Following the Porting Disaster of Grand Theft Auto: Definitive Edition, a user called DinosaurBytes decided to make their own version of how a real definitive edition of the original trilogy would look like, but with a catch: Make them much more harder, but also putting a Denser and Wackier spin to it to balance it out.
And with that, the GTA Tightened series came to be, being Exactly What It Says on the Tin, a Nintendo Hard version of the original 3D Trilogy.
These mods are built around on exploits and strats from around the GTA speedrunning community, with also brand new quality of life features that appeared in later GTA games (such as the ability to pop tires, being able to shoot car windows, character customizations, and more), on top of also adding some Easter Eggs referencing the community.
So far, only two mods have been released, Tightened Thrice
(for Grand Theft Auto III) and Tightened Vice (for Vice City), with a third one, Tightened'reas (for San Andreas), still being worked on.
You can find DinosaurBytes second channel here, where they shares update on Tightened'reas development.
Big Trope, Big W!
- Anti-Frustration Features: Despite the overall increased difficulty, the mod does address some of the original game's
Scrappy Mechanics and other unnecessary bits of randomness.- The games give you unlimited sprint right from the start, removing a lot of Button Mashing. It also allows you to sprint with two-handed weapons, and in Tightened'reas specifically the effect of CJ's weight on movement speed has been removed, overall making on-foot movement a lot faster.
- In Thrice, the ability for parked emergency vehicles to be randomly locked has been removed, taking out a common cause of time-wasting.
- April Fools' Day: In 2024, DB released a mod for Vice City called "Loosened Vice", which is basically the complete opposite of the Tightened games, being a simplified version of Vice City that can be beaten in almost 20 minutes.
- Difficult, but Awesome: Sometimes the missions requires the player to perform a specific trick or exploit that is known to be used by speedrunners of the game.
- Formerly Fat: CJ is fat at the beginning of Tightened'reas, but after this mod version of Drive-Thru (now titled Drive-Thru Delirium), the game will say that Carl lost weight due to skipping too many meals, making him skinny again.
- Losing Horns: A sad trombone will play if the player fails a mission in Tightened Thrice or dies in Tightened'dreas.
- My God, What Have I Done?: In Tightened'reas, some mission will lead to unexpected results: In "Well Stocked Pizza Co.", if you end up blowing up Ryder car at the beginning (which speedrunners usually do to save time as it skips a cutscene), Ryder ghost will haunt you to the theme of Goosebumps, stating you truly are a busta. If you are able to survive the ghostly shootout, the game will give you the mission complete result, stating that Ryder respawned in the closest hospital.
- You can, if you want to, kill Sweet during one of the missions by meeting with Benny. It will give a different outcome if you do so, as a clip from Top Gear (UK) will play out, specifically the infamous "Oh no, anyway" clip, crashing the game as a result.
- No Fair Cheating: The Replay feature, home to a whole array of glitches with useful effects in speedruns, is still present, but the flashing 'Replay' text during the playback has been replaced with 'Cheater' to remind players that skipping missions and obtaining functionally-unlimited Rocket Launcher ammo isn't for cool people.
- Not His Sled: Many of the mod's alterations involve messing with players that are used to common speedrun and gameplay strategies.
- Reference Overdosed: The Tightened mods include references not just to other games in the GTA series, but also various movies, TV shows and video games, such as Assassin's Creed, Twisted Metal, Toy Story and so on.
- Sprint Meter: Subverted for the mods, as the characters now have infinite sprint for the entire game in order to make the whole thing less frustrating.
- Unexpectedly Realistic Gameplay: Some of the mod's Not His Sled twists involve this.
- In the regular speedrun route of III, you are expected to have a police car for "Drive Misty For Me", given that it is a fast car that conveniently spawns right at the end of the previous mission. In Tightened Thrice, pulling up to Misty the prostitute's apartment in a police car will understandably spook her and fail the mission.
