I may have to try this. I have quite a few freezing issues in game, but never have I had any at the loading screen. Once I loaded the game, walked out of Niko's apartment and it froze straight away. It  also froze on me on the first and second cut scene, in the middle of a mission, at the end of a mission as well.

All these possible sollutions and some work but what about these solutions....if you sign out of the psn network, your stats are not tracked and thus eliminating you from possibly getting a key to the city in the 100% club. I have given up trying to get one just for the reason my stats are not being tracked. Eric... can you ask rockstar how we are suppose to get a key to the city if we are having so much trouble with the game and our stats are not being tracked?

Actually Ramman, I tried to call Rockstar to get an official comment for this news piece. Surprisingly, the line was busy.

PSN ID..ReppinDaNorth21...im getting sick and tired of the ps3 getting the bad end of everything. I hate how the 360's games always work better. For example Madden, Rainbow 6..and now GTA4. We are paying more for a system that should be better then the 360 and yet the 360 seems to always have the last laugh. I will say this though GTA4 is by far game of the year so far. The short time I had played it with no problems has been fun. Hopefully rockstar can get a quick update so I can get back to playing.

I do have one question..if they test the game  on both systems how did the people not see that GTA4 will freeze and act gay while being signed in.

I don't have any issues so idk what ppl are talking about.

Yeah its doing it all the time for me and I have to turn off PSN. Sucks because I cant get much multiplayer time up :(

 It worked for me, I tried it out yesterday after being stuck on the loading screen for a while. 

You wanna know why most of us PS3 users have all these problems, it's quite simple, the PSN is FREE therefore it isn't maintained the way the XBOX online users who pay for their service are treated and until we get sick and tired of getting screwed this is ALWAYS gonna happen on the PSN.

This "fix" works alright. But no multiplayer sucks. It REALLY, REALLY SUCKS!! WTF!!!

Just because PSN is free doesn't mean it shouldn't be held to high standards. Believe me, if Sony charged for the PSN but could guarantee these problems wouldn't exist, Im sure most people wouldn't have a problem paying. Problems like these shouldn't be happening to a tier 1 game of this level. It's just unnaceptable, and it troubles me that it got through testing, and they still haven't even released info regarding what is actually causing the problem. I have heard everything from not using a dualshock controller, to logging out of PSN before playing. Not to mention apparently the PS3 version runs at 640p?? It still looks really good, but all of these issues combined kind of pisses me off.

this is not a solution...we need a patch!!!

PSN: yungder

Thank God!

It works.

PSU saves the day.

Cheers lads it all got a little tense back there.

the game only froze once for me so far and i been playin for countless hours. lets hope it stays that way

"i'm getting sick and tired of the ps3 getting the bad end of everything. I hate how the 360's games always work better."

I feel u....I feel bad when everybody laugh at us because either their game plays better, or they have extra stuff because Microsoft paid millions to have that, "exclusive" to the 360. I really wish sony could do the same and play the same game Microsoft is playing. "GTA 4 ps3 exclusive" I guarantee u that if that was the case none of this fu$%^ng  freezing problems would exist and we wouldn't be doing the 10 something "to do list" published by G4's The Feed...GTA 4 is an excellent game and I really hope Rockstar releases a patch to fix this.....("knock, knock....Are you listening Rockstar?")

Umm, does this only happen to the 60gb version? I ask this since I plan on buying this game soon, I have an 80GB, and well, frankly I'm worried.

i don't have this problem because i don't have highspeed yet. but, maybe soon. for the MGS4 launch. hopefully they come out and put it in. i haven't had any problems with my signle player GTAIV disc. i guess i'm just lucky

Did this just happen over night or something, cus a few days ago I was hearing stuff about very isolated issues, now almost evrybody in the coments section is having problems. And I should be getting the game on Monday and after reading this it's not sounding too good. :/

I have the 40 gb, been playing 4-7 hours a day and no problems. no freezes, online works fine.

This does me no good since every game i play now freezes. Had PS3 since launch an no problems, but once GTA4 froze every game since does it as well

Thank you PSU very much. This fixed my problem of being stuck at the loading screen.

Props to Eric Blattberg

this seem's to happen more on the 60gb ps3s then the 40 aswell as for the old xbox 360's or all im not sure anyhow my brother has a 60gb and i have a 40gb and we tried the game on both and it keeps freezing on the 60gb as for the 40gb i have had no problems what so ever i do hope they fix this for everyone else getting it aswell they should fix the ranking system that keeps reseting every time you log off and they should add text messaging in game cause we are fu.cked as we can't do that yet T_T and xbox 360 can lol dum you xbox! still i im not buying a 360 just for messaging fu.ck that i will wait.

ReppinDaNorth21- what you said that xbox 360 always gets the games working better you should look before you talk or try the games before anything i have tried rainbow six vegas 1 and 2 on the ps3 and xbox 360 and the ps3 looks just a bit better as for the online it all works the same so don't bulls.hit me and like i said this is happening on the xbox 360 ver aswell my friend has it i would know.

the cause of this issue im not sure what is makiing it im sure its not the psn or the ps3 as some 60gbs work and some don't and all 40 gb seem to be working fine and as for xbox 360 some don't work and some do i don't know if this is something to do with people playing the game before the 29 and going online this may have errored the system don't know.

im one of those people lol sorry :(

Ok.This is how I get GTA online working.1st boot up your ps3.Then before you launch the game sign out of the PSN by highlighting your tag above your friends list then press triangle then sign out.Launch the game and when it loads press up to access your mobile.Then select multi player and you will be asked to sign in.Do so.It will give the connecting to game provider msg.DONT press anything until it finishes connecting.Hope this helps.PS3 ID Psypathic.MSG me if you need help.

Today i just got the game. 4 times it frozen and this game will break my Ps3.

I am having similar problems thnx for the info on the sign out i will try to see if that works, but yes it is freezing for me and i have the 60gb ps3

@Psypathic: Thanks so much! your way worked and now i can play some more online!!!! your a true hero! lol anyways, everyone having troubles should follows his instructions!!

As much as I like this game, I believe 0.5 point should be taken off the review result for thise "plague" going on globally.  It may be due to the game, but it certainly is a "flaw" in the overall package!  Other games with glitches or flaws are marked down on reviews due to it, so I don't any difference here. 

It's also not an isolated incident on one platform but includes both.  What do you think?

@Undying_Darkness:No problem glad to help:) Hope to see you online

I'm not having any loading issues at all with GTA4 (thank god) and I have a 60GB PS3. But if I ever run into any problems, I'll definanlty try this out.

No problems for me

F**K SONY & F**K Rock Star   ALL OF YOU SAY AMEEEN

Solution works. Had no loading issues for first couple of missions but they started today, but method described above works.

I had no issues with the game from launch up till friday of the same week. I got the mentioned endless load screen from my 80G, as well as my friend who is on a different ISP than me, but in the adjacent city. So if you ask me, these issues are totally server side from RockStar. They need to fix it and I'm also in agreement with PS3 owners getting the shaft when it comes to QC in games. I don't know if they are having load issues or what but this is pretty out of control. It seems as the days go by more and more are being effected.

I haven't had any issues.. i've even completed the games story.

Haven't frozen once. No problems. I have a European 60gb

stop making stuff up eric.

jk

ok... there are no problems w/ 40 or 80/ gigs... only the first run 60 gigs...wtf...cant say about 20 gigs...but I am too, getting sick of this b.s.  poor software support... and only a  few aaa games...that work 50% of the time ,on specific systems...and this is not only for ps3...the p.c. games suck... i wont own another xbox because it will OVERHEAT! and die....after 1 game!(over 3,ooo retuned weekly...) and if I dont play fps games, I'm screwed! F video games! I get 3 or 4 games per year that are mediocre at best.. no matter what system...I  am not a fanboy of anything....the state of video games is abysmal  at best... as well as hdtv! omg!!!!... that pisses me off too! I get like 10 channels in hd for almost 200 bucks per month! AND they're  not even really in hd! they're so compressed they look like fooked up pixelated poor dvd rips you get off of sheety torrent sites! I'm so fed up w/ buying into all this new tech that doesn't work worth nothing! I'm reverting to the old days of  n.es.  and genesis

and rabbit ear  t.v. signals and v.c.r's because at least my v.c.r. didn't overheat and loose all my recorded shows every fookin tuesday night! (right before heroes) omg! I'm so pissed off at everything! especially you sony, for making me hope (and pay) for something more than what I already got out of my ps2!

update:  btw... gta4 just froze my new ps3 40 gig made nov 07 and now i cant load any other game or even use my  media center. internet access wont work and I cant even load other pre installed games d.l'd from ps3.fckme network...gdmn f'n rockstar ruined my whole f'n 499.00 xmas gift! 

Well the last time there was a GTA release, the entire staff got a weeks paid leave in the caribbean. If anyone's let out of the office more than 1/2 an hour right now, they deserve to be sacked.

Shame on Rockstar for not finding these problems. Surely with the amount of people on here that are annoyed, they would have found this stuff straight away in pre-testing.

So much for getting a key for 100% in a week.

I'll be happy if I get it to load 100% of the time!

i heard how gta4 breaks ur ps3 and i didnt believe it until now alot of u sayin after playin gta4 all ur games freeze, def not gettin.

I can confirm this. Yesterday I had the same problem, read semewere to sing off from the PSN and it worked. That is the solution alright.

I have been telling people this since it first started. I have a theory that Rock Star may be fixing the servers, or something similar. Kinda strange that it all just started yesterday. Hopefully Rock Star will come out and release a statement or something.

I have no idea what is going on with this game. All my friends have ps3's with 60 gb drives and no problems with gta iv what so ever. All other games still work as well. From my other friends who own xbox 360's some of them are on there 3rd one for breaking down all the time. I hear that Gta IV on the xbox's crashes a lot. So for me the final conclusion is there is probably something wrong with some of the games or maybe firmware conflict issues. I am happy with my game it hasn't crashed yet and i've been playing for over 50 hours now on- and offline. For the ppl that are having problems I can understand it's frustrating but there's no use pointing fingers untill they know where the problem lies.

The other note is don't believe everything you read on the internet. for some reason ppl like trashing consoles they don't own. The best thing to be doing is get as much info about the freezes and crashes over to rockstar so they can fix the problem.

A few people around here need to wise up/grow up - or both.

The problem is NOT with the PS3 or the PSN - the problem lies purely in the GTA IV game code. That's why they're looking at patching it. If it was the PS3 or PSN, every game would have the same issues. For goodnes sake, think before you post this crap!

That said - I have a Euro launch 60GB PS3, and have none of these issues. Another pointer to the fact that it's neither the PS3 or PSN, but something unique to the game. If you're looking for someone to blame, it simply has to be Rockstar I'm afraid.

i agreeel this is not a solution, cause some problems are different like mine my ps3 froze even faster without psn so i think that aint going to work and wht im seeing  if u ever get to play the game (my frozes but i can play a little) the ps3 gets kind of used to it because i could even passed the first mission, ive been hearing over here in puerto rico that if u leave it for a while (try like half an hour ) the ps3 will get use to it and it should work fine, but we really that patch and we need it nowwww!!!!

right ive got a 40gb ps3, (my 2nd ps3) and i got gta4 launch date....and ive not had 1 single freeze, i thought all you people with problems would like to no HA HA only joking, onlines a bit stupid sometimes, but it seems to have got better. think you should all go buy the ps3 gta euro package, see what happens :P

i found that as long as you hard drive isnt rammed with stuff it will be fine i just delted a few of my old game ive trade in saves and it worked fine

I had the same freezing on loading screen issue and came across the solution of disabling the PS3's internet connection elsewhere. This has solved the problem but no multiplayer until Rockstar fix the issue :(
It is obviously just a problem with the game and/or Rockstars servers, I suspect even they did not realise just how many people would be playing this. As the game automatically connects to the sever during load time, even though you might only be playing single player, their servers simply cant cope.
As other people have pointed out, it is not a problem with the PS3 as other games would have suffered too.
If the severs are the problem, perhaps one way to solve it for now, would be a patch which if the game fails to connect to the sever during loading, it doesnt simply freeze there, but allows you into a single player game then keeps trying to connect in the background and notifies you via the mobile phone.

This confused me cause I was initially able to play multiplayer without any bugs..then the game just randomly locked up last night !!

I was able to figure out it was the PSN's problem by myself though..

 I was not experiancing this until I got up to mission 10, now the game will not leave the loading screen.  Worse yet if it is frozen and I try to quit the game, it causes the entire pS3 just to shut off!    I then tried this suggestion - and now the game works but there of course is no multiplay!  :-(   I am not sure if this is a Sony or Rockstar problem, but it is making me regret buying the PS3 version of the Xbox!

This is also a problem for Xbox360 users. I read on other forums they are having the loading problem also.

My Game would freeze during the initial boot from time to time.  But, eversince I started saving m game in my safe house everytime I quit, It hasn't done it once.  I think it is an autosave issue more than anything.  Try it out and see if it works for you guys.  I wouldn't know about the PSN I always boot in during the game, which isn't often but it hasn't locked up on me.

I find that sometimes I can reconnect to PSN through the cell phone and other times it just freezes. The other thing that ticks me is that the PS3 so often gets cheated on resolution when it was advertized to be 1080p gaming. I read things like, "It’s been claimed that GTA IV runs at a resolution of 630p (1120 x 630) on the PS3, which falls short of the 720p (1280 x 720) resolution claimed to be given to Xbox 360 gamers. On one forum, gamers have begun comparing like-for-like screenshots from both consoles and come to the conclusion that trigger happy PS3 players are coming off worse, resolution wise."

That said, GTA4 is still an increadable game. I'm glad I got it. (Come on patch!)

psn id: gingo.... good good at least something works, i really dont understand how the problems for GTA and bully for the 360 were missed becasue they are not minor problems

mine would lock up before getting into the game... so then i would quit game... and the ps3 would restart itself. but now it works with psn off...

That's what you get for buying that sickness of a game.  Stop buying cross-platform games, they don't care what happens on the PS3.  If you can't handle that, get a 360.  Done.

honestly I have a 60GB ps3 from launch and GTA 4 has froozen once on me. I'm only playing the single player game so I"m not logged into psn, but I'll try this next time I play and let you guys know.

GTA 4 is a really fun game but with problems like this I don't know how it got 10/10 from most reviewers.

I hope they come out with a patch soon for you guys.

how do u even shut off psn without logging off?

 This is the only thing that worked for my freezing issues. I'm def. hoping for a patch so that I can play multiplayer in the future. 

is this only happening to the 60GB versions?

I used this yesterday and it helped me get past the loading screen.

I'm another launch 60gb player and this does not fix anything

GUYS I FOUND A RANDOM WAY SO GIVE IT A TRY IF U CAN. WITH ME I PUT IN A PS2 GAME THEN EXIT IT THEN PUT IN GTA AND IT WORKS. THIS MAY NOT B ACCURATE COS IVE ONLY DUN IT TWICE BUT GIVE IT A SHOT IF UR DESPERATE. EITHER THAT OR I GOT SIGNED OUT EACH TYM BEFORE GOING BACK ON AGAIN LOL. ANYWAY TRY AND THEN TELL ME IFF IT WORKS WITH U GUYS  HOO HAV BACKWARDS COMPATABILITY. AND DONT GET MAD AT ME IF IT DOESNT WORK!!! PLEASE :L

I have an 80gig PS3 from the australia launch and started the game and waited 10 minutes for it to start a new game haha. uninstalled and reinstalled the data. nothing still waiting. then unplugged the network cable and woooo GTAIV apart from needing a little patch best game ever.

Can't say whether mine freezes or not until I can grab a copy of this.  *Goes off to cry*

I don't know if anyone has tried this but it worked for me.  I had the freezing problem on startup and so did my friend. what we did was sign up for the social club and linked the PSN account.  once we did that we put the disk back in and the freezing problem has been fixed so far.  I'm played for an hour and no problems. even bounced in and out of the multiplayer.  Hope this helps someone. don't know how many folks have linked the psn id and still having the problem.

Here is 100% solution for PS3 (wireless connection)

Turn OFF Network adsl router (modem), start the game and play...

If you want multiplayer then turn on adsl router (modem).

Problem is due WIRELESS connection.

It's NOT due a wireless connection, since I have a wired connection.

Don't know if anyone will read this, but ive also noticed that the game (for me anyway) only locks up when I manually save.  If you quit after an autosave, it might just let you back in without having to sign out.  Give it a shot.

i had a download on the go and gta would not load!! stopped the down load and the game worked!, still logged in to my ps account!

GTAIV didn't load for me only 1 time since I picked it up on launch night. After I reset my PS3, I haven't had that problem since and that was like 3 days ago. So far everything has been working out fine. I was even able to get back online about 4 days ago. All things considered, I won't be turning off PSN just to play the game. I'll just wait for R* to release a patch for it, which should be sooner rather than later.

"and viola" 

hahaha.  noob editor.

i havent had any problems wit it.. im playing it on my old 60gigger also...

the only solution is that you have to delete ur install,and reinstall it again while keeping ur internet conection deactivated (from internet settings)than boot the game and voila,all goes fine ,since than had no freezing issue at all.please try it(and yes even if i was signed in to psn) no freezing

This didn't fix it. I'm going to try #81's suggestion though.

I think this particular problem was being caused by an update to the servers - it seems that GTA IV tries to upload your current stats to the Social Club server when the game starts and as the servers were offline for what ever reason on the 4th then the game wouldn't start - seems that if there is a network connection the game will just keep trying to upload to the server even if it 's not there but if there is no network connection then the game starts with no problems. Once I'd signed out of the PSN I had no problems playing the game happily for hours and then the next day when I tried again the problem had been fixed and multiplayer etc was working again with no problems. THIS is why it suddenly went from a small handfull of people having a problem to everyone getting issues - and it's possible that they were trying to remedy the problems that the few were having at the time.

Oh, and the game rocks! ;)