Best GTA IV Mods - Grand Theft Fans

About
Latest Posts

Beginning his gaming journey in 1993 SNES as an avid Super Mario World fan, his passion for games led him into journalism in 2019. When he's not cranking 90s in Pleasant Park, he can often be found playing the latest releases including Resident Evil, The Legend of Zelda, and Grand Theft Auto.

Bottom Line Up Front

There are hundreds of GTA IV mods available online for you to download for free to alter the way you play the game. These can range from simple mods such as adding a new character model or weapon to the game. To completely overhaul how the game is played.

Such as the LCPDFR mod that puts you in the shoes of a police officer rather than a criminal. This list aims to bring you the best possible mods for GTA IV across a wide range of applications from the styles mentioned previously. As well as mods to overhaul and improve the game’s graphics to make them more realistic.

Before we get into the list, here are some of my favorites. If you only want to download a couple of mods, try to ensure it is these ones.

Simple Trainer For GTAIV:

The Simple Trainer mod allows you to add cheats into the game, which the GTA series is known for. Some cheats include gaining infinite health, all weapons and ammo, and the ability to spawn in objects and vehicles and teleport to any part of the map you want.

This is a fun mod for having carefree fun and going on rampages. Or saving yourself time when you need to get to a particular part of the map or to find a specific vehicle.

LCPDFR:

LCPDFR is one of the first total conversion mods that completely changes how GTA IV is played. The mod puts you in the shoes of law enforcement as you take down criminals and solve crimes rather than being the one committing them. LCPDFR proved to be such a hit that the team brought the mod to

GTA V:

As LSPDFR. The mod shares similarities with GTA Role Playing. This popular online conversion mod sees players take on the role of the public as they live their lives and work jobs with hundreds of other gamers on the same server.

Realistic Driving & Flying

This mod helps to make your driving experience more lifelike. All 170 vehicles in GTA IV have been individually modified to reflect how they drive and act in real life. The mod also adds a speedometer for a more realistic experience.

Spiderman IV

This mod transforms Niko into Spiderman. It lets you swing across Liberty City and use Spider Sense just like if you were playing a Spiderman game. This isn’t a simple character model swap. This completely changes the game and adds a new level of depth and fun.

4K Ultra HD Graphics

Since GTA IV was first released in 2008, a lot has changed. GTA IV saw the series move into the HD era for the first time. The previous mainline entry San Andreas was released one year before consoles were capable of HD. But, it is now 2022 at the time of writing this, and things have progressed beyond 720p.

This mod changes every texture in the game to 4K thanks to the painstaking effort of the modders involved. As expected, GTA IV looks a lot more realistic and like a modern title. When combined with other mods on this list, such as Realistic Driving & Flying, it is almost as if you’re playing a remaster of the game.

The History Of GTA IV Mods

Mods have been a part of the Grand Theft Auto series since the franchise’s early days, with the very first game from 1997 featuring a dedicated modding community.

This trend has continued throughout the following years, with every game in the series seeing creators bring mods to the game, each becoming more elaborate than the last as technology advanced. GTA IV saw mods become larger and more ambitious as the series entered the HD era. These include conversion mods that bring new mechanics and gameplay elements to GTA IV and many characters and weapon mods to enhance the experience.

Unfortunately, some of the more ambitious mods created were abandoned before completion due to the sheer amount of work needed. But, they helped lay the groundwork for what would be achieved with GTA V. Such as GTA Roleplay which has become one of the most popular ways to play Grand Theft Auto today.

Essential Software To Mod GTA IV

OpenIV

OpenIV is an essential piece of software to mod files in GTA IV, as well as GTA V and Max Payne 3. By using OpenIV, you can modify the game files, allowing mods to be installed. This piece of software can be a little tricky to start, but plenty of tutorials are available to help if you get stuck with it.

Mod Loader

The Mod Loader is exactly what the name implies. It is a piece of software that allows you to easily import mods into GTA IV and activate and deactivate them at the click of a button. This mod is the easiest way to mod the game and doesn’t require any technical know-how to get started.

The Best GTA IV Mods

Simple Trainer For GTAIV

Cheats and GTA go hand in hand and have long been a key part of the game. Millions of us spent many hours causing havoc by using cheats to unlock all weapons, maximize ammo, gain infinite health and then go on a 5-star rampage.

Cheats have become less prominent in games recently, but the Simple Trainer mod brings them all back. This mod allows you to access the usual cheats, such as all weapons and infinite health. As well as the ability to teleport across the map and spawn in objects and vehicles, as well as many other features that are too long to list.

Grand Theft Auto IV Beta Mod

Throughout a game’s development, many ideas are often planned and later scrapped, with some being created and added to the game for some time. GTA IV is no different, and there was quite a lot of cut content that we never got to play.

A group of modders has added a lot of the removed content from GTA IV back into the game, allowing us to explore a version of the game that we were never meant to see. If you’re into video game preservation and game development like me, this is something that you will find really interesting.

LCPDFR

The GTA series sees you play as a career criminal as you build your empire and fortune. But did you know that the original concept for the series was cops vs. robbers? The LCPDFR mod looks to bring that concept back by putting you in the shoes of law enforcement as you take down the criminals of Liberty City.

This is one of the franchise’s best overhaul mods, and the idea was brought over to GTA V too. LCPDFR also likely inspired what would eventually become GTA Role Playing.

GTA 4 Zombie Apocalypse

What would a GTA mod list be without a zombie apocalypse mod? Thankfully, you’re in luck because GTA IV has a mod to let you fight off hordes of the undead. As with other titles such as GTA V, this zombie apocalypse mod is a lot of fun and completely overhauls the game. It’s not something you can play for dozens of hours, but it is a mod that every player should try.

Liberty City Customs

Los Santos Customs is one of the best additions to GTA V and something long overdue in the series. Modders have taken the concept and brought it over to GTA IV with Liberty City Customs, which allows you to modify vehicles in the game by changing car parts and respraying them.

GTA IV Snow Mod

New York City, the city that Liberty City is based on, looks beautiful when it snows. Most of us have seen it in person or in dozens of TV shows and movies. Now, you can experience it in GTA IV with the Snow Mod that covers the roads, buildings, and trees in snow. This great visual mod changes up the game subtly and is fun to use every now and then for a change of scenery.

Realistic Driving & Flying

When playing any GTA game, you will spend most of your time in a vehicle. This means that if the experience can be enhanced, then I am all for it.

The Realistic Driving & Flying mod overhauls the driving mechanics in the game by adding new realistic physics for each of the 170 vehicles in the game, with each vehicle being tweaked to make everyone as realistic as possible. This makes this an essential mod as the vehicle physics aren’t the best in the vanilla game.

Death Race IV

Death Race IV is based on the 2008 movie directed by Paul W.S. Anderson of the same name. This mod brings elements of the movie into the game, such as armored and weapon-equipped cars and vehicles. Unfortunately, this mod never saw completion due to the amount of work that would be required. Still, it is fun to play about with what the modders managed to create before abandoning the project.

Spiderman IV

Spiderman is from New York City, the city that Liberty City is based on, so it only makes sense for him to come to GTA IV as a mod. This mod is incredibly detailed, allowing you to swing around the city using webs and even activate Spider-Sense to see nearby dangers, just like in Spiderman games.

American Sleep

The American Sleep mod is a collection of mods that come together to expand the game drastically. The mod adds features such as eating and hydration survival mechanics, as well as a notoriety system similar to Assassin’s Creed, allowing cops to remember you and arrest and charge you for past crimes if they spot you.

Your money earned from your empire is now stored in your bank account and needs to be withdrawn and deposited through ATMs like GTA Online. There are also a lot of realism changes, including improvements to the traffic in the game, realistic driving, and changes to weapon mechanics. This is a fantastic gameplay overhaul mod that is a must-play.

GTA IV: San Andreas

This is another mod that was unfortunately abandoned before completion, but it is fully functional and worth playing. The mod ports over the entirety of GTA San Andreas into GTA IV’s RAGE engine, including the map, vehicles, weapons, and even CJ the protagonist of San Andreas.

This allows you to experience San Andreas in a newer engine with HD graphics. This is an incredibly ambitious mod, and it is a shame we will never see its full potential.

GTA IV For Extreme Low PC’s

GTA IV was released in 2008, meaning that most of us should have no problem playing this game today over a decade later. But, if you play video games on a literal potato, then this mod might be one you’re interested in.

4K Ultra HD Graphics

I have grouped the graphics mods together because they all essentially do the same thing by replacing and enhancing the textures in the game. However, it really comes down to personal preference as to which one you prefer. Some of them aim for a more realistic New York City vibe, while some come across as too shiny, and some upscale to 4K, such as this mod. So, it really comes down to which one you prefer.

This 4K Ultra HD Graphics mod replaces all of the textures in the game with high-detailed 4K textures. Because the textures are 4K, it means that you will need a very high-end PC to be able to take full advantage of this mod.

Grand Theft Auto IV – Ultimate Textures v.2.0

Ultimate Textures is another graphics mod, with this one aiming to provide photorealism graphics in the game. One of the most significant improvements is the road textures that look almost lifelike and are certainly some of the best I’ve ever seen in a video game.

VIVA New York Mod

As mentioned throughout this list, Liberty City is based on New York City. The VIVA New York mod takes locations inspired by New York City and changes them to match the real-life equivalent, such as building names and logos found in the city.

FAQs

Question: Which city is GTA IV set in?

Answer: GTA IV is set in the fictional city of Liberty City, one of the most iconic locations in the series.

Question: Which GTA games are set in Liberty City?

Answer: Liberty City has been home to many different GTA games throughout the years. The first ever GTA game released in 1997 was partly set in Liberty City, with Vice City and San Andreas being included. Liberty City next made an appearance in GTA 3, the first time the series made the jump to 3D. In later years it has also been the location for GTA: Liberty City Stories, GTA: Chinatown Wars, and finally GTA IV and its two DLC expansion packs, The Lost and Damned and The Ballad of Gay Tony.

Question: Which city is Liberty City based on?

Answer: Liberty City is based on New York City in the United States of America.

Conclusion

GTA IV has a Metacritic score of 98/100, making it the third highest-rated game of all time, and with good reason. The game ushered the series into the HD era, being the first game in the Grand Theft Auto franchise to be released on an HD-capable console, releasing on the PS3 and Xbox 360.

Although GTA IV does look and feel slightly dated when playing it today, looking through a 2008 lens, gaming really didn’t get better than this at the time. That said, it is still an enjoyable game to play today, something I did shortly before writing this guide.

If you played GTA IV back upon its initial release, or you’ve jumped into Liberty City more recently, mods are a great way to give you another reason to explore one of the greatest games of all time in a whole new way.