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This Crazy Mod Makes Grand Theft Auto V Look Like Real Life

1 minute read

Sick of claims about photorealistic games? Here’s one that delivers.

Grand Theft Auto V (see TIME’s review here) was already a swanky visual buffet played on a high-end computer at 4K resolution with the detail needles buried. But mod-maker NaturalVision’s remastered version refurbishes everything to…well, let’s just say there are moments here I can’t tell whether I’m looking at a simulation or one of those tourism and convention board videos.

NaturalVision, which has been doing this for a while, describes its new mod as “a complete overhaul of the original,” adding that “changes were made to the environmental weathers [sic], lighting system, ambient colors and tonemapping in order to blur the line between fantasy and reality.”

The whole thing reportedly took over 1,200 hours spread across six months. I can’t begin to fathom the kind of PC muscle you’ll need to pull this off at buttery smooth frame rates. You can download the mod here.

Anyone else care to sing the first two lines of Bohemian Rhapsody with me?

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Write to Matt Peckham at matt.peckham@time.com