Rockstar's Grand Theft Auto series has changed greatly since the franchise first arrived in 1997 as an urban-themed action game with an overhead camera. The first game did well enough to merit a couple of expansion packs and a sequel, but GTA didn't transform into the game we know today until the franchise made its way to the PlayStation 2 with Grand Theft Auto III, which took the 2D game into a 3D world filled with interactive elements. GTAIII immediately dominated what we now recognize as the open-ended sandbox gameplay style, which lets players interact and experiment with the people, places, and modes of transportation present in the game's world simulation.
We decided to compare GTAIII, GTA: Vice City, GTA: San Andreas, and GTAIV for this graphics comparison. All four games have a 3D world and follow the open-ended gameplay now standard in the series. The graphics only improved incrementally over the first three games, which were largely bound by the PlayStation 2's graphics capabilities, but they made a dramatic leap in GTAIV, which uses a new game engine to take advantage of the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360's graphics power. Note that some of the GTAIV shots will appear slightly fuzzy due to the game's daylight postprocessing effects.
The People
Your character and people on the street comprise the bulk of the character models you encounter in each game. The graphics quality didn't improve much over the first three games, but Rockstar made up for it by adding more character models and giving the main character more customization options in each sequel. Characters became much more lifelike in GTAIV thanks to the advanced game engine and the new consoles.
Main Character
The main character evolved from a nameless protagonist in GTAIII to Tommy Vercetti in Vice City, C.J. in San Andreas, and, finally, Niko Bellic in GTAIV. You don't have the ability to turn around the character to face the camera until San Andreas, so we sneaked in a cutscene image for Tommy and a side-view shot for the GTAIII protagonist.
Citizens
The citizen graphics don't change that much between GTAIII and Vice City before getting photo-textured faces in San Andreas. The GTAIV characters all have defined facial features and perfectly modeled clothing. The pedestrians have also become much more talkative and emotive in the new game. You'll find yourself stopping to eavesdrop on them while completing missions throughout the city.
Vagrants
Vagrants, much like other random pedestrians, often function as driving targets in GTA. However, seeing characters like this poor guy trying to keep warm in front of a drum barrel really humanizes them, making us all the more uncomfortable when we have to run them over if and when they get in the way.
Women of the Night
It's no secret that the general GTA population includes its fair share of streetwalkers. The prostitutes in the older games were pretty easy to spot, but they didn't really reflect their real-world analogs until the later games. Let's face it: Girls walking the street aren't exactly Emperor's Club VIP material.
The Cities
The GTA games have all had draw distance limitations and an abrupt level of detail transitions, but pop-in has become less of a problem over time, and gone are the days when incoming vehicles first appear as smudged boxes only to sharpen up as they get closer. Textures look great near and far. We were particularly impressed with how detailed Staunton Island looks when viewed from Portland Island.



677 Comments
ALSO HAVE TO STATE GTA V.C. HAD THE VERY BEST MONEY CURRENCY SYSTEM TO.
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VICE CITY ALL THE WAY LOOKS BEST BECAUSE OF IS NOT REALISM & IS CARTOONISH...
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Creat ! Thinking about it after 10 years , boys . Hah ! I thinks maybe ..... i died .kekeke
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I WANT a new GTA for pc!!! =( How can they do this to pc gamers :S
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oh sh... I 4got how the hookers looked like in San Fierro... DARN!!!
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Vice city is still my favorite, but I think san andreas is great too. my only problem with san andreas is that I could never get used to it. I still discover a new part of los santos every day, even though I've unlocked the other cities. but that is a good thing at the same time. and gta4? I consider it on the same level as vice city.
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RockStar ROCK!!!!!!!!
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Vice city looks the best out of the old ones, it's mostly because of the colours and the water, but it also looks like it runs at a higher native resolution. A much cleaner image. But the coolest one out of all of them is still GTA SA, I miss all the things you could do and the different places you could go to. The countryside was awesome, it was cool to have when you got tired of the city's. I hope they add most of the things they had in SA to the next GTA.
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Shows how far the game industry has come in 10 years, looks fantastic now. I wonder what the next ten years will bring. I miss ammu-nation and tanks though :/
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I never noticed how low the graphics were at first in the older GTA's until recently and they were still funny as hell to play
they have so much potential for this game I hope it lasts a long time
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I keep wondering, Why does San Andreas look like S*** compared to Vice City and III??
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Amazing how Rockstars can make fantastic water ( I even liked the ones in the previous games.), Great car models and Characters. But a decent bush or tree is difficult to make.
Still when you're driving like mad with the cops after you, you don't really stop and shout out " Oh my god!, Look at those fantastic trees and bushes!"
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hope the pc version comes out sooner. The Mods will be superb.
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nice.
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In certain aspects, you can really see the differences between each game. Vice City had improved lighting, while San Andreas had improved textures and character models. And of course, 4 gets the best of every world, give that it's current generation. All in all, an interesting look back on the previous installments and how things have changed since 3's release.
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it's a good step forward, but not a real leap as they try to make it sound. where are the animals? dogs,cats, birds, rats, so on and so on. there is still room for improvement.
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I like how they try to make GTA look like such an achievement by comparing it to last-gen iterations of the series. I'm not trying to bash the game, but it's not like it's the first current gen game to have graphics of this quality.
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This article has made me realize how much time has passed and graphics, advanced. I didn't really notice the preceding editions of GTA looking so Virtua Fighter.
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The truth is with each passing year and with each advance in technology GTA has come a long way in both gameplay and in story. I just hope it keeps getting better as a franchise, but then again how far can a game go? I guess the future will only tell.
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vice city i believe really made the franchise, gta3 was really disapointing when i got it way back when......just driving got really boring..you couldnt really do that much. and SA was kinda overwelming , there was to much to do and all the little add in where not really that in depth and kinda lame. gta 4 is by far the best. hopefully the next game with be in vice city with this games engine
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they soulda put gta 1 and 2 in it for shyts and giggles, than 3 would look sooo shotyy, and in regard to Koal_Jadian about the graphics...gta has really always been under par with what system there on i mean look at gta on ps1, and i think the faces and whatnot last gen were really disapointing, i mean the mouths didnt move and if they did it looked like sock puppets
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man, lets praise the technology. When I had GTA III I thought those where the best graphics, but now...
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I have every single game from this franchise (including the PS1 versions and expansion packs), so as a die-hard lifetime GTA'r, I was slightly disappointed by the overall content offered in GTA4 in comparison to GTA: San Andreas. San Andreas was MASSIVE, however, this new outing seems less so. Sure, the graphics are top-notch and the options are widely varied, but to be honest with you, I was expecting far more. Gone are the days of eating too much/too little and exercising to change your physical appearance. Also, gone are the top notch voices of Hollywood maestros such as Ray Liotta, Burt Reynolds and Luis Guzman (my favourite of all!), but the variance of Radio Stations and your coveted mobile phone add a degree of solace. The greatest question of all is....why Ricky Gervais???
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it is the best GTA game by far EASILY but graphics wise it doesn't even reach the same level as other 360 and PS3 titles. I don't understand how they gave this game a 10 on graphics. More like a 6 or 7. Same with sound effects.
Gamespot is overrating it...maybe its rated by opening week sales predictions.
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magnificent game. 9.9/10. not perfect, but the closest bthing we are going to get to perfect for a long time.
1 thing i dont think that they shouldnt have put in is the un needed sexual content, if they didnt put it in it might not be 18 so more people could enjoy it.
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I have been living in Liberty City for the past 10 days... Anyone who say's this is not the best GTA game thus far is completely beyond me. This game is addictive, immersing and ridiculously funny.
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hahah and im hearing complaints about gta 4 having the same graphics as gta sa, rubbish
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Ambulance feature was weak anyway. Glad they kept the vigilante missions.
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Gta forever
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Nice
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I'm not seeing my last post so I'll say again: There ARE Taxi missions in GTAIV, you have to call Roman and then select the "job" option. At that point he'll tell you to pick up the car; afterwhich you will see the waypoint navigation to the destination. I noticed some of you saying there were no bikes in GTA IV. Not true! Unless you mean pedal bikes. Motorcycles can be found anywhere; however, the NRG-900 can be easily found by the dart throwing bar. Usually after 9pm.
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you get Taxi missions by calling Roman on the cell phone and then selecting the "job" option. You don't get alot of cash but you do get some money for the Taxi jobs.
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Very nice !
What about the PC version guys ?
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Taxi missions are but you need to do them for a company.
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damn, no taxi missions ?
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no ambulance missions in GTA4 ? that sucks big time. another unfinished feature for rushing the game into stores...
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I have never played a GTA that I didn't like. Sure they all have subtle pros and cons, but overall they are all great. From the original PC game (which I would skip school to play at my friends house) to to the new hotness GTA 4, LOVE 'EM!!!! I do miss running down the monks though, anyone remember that? And the point system, that was cool to. Earning points for running over people and blowing up cars...brilliant!
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VIce city had the best hero with coolest atitude and voice.Best environment and the best Radio with most varied songs and i dont need to tell about the funny ads and talk shows.he he
GTA 4 looks great but is Nico as good as or better than tommy?Let me think a while........ P
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ya we lost the bike and a few other things but this is basically GTA3 for the ps3, it'll be back and besides how often did we ride it?! i think the dialouge has been much improved though i think the radio in vice city and in san andreas better even though there were less stations. and the commercials in vice city are mega funny..."but im not married..you are now..to america". not even the republicans in space tv show can top that! and yep, ray liotta voice tommy. dont know much bout the racism in sa tho
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hey dude listn if tht racist thng wud hav been thr thn vice city stories wud neva had a blck as a main charactr and i dn thnk there has been any discrimination to gta san anderas i mean what makes u thnk so
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why do sooooo many people dislike GTA SAN ANDREAS? Are people still so racist that just because a video game main character in black, they look for lame excuses to not like a game?
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Was Tommy Vercetti played Ray Liotta?
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Honestly, I would love to see RockStar do a Squeenix and offer all the previous GTA material from III onwards on the new engine. Loved GTA 3s story, hated the UI.
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I think that GTA IV is by far the best... its an evolution, and we're just seeing the begining of what they have to offer. Remember in GTAIII you couldn't drive tanks or fly planes and you managed. In Vice city you couldn't customize your ride and you managed. San Andreas was a fantastic game,I felt it was very flat with a lot of dead area (ya know those ares where there was no one just empty field) it was also the last GTA to come out for PS2. We're just getting started with NextGen GTA, its going to get better.. and hell for what it is, its awesome.. the graphics, AMAZING! the sound is top notch and Rock star has given you yet another terrific story with a another criminal veiwpoint. I think the Game spot score was high but hey its the best they have seen, its the best I have played and we still have the future to look forward to.. COOL!
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of all the characters, claude speed is my least favorite. he has no personality! in my opinion, tommy vercetti is the best.
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For all you people ranting and raving about the last gta titles go back and play those and stop **** about whats not in gta 4. Yeah the planes and tanks were cool but from my stand point i would rather give up those few things for all the new and better features.
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Waviglighter, you are not that bright when credit is due. You are trying to say that vice city looked better that san andreas. True that the story line was good as always but after making that comment nobody will ever take your comments in a positive way. I am really not trying to bash you just thought I would be honnest.
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Wow...big improvements!
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Anyone else think that some of those Vice City screenshots looked better than the San Andreas screenshots?
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