Rockstar Disputes GTA 5 Social Club "Hack"

The Rockstar Games Social Club, an online service for Grand Theft Auto V and other games, has not been hacked, the developer says in a new statement. The statement, provided to Kotaku Australia, comes after players wrote on Reddit and Rockstar's own support forums that their accounts had been hijacked in the days following GTA V's release for PC, leaving them--in some cases--unable to play the game.

In its statement, however, Rockstar said it is aware of cases of compromised accounts, and is working with affected users to straighten things out. The developer also reminds players that they should avoid using the same password for multiple services--and the Rockstar Games Social Club is no exception.

"The Rockstar Games Social Club has not been compromised," the developer explained. "However, it appears that attempts have been made to access user accounts using email and password combinations from an unaffiliated, compromised website or database elsewhere on the Internet."

"For the accounts affected, we are in the process of reverting those accounts back to their original owners. As a reminder, it is a good policy to ensure that the Rockstar Games Social Club account username and password is not shared across multiple websites on the Internet."

GTA V was released for PC on Tuesday, April 14, quickly becoming the most played non-Valve game published on Steam, with more than 300,000 people playing the game simultaneously. Although the game lacks official modding support, that hasn't kept players from developing all manner of unique creations.

GameSpot's GTA V PC review praised the game's improved visuals and frame rate.

"It looked great on PS4 and Xbox One, but GTA V shines on PC thanks to 4K-grade textures, the availability of additional post-processing effects, and an unlocked frame rate," reviewer Peter Brown said. "Previous versions of the game played just fine at 30 frames per second, but you quickly appreciate the added fluidity of playing at 60 FPS (if not more) on PC."