Modders ‘Jessica Natalia’ and ‘Junior_Djjr’ have released a new version of the Proper Shaders mod for Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas and Vice City. This is one of the best graphics mods for these two GTA games. So, let’s see what’s in store for us.

Before continuing, I have some good and some bad news. The bad news is that this latest version is behind a Patreon wall. The good news is that it will become available to everyone on December 5th.

Right now, this latest version of Proper Shaders is in an alpha stage. This means that it has a number of bugs and glitches. This alpha phase will last until December, when the modders will fully release it to everyone.

Going into more detail, the latest version of Proper Shaders for GTA: San Andreas brings many new lighting and shadow effects. These include volumetric light beams, soft shadows, four-level dynamic shadows, and screen-space global illumination. It also adds ambient occlusion, skylight, and three-color ambient lighting.

The sky and weather get major upgrades too. You get volumetric clouds, height fog, god rays, horizon fog, rain effects, and water caustics. The mod also improves underwater visuals and adds a new water surface system.

Proper Shaders also adds many modern image effects. These include HDR, tone mapping, bloom, sun rays, LUT support, auto exposure, temporal SMAA, sharpening, and depth of field. It also improves dark scenes and reduces color banding.

Materials also look better. The mod supports normal, roughness, and metallic maps. Vehicles get PBR materials, Fresnel effects, and rain effects. The mod also adds real-time reflections and better wind effects.

The world gets better grass and objects. GPU-instanced grass can bend when you move through it. Multithreading also allows grass and other objects to appear at greater distances.

There are many smaller upgrades too. These include soft particles, better Z-fighting, first-person anti-clipping, animated pickup effects, and procedural textures. Optional effects include VHS visuals, GTA: Chinatown Wars-style outlines, and the Aurora Borealis.

Finally, Proper Shaders supports unlimited TXDP files. More than 11,000 game textures are already set up with proper values for roughness, shadows, and procedural effects.

On the other hand, the version for GTA: Vice City adds support for AMD FSR with Frame Generation. It also brings new water physics with fluid simulation and ocean wave physics. The update adds a new rain system and per-pixel lighting as well. There is also support for NVIDIA PCCS shadows, a physically based atmosphere, volumetric plane contrails, and volumetric lights.

Below, you can find two videos that showcase some of the new features of Proper Shaders. You can download the latest public version for GTA: San Andreas from this link. You can also download the latest public versions of Proper Shaders for GTA 3 and Vice City from here.

Speaking of GTA: San Andreas, here are some other cool mods for it. Multi Theft Auto is an open-source software project that adds full online support to Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. Modders are also experimenting with RTX Remix Path Tracing. Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas Mission Maker is another cool mod that lets you create your own missions. And then we have this mod that allows you to play it in VR.

As for Vice City, you can try this RTX Remix Path Tracing Mod. This mod is based on the GTA 4 RTX Remix Mod, and it requires Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Nextgen Edition. It takes a bit to configure it properly, but it can greatly improve the game’s graphics. As with most RTX Remix Mods, though, it requires a high-end GPU. Still, this is a unique experience that most Vice City fans will appreciate. And it’s free.

Another cool mod for Grand Theft Auto: Vice City NextGen Edition is this first-person mod. As its name suggests, it lets you experience Vice City via a first-person perspective. And then we have this mod, which aims to improve the handling of all cars and bikes.

Finally, we have the Grand Theft Auto: Vice City New Legacy Mod. This mod expands the original game with 25 brand-new story missions. Built using Sanny Builder and CLEO, this project delivers fresh gameplay while staying true to the classic Vice City experience.

Have fun!

John Papadopoulos

John is the founder and Editor in Chief at DSOGaming. He is a PC gaming fan and highly supports the modding and indie communities. Before creating DSOGaming, John worked on numerous gaming websites. While he is a die-hard PC gamer, his gaming roots can be found on consoles. John loved – and still does – the 16-bit consoles, and considers SNES to be one of the best consoles. Still, the PC platform won him over consoles. That was mainly due to 3DFX and its iconic dedicated 3D accelerator graphics card, Voodoo 2. John has also written a higher degree thesis on the “The Evolution of PC graphics cards.”
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