III Classic Grand Theft Auto III Glitches

[GTAKid667 12,065]

Grand Theft Auto III Glitches

Grand Theft Auto III is a game with many Glitches and Errors which can be used as ways to affect the gameplay, in most cases, making the game easier to complete. Here is a list of glitches, if you have any to add, feel free to share them below!

Walking above the Porter Tunnel Glitch
One method of reaching Staunton Island and Shoreside Vale before they're unlocked is using the Walking above the Porter Tunnel Glitch. There are two possible ways of doing this glitch - both will involve the top, concrete wall of Portel Tunnel. One way is to park the car right along the edge of the wall, in line with the tunnel and exit, and the other way is to reverse the vehicle off of the platform while facing east and exit as the door starts going over. When the player exits the vehicle, they will fall through the sea and into Blue Hell, but will land on top of the tunnel. The player can then walk along the tunnel, then jump into Blue Hell at the Staunton Island or Shoreside Vale end, so that the player can get teleported above the surface.
Videos:

 

Walking Above The Subway Tunnel Glitch
This glitch can be performed at the subway in Shoreside Vale at the airport. When the train arrives to the platform, take the very last door of the train. Enter the train and then get out again. You will automatically get teleported above the platform, standing above Blue Hell and you will see the tunnel. Jumping into Blue Hell will make you respawn on the surface of Shoreside Vale.

Taxi Driver Glitch
The player can transport people in any car besides the Taxi or Cabbie by executing the following glitch. Enter a taxi cab, and press and hold the side mission button. Keep holding the button and exit the cab. Then enter the car to whichever one the player desires (except for other vehicles with side missions). Once in the new car, release the sub-mission button and the Taxi mission will start.

Crusher Glitch (Making a Vehicle Dent Proof)
You can make any vehicle (that the crusher will accept) Damage Proof by starting ‘Taxi Driver’ (you can use the above glitch), collecting a passenger near the crusher and then park car near the crusher like in the video linked. Then Press the 'Look behind' button and without releasing it, exit from the car. Enter the vehicle as you see the grabber coming down (still keep the ‘Look Behind’ button pressed), if done correctly, you should pull the passenger out of the car. Once in the car, release the look behind button and you and the car should fall back to the ground, ending the side mission 'Taxi Driver'. Your car is now a ghost and can drive through anything, DO NOT EXIT THE CAR as you will not be able to re-enter it. As a ghost, the car will periodically get larger and ruin the handling, drive through 'blue hell' and it will respawn you and restore the cars default size and handling (it will still be a ghost).
To make the vehicle dent proof, simply drive it into your garage, exit the vehicle and leave the garage.

This is also a good trick to get to other islands early as while in Ghost mode, you can drive through the Panlantic signs in the tunnel.
Video:

 

Pause Trick (Vigilante)
Whenever you are on a Vigilante mission, get near the target car and pause the game, entering the menu screen. Immediately once you resume playing the criminal on the car will stop and proceed his/her "getaway" on foot, being much easier to kill.

"Killer Look" Glitch
While you are on foot, if there is anybody trapped under a car and you use the first person view (just look around a little bit), they will die instantly. The death will not be added to Stats Menu. This also happens if the pedestrian is trapped under the car and the player starts a mission.

Tunnel Gang Reproduction
Inside the narrow tunnel near 8-Balls Bomb Shop that runs beneath St. Mark's, there are 4 pedestrians wielding Molotovs. Drive a Bobcat into the tunnel and stop so you are in view of the gang. Get out of the Bobcat, jump on its hood, and walk up to its roof and jump back down onto its hood, 4 more of these pedestrians will spawn in the same spots. The game will freeze after at least 40 have spawned.

Breaking out of the first mission
This is a glitch which requires a mission failure - This glitch results in you being able to explore LC in the prison outfit before Give Me Liberty has begun. To do this, when 'Give Me Liberty' starts, you need to somehow flip 8 Ball and the Kuruma over (Easiest by letting fall off of something) hoping it will fail the mission - The moment the 'Mission Failed' Message comes up you need to jump, if done successfully you just appear on the bridge in free roam, you will only be able to walk forward at this point - Jumping will enable you to walk in any direction

The Portland Safehouse is locked but it can be unlocked by using the Crusher Glitch and exiting the ghost vehicle when it is inside the safehouse causing the save menu to appear, just cancel it (or save if you wish) and the door will fling open.

There will be no specific mission marker or a radar icon for "Give Me Liberty" mission, so to trigger it, Claude has to be standing in a specific place:





Porter Tunnel Glitch
If the player is driving thorugh the tunnel, particularly through the Portland and Shoreside sections of the tunnel, the player may spot cars such as the TOYZ van which appear to be hovering with their lower section (the wheels) inside the tunnel and their top section outside the tunnel.

Purple Nines Glitch
If you start a new game with Rumble completed on another save file, the Purple Nines will not spawn as they permanently disappear after that mission. This will make it impossible to complete Uzi Money and subsequent D-Ice missions, as killing randomly spawned Nines is the sole objective of the mission.

Disappearing vehicle glitch
The Disappearing Vehicle glitch is prevalent in all of the 3D era games and occasionaly in HD era games. If the player parks a car near any mission marker, and then walks into the marker to trigger the mission cutscene and starts the mission, there is a high chance that the vehicle he parked will have disappeared after the cutscene.

Walking in walls
Some walls in the game have weak spots as shown here making you able to walk into them.

Driving Through walls
Some walls/points across LC have weak spots allowing you to reverse vehicles into Blue Hell. If done at the right spots, you can reverse vehicles on to the top of the subway/tunnel allowing you to get them to other islands easily.
Use lol232's Unique Vehicle Guide for more information: http://gtaforums.com/topic/497491-grand-theft-auto-iii-unique-vehicle-guide/

 

Wear Prison Uniform
If you load a save game as soon as you start a new game, the game can occasionally glitch to make Claude wear the prison outfit from the introduction.

 

Weapon Pickup Respawn Glitch

Once you have weapon spawns at your hideout (obtained by collecting hidden packages), go to your safe hour, collect the weapons and walk into the safehouse's garage and continue walking all the way until you hit the back and the camera swings around. Once that has happened, just walk outside of the garage and the weapons should have respawed!

-Thanks to @TheMantisDied for submitting this glitch!

 

This glitches list is incomplete, some glitches have most likely been missed out by mistake. If you have any more glitches to share, post them below!

[TheMantisDied 6]

Hi guys

I found another glitch that seems to have been overlooked, so here it is

 

Free ammo glitch

 

Once you have at least 30 hidden packages, and have several guns at your safe house, go to your safe house, collect the weapons on the right, then walk into the garage, all the way to the back, so the camera swings around. Once that has happened, just walk outside the garage, and the weapons have respawned, without having to wait 6 ingame hours for them to do so. If you have the Uzi, you can max it out pretty quickly, and makes those killing sprees that much more fun!

This will also work on the second island as well, but not on Shoreside Vale.

 

Anyway, this is my first post, so let me know what you think, or if this has been covered before. I haven't seen it anywhere else, so here it is. Enjoy!

Cheers from New Zealand

[GTAKid667 12,065]

I may be incorrect, but I don't remember it taking 6 ingame hours for the weapon spawns to refresh in this game. Regardless, I've added the glitch/tip to the list, thanks for the contribution @TheMantisDied

[TheMantisDied 6]

I forgot to mention it works for both pc and ps2 versions.

[what's my name 10]

i dont know if this glitch already mentioned here but i just discovered this after viewed this site. on pc,hold look left or look right button in the car.police/thieve cant hijack you from the car anymore but you must have an uzi first. you can browse this site for better explanation about this.

 

http://www.neoseeker.com/forums/1430/t125495-locking-doors-trick/

[king_cucaracha 1]

Hi there Guys I'm new in the forum, basically just registered yell to the world about this brand new glitch

 

I've found a real weird (and really annoying glitch)

I was playing the exchange mission, and while I was running away from the bullets got too close to the containers.

Now I'm inside the container and can't get out

I've never been trough this on this game. (Is funny driving inside landing planes in GTA VC but it's not funny in a long and hard mission)

Have someone ever gone in this glitch? I've found nothing in google about this.

 

Be my guests

 

[Harerama Chakraborty 94]

Hi there Guys I'm new in the forum, basically just registered yell to the world about this brand new glitch

 

I've found a real weird (and really annoying glitch)

I was playing the exchange mission, and while I was running away from the bullets got too close to the containers.

Now I'm inside the container and can't get out

I've never been trough this on this game. (Is funny driving inside landing planes in GTA VC but it's not funny in a long and hard mission)

Have someone ever gone in this glitch? I've found nothing in google about this.

 

Be my guests

 

Welcome to the forums, king_cucaracha!

I never had this glitch. Do you have any mods installed?

[king_cucaracha 1]

Welcome to the forums, king_cucaracha!

I never had this glitch. Do you have any mods installed?

Hello Thanks. Nope, no mods at all not even no-cd Is plain install from old GTA3CD that I still keep. Maybe is another one of those collision detection bugs. It was the first time like in 20 tries that I got inside the cochrane dam in this mission with a good health level and this happened to me. Very frustrating.

[Harerama Chakraborty 94]

I believe it was just a glitch. A small glitch. If you couldn't find a way out, try loading your last save game (hopefully, if you saved before the mission). if not, I recommend blowing yourself up with explosives. It removes all your weapons, but atleast you shouldn't be stuck.

[skyeyemx 97]

Wow, a glitch thread. Finally! A similar glitch as stated above happened to me before, when a explosion launched me into Joey's Garage. I believe it is just a rare collision bug, rather than an unsolid wall.

[GlassGhost 0]

Breaking out of the first mission

This is a glitch which requires a mission failure - This glitch results in you being able to explore LC in the prison outfit before Give Me Liberty has begun. To do this, when 'Give Me Liberty' starts, you need to somehow flip 8 Ball and the Kuruma over (Easiest by letting fall off of something) hoping it will fail the mission - The moment the 'Mission Failed' Message comes up you need to jump, if done successfully you just appear on the bridge in free roam, you will only be able to walk forward at this point - Jumping will enable you to walk in any direction

 

The Portland Safehouse is locked but it can be unlocked by using the Crusher Glitch and exiting the ghost vehicle when it is inside the safehouse causing the save menu to appear, just cancel it (or save if you wish) and the door will fling open.

 

There will be no specific mission marker or a radar icon for "Give Me Liberty" mission, so to trigger it, Claude has to be standing in a specific place. I have used my super experienced Art Skills below to show the location of the invisible mission trigger point, highlighted in blue. Use the radar from the screenshot to navigate yourself to this point.

 

 

Tried to do this like 20 times in a row, cannot reproduce; does this work on PC version?

[fnxrak 708]

Yeah it works the best way I was able to make it work is by putting the Kuruma on top of the bridge road middle separator and pushing it until it falls if the car stays flipped then just jump down the bridge while the mission failed screen shows

Edited February 7, 2015 by fnxrak

[GlassGhost 0]

Yeah it works the best way I was able to make it work is by putting the Kuruma on top of the bridge road middle separator and pushing it until it falls if the car stays flipped then just jump down the bridge while the mission failed screen shows

 

I did it by jumping to fall like you said, Thanks again!

[WildBrick142 25,925]

Figured I'll add some more glitches that may help out or bug things out completely.

 

Infinite ammo from some Rampages

Any rampage that requires you to blow up vehicles can be used to get you infinite ammo. All you have to do is blow up a few vehicles and hit F1 to replay. Cars blown up during replays count towards the rampage. As long as you complete the rampage within a replay, you will keep infinite ammo. It stacks with any existing ammo you have - for example if you have 4 Rocket Launcher ammo, you will get 30000 ammo (29996 and the existing 4).

 

TOYZ Rampage high score

Blow up a gang vehicle (that you're supposed to blow up) and hit F1 to replay. You can do this repeatedly to increase the score but it's a little harder than Rampages; vehicles take a while to blow up during replays and if your camera goes off the view the "wreck" either despawns or stops burning so it won't blow up. Recording a replay of you blowing up a chain of gang vehicles might work but I haven't tried that.

 

Replay Cop Bribes

Stand on a cob bribe, force replays multiple times (so that the last replay is of you standing directly on the bribe) and save it (F2). If you have a wanted level, just load the replay (F3) and cancel it (F1) once you hear something being picked up which means you lost the wanted star. This is useful in some missions with high wanted levels (for example: "A Drop in the Ocean". Pick up all packages, then F3 F1 F3 F1 F3 F1 F3 F1 F3 F1 and your wanted level will be gone completely). The cop bribe does not despawn on replays so there's no wait time.

 

Becoming fireproof

Set yourself on fire from a burning ped or a molotov then replay when you're burning. Next time you will go on fire you won't lose any health. This isn't a permanent effect.

 

MP3 Player in Police Car

Press F9. This will tune in to mp3 player radio station (if you have it). Doesn't work for other emergency vehicles. Pausing game or exiting the car switches off the radio. Also works on Barracks OL.

 

Enforcer and other items from info pickups

Go to the Portland Police Station with a vehicle that can start side missions. Hold look back and exit the vehicle. Walk into the pickup and wait until Diablo Stallion and Police Cars spawn. Let go of look back to start and fail the side mission. This will glitch you out of the pickup and will not despawn things spawned by the pickup. You can enter the Enforcer and deliver it to the crane. Or you could kill the SWAT guys. Whatever. It can be done only once so if you screw up there's no more chance (unless you reload).

 

Cloning missions/instant mission passing

Go to the exact spot where a rampage would be. Save replay there (like in cop bribe replay glitch you must be standing on the icon when you load the saved replay). Then stand in front of a mission marker and walk into it, activating the replay/rampage at the exact same time. You would be active on a mission and a rampage simultaneously if done right. Complete the rampage and this will allow you to walk into mission marker again. Walk into the marker and you will start the mission again, having both of them on at the same time. Then kill yourself and you will get a "Wasted!" and "Mission Passed!" screen. The mission counts as complete and you still get the % for "completing" the mission.

 

Also if some missions require you to pick up a weapon and have an icon on the radar (Ammu-Nation gun) that radar icon/weapon pickup will stay there for good (or until you reload, I dunno).

 

List of missions that can be cloned: http://www.speedrun.com/gtaiii/thread/bse91

 

Cloning Taxi passengers

Park a cop car and a taxi in garage (I dunno if it works outside the garage) and a third vehicle you would use for taxi driver outside the garage. Get in the cop car, hold the look back button. Then get in the taxi, keep holding the look back button. And finally, get in your car and let go of look back button to start the mission. Any passenger you drop off will actually add +2 fares complete instead of the usual +1 fares complete. You can continue dropping off passengers, sometimes even the same one that will instantly re-enter your taxi until you complete 100 fares.

 

The problem is, you have to know exactly where you're going. Once you pick up the first passenger you will get two map blips, only the destination written on screen counts. Also if you do, for example, 10 in a row (score: 20) you will have a ton of useless blips on the radar that will stay there for good (even if you save and reload). Also there will be a lot of fake peds that will never enter your taxi and some peds will enter your taxi without having an arrow over them (so you have to look out for whoever's waving). You would have to restart the side mission to remove the fake peds.

 

With this trick you have to only drop off 50 passengers and that will be counted as 100 passengers. After the mission only the useless blips remain on the minimap. You can also clone the side mission more times (you could make it so you drop off 5 passengers for every passenger) but that's a level of glitching you may want to avoid.

 

EDIT: Did some research on that. It works only on a brand new save (means you can't load a save) but you can do it just about anywhere, not only in garages. Also you have to hold caps lock instead of middle mouse button

 

 

I do not take credit for any of these findings.

Edited August 21, 2015 by WildBrick142

[Lethal Vaccine 7,181]

Pretty cool, especially the Taxi Cloning. Too bad it's all PC Exclusive for the most part

 

Also, it's technically not infinite ammo, just the ammo cap. It will count down gradually as you use the ammo and when it gets to 9999 or below, you will see it less. Too bad The Exchange makes you lose all your weapons, though, resulting in having to start over getting them...

[Nick007J 276]

Figured I'll add some more glitches that may help out or bug things out completely.

 

I'll make some small notes to this list

 

Becoming fireproof

Set yourself on fire from a burning ped or a molotov then replay when you're burning. Next time you will go on fire you won't lose any health. This isn't a permanent effect.

Side effect is inability to use sniper rifle and rocket launcher.

 

 

Cloning missions/instant mission passing

Go to the exact spot where a rampage would be. Save replay there (like in cop bribe replay glitch you must be standing on the icon when you load the saved replay). Then stand in front of a mission marker and walk into it, activating the replay/rampage at the exact same time. You would be active on a mission and a rampage simultaneously if done right. Complete the rampage and this will allow you to walk into mission marker again. Walk into the marker and you will start the mission again, having both of them on at the same time. Then kill yourself and you will get a "Wasted!" and "Mission Passed!" screen. The mission counts as complete and you still get the % for "completing" the mission.

 

Also if some missions require you to pick up a weapon and have an icon on the radar (Ammu-Nation gun) that radar icon/weapon pickup will stay there for good (or until you reload, I dunno).

 

List of missions that can be cloned: http://www.speedrun.com/gtaiii/thread/bse91

Much safer method is to get in an emergency vehicle and press Caps Lock and F3 at the same time (assuming the replay is already stored). Then cancel side-mission, start the necessary mission and wait for rampage to fail (completing it will be almost impossible, unless it's a "blow up vehicles" one) or fail it with a method descriped lower. Then mission can be activated once again.

 

 

Infinite ammo from some Rampages

 

Any rampage that requires you to blow up vehicles can be used to get you infinite ammo. All you have to do is blow up a few vehicles and hit F1 to replay. Cars blown up during replays count towards the rampage. As long as you complete the rampage within a replay, you will keep infinite ammo. It stacks with any existing ammo you have - for example if you have 4 Rocket Launcher ammo, you will get 30000 ammo (29996 and the existing 4).

Alternative way is to record a replay "in the future". For example, load a save, wait for 3 minutes, save a rampage replay. Then reload a save, start a rampage via replay and start replay once again. Rampage will fail and ammo will remain. Moreover, you don't even need replay to involve a rampage. You can pick up a normal rampage and activate any replay from the future.

 

 

Enforcer and other items from info pickups

 

Go to the Portland Police Station with a vehicle that can start side missions. Hold look back and exit the vehicle. Walk into the pickup and wait until Diablo Stallion and Police Cars spawn. Let go of look back to start and fail the side mission. This will glitch you out of the pickup and will not despawn things spawned by the pickup. You can enter the Enforcer and deliver it to the crane. Or you could kill the SWAT guys. Whatever. It can be done only once so if you screw up there's no more chance (unless you reload).

 

Not every sub-mission works. Using vigilante for this will crash the game. If I remember correctly, firefighter crashes it too. Taxi and Paramedic work though.

 

 

Cloning Taxi passengers

 

Park a cop car and a taxi in garage (I dunno if it works outside the garage) and a third vehicle you would use for taxi driver outside the garage. Get in the cop car, hold the look back button. Then get in the taxi, keep holding the look back button. And finally, get in your car and let go of look back button to start the mission. Any passenger you drop off will actually add +2 fares complete instead of the usual +1 fares complete. You can continue dropping off passengers, sometimes even the same one that will instantly re-enter your taxi until you complete 100 fares.

 

The problem is, you have to know exactly where you're going. Once you pick up the first passenger you will get two map blips, only the destination written on screen counts. Also if you do, for example, 10 in a row (score: 20) you will have a ton of useless blips on the radar that will stay there for good (even if you save and reload). Also there will be a lot of fake peds that will never enter your taxi and some peds will enter your taxi without having an arrow over them (so you have to look out for whoever's waving). You would have to restart the side mission to remove the fake peds.

 

With this trick you have to only drop off 50 passengers and that will be counted as 100 passengers. After the mission only the useless blips remain on the minimap. You can also clone the side mission more times (you could make it so you drop off 5 passengers for every passenger) but that's a level of glitching you may want to avoid.

 

EDIT: Did some research on that. It works only on a brand new save (means you can't load a save) but you can do it just about anywhere, not only in garages. Also you have to hold caps lock instead of middle mouse button

An important addition to this is that this method should not be used before you complete Bait. If you don't do it prior to taxi glitching, yakuza will shoot you and not Colombians in Bait. This is a programming error that only doesn't happen normally because usually game doesn't exceed hardcoded limit of 32 radar blips, but in fact overflow is not handled correctly and it results in small memory corruption. And indeed this method stops working after reloading a save.

 

 

 

 

is the video in question. The "yellowing" happens towards the end of the video.

sorry for the bump, but that video is fake. you dont get wasted by having the screen flash white and without the wasted message

 

 

Can't say about video but the glitch is real. However, the color may be yellow and may be violet.

[crashoverride93 121]

 

Hi there Guys I'm new in the forum, basically just registered yell to the world about this brand new glitch

 

I've found a real weird (and really annoying glitch)

I was playing the exchange mission, and while I was running away from the bullets got too close to the containers.

Now I'm inside the container and can't get out

I've never been trough this on this game. (Is funny driving inside landing planes in GTA VC but it's not funny in a long and hard mission)

Have someone ever gone in this glitch? I've found nothing in google about this.

 

Be my guests

 

Welcome to the forums, king_cucaracha!

I never had this glitch. Do you have any mods installed?

I had a simarlar glitch to this the otherday on a pesonal save when a cartel goon pulled me out of a car while I was really close to a create you know like a small wooden one that cant be smashed. I was playing the miision where you had to lead the death squads to pike creek death squad goon pulled me out of the car while near the create and I couldent get out. Bait was the mission I was doing. By the way there seems to be two varrients of a small wooden crate one can be smashed and one cant the one in pike creek is not smashable Edited March 3, 2016 by crashoverride93

[njp66 2]

I have also experienced what I believe is a collision-related glitch.

It happened when I was driving over to SSV from SI, like I stole it, which I did of course! Anyway, the bell for the lift bridge was ringing, which I ignored.

 

However... The bridge started to lift just as my front wheel crossed onto it. My car leapt into the air & nose-dived towards the bridge deck. What was remarkable is that the car passed straight through the bridge deck and I was fish food in the river. This was such an unusual event I wish that I had a recording of it. The bridge deck ought to be solid, even when in motion, because you can ride it up & down if you wish.

[njp66 2]

Is there any PC-specific way to execute the Taxi Glitch & Crusher Glitch.

I managed to make the Ambulance a ghost one time only, but I can't remember what I did.

When I try the Taxi glitch I do 'look behind' & hold the mission button.

The magnetic grab of the crane comes down. If you press to enter the vehicle as the grab is coming the grab lifts away and the taxi is not damage proof or a ghost. If you allow the grab to start to lift the taxi it cannot be re-entered.

[Lethal Vaccine 7,181]

Making Emergency Vehicles Ghost/DP is written in the GTA III Special Vehicle Guide. fnxrak found a Method to make Emergency Vehicles DP on PC. Probably exclusive to PC, though, since on PC you can change the Button Layout and it's very limited on Console, if possible at all...

[Nick007J 276]

There is another replay related (therefore PC only) glitch in III. As seen on the video, if player activates a replay at the end of train exiting animation, player is teleported:

 

Player is teleported to a where train he exits was in the replay (this data is stored as replay data) when it was cancelled or ended. It works with both Portland trains (there are 2 of them) and underground trains (4). Replay activation timing has to be precise for it to work. On rare occasions game may crash when replay is activated.

[4emp2008 5]

Teleport has been found!
Teleport happens if you go to any train car and immediately exit by pressing the on / off repeat at a time when changes to the camera view

 

[Mr JoeStalin 2,752]

@GTAKid667 Can you show us your art skills again by uploading the image with 'Give Me Liberty' marker since tinypic is not longer in existence...

[GTAKid667 12,065]

I think it's probably for the best that my artistic abilities are kept out of public view, but luckily a few years ago I made a new one for the Chain Game with an actual in-game marker which shows it much better!

 

[Mr JoeStalin 2,752]

I just noticed that if you do a stunt jump with a ghost car (I did the USJ under the Callahan Bridge), the cars falls into blue hell thus the game cannot recognize a landing and hence the cutscene plays infinitely.