Vehicles

This is a sub-page of Grand Theft Auto III.

To do: Find old text. Make a video showing these cars in-game.

There is a file called vehicles.dff left in the Android and iOS releases which contains very old vehicle models, many of which have wildly different internal names from the final game. They seem to match the oldest screenshots of the game and look quite similar to the earliest renders released. To sum up:

• Besides the Buggy, none of these models have accompanying collision or handling data.
• These older versions of the car models have different origin points, are mostly smaller, and have some have their damaged parts set up differently so the final game's collision data isn't compatible.
• All of these models have extra parts labeled with the suffix _lo, indicating that an extra LOD stage between _hi (full detail geometry) and _vlo (distance LODs) was planned. However, these are all duplicates of the _hi parts, and the final game's code simply deletes these upon loading a model in.
• No body textures are used anywhere — they wouldn't be implemented until the game was nearly complete.
• Speaking of textures, most of these vehicles use generic split textures instead of having a specialized sheet. Thankfully, some of these are used elsewhere in the game so we at least have something to the look at.
• Unless otherwise mentioned/shown, the damaged parts on these cars are usually duplicates of the undamaged geometry.
• Naturally, these models are very unfinished. Underneath the split parts used for the game's damage system, you are likely to find gaping holes in the geometry.
• Vehicle reflections wouldn't be implemented until right before launch, so these are meant to look completely matte. There's no specularity value set in their materials so loading these in-game results in it defaulting to the max, meaning very shiny vehicles.
• Many of the cars don't support custom colors, as you'll see below. If they're any color other than green then they will only be that color in-game.

Unlike the final game, these are all stored as "chunks" in one .dff file (the game's model format) and would've all been loaded at the same time instead of being streamed individually from the disc. They can still be activated (partially, namely ambulan, armytruk, bus, cabbie, chopper, coach, dodo, firetruk, police, and taxi) by inserting this line into gta3.dat:

HIERFILE MODELS\GENERIC\VEHICLES.DFF

However, due to the aforementioned collision data issue, they are for the most part not functional.

Ambulan#

ambulan	ambulan (Final)

The Ambulance. The green windows are an error — the texture for them appears to be slightly different than what was originally used.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Armour#

armour	securica (Final)

The Securicar, or Armored Truck as its render is named.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Armytruk#

armytruk	barracks (Final)

The Barracks OL, or Army Truck as its render is named. Unlike its final iteration, it doesn't have randomized components in the rear.

Astrovan#

astrovan	moonbeam (Final)

The Moonbeam, or Aster as its render is named.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Beamer#

To do: Write about Joey textures.

beamer	sentinel (Final)

The Sentinel, which was still called the Beamer at this point in development.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Buggy#

To do: This is the only early vehicle with leftover collision. Let's show it in action!

buggy	bfinject (Final)

What seems to be the BF Injection. It's much smaller and was never shown anywhere. Unlike the BF Injection, it actually has destructible parts!

Bus#

bus	bus (Final)

Ah, the infamous school bus. It only has one functioning door (on the left side), which isn't supported by the final game. A junked version of the vehicle can be found at the scrapyard.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Cabbie#

cabbie	cabbie (Final)

cabbie - Damaged	cabbie (Final) - Damaged

The Cabbie. It's quite a bit smaller than the final version.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Carrier#

carrier	blista (Final)

The Blista, or Space as it was called at this point.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Chopper#

chopper	chopper (Final)

An older version of the police chopper. It has less breakable parts, a different shade of blue, and the textures are laid out a bit differently.

Coach#

coach	coach (Final)

The Coach, sadly no awesome Felly Tours signage is left. The LOD is a duplicate of the high poly mesh and there is no randomized signage.

Dodo#

dodo	dodo (Final)

The Dodo! This confirms once and for all that the wings were always clipped, finally debunking an infamous rumor.

Eldorado#

eldorado	esperant (Final)

eldorado - Damaged	esperant (Final) - Damaged

The Esperanto, misspelled "Esparanto" on the official site. It has different damaged parts from the final game.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Firetruk#

firetruk	firetruk (Final)

The Fire Truck.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Freight#

freight	linerun (Final)

The Linerunner, or Semi Cab as its render is named.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Garbage#

garbage	trash (Final)

The Trashmaster. Its render is named Garbage Truck on the official site.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Humvee#

humvee	patriot (Final)

The Patriot, once called the Hum Vee on the official site. Unlike the Patriot, it doesn't have randomized components in the rear.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Icecream#

icecream	mrwhoop (Final)

An old version of Mr. Whoopee. It was plainly named the Ice Cream Truck at this point. The green bottom half is an error — the texture for it appears to be slightly different than what was originally used.

Intrepid#

intrepid	kuruma (Final)

The Kuruma, named the Sentinal at this point. It has no unique damaged parts.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Limo#

limo	stretch (Final)

The Stretch.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Luton#

luton	mule (Final)

The Luton, an iconic vehicle from this early development era and predecessor to the Mule.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Nova#

nova	peren (Final)

The Perennial, or the Maurice as it's referred to on the site.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Pickup#

pickup	bobcat (Final)

The Bobcat, or U-Jerk (a callback to GTA2) as the name of its render would indicate.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Polboat#

polboat	predator (Final)

The Predator, still simply dubbed the Police Boat at this point. It lacks turrets on the front, has guard rails, and is overall considerably dumpier-looking than the final version.

Police#

police	police (Final)

police - Damaged	police (Final) - Damaged

The real deal, the NYPD blue police cruiser! It has different damaged parts from its final iteration.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Reliant#

reliant	manana (Final)

reliant - Damaged	manana (Final) - Damaged

The Manana, once called the Ariant on the official site. It has different damaged parts and big round lights on the back.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Riviera#

riviera	idaho (Final)

riviera - Damaged	idaho (Final) - Damaged

The Idaho, or the Hachura as it was called on the official site. It has different damaged parts.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Subway#

subway	train (Final)

The Train, or Subway Train as its render is named. Besides not having functioning doors or a LOD and a few minor detail differences, it's about the same as what shipped with the PC version and beyond.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Swatvan#

swatvan	enforcer (Final)

The Enforcer, or SWAT Van according to its render.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Tank#

tank	rhino (Final)

Now this is something else! A much smaller version of the Rhino that took on an APC-like appearance. It was called the Tank at this point according to its render filename. It has functioning headlights/brake lights, six wheels, and only one door on the back, which the final game doesn't support.

Taxi#

taxi	taxi (Final)

taxi - Damaged	taxi (Final) - Damaged

The Taxi. It has different damaged parts and is a bit smaller. Also, there's no alternate TAXI sign on top of the body for the game to spawn.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Testeros#

testeros	cheetah (Final)

testeros - Damaged	cheetah (Final) - Damaged

The Cheetah, once called the Rocket on the official site. It has different damaged parts.

Official render	Pre-release screenshot

Transit#

transit	pony (Final)

transit - Damaged	pony (Final) - Damaged

The Pony. It's mostly complete!