Do not buy GTA:SA from Gamefly.

Here is why.

 

Yeah, that's kind of assholish. Replying to a query from a customer that most definitely requires someone taking a look at it and thinking, with an automated reply that might as well be created by a script.

And how the eff is anyone supposed to actually get help from the "Publisher's support team", if GameFly's frigging modified game files make that impossible. And seeing as you did tell them about not being able to get help, that's beyond irritating.

Really, some people are idiots. Thanks for that, OmniNegro. Even though it was unlikely for me to buy anything from them in the first place, I will now make sure that I never do.

 

You should see the idiotic form you have to fill out to even contact them. It asks if I use a router, a firewall, and what antiviral software I use. It cannot be completed without telling them those things.

I thought it was using the same 3.0 version as Steam does, and there are half-working solutions to that, but nope. It does not work with this version 3.0 that is apparently different.

 

Wait, someone actually uses Gamefly?

 

Yep. It is one of the three places to buy DoD + RotDG from.

Desura is also used by someone.

 

EB games didn't even have the codes instore on the date of release for GW2 in Australia, and have no plans to date to get them to pre-order customers that missed out. Unfortunatly they have exclusive distrobution rights for the collecters edition here in Australia, so I have little choice but to deal with them

 

They automagically send a default reply. I e-mailed their support this weekend and got an automagic response.

 

Here is another blanket response to my reply above.


They may as well have told me that initially before they told me the "Publisher" is responsible for everything. That way I would know this reply means nothing. Last time I checked, the game version they use is 3.0 and has the exact same limitations as the Steam version. They are dismissing my question since I dared to quote something that had the word "Steam" in the article.

http://support.rockstargames.com/entries/20355608-lack-of-widescreen-support-for-san-andreas-v3-0

 

I reckon they merely tried to save their face because of the threat that you'll spread the word about their "attitude". Which is not necessarily a bad thing in itself as they do need good publicity to be able to sell stuff to people and thus get enough money to live, but them doing it right now only appears to make them look like idiots, since it sort of is a barely competent attempt at saving their bottoms that will yield no results.

Honestly, I do get that they get a lot of mail and want to decrease the burden on them with an automated system, but even if it's just an automated response, saying "I'm sorry, but we don't know" is much better than saying "We won't help you because it's not our problem".

 

Yeah. I would not have cared all too much if they said they had no solution. It just feels like a cheap excuse to say they are not responsible and I must contact the game publisher. The game was made in 2004. They are not still supporting it. The games I buy from sites like GoG.com are often older and are still supported as a blanket policy. They actually guarantee the games will work in a reasonable way.

Perhaps I just keep getting responses from the dumbest sub-burger-flippers they could find for the job. I did not pay much for it. I just wanted to know if they had any ideas.

If anyone happens to have the Steam executable, could you tell me what the size and/or checksum is? It may well be the same exact file after the ridiculous activation junk was finished.

 

I found a fix. The "Euro 1.01 Patch" works if you grab it. It is found on gamecopyworld.com but I cannot give an exact link since that site forbids such. The file you end up with is a 4.85 MB rar archive named "dev-sa11.rar" that contains the 1.01 exe and an nfo file from the scene release group Deviance. They call it a crack, but it is unmodified from the original. (There was no copy protection on the 1.01 exe.)

The game works perfectly, but it is hideously ugly by comparison to modern games. That is to be expected since it was 2004-2005 that it was released.

*Edit* Here is my Dropbox link to the file. It works flawlessly.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/twmqmrp1pvgkv72/dev-sa11.rar
*Edit* Removed the link since I have deleted the file.

 

I will be away for a few hours playing this. Ironically, it works even better than the retail version I had five years ago. I can actually alt+tab without killing the game. I never could do that before. Too bad Gamefly clearly does not know this works. It would save people boatloads of time and trouble. (I tried dozens of so-called "Cracks" trying to find anything that works. I use Windows 7 x64 and most would not even run.)

Time to be a gangbanger again!

 

GoG tends to release shoddy binaries of games.

 

Steam version of the .exe is 5,43 MB (5.697.536 byte) and if you tell me how to check the HASH value for it I can post that as well. I dont have the "hash values" tab on my properties in 64bit windows 7 unfortunately

 

The Gamefly version is about three times that size. 14.4MB 15,175,680 bytes.

Here is a link to Hashtab, the tool I use to check hashes in Windows.
http://www.afterdawn.com/software/desktop/verify_files/hashtab.cfm

 

Here is the file info from steam. Feel free to send it to them along with your picture and perhaps inform them about how bad it looks when companies lie to their customers faces.

 

Regarding the original post and the email response from Gamefly, once you activate the game, all game support for that game is done by the publisher, e.g. when you buy a game at gamestop, if you have a problem with the game, you don't call gamestop, you call the publisher. If you would have looked to a question asked and answered before you're referenced support question (which is completely irrelevant due to the fact it's for steam), you would have found http://support.rockstargames.com/entries/479507-Patch-Info-Grand-Theft-Auto-San-Andreas This gives you the link to the 1.01 patch, which has been around since August of 2005. Good luck in the future.

 

With the x32 textures even?