Recently, a 27-year-old Grand Theft Auto (GTA) classic received a massive graphical overhaul. Modder ‘gabdag’ released a new YouTube video showcasing “GTA 2 RTX Remix”. This open-source fan project gives the 1999 game full path-traced lighting. Consequently, it completely transforms the look of Rockstar’s classic top-down title using modern Nvidia hardware.
GTA 2 RTX Remix Mod Brings Modern Lighting to Anywhere City
First, the most noticeable change involves how Anywhere City responds to light. The mod integrates Nvidia RTX Remix to add dynamic shadows, reflections, and glows. For instance, exploding vehicles now briefly flood nearby streets with intense illumination. Furthermore, gunfire creates bright flashes within darker areas. Neon signs also cast their own colored glow across surrounding surfaces.
Additionally, ‘gabdag’ introduced a dynamic time-of-day system. This day-night cycle significantly changes the city’s appearance. Therefore, nighttime sequences feel vastly different from the original game’s static presentation. Players can even use an in-game settings menu to adjust the lighting and time of day. Despite these dramatic visual shifts, the fundamental gameplay remains completely unaltered. Players still view the action from above, steal vehicles, complete missions, battle police, and work with competing gangs.
However, getting this 1999 game to work with modern rendering software required serious effort. Nvidia’s RTX Remix primarily targets fixed-function DirectX 8 and DirectX 9 titles. Meanwhile, Grand Theft Auto 2 predates those technologies entirely. The game relies on much older rendering methods. To solve this, gabdag created a custom Direct3D 9 renderer. This bridge successfully translates the legacy graphics pipeline into a format the newer technology can process.
Widescreen Support & Smooth 60 FPS
Finally, the project brings the retro title up to current display standards. The mod expands the original 4:3 presentation to a modern 16:9 widescreen format. Moreover, gabdag implemented fixes to prevent vehicles and pedestrians from awkwardly appearing or disappearing near the newly visible screen edges.
Most importantly, the mod uses Frame Generation to deliver a smooth 60 FPS presentation. Normally, GTA 2 ties its underlying logic and simulation directly to its rendered frame rate. Fortunately, Frame Generation safely bypasses this issue. Ultimately, fans can explore this entire suite of modernizations directly in the project’s GitHub repository. Just remember, this is an unofficial fan project, not an official remaster from Rockstar Games.
