Case study

Grand Theft Auto: a Windows static recompilation of the 1997 game

Grand Theft Auto translates the 1997 Windows game's x86 executable into C and links it with modern replacements for Win32, DirectDraw and sound services. The repository supplies a runtime, import bridges and analysis tools; the author reports that the translated game reaches its title screen and city-selection menu. Related executables for GTA London and GTA2 are also investigated.

Targets: Game
Category: Independent reconstruction cases
Relationship: Independent reconstruction project
Sources reviewed: 2026-11-06
Evidence class: C2 code & docs, no demo or download

Stars: 16
Last commit: 2026-08-26
Language: C
License (GitHub): MIT

GitHub data as of 2026-11-10

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Evidence

Observed: Code, documentation and a demo observed; no download method found.
Checked: 2026-11-09

How evidence classes are assigned

Requirements & limits

Prerequisites: The user's own original Grand Theft Auto executable and extracted game data.
Prerequisites: Windows Win32 build with Visual Studio 2022, CMake 3.20+, Python 3.10+, capstone, pefile and pcrecomp.
Limits: The front end does not yet start a loaded city.
License: MIT License.

Cite

BibTeX

@misc{grand-theft-auto-1997-recomp-case,
  title = {{Grand Theft Auto: a Windows static recompilation of the 1997 game}},
  howpublished = {\url{https://github.com/sp00nznet/gta}},
  url = {https://github.com/sp00nznet/gta},
  urldate = {2026-11-06},
  note = {Awesome REA entry: \url{https://awesomerea.org/resources/grand-theft-auto-1997-recomp-case/}}
}

Plain text

Grand Theft Auto: a Windows static recompilation of the 1997 game. https://github.com/sp00nznet/gta (accessed 2026-11-06). Awesome REA entry: https://awesomerea.org/resources/grand-theft-auto-1997-recomp-case/

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About this entry

The description was reviewed against primary sources.

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Primary sources

README.md GitHub · sp00nznet/gta · Revision 61182a9
docs/PROGRESS.md GitHub · sp00nznet/gta · Revision 61182a9