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GTA 3 was made more realistic with newspapers and flyers lying around on the streets, and it was former Rockstar developer and current provider of behind-the-scenes content Obbe Vermeij who put them there because the game "looked too clean."
The litter you see is a rectangle that moves with the wind and can be dragged along by cars. "If a car moved above a certain speed it would (once every few frames) check the area just behind it for litter. Any litter found not currently in an animation would be dragged," the developer explained.
There are only 4 textures for litter: 2 newspapers and 2 leaves. Here is how they move, according to Vermeij:
For each ‘hop’ the animation consists of:
- Movement along the ground. Further if it’s windy.
- Movement up and down along a sinus function.
- Rotation of the rectangle.
- More hops occur when it’s windy.
Vice City also had the feature, with one of the 4 textures changing to Candy Suxxx's show flyer after one of the missions. However, you might notice it missing in San Andreas. Although Vermeij wanted it there, some other developers didn't agree:
"Not everyone on the team liked the litter. I removed it for San Andreas because I eventually lost the argument."
One of the reasons for getting rid of it was the slower rendering time because it uses immediate mode polygons. And, of course, not everybody liked the sight of litter overall.
Speaking of rendering, Vermeij also revealed that Rockstar had to slow players down so models had time to load properly, and this is also why you couldn't fly in GTA 3.
You can find all kinds of interesting production tricks on Vermeij's X/Twitter, like how San Andreas' mirrors were made and why planes randomly crashed there.
Check it out before the GTA 6 release, which Vermeij thinks might disappoint some fans.
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This project includes assets, maps, materials, Blueprints, and effects created in the Unreal Engine. Each asset was created for realistic AAA quality visuals, style, and budget.