Grand Theft Auto 5 Crashes Older Xbox 360 Models, Rockstar Offers Fix

By Justin Sarachik, Christian Post Reporter Thursday, October 17, 2013

GTA 5 is causing gamers with older Xbox 360 models headaches as many times the disc will not even read or sometimes crashes the whole console.

The new Grand Theft Auto game requires two discs to play, and some people are saying the second disc, the actual game, is unreadable.

Others reported their 360s froze and they had to unplug it and reboot, according to KJRH.com. A commenter told the site that once he used a friend's newer model, the game worked fine.

Most of the complaints are coming from people with Xbox 360s older than 2009.

A representative of Microsoft told KJRH that the new game "pushes the limits" of the older Xboxes, and takes about about 8GB of space, which many do not have anymore because of the amount of games on the console. The standard Xbox 360 shipped with 60GB.

For more info on the older Xbox 360 problems, Rockstar has set up a help page here.

"For Xbox 360, Grand Theft Auto V will ship on two discs; Disc 1 will be used for a one-time mandatory install and Disc 2 will be used to play the game. After the install, players will be able to enjoy both Grand Theft Auto V and Grand Theft Auto Online without any need to switch discs," Rockstar posted.

"This initial install will require an Xbox 360 Hard Drive or an external 16GB USB flash drive with at least 8 GB of free space. If using a USB flash drive it must be at least USB 2.0 with a minimum 15mb/s read speed and formatted for Xbox 360 use. A new USB flash drive is recommended to ensure optimum performance," the company added.

Gamers were also having trouble logging on to Grand Theft Auto Online and being able to access the game. On the game's site they are offering a signup to be sent emails when updates were made to the online game.

"One thing we are already aware of, and are trying to alleviate as fast as we can, is the unanticipated additional pressure on the servers due to a significantly higher number of players than we were anticipating at this point," Rockstar said initially, addressing the mass popularity of the game. "We are working around the clock to buy and add more servers, but this increased scale is only going to make the first few days even more temperamental than such things usually are."

"We apologize for any inconvenience, and thank you for your patience while we work to resolve this," Rockstar Games said on its support site.