It was a pretty awful launch, but in a game like this and such a massive project being undertaken for the first time, it should be expected. Online is basically one huge beta until things are fully figured out and functional. Overall, it already has some insane potential for a group of friends.
It seems to be half-decently good for me now on PS3. My biggest issue has been occasional inability to get missions. Just means I get to run around in free roam for a while.
The loss of character/progress glitches are pretty scary though.
The inability to get through the tutorial was probably the worst of it that I saw.
Here's what gets me though: They have $1bn in sales in a few days. Based on that, safe to say over 17 million copies sold in between release and Oct 1. I'm sure it's more, but I fail at google today.
One of the early issues was that the PSN had some kind of cap on concurrent users that wasn't allowing people to connect. How does something that significant slip through the cracks at that level of game development? Nobody at Rockstar thought to pick up the phone to their contact at Sony and say something to the effect of, 'Hey... we just broke all sales records. Around 17 million people are probably going to be wanting to go online with the game in a couple weeks, is that going to be an issue?'
Yet it didn't get caught until after release. That just boggles my mind.
I'm looking forward to it though. It's been pretty fun thus far, although it's seemed to me to feel a lot like DayZ at times. If you're within range of other players in free roam you're likely about to get shot at.
Wiley.
