GTA VCS review

[DragonpokeZ]

Hello everyone

 

I came back to the forums after idk how many years to talk about this game

 

You might be thinking "who is this dude to come back/show up and talk about this game". And you're absolutely right, I'm nobody. That's the fun of internet forums, isn't it

 

GTA VCS was the last game of the 3D Era (not counting Advance I guess) that I had barely played through. A few hours ago I finished it to "100%" completion (getting the 100% message, which as some of you know, you can get while not completing one 'objective'). I came back to the forums just to rant about this game

 

The game itself: for people who are not sick in the head enough to complete this to 100%, and won't bother with that, it's probably a hard but fun game. I, however, completed this thing to 100% while taking breaks to study for uni exams, and at points it made me wanna go back to reading 500+ pages textbooks written by out-of-touch old men.

 

The soundtrack: it's good, honestly. But that's it. When you play a game with the words "Vice City" on it you inevitably expect the soundtrack to be on par with the original GTA Vice City, even if deep down you know that nothing can beat it. But come on, they had the budget to get THE Phil Collins on this game, they could've done a bit better. I found myself skipping through half of the radio stations all the time. But then comes another problem: with all the ****ing side missions, it's annoying that A) so many of them are done on a vehicle without a radio, and B) a lot of them will, in one way or another, have you changing vehicles often, and it's annoying because you have to change the radio back to whatever you were listening to. On this second point, the Time Trials definitely come to mind. amongst other things. However, I do believe In The Air Tonight by itself carries this to a Top 2 ranking on the soundtrack level of the 3D Era games, above San Andreas. This could be biased, however: I played the VCS concert version of In The Air Tonight on Youtube right as I started the last side mission that I had to do to get 100% completion (which in my case, was Skywolf). And, I managed to complete Skywolf, with seconds to spare, AT THE SAME TIME as Phil Collins breaks out the drums. That feeling of euphoria was out of this ****ing world, and I accordingly smashed the sh*tty knock-off controller I was using in "celebration" (I had another one, so I could save the game afterwards). In summary: the soundtrack is really good but it doesn't live up to Billie Jean and Self Control.

 

The gameplay: It was a bit annoying that a lot of the vehicles have their handling changed compared to previous games (the one that shocked me the most was, weirdly enough, the Glendale being a legitimate option for the races because of how buffed it was). Playing a 'Stories' games is always going to be hard because free aim on a PS2 controller is an experience that should be prohibited by the Geneva Conventions, but on this game in particular it felt worse than the others. Full disclosure, this might have been because I played on a knock-off controller from AliExpress, but I don't have an original PS2 controller to compare to, so who knows if that's the reason. Points 'deducted' because of the sheer amount of loading screens I had to sit through in both story and side missions, because dear lord that took away from the flow of the game.

 

Expanding on the gameplay, the sheer amount of side missions made it feel like a chore most of the time. "Oh hey let's do this dumb checkpoint mission where the only challenge involved is 'I hope that some random car doesn't crash into me/I hope my stupid analog stick reacts properly' " gets old after the, idk, 5th mission with that same premise or so. That, and I'm like 80% sure that the Air Rescue mission literally gave me gray hairs. THANK GOD for the checkpoint system because otherwise I do not know if my system could've survived having to replay Air Rescue from level 14 all the way to level 1 because the ****ing wind decided to knock me into a building and the useless Air Ambulance thingy caught fire.

 

To finish on the rant about side missions, avid readers must have noticed the quotation marks around '100% completion'. That is because GTA VCS allows you to receive 100% completion rewards without a singular 'objective' being met. There's a good thread on this, and if I still remembered how to attach the link to it, I would. Look it up. Anyways, I saw this as a "get out of jail free" card of sorts, where I could skip one side mission and still get "100%" completion. So I burned that chip on the Mashin' Up The Mall side mission, on account of my trashy knockoff controller not allowing me to do stoppies or wheelies on the bycicle.

 

The story: Amazing. One of the best in the franchise, deeply weighed down by not having a PC port and how obnoxious this game is to get it to 100% completion. "Boomshine Blowout" is not that bad, neither is "Light My Pyre", neither is any of the story missions and none of them took me more than 7 tries. At least in my opinion. Most of them are amazing too, being fun and having story-relevant and/or funny/entertaining cutscenes. Dodging a military chopper's missiles while I drive a cocaine-filled military truck with Holy Diver in the background has been integrated as a core memory of mine. And, VCS did the 'regretful character who doesn't want to be in the "game" but is forced to because of their environment' character MILES AND MILES better than The Lost And Damned ever did for Johnny Klebbitz. Throughout playing TLaD I felt little to zero sympathy for Johnny, but I always ended up feeling it for Vic.

 

With the understanding that some people will be mad about this: Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories is my least favourite and personal worst game of the 3D Era, notwithstanding Advance. Of course, my authority on this is absolutely nonexistent, so if this is your favorite game in the series, don't take it (too) personal. Hell, my favorite is still LCS, the first that I played, and many people rate that as the worst. But if a game consistently makes me feel like it's a chore to get through it, with unending repetitive side missions, what else am I supposed to rate it? Whoever designed the side missions on this game tried to do some sort of demonic ritual where the suffering of those who played them goes to benefit them or something, because otherwise I do not understand half of 'em

[Moncastler]

I'll start with your main complaint, which is 100% completion. I absolutely agree with everything you said.

GTA VCS is by far the worst GTA to 100%, it really drains all of the fun and enjoyment of the main storyline. Most vehicle missions are basically copy pasted from previous titles, with the added "bonus" that there are 15 levels now! At least there are checkpoints. The VCS exclusive vehicle missions are possibly even worse, Air Rescue is the single worst side missions in the entire franchise, who the hell at Rockstar thought that flying a slow helicopter for almost a hour is fun?

Other side content is again mostly coming from old GTAs, collectibles, time trials, stunt jumps, rampages, etc... You know the drill. The sheer amount of them is the real problem.

 

2 hours ago, DragonpokeZ said:

The soundtrack: it's good, honestly. But that's it. When you play a game with the words "Vice City" on it you inevitably expect the soundtrack to be on par with the original GTA Vice City, even if deep down you know that nothing can beat it. However, I do believe In The Air Tonight by itself carries this to a Top 2 ranking on the soundtrack level of the 3D Era games, above San Andreas. In summary: the soundtrack is really good but it doesn't live up to Billie Jean and Self Control.

Entirely subjective. Personally I think both Vice City games offer the best soundtracks in the entire series, and I can't choose between one or another as my favourite. They're a bit different I would say, but I feel like they complete each other when put together. I have to say that the mission "In The Air Tonight" helps a lot in giving the whole soundtrack a legendary status, because the OST isn't just there to give you a background sound to listen while driving. This is something that Rockstar never replicated in the GTA series, GTA V comes close with their original OST playing during certain missions and moments of gameplay, but it's not the same thing. RDR1 and RDR2 have some missions where the OST is a big part of them, I would like to see something similar in GTA VI.

 

2 hours ago, DragonpokeZ said:

it's annoying that A) so many of them are done on a vehicle without a radio, and B) a lot of them will, in one way or another, have you changing vehicles often, and it's annoying because you have to change the radio back to whatever you were listening to.

This can be said for all 3D era titles, of course it makes sense IRL that an emergency vehicle doesn't play commercial radios, but it makes those missions extra boring. With the Trilogy on PC there's a mod that enables radios in emergency vehicles, with Stories games there's nothing that can be done other than having a Spotify playlist in the background.

 

3 hours ago, DragonpokeZ said:

The gameplay: It was a bit annoying that a lot of the vehicles have their handling changed compared to previous games (the one that shocked me the most was, weirdly enough, the Glendale being a legitimate option for the races because of how buffed it was). Playing a 'Stories' games is always going to be hard because free aim on a PS2 controller is an experience that should be prohibited by the Geneva Conventions, but on this game in particular it felt worse than the others. Full disclosure, this might have been because I played on a knock-off controller from AliExpress, but I don't have an original PS2 controller to compare to, so who knows if that's the reason.

HAHAHAAH, yeah controls are a crime against humanity, but this is mostly true for all 3D era games on PS2 and Xbox. Stories games (like SA) at least let you free aim with all weapons on consoles, although the button to enable it doesn't make any sense. Vehicle handling feels similar to other GTAs, camera can be moved while driving (just like SA). Swimming is a thing, like SA. Melee combat (when it works) is easily the best in the 3D era.

In terms of gameplay VCS is at least on par with SA, and definitely above III, VC and LCS. Still, it's a nightmare to play a PS2 game with a controller, most of the Trilogy gameplay can be overlooked when playing on PC. I can imagine the pain with a cheap controller.

 

3 hours ago, DragonpokeZ said:

The story: Amazing. One of the best in the franchise, deeply weighed down by not having a PC port and how obnoxious this game is to get it to 100% completion. "Boomshine Blowout" is not that bad, neither is "Light My Pyre", neither is any of the story missions and none of them took me more than 7 tries. At least in my opinion. Most of them are amazing too, being fun and having story-relevant and/or funny/entertaining cutscenes. Dodging a military chopper's missiles while I drive a cocaine-filled military truck with Holy Diver in the background has been integrated as a core memory of mine. And, VCS did the 'regretful character who doesn't want to be in the "game" but is forced to because of their environment' character MILES AND MILES better than The Lost And Damned ever did for Johnny Klebbitz. Throughout playing TLaD I felt little to zero sympathy for Johnny, but I always ended up feeling it for Vic.

 

With the understanding that some people will be mad about this: Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories is my least favourite and personal worst game of the 3D Era, notwithstanding Advance. Of course, my authority on this is absolutely nonexistent, so if this is your favorite game in the series, don't take it (too) personal. Hell, my favorite is still LCS, the first that I played, and many people rate that as the worst. But if a game consistently makes me feel like it's a chore to get through it, with unending repetitive side missions, what else am I supposed to rate it? Whoever designed the side missions on this game tried to do some sort of demonic ritual where the suffering of those who played them goes to benefit them or something, because otherwise I do not understand half of 'em

My favourite is VCS and my least favourite is LCS, yet we agree on a lot of things. The story is IMO easily the best among 3D era titles, nothing too crazy of course and all following Rockstar titles (including GTA V) go so much more in depth... But this was probably Rockstar's first attempt at a more serious and believable story, which blends quite well with the jankiness of 3D era 

Don't make your final judgement on this game be so reliant on side content, these games should be played exclusively for their stories. Because, if we take into account all side content, is there a GTA worth playing? Honestly all games in the franchise have extremely boring and painful checklists that make the whole experience worse. GTA V is probably the most enjoyable to 100%, as there are a lot of missions and fun activities.

[nitrogen092]

who can decipher the running line on the stadium scoreboard?