Update 10/08/2021 11:55 a.m. ET: After months of rumors and leaks, Rockstar Games today officially confirmed the existence of the Grand Theft Auto Trilogy collection. In a series of tweets and a blog post, the publisher shared some of the first official details about the collection, which is being released later this year in celebration of the 20th anniversary of GTA III’s release.
Rockstar plans to release the collection on PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and on PC via the publisher’s own store and launcher. Rockstar says the Definitive Edition versions of these classic open-world games will feature “across-the-board upgrades including graphical improvements and modern gameplay enhancements” for all three games. It will be released on mobile next year.
Original story follows below:
Last month, we reported that Rockstar Games was planning to release a collection of remastered versions of some classic Grand Theft Auto titles later this year. Now it appears that the (still unofficially announced) collection has received an age rating in Korea. This lines up with new information Kotaku has heard about the upcoming GTA trilogy rerelease.
As spotted by Nibel on Twitter, a new GTA collection title appeared in the Game Rating and Administration Committee database. The GRAC is the South Korean governmental group responsible for reviewing and rating video games. Earlier today, a new database entry was published for something called “Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – The Definitive Edition.”
In August, Kotaku reported that Rockstar Games was developing a remastered GTA collection featuring three PS2-era titles: GTA III, Vice City, and San Andreas. This confirmed long-standing fan rumors surrounding the older Grand Theft Auto games. Kotaku learned the collection would be released later this year on PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, and Switch. PC and mobile ports would follow in 2022. The new collection is being developed by Rockstar Dundee, a Scottish studio and one of the newest to join Rockstar Games’ vast, global network of devs.
The name that appears in the GRAC rating board database is interesting as it seems to be referencing a previous Rockstar release: Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy. This was a 2006 collection released for PS2, Xbox, PC, and later PS3.
As reported back in August, Kotaku was told that plans around these remastered GTA games had shifted and changed quite a lot over the last year. Originally, the plan was to release them in October or early November. But Kotaku has heard from sources that the plan has shifted once again and now Rockstar plans to release the trilogy in November.
Earlier this month, Rockstar Games announced that the PS5 and Xbox Series X/S ports of GTA V were delayed. Instead of releasing in November as originally planned, the enhanced and expanded port of GTA V (which includes GTA Online) is now set to launch in March 2022. Some fans feared that this delay signaled that the remastered trilogy would also slip into 2022. But Kotaku has been told that, at least for now, that’s not the plan. With GTA V’s next-gen ports moving out of November, it makes sense that Rockstar would shift plans around the trilogy to take advantage of that month.
Also, something to remember is that GTA III’s 20 year anniversary is October 22 and Rockstar has teased around that time it will have “fun surprises to share.” Could that be a remastered version of GTA III and two other popular PS2-era GTA games? We won’t have to wait long to find out.