'GTA Online' Update Finally Fixes Loading Times, Rockstar Awards Fan Responsible $10K

Here's a list of things you can do in the time it takes Grand Theft Auto Online to load: Have a bath. Watch The Lord Of The Rings trilogy. Go for a light 10K run. Cook a roast dinner for a party of five. Invent a new source of sustainable energy capable of carrying the human race into the stars for a bright new tomorrow. Eat a flapjack.

Okay so I might be exaggerating there apart from that last one, but you get my point. Grand Theft Auto is a long boy. A hefty lad. It's one of those games that takes so long to load that you're actively put off the idea of playing it. The good news is that's finally set to change.

Earlier this year a modder by the name tostercx/t0st found a way to reduce Grand Theft Auto Online's chunky load times by an incredible 70%. In terms even I can understand, t0st discovered a 10MB JSON file containing 63,000 item entries that the game scans every single time when it doesn't actually need to. This basically backs the whole system up and causes the delay in loading times that we're so used to at this point.

"If this somehow reaches Rockstar: the problems shouldn't take more than a day for a single dev to solve. Please do something about it," t0st wrote at the time. Lo and behold, Rockstar is doing something about it.

In a new update, t0st announced that he "just got awarded $10k" via the Rockstar Game's bug bounty initiative. This is typically for players who uncover major security issues, but you can't really blame Rockstar for making an exception in this case, can you? t0st added that "I did try asking for more technical details but they couldn't say anything."

Rockstar

In a statement shared with PC Gamer, Rockstar itself confirmed that "after a thorough investigation, we can confirm that player t0st did, in fact, reveal an aspect of the game code related to load times for the PC version of GTA Online that could be improved. As a result of these investigations, we have made some changes that will be implemented in a forthcoming title update."

There's no confirmation yet on when exactly this loading time tweak will arrive, but it's certainly something to look forward to. I can't help but wonder how many players will rush back to GTA Online just because it finally loads a little quicker.

Topics: GAMING, Rockstar Games, News, Grand Theft Auto