What Could Have Been / Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas

Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas is a very huge game, even today. Yet, to say quite a bit was cut would be an understatement. In fact, YouTuber Vadim M. has done quite a few videos on beta GTA SA content, as well as other GTA games, finding out even MORE unused content!

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Missions

• Due to the Definitive Edition accidentally leaking studio files, it was found out that there was supposed to be a mission for C.R.A.S.H involving CJ having to drive Tenpenny's car with Hernandez's body in the trunk while avoiding road blocks, then escape from a chopper and finally burying the body in the desert airstrip through a minigame. The reason why it was cut is unknown, although probably because it was too ambitious (it would be the only mission, aside from '"End of the Line", divided into three acts). It's believed that the mission "High Noon" was made to replace it late in development, which would explain the jarring differences between said mission cutscenes and actual gameplay. More information can be found here.
• The mission "Doberman" as-seen in the final game is repurposed from a completely different mission that was cut, which would've seen Tenpenny ordering CJ to murder an informant named Poncho in East Los Santos to prevent him from potentially talking to the DEA about C.R.A.S.H.'s corruption (the name "Doberman" references the original introductory cutscene, where Tenpenny said it as a nickname for CJ). This was changed to Sweet asking CJ to help kill a former member of the Grove Street Families in Glen Park who had defected to the Ballas; despite the change, after finding the traitor, he still exclaims that "Tenpenny set him up". The cut mission is unusual in that the audio for the introductory cutscene is still in the game files. More leftover audios imply that police cordoning off the area was a thing in the original mission.
• "King In Exile" and "Fish In A Barrel" were originally full missions, instead of the mere cutscenes in the final game. The former would have required escorting Cesar and Kendl from the Verdant Bluffs observatory to Angel Pine while being attacked by rival gangs. The latter would have required escorting Ran Fa Li to the Four Dragons casino while being attacked by the Leone mafia (who would have been disguised in public as a carnival). Interestingly, the initial cutscene for "Fish In A Barrel" had CJ being concerned about Rosenberg, Paul and Maccer's safety, with Woozie asking if CJ is getting too soft. In the phone call that unlocks "Breaking the Bank at Caligula's", Woozie still makes reference to this moment, which in the final game is a non-sequitur.
• "Beat Down on B Dup" originally finished with CJ taking Big Bear to rehab himself (instead of Sweet doing so). In the process, Big Bear would provide a bit of context about the five years where CJ was absent.
• "Life Is A Beach" originally took place in Playa del Seville, and the party was organized by the Seville Boulevard Families.
• "Photo Opportunity" originally involved a helicopter, where Cesar and CJ would be taking photos from (that explains why they're shouting at each other in the final mission despite being at the same spot). It's been said that the reason to the change is that Cesar later mentions that he's afraid of heights, but nothing has ever been confirmed.
• According to the Definitive Edition, "Monster" was initially very different, playing more like "Nice Package" from Vice City Stories than as the final version. It's also worth mentioning that the texts mention Toreno by his name (in the final version, CJ doesn't know Toreno is alive at that point).
• The mission "Saint Mark's Bistro" was originally going to have the player chase the target through the streets of Portland Island. Due to the large amount of work that would've been needed to implement an entire district of a city for one mission, the mission was instead placed inside the Bistro, with only a few shots of the outside area during a cutscene. This explains why so much of Portland is modeled in the mission area, despite going nearly completely unused outside of establishing shots.
• "Green Goo" originally made much more clear that what you're stealing has an alien origin.
• The cut mission "All-Terrain Take Down" involved CJ going after a Russian mobster, under instructions from the now clean Big Bear, in order to find out Big Smoke's hideout. In the final game, Sweet just finds out on his own after taking over enough territories. Interestingly, the cut mission involved taking Vagos territories in Market (which isn't gang controlled at any point of the final game).
• The cut mission "The Truth Is Out There" has become quite infamous. What's known from leftover strings is that it would have been the last mission of the desert storyline, the mission was given by Truth, it took place in Bayside, it was about helping Truth escape from FBI agents who were chasing him for wandering around Area 69, and somehow involved a helicopter (it's unknown whether the helicopter was the player's or the enemy's). Dialogue hints that CJ was not alone for that mission. The mission was likely cut before much work was done, given the unpolished state of the strings. It's worth mentioning that nothing in the leftover strings suggests that the FBI Truck was involved in the mission, despite some rumors.
• The cut mission "Impounded" was given by Cesar after "High Stakes, Low Rider": CJ visits Cesar after the race, and after CJ's car gets towed to the police compound, CJ drives there to take it back, loses the wanted level and drives back to Cesar's garage (which was originally a modding garage for lowriders, besides Loco Low Co). This cut mission would have served as an introduction for the compound mechanic for despawned cars that is still present in the final game, and it's unusual in that it's quite complete for a cut mission: lots of leftover strings could be found in the final game, and even more were found in the Definitive Edition.
• More cut missions include "Roadside Assistance" (a Wang Cars mission between "Test Drive" and "Customs Fast Track", nothing else is known about it), "Tanked Up" (a Zero mission where CJ had to use a RC Tiger against some RC Bandits sent by Berkley), and an unnamed mission from CRASH (which involved setting up a bomb on a bridge to steal a van.
• The relationship between Ran Fa Li and Woozie is that the former is a high ranking member of the Triads, while the latter is a mid ranking member who's trying to get the former's favor. While in the final game this isn't really explored and Ran Fa Li is a very minor character, a cut mission involved assassinating a Triad boss who was a rival of Woozie. The mission is overall quite strange, and apparently it involved the gimp suit at one point.
• Another cut mission of the desert storyline (presumably for Toreno) involved flying a Rustler and escorting a second plane to the San Fierro airport.
• Madd Dogg originally had more missions for the player. In particular, one mission originally available before the attempted suicide, has several leftover strings in the Definitive Edition, but they're extremely confusing and it's not clear what the mission was about. Furthermore, "Cut Throat Business" originally didn't feature OG Loc, and instead involved Madd Dogg and CJ approaching the record label on a helicopter (which, for some reason, was guarded by goons with rocket launchers).
• The quarry missions were initially much less convoluted, involving merely dropping and removing rocks from several locations around the map (although there were still several levels).

Characters

• According to Rockstar, they played around with the idea of multiple protagonists for this game, presumably one for each city. While this was eventually dropped, it resurfaced later in GTA V. The idea was scrapped because of hardware limitations, but some of the code still remains in the files, and this could explain C.J.'s slight personality quirks throughout the storyline.
• Tommy Vercetti was supposed to make a cameo appearance, but Ray Liotta was under the impression that he was underpaid and refused to return.
• Sweet, Big Smoke, Ryder and Kendl all had very different designs in the beta. Interestingly, a statue in the Crack Palace shows Big Smoke as he was in the beta, instead of his final design, and the beta model for Kendl is used during the mission "High Stakes, Low Rider".
• OG Loc was originally called "MC Strap"; his final name is thus unrelated to the original Families name of "Orange Grove Families" (see below), since he got his final name after the Families had already been renamed to "Grove Street Families".
• Berkley was originally called Melvin, and had a few lines. Madd Dogg was originally called Dr. G.
• There is a model for the fat Big Bear completely unused, in contrast to his emaciated look in his sole appearances in two cutscenes, one in early game and other one late game.
• Cut NPCs include deputies for patrolling around the countryside and motor officers for San Fierro and Las Venturas.
• Tramps were originally supposed to behave more improperly, doing things such as urinating, sitting on the pavement, and walking drunk. The script, while still present, is very glitchy if re-added.
• The girlfriend Katie was supposed to be met inside the San Fierro Gym. At some point it was "temporarily" moved to her current location, but the programmers apparently just forgot to move her back.

Gangs

• Originally, all gang turfs would have been shown in the map (as opposed to the final game, where only GSF, Ballas and Vagos turfs are shown). The colors would have been: cyan for Aztecas, blue for Rifas, red for Triads, brown for Da Nang Boys, and gray for Mafia. These colors could actually be seen without a cheating device in early versions of the game due to a glitch occurring when flying far out into the ocean. Doing so would corrupt various bits of data on the save file, including gang territories, which could cause the unused gang turf colors to appear on the map.
• Grove Street Families were originally called the Orange Grove Families, and the Ballas were originally called the Flats. "Orange Grove Families" is still referenced in some CJ lines, several graffitis around Los Santos, and an available tattoo for CJ. It's worth noting that, despite the Families' original name, there's almost no proof for the Families having ever used orange instead of green (only a couple of old artworks for Big Smoke and OG Loc).
• Rifas had originally their own graffitis that could be sprayed over, and very early in development, were originally called "Los Cabras".
• The Mafia was originally like any other gang, and could appear on the streets (around the Caligula) with their own cars and weapons. They're still on the files, completely functional, and can be added without problem using glitches or external tools.
• The Russian Mafia has several unused assets that suggest they may have been intended to be a full gang at one point of development.

Locations

• Las Venturas was originally called "Las Venturra", and San Fierro "San Fiero", early in development.
• An analysis of old race maps shows several changes in Los Santos when comparing the final version to the beta. It initially had overall more green areas (but Glen Park didn't exist at that point), the 6th Street Plaza (in the final game present in Willowfield) was originally located south of Grove Street, Las Colinas was much emptier, the airport runway was very different and had stationary planes, and Playa del Seville was almost entirely concrete, among other things.
• The exterior of Liberty City is only used in a cutscene and can't be accessed normally. But, when accessing it through a glitch or mod, the player can see that it is much bigger than it appears (but incomplete) as it was supposed to take a larger role in the mission "Saint Mark's Bistro".
• San Andreas is also missing the interior for the San Fierro Police Department (which is why you respawn on a nondescript street corner near the building and you can't enter it, unlike the other ones), presumably because entering it crashed the game or they didn't have time to clean up the programming for release, and hospital interiors as well. Several other interiors were dummied out as well, including a two-floor Ammunation, a copy of the Hyman Memorial Stadium from Vice City, several unused safehouses, and some that seem to be brothels and were probably intended to be related to the "Hot Coffee" minigame.
• The Rusty Brown donut shop featured during the mission "Burning Desire" was originally intended as a functional food shop. There are two more donut shops in San Andreas (Tuff Nut Donuts in San Fierro, and King Ring in Las Venturas) that would have also been part of this fourth series of food shops.
• Alcatraz was originally going to be present in the game, although it's unknown what role it could have had.
• The town of Bayside wasn't added until late in development, with the freeway originally just looping straight into the desert. It explains its strange position, and why it's so lacking of features apart from the boat school (which could have been located somewhere else initially, then relocated to Bayside to give it some content).
• Regarding Bayside, there are several hints that the Broken Bridge around the area was initially at the Bayside Tunnel with Bayside being unlocked along with San Fierro, and placing the Broken Bridge at the Gant Bridge with Bayside being unlocked along with the desert was a last minute change: the Bayside Tunnel being a convenient Chokepoint Geography^ExplanationThe town of Bayside is secluded from the rest of the desert area. It's surrounded by lots of water, with most of the land outskirts consisting of very tall, insurmountable on foot mountains, and the only access to the rest of the desert being a single tunnel.; the official strategy guide claiming that the boat school unlocks after "Pier 69"^ExplanationThe boat school is located in Bayside, so it would still be inaccessible at that point. It's likely that it was unlocked after "Pier 69", and the requisites were later changed when Bayside became inaccesible.; the requirements to unlock the mission "Zeroing In", whose car chase ends in Bayside^ExplanationThe requirements are finishing the driving school, and unlocking the desert. It's strange because, apart from the car chase in the first mission, none of the missions in the Wang Cars set take place in the desert. Furthermore, the markers for the two sets of missions from the Doherty garage having different labels and being located at opposite sides of the garage hint that originally they would have been available at the same time. Most likely, the Wang Cars missions were originally available right after completing the driving school, and the second requisite was added much later.; a unique stunt jump near Gant Bridge^ExplanationIt can be attempted right after unlocking San Fierro, but it's impossible to complete before unlocking the desert, since otherwise the invisible wall that's part of the Broken Bridge blocks the landing spot. Nowhere else in the GTA series has something like this happening again, which suggests that the invisible wall was added much later than the stunt jump.; and the badly implemented Border Patrol around the area^ExplanationLarge parts of the area in and around Bayside don't give 4 stars if entered before unlocking the desert, as if that Border Patrol wasn't present initially, and was later added in a hurry..
• Similarly, there's a long depression in the terrain just east of Foster Valley. Checking the surrounding area, it's likely it was originally a river (a continuation of the one between Easter Basin and Easter Bay Airport) that headed all the way to Whetstone. While impossible to see in normal gameplay, unlocking via glitches the trucking missions at the start of the game, allows the fourth mission in Whetstone without problem, but prevents the fifth mission in San Fierro from starting because "San Fierro hasn't been unlocked yet". This suggests that San Fierro originally wasn't unlocked at the same time as Whetstone and Flint County. The aforementioned river would thus have allowed to put Broken Bridges preventing access from Whetstone and Flint County to San Fierro (impossible in the final game since they share a landmass).

Weapons and other collectibles

• There is text data for a skateboard hidden in the game's main files (which is why Los Santos has a skatepark), intended as both a weapon and a vehicle. The skateboard was scrapped for the presumably much easier to program and animate bicycles.
• There are also unused icons for the cell phone and the jetpack.
• The country and sniper rifles were originally supposed to have weapon skills just like any other weapon.
• There was an option to buy molotov cocktails from the petrol pumps scattered around the map (12 cocktails for 50 dollars, to be precise). The ability to do so would eventually be introduced in Chinatown Wars.
• Lots of clothes for CJ are left unused in the game files.
• Adrenaline pills were planned to make a return, but they don't appear in the final game (although they can still be found in the game files).
• Heart pickups were intended to be available around the map, and not just in specific missions (as it happens in the final game). The intended locations were revealed in the Definitive Edition, along with some developer comments. It seems that they were removed relatively early in development, as many locations would have been redundant with the mission-specific pickups from the final game, and some of them are inaccesible if re-added due to changes in mapping after their removal.
• Some tikis (the hidden packages in Vice City) are still programmed into the files. Their programmed locations show up only in Los Santos (with their name suggesting they were never planned to show up elsewhere), and their spawning and intended locations are very bugged if reimplemented. All of this suggests they were dropped very early in development, perhaps being just an early test by the programmers.

Vehicles

• According to the game files, motorcycles were originally able to be modified, just like cars. The modifications are still able to randomly spawn as extras on bikes.
• The Andromada plane and the FBI truck are two vehicles that can't be obtained by the player in a normal gameplay, but everything indicates that they originally could, as both are fully functional when accessed with a mod or trainer. ^note Although the Andromada's door is not animated, CJ simply pass through it The Andromada can still be seen in-game in a mission and flying in the sky sometimes, but the FBI truck never appears under normal conditions.
• The RC Cam, a flowerpot as a vehicle, never appears either. If somehow spawned into the game, it's clearly unfinished, with a glitched handling in all aspects. The Definitive Edition showed that it was originally intended to be used during one of the casino heist missions, as a means to spy a security guard and obtain a code.

Mechanics

• There is the "Hot Coffee" minigame. The sex minigame had to be removed in order to avoid an AO rating, but deleting the code for it would've required delaying the game by a few months to fix the girlfriend system. Apparently, some of the resources used in the Hot Coffee minigame actually were used in other parts of the game, which is why the data is on the final version of the game files. So Rockstar, to meet their release date, simply buried it under layers of code. The result, after a modder re-enabled the minigame, was the Hot Coffee scandal. The "Second Edition" version, however, did omit the code. Also, lots of other stuff was coded, but never implemented. A Game Mod by Deezire restores a crap ton of content, including cutscene dialogue that fills in so many plot holes you'll wonder why the hell Rockstar never bothered to activate it. It's also (most likely) thanks to Hot Coffee that the ESRB now asks game developers to see any dummied data when rating games.
• The game has built-in functionality to accept DLC levels, which ultimately wasn't used for anything. Many custom levels and mods (such as the famous DYOM mod) take advantage of this system.
• While in the final game CJ is vehemently against drugs, some leftover strings suggest that, at one point of development, there was an option for CJ to buy or sell drugs.
• Similarly other leftover strings suggest that CJ was able to buy furniture as well. Five furniture shops were originally planned: "Cheap Furn" (cheap), "Tableau" (design), "Helmut Schein" (expensive), "Nice Idea" (IKEA-like) and "Homebuys" (unknown). There are so few traces of the concept left in the game files, even in the Definitive Edition, that it seems it didn't really make it past the idea phase. Appliance shops were also planned, but it's unknown what could have sold to the player.
• A code for earthquakes remains in the game files, yet glitchy as hell.
• A minigame involving safe cracking (possibly related to house burglary) was planned at one point.
• Related to the above, keypads originally were more interactive, with the player having to guess the code (the Caliguna heist would have been an example of a keypad use, with the aforementioned RC Cam being used to learn its code).
• A mechanic involving oil puddles was planned at one point, apparently present in missions such as "New Model Army" and "End Of The Line".
• A coastguard sidequest was also planned, which involved rescuing drowning people with a Raindance. Besides, the paramedic sidequest was the original source of the infinite stamina (instead of the burglary sidequest), and the firefighter sidequest originally involved entering burning houses and rescuing people inside (similar to the mission "Burning Desire" in the final game).
• Parachute jumps were originally planned for this game, before they were cut, and eventually brought back in V.
• A hitchhiker-picking sidequest, much like the random encounters in V, was originally available, albeit very little is known about it.
• A third type of the sidequests available from Cesar's phone calls (apart from the infamous Big Smoke couriers) involved using a crane to sabotage drug-carrying boats.