash upon opening, while others are still trying to figure out when the real Rockstar will make a comeback and bury this corporate impostor behind the shed.
Anyway, I imagine this is a move by 2K Games and Take-Two Interactive to maximize profits on PC. They’re likely going to use the Rockstar Games Launcher and Social Club as a hub on PC for their future PC releases, bypassing Steam and other PC launchers so that they keep all the revenue for themselves without having to share in the revenue cut with other portals. Also, if they do decide to release Red Dead Redemption on PC they would do through their exclusive launcher, cutting out any other middlemen and further maximizing profit without having to worry about distribution, shipping, or retail fees, all while they publicly lament about how expensive it is to make games while using their new launcher to pass zero savings on to gamers.
Anyway, you can check out the Rockstar Games Launcher over on the official website if you want to download it or just take a mental snapshot of the moment Rockstar would lose the PC gaming audience.