According to Rockstar via that last update, the reason the remastered GTA games remain unplayable is that the company is currently removing files that were “unintentionally included in these versions.” No word on what files are being removed, though many speculate it could be all the unlicensed songs hanging out in San Andreas’s code. Or perhaps it’s all the dev comments and leftover bits of the infamous “Hot Coffee” sex mini-game code dataminers have found in the collection.

As you might expect this has led to a lot of frustration and many, many refund requests. Even though the remasted collection hasn’t been receiving much in the way of positive praise and is a bit of a mess, players still spent $60 on these games (which are entirely singleplayer and don’t have any online gameplay, BTW) and now three days later they still can’t play them.

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One assumes Rockstar and the devs behind the remasters, Grove Street Games, are working hard to get these games back on the PC launcher. Until then, I’d suggest players go buy the classic games on Steam while they wait for these remasters to come back, but Rockstar yanked those already. So... I guess play GTA V?

UPDATE 11:41pm, November 14, 2021: Rockstar says the game is now back and available to buy/play: