Rockstar Games finally showed off a trailer for the remastered Grand Theft Auto trilogy, including GTA III, Vice City, and San Andreas, showcasing many graphical and quality-of-life improvements made to each game.
The Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy — The Definitive Edition collection will launch digitally on November 11th for $59.99 (£54.99). You’ll be able to play them on the Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4 and 5, Xbox One, the newer Series X/S consoles, and PC via the Rockstar Games Launcher. It’ll get a physical release on December 7th, followed by versions for iOS and Android in the first half of 2022. Rockstar Games launched a site where you can look through more details.
Xbox Game Pass subscribers will get instant access to Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas — The Definitive Edition on launch day. Grand Theft Auto III — The Definitive Edition will come to PlayStation Now on December 7th.
San Andreas — The Definitive Edition is coming to Game Pass on launch day
Each of these games was remastered by Grove Street Games, which appears to have done extensive work to make them far prettier and more playable than their PS2 counterparts. Rockstar says it used Unreal Engine and a “completely rebuilt” lighting system, and the graphical improvements seem to touch practically every part of the games. The list provided in Rockstar’s press release includes improved shadows, weather, and reflections, and upgraded character and vehicle models. There are increased draw distances, smoother surfaces, and “higher resolution textures across buildings, weapons, roads, interiors, and more.”
Rockstar Games confirmed that each game has Grand Theft Auto V-inspired controls. That alone should do a lot of heavy lifting in making these games feel more modern. Targeting and lock-on aiming has been overhauled in each game. In terms of their interfaces, each game offers updated weapon and radio station wheels, along with new mini-maps that let players set waypoints and destinations.
There are some platform-specific additions, too. On Nintendo Switch, Rockstar added gyroscopic aiming, and you can utilize its touchscreen to zoom or pan with the camera and make selections within menus. The PC version (a 45GB download) supports Nvidia’s DLSS tech that can help games run a little better on a wider array of graphics cards without a noticeable drop in visual quality.
This latest trickle of news comes on the 20th anniversary of Grand Theft Auto III for PS2. The $59.99 price might surprise some people, but the improvements make it seem worth it for fans. Nevertheless, if you’re a Game Pass or PlayStation Now subscriber, at least you already know you’ll get to experience some of the games in the collection at no additional cost to you.
