Three weeks have passed since Grand Theft Auto: Definitive Edition was released on the 11th of November digitally. I’m sure you’ve heard or seen some of the comical, yet serious issues the collection had, and in some cases, still have. I wanted to wait a couple weeks before I wrote this review to see how much was going to be fixed by the first major updates that hit consoles through the month of November. This remaster feels rushed and the visuals made it obvious. Let’s dive in and analyze Rockstar’s and Grove Street Games’ mistakes who helped port these classics.
The gameplay for Grand Theft Auto, if you’ve never been graced by playing the older games released in early 2000’s, plays out in 3D open worlds with third person aspects. The series revolves around a new character each game and they are typically ‘new’ to the city and slowly work their way up through crime organizations. In this collection we have GTA 3 based in Liberty City, Vice City (VC) which is based on Miami, FL, and also San Andreas (SA) which is some popular California and west coast locations. The games were made to be satirical and fun, racing recklessly around each game causing mayhem with weapons and vehicles. The only things more outrageous than the gameplay were the characters. For those who grew up playing these games, to see them in such a negative light feels strange. However, it’s well-deserved hate based on the numerous errors with the collection.
When the game launched, I dove into them as soon as possible and there were some major flaws that just hindered gameplay entirely. My biggest issue was the rain! The rain in all three games was exactly the same; when it rained in game, it was practically impossible to see at night. The first thing I did in GTA3 was the paramedic side mission. I failed a few times from simply not being able to see and wasted a couple hours trying to finish this. The gangs are notorious for being violent and making side missions harder late in game, so it is always encouraged to do them early. I also was not able to alter the settings and see a change at all with the brightness or contrast settings. I tried resetting and re-downloading, but it seemed like a rarer bug as friends reported they could alter those settings fine. No matter how many times I lowered or raised the brightness, no difference occurred. The menus were also changed from the originals and also lack some stats that the classics had, such as time played. Instead, all the menus for the three games are the same and function with vertical tabs to cycle through. Some end game missions at launch were bugged, so the AI would go off their set driving path and cause for some serious time loss and headaches to maneuver them back into position.
The radar was improved upon the classics by adding GPS routes for new players who may not know the maps yet. This feature is from GTA:SA and works just the same with the exception that they are all the same color, yellow. It would have been nice if they made each game a unique themed color that fits the game. The weapon wheel from GTAV was added to make swapping between guns more efficient and time slows down when the wheel is open, and also works for radio stations. The controls were also remapped based on GTAV ’s controls such as driving. Accelerating and reversing work with the triggers now rather than pressing the A and X buttons. The controls were a general improvement; however, the visuals were the main issue.
The visuals for the Definitive Edition changed lighting in the games and made lighting feel nearly non-existent at launch. After the 10 GB update rolled out for the three games, the lighting and rain were fixed. There are still minor visual issues such as reskinned roads not being at the correct height. When driving around, I noticed occasionally my tires were clipping through the roads. This is not the only showcase for reskinned issues. In GTA3, the second island has guard rails in various locations, but when driving in between them your car will slam into invisible barriers. It’s not an invisible wall, but an invisible fence from the originals. That summarizes this “Definitive Edition” quite well. This was a rushed reskin of the three games rather than a true remaster. The character models which were ‘redesigned’ look goofier than the 20-year-old models. Their faces look oddly shaped and their hairlines and foreheads look ludicrous. When the game launched, this was the most obvious issue. Characters on bikes or squatting would show that the new models were bending at strange unrealistic angles elongating necks. The main characters of each of the three games do look the best out of all the characters fortunately. Carl’s first girlfriend in SA looks totally different than she did in the originals. The models’ hands were rigid and move the same as the originals along with the rest of their movements. I did notice the slow prostitute walk was fixed for some of the characters and they now move a bit faster during cutscenes. This seems like a minor improvement, but it’s not all bad. I know speed runners will dislike the fix that was implemented to the vigilante car missions, the enemies no longer can be tricked by the pause method and now stay in their cars properly. This made the game a bit more of a challenge and was a fun change in my opinion. Speed runners won’t enjoy this change since it will add a lot of time to their runs.
At launch, there were many typos in signs across the games and lacked the attention to detail. The three games do refer to each other more openly now with billboards. Many of the assets from GTAV like small bottles or soda machines have made a debut in the SA. Whiskey and other alcohol were also ported over and can be off putting if reading the labels as some of dates on the bottles that are off by nearly 4 decades. Just minor nuances fans noticed across the collection, and as I stated it just adds more evidence that this project was rushed. The file sizes since launch have nearly doubled for all three games in patches fixing literally hundreds of bugs.
Rockstar officially made a public apology on the 22nd of November, which is unheard of from such a well-known developer who usually releases quality content. They readded the originals back to their game launcher for purchase and offered the classics for free to those who bought the new collection on PC. They generally stated that they knew the games were released in an unacceptable condition and issued their apology and wanted to thank the fans for their patience. They have also DELAYED the physical release until 2022 for Switch, and pushed back the date to 17th of December for other consoles.
The audio in this collection hasn’t been changed from the originals with the exception that some of the radio shows across the games are missing some songs. New songs weren’t added to replace the ones lost, but VC and SA lost about 29 songs total across the two. This would be due to the rights of the song being either lost or too expensive to establish again. The shortness of these radios will feel like a major loss if that’s one of your favorite takeaways. The radios in GTA are comedy gold and have satirical commercials that play that always manage to get a laugh out of me. Lazlo, who hosts the talk shows, is hilarious and always worth a listen, making an appearance across the games. The sound for the guns is the same and along with vehicle noises such as braking, accelerating, stopping, and even the door sounds. All of the pick-up sounds for packages, weapons and voice actors sound the same. The menu sound effects were updated to sound like the originals after launch.
The longevity for these titles is roughly between 40-50 hours. They vary so much due to the length of each game getting longer than the previous entry and having tons of optional content. GTA3 will take around 20-30 hours depending if you are trying to earn 100% completion in the stats or not. VC is close to the same estimate, but I would add another 5-10 hours to it since there are more side missions to finish. SA will take the longest of the bunch as the map is truly massive and there is a lot to do in that title. For the collection as a whole if you are just looking to enjoy the stories then it should take around 40 hours to finish the three games leaving side missions behind. The difficulty of some of these missions seems to be easier to handle due to the change in controls which is a benefit for this collection. I remember years ago getting upset at some of the utterly frustrating missions thrown at the player in VC with lots of enemies at once. The improved aiming system makes the player feel overpowered at times, but the tides can always turn against you. In GTA3 I had the Triad gang throwing me out of my car every chance they got and would gang up on me making it tough at times. Same for the Mafia with their boom sticks three shotting vehicles. When I felt overwhelmed, I would swap to my Tech-9 and mow any threat down easily. The spawn rates for pedestrians seems increased from the originals. I was completely surrounded once before by a dozen enemies and couldn’t move as they each took turns beating me. Even though the game feels easier, threats are still present and the player must be alert of enemies ruining a mission attempt or being ganged up on. The biggest update I noticed while playing this collection was the physics upgrade. There is water physics now which allows players to interact with puddles or shoot at water causing ripples. These new physics aren’t all great, the doors fall off of vehicles and could get stuck in the sides causing damage to your car and stopping you entirely. Typically, this issue was more prominent with the size of the vehicle increasing. This would also explain the weird movement for bumped fences twitching around, clipping through the ground.
In conclusion, This ‘Definitive Edition’ was the exact opposite at launch from what a fan could want. Rockstar had removed older versions of the games which fans would mod for fun to encourage new sales, but were re-added after some horrible publicity with the tragic launch. It seems as if this project was rushed out the door beyond the developers control and most likely was done so by those in charge over at Rockstar and Take-Two Interactive. People were even sending threats to developers for this horrible port. The games were updated twice since launch fixing MOST of the issues, but the file sizes have been doubled. I had to reload a save a few times across the games where missions just didn’t work the first time. Rockstar should have waited to release the digital version along with the physical release set for December 17th rather than dropping an unfinished classic with hundreds of visible, painful issues.
Conclusion
The bottom line is you should wait whether you’re a new fan or an old fan returning. This Definitive Edition was a sad excuse for a re-release. Visual issues plagued the gameplay making it a frustrating experience with goofy looking models looking worse than the originals. The sounds still hold up and have aged well and there is longevity with these titles as they are brilliant when functioning. I have faith they will continue to update and fix issues, but game developers are getting away with dropping broken games and fixing it later. The delay for the physical releases being pushed back to the 17th shows that they want more time to fix them. The digital launch was a beta test at best and we were the guinea pigs to experiment with. Wait for the inevitable updates to slowly roll out before giving your money to a game company that wanted to swindle loving fans at launch. At least San Andreas is part of Game Pass if looking to test the waters before buying.
This game was reviewed based on Xbox One review code, using an Xbox Series S|X console. All of the opinions and insights here are subject to that version. Game provided by publisher.
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Rob Turnbull
Awesome! Thanks for the informative and honest review.