The Grand Theft Auto 5 giveaway broke the Epic Games Store

(Image credit: Rockstar)

Update: Epic has sounded a cautious "mostly clear," but will keep its finger on the pulse in case things go sideways again. 

Original story:

You might think that most people who want the seven-year-old Grand Theft Auto 5 already have it, but that's apparently not the case. It went free today on the Epic Games Store—and immediately broke it.

The moment the new freebie went live, the store started throwing up 505 errors, apparently overwhelmed by demand. Epic acknowledged the overload on Twitter, and asked everyone to please be patient while it worked on the problem.

The issues appeared to be smoothing out, but some users began running into more exotic problems, including random changes to language settings. Our resident Fortnitesmith Joseph Knoop was surprised to find that, after multiple attempts to access the store, he'd suddenly been switched to Spanish.

Epic said it would share an update when things were smoothed out, so we'll let you know when that happens. For now, good luck and godspeed—and remember, GTA5 is free until May 21, so you have a little while to grab it.

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Andy Chalk

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.