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Even though it is cleaner and runs smoother than the old releases, many would prefer the original look. Additionally, Rockstar Games ignoring the modders and even taking down some of the most popular ones did not make fans happy. This list is trying to be optimistic, though, and wants to point out what the Grand Theft Auto remasters do right.

7 Smooth Performance

The older Grand Theft Auto games were technical marvels back in their day just for the ability to roam around a massive open world. Unfortunately, the frame rate took a backseat to the performance in order to put these games on the PS2. This new remaster fixes that issue, making all three games run at a smooth 60 frames per second.

With this being said, there is still plenty of jitter players are encountering. Considering the oldest of these three titles is 20 years old and the newest is 17 years old, it seems like all of these should be able to run at 60 frames per second with no issues. Hopefully, some updates will iron out the kinks in the frame rate.

6 Higher Resolution Textures

All the media surrounding the game stresses how the games are meant to look and feel like they did in their original carnations. The game is updated to take advantage of 4K displays and has improved textures.

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They are meant to look like the old art style, so don’t expect any major upgrade. Some wish they either hadn’t upgraded the textures at all or had done a heavier overhaul of the whole aesthetic. It wouldn’t bother people as much if the older versions weren’t all delisted from digital storefronts.

5 Weapon And Radio Wheel

Grand Theft Auto 5 introduced a wheel for both the radio stations and the weapon selection. Not only that, but time slows down to almost a halt when players activate the wheel. It makes gameplay way more convenient and prevents any accidental deaths or car damage.

This innovation was put into the old games for this remaster. While all the radio stations are selectable, not every song made the cut. Grand Theft Auto 3 is mostly intact, but some songs were taken out of the iconic soundtracks of Vice City and San Andreas.

4 Load Times Are Significantly Reduced

The older Grand Theft Auto games had some massive load times. This tradition has continued on throughout the series and other games from Rockstar. Anybody who boots up GTA 5 or Red Dead Redemption 2 is familiar with how long players have to wait before the protagonist is dropped into the open-world setting.

In the old PS2 games there used to be a slideshow of different pieces of art before the gameworld loaded up, Thankfully, players are dropped into the game world in just a couple of moments once they load up any of the three titles.

3 Free Aim And Improved Aim Assist

These two upgrades benefit Grand Theft Auto 3 and Vice City the most. GTA 3 in particular had a legendarily bad auto-aim. This issue is fixed thanks to the ability to play the games with free-aim or a different auto-aim setting.

San Andreas already has improved aiming, so it does not benefit as much. Even though this feature is appreciated, players should not go into these old titles expecting the tight aiming of more modern Rockstar games like GTA 5 and Max Payne 3. It is still a massive upgrade, though.

2 Checkpoints And Quick Restarts

In Grand Theft Auto 3 missions are not especially long. Still, it is extremely annoying to fail them. In older versions, restarting a mission means heading back to the character who gives the player the assignment.

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This process is streamlined in the remaster. Upon failing a mission, players are asked if they would like to start from the nearest checkpoint. In GTA 3, this means restarting from the beginning of the mission. It is a small change but ultimately ends up saving potentially hours, depending on how often one fails a mission.

1 New Control Scheme

More outdated than the responsiveness of the older games might be the actual control scheme themselves. Games had different standards back then, and open-world games were especially controlled differently because of the degree of freedom and variety of actions.

Some ideas like accelerating using a face button are outdated, so the controls have been changed to more closely resemble those of GTA 5. Even though the button mapping is changed, the gameplay is still restricted to what was available in the older games. This means you won’t be climbing, swimming, or hiding behind cover in GTA 3 or Vice City.

Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy - The Definitive Edition Is Out Now For PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series S and X, PC, and Nintendo Switch.

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