GTA 5 mod brings out photorealistic graphics and shows a glimpse of enhanced RAGE engine

The Rockstar Advanced Game Engine (RAGE), used in GTA 5, is one of the most powerful game engines in recent times. While the game’s graphics and functions already look beautiful as it is, a YouTuber named Gam3 4 Lif3 (YouTube/@Gam3_4_Lif3) enhanced the RAGE engine’s performance and used graphics mods to produce photorealistic visuals in the decade-old game.

The 13-minute-long video showed the RAGE engine at its full potential. The video consisted of three parts and featured three unique environments: city, jungle, and suburbs. Mods made Grand Theft Auto 5’s graphics look more realistic, further reducing the difference between the game and the real world.

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YouTuber enhances RAGE engine’s performance to produce photorealistic graphics in GTA 5

On August 21, 2023, Gam3 4 Lif3 posted a video on YouTube to demonstrate the true potential of the highly popular RAGE Engine. The YouTuber first drove a modded BMW car to showcase the photorealistic city traffic in GTA 5. Even the sky appeared cloudy, lending a gloomy effect to the environment.

They also used GTA 5 mods to add ray tracing and custom vehicle sounds in the game, allowing the body of the convertible BMW car to reflect its surrounding objects in real-time. Other objects, such as trees, streetlights, and NPCs were also redecorated by the graphics mods for Grand Theft Auto 5.

A screenshot of the modded nighttime scenery (Image via YouTube/@Gam3_4_Lif3)

The second part of the video started in Stab City during the night. The YouTuber drove a custom vintage vehicle, moving towards the North Calafia Way to show the sceneries of the jungle. The lights emitted by the vehicle's headlamps and the moon were both much more realistic compared to the original GTA 5 gameplay.

The denser areas in the jungle were dark, making it difficult to see places that were not illuminated by lights from the vehicle. In the original game, Rockstar Games keeps the entire map illuminated so that players can see and navigate properly. However, the modded gameplay used realistic properties to enhance the nighttime experience.

A screenshot of the modded suburban scenery (Image via YouTube/@Gam3_4_Lif3)

In the last part of the video, the GTA YouTuber drove a modded Jaguar SUV on the Catfish View road. It is a suburban area with tall trees and dense vegetation. Gam3 4 Lif3 drove towards Grapeseed to show off different elements of the open world that had been enhanced with the realistic graphics mods in GTA 5.

The modded gameplay also featured some unique physics properties which are absent in the original game. All the custom vehicles had unique exhaust notes and ragdoll physics which is not available in the official release.

However, producing such highly detailed gameplay requires significant hardware power. According to the YouTuber, they used Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 to run the mods.