The in-development GTA 4 build found on a console purchased for £5 by a fan in Scotland earlier this week has been taken down.
This week, a user on the GTA forums posted a build of GTA 4 that was found on a dev kit that they picked up at a car boot sale in Edinburgh, Scotland (where Rockstar North is stationed). The leaked build featured assets and ideas that never made it into the game, including a ferry. This inspired comment from Obbe Vermeij, former technical director at Rockstar North, who confirmed that ferries were cut late in the development of GTA 4. And, what’s more, fans even managed to access a somewhat playable build of this in-development version of the game.
As spotted by IGN, the page where the build was initially uploaded now features the message, “This item is no longer available. Items may be taken down for various reasons, including by decision of the uploader or due to a violation of our Terms of Use.” The page itself doesn’t note if this was the result of a DMCA takedown request, or – if so – who filed it, but while I imagine Take-Two and Rockstar aren’t exactly keen to have development builds of their games online, there’s nothing to suggest that either party was behind it.
Of course, as evidenced by the likes of fan-made Metroid 2 remake AM2R almost a decade ago, once something is on the internet, it’s there for good. So, it’s very likely that this build of GTA 4 will continue to be looked into for years to come, and while it may not be quite as interesting as leaked builds of games like Resident Evil 1.5, Fallout 3 Van Buren, or Star Wars Battlefront 3, it’s always an interesting thing to see how games evolved before their final release.