Grand Theft Auto-Vice City Stories

Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories is the latest installment in the Grand Theft Auto series, developed by Rockstar Leeds in association with Rockstar North, published by Rockstar Games for the PlayStation Portable and PlayStation 2. It is a prequel to Grand Theft Auto: Vice City and successor to the previous PSP release, Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories.

History
Take-Two Interactive originally announced the title was to be released in North America on October 17, 2006 and in Europe on October 20, 2006, but an announcement in early September stated that the game’s North American release had been delayed until October 31. It was also announced that the game would be released on 10 November 2006 in Australia. Moreover, in Europe (Excluding the UK) the game suffered another delay, from November 3, 2006, to November 10, 2006, the same as Australia.
Gameplay
 
Map of Vice City as depicted in Vice City Stories.Vice City Stories is structured similarly to other releases from the Grand Theft Auto series.

The core gameplay consists of elements of a third-person shooter and a driving game, affording the player a large, open environment in which to move around. On foot, the player’s character is capable of walking, running, swimming and jumping, as well as utilizing weapons and basic hand to hand combat. Players can steal and drive a variety of vehicles, including automobiles, boats, airplanes, helicopters, jetskis, and motorcycles.

The open, non-linear environment allows players to explore and choose how they wish to play the game. Although storyline missions are necessary to progress through the game and unlock certain areas and content, they are not required, as players can complete them at their own leisure. When not taking on a storyline mission, players can free-roam and create havoc (e.g. drive-by shootings, robberies, etc). However, doing so can attract unwanted and potentially fatal attention from the authorities. The more chaos caused, the stronger the response: police will handle minor infractions, whereas undercover cops, SWAT teams, the FBI, and the military respond to higher wanted levels.

The player can also partake in a variety of optional side missions. The traditional side missions of the past games are included, but have been moderately upgraded and enhanced compared to previous titles. A new addition to the game is “Beach Patrol”, in which Victor must deal with bikers on the beach by beach buggy (by ramming or shooting to knock them off their bikes) or throwing life preservers to drowning swimmers by boat or by taking a paramedic around to injured people on the beach.

One of the key gameplay elements in Vice City Stories is “empire building.” New to the GTA series, it borrows a few ideas from Vice City’s “properties” and San Andreas’ “gang wars” systems. In order to make money, the player must open and operate various businesses on property taken over from enemy gangs. The businesses include protection racket, loan shark, prostitution, drugs, smuggling or robbery.

For Vice City Stories, the combat system was overhauled to feature more depth than ever before. The targeting mechanism has been tweaked to “intelligently target”; enemies posing a threat or attacking the player will be targeted over pedestrians. The biggest changes concern the hand-to-hand combat system, as players can now perform grappling moves and throws, and stand on top of enemies lying on the ground.

Players are able to bribe policemen or hospital staff when “Wasted” (killed) or “Busted” (arrested) in order to keep weapons that ordinarily would have been lost. The cost of the bribe is $2000.

The standard hidden package system returns in the form of 99 red balloons scattered around the city. This is a reference to Nena’s 1984 hit “99 Luftballons”, which was featured in Grand Theft Auto: Vice City.

Improvements to the graphics since the release of Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories include new animations, faster load times, a longer draw distance, reductions in clumping of pedestrians and vehicles, more complex explosions, and increases in the density of objects, vehicles, and NPCs.
Characters
Main articles: List of characters in Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories and List of gangs in Grand Theft Auto series
Like previous GTA games, Vice City Stories features notable voice actors. Gary Busey, Luis Guzmán, Philip Michael Thomas, and Danny Trejo reprise their roles as Phil Cassidy, Ricardo Diaz, Lance Vance, and Umberto Robina, respectively, which they previously played in Grand Theft Auto: Vice City. Phil Collins also makes a cameo as himself, making him the first famed musician to ever appear in a Grand Theft Auto as a virtual representation with a character model. Also, several cast and crew members of The Opie and Anthony Show were recorded and used as voices of several minor characters.

In addition to the gangs previously featured in Vice City, new gangs make a debut in this game: the Trailer Park Mafia, the Cholos, the Stallionz, the Vance Crime Family, and the Mendez Brothers.
Plot
 
The protagonist Victor Vance, at the airport with his brother Lance.Victor Vance, the protagonist, is a U.S. Army soldier. His sergeant, Jerry Martinez, gets him involved in drug trafficking, which is strictly against Vic’s morals. Soon Vic is dishonorably discharged for the drugs found in his room and bringing a prostitute to the barracks, both of which were intended for Martinez. Vic works for Phil Cassidy, who is also featured in Grand Theft Auto III and Grand Theft Auto: Vice City. Phil’s brother-in-law, Marty, abuses his wife Louise and their baby Mary-Beth. After Marty kidnaps Louise, Vic kills him and begins a relationship with her.

Soon after Vic’s brother Lance Vance comes into town to join him in his rampage. Together they steal Martinez’s cocaine, but tensions arise between the brothers after Vic finds out that Lance and Louise used it for themselves. They find out that Martinez was only transporting the drugs for Armando and Diego Mendez. Lance and Vic are forced to work with the Mendez brothers, only to be betrayed. The Mendez brothers kidnap Louise and Lance, and Vic kills Armando while he is trying to kill Lance. Vic is too late to save Louise, although Lance lives. With help from Phil Cassidy and Ricardo Diaz, Vic manages to steal an army helicopter, the Hunter. He guns down some of Diego’s goons with it, and lands to continue his killing spree on top of the Mendez building. Finally there is a confrontation on the top of a building, which ends when Vic kills Diego Mendez and Jerry Martinez. Lance arrives to help Vic, and together they agree never to touch drugs again, a promise which is broken in under two years, as the brothers are seen dealing cocaine in the opening scene of Vice City (a deal which results in Victor’s death).
Weapons
The weapons in Vice City Stories are essentially identical to those in Liberty City Stories, with the exception of a few changed weapon models and names (such as the Tec-9 being replaced with a weapon model of the Scorpion, but it is still the same weapon in function.) which were changed to fit the period (such as the M4 Rifle replaced with the M16 because the M4 did not exist in 1984). Another noticeable change is the pistol (originally the Colt .45), which now has a different model, a Beretta M9. The AK-47 also replaces the Ruger Mini-14 from the original Vice City. However, the weapons remain the same as their Liberty City Stories counterparts. There is also a new version of the rocket launcher, modeled after the M72 LAW, which now includes a centerpoint-crosshair for easier aiming. Some weapons such as the land mines and tear gas were removed from the game and can only be obtained with cheat devices. Also when the player pops all 99 red balloons, an M249 machine gun will become available at every safehouse, this is the only way to obtain this gun, except from the one that can be found at the prawn island movie studio.
Soundtrack
Main article: Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories soundtrack

Radio stations
Like all other video games from the Grand Theft Auto series, the Vice City Stories soundtrack plays an integral role in setting the game’s atmosphere. It features 9 different radio stations that play 105 licensed songs from the 1980s.

V-Rock
Flash FM
Emotion 98.3
Fresh 105 FM
Paradise FM
 VCFL
Wave 103
Radio Espantoso
VCPR
 
Custom soundtracks
Like its predecessor, Vice City Stories has the ability to play custom soundtracks. Prior to the PSP series, only Grand Theft Auto games on Xbox and PC were able to implement custom soundtracks.

Rockstar released an application called “Rockstar Custom Tracks” on the official site under the “Downloads” section. The application appears to be based on Exact Audio Copy.

In the application, songs from a CD are ripped, compressed, and converted to files that can be read by the game. Rockstar Custom Tracks (RCT) only allows the ripping of songs that are from a store-bought CD. However, fans have found a way to compress and convert MP3 files that are not burned onto CDs[1]. RCT can also look up and use the names from the FreeDB server if there are no names for the song(s). There must be at least one save file in order for RCT to work. It is thought that this will be used for other games Rockstar will release on the PSP from the name. More details can be found in the PDF in the file downloaded from the official site.

Players using the Rockstar Custom Tracks (RCT) from the Liberty City Stories edition need only rename their custom tracks output folder to ULUS10160CUSTOMTRACKS, and the tracks will then be accessible by Vice City Stories.
Multiplayer
Like the game’s predecessor, the PSP version of Vice City Stories features a multiplayer mode, for up to 6 players through WiFi ad-hoc mode (local area). The game features 10 different modes of wireless multiplayer gaming, which incorporate the use of automobiles, aircraft, and water-based vehicles. Various pedestrian and character models from the single player mode are available as player avatars. Rockstar decided not to include these modes in the PS2 version.
Reception
The game has received an 86% on Metacritic and 85% on GameRankings.

The PlayStation 2 port of the game was considered worse with a rating of 7.2/10 from GameSpot and a 7.5/10 from IGN.

Awards
Received IGN’s award for the best licensed soundtrack on PlayStation Portable in 2006.
Best Handheld Game - Golden Joystick Awards 2007.

PlayStation 2 port
On February 7, 2007 Rockstar Games announced plans for a PlayStation 2 port, released on March 6. It was confirmed by Rockstar Games that the PlayStation 2 version of the game would be an almost straight port. The port has improvements such as enhanced graphics (including the addition of bloom effects, enabled via a “trails” option), draw distance, and performance as expected, but also includes a few new side activities that were not in the PSP release such as five new odd jobs, six additional unique jumps, five more rampages, and a new easter egg.

While other Grand Theft Auto ports have had extra features added (such as replays or custom soundtracks), this is the first port of any Grand Theft Auto game to include extra in-game content.