| Grand Theft Auto: Vice City | |
|---|---|
 Grand Theft Auto: Vice City cover | |
| Developer(s) | Rockstar North |
| Publisher(s) | Rockstar Games Capcom (Japan) |
| Distributor(s) | Take-Two Interactive |
| Producer(s) | Leslie Benzies |
| Programmer(s) | Adam Fowler Obbe Vermeij |
| Artist(s) | Aaron Garbut |
| Writer(s) | Dan Houser James Worrall |
| Series | Grand Theft Auto |
| Engine | RenderWare |
| Platform(s) | PlayStation 2, Windows,Xbox, OS X, Android,iOS, PlayStation 3 (PSN) |
| Release date(s) | |
| Genre(s) | Action-adventure |
| Distribution | CD, DVD, download |
Grand Theft Auto: Vice City is a 2002 open world action-adventure video game developed by Rockstar North (formerly DMA Design) and published byRockstar Games. It is the second 3D game in the Grand Theft Auto series and sixth original title overall. It was released in North America on 29 October 2002 for the PlayStation 2 and was later ported to the Xbox, and Microsoft Windows in 2003. It was made available on Steam on 4 January 2008, and on the Mac App Store on 25 August 2011.[3] Vice City was preceded by Grand Theft Auto III and followed by Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.
Grand Theft Auto: Vice City draws much of its inspiration from 1980s American culture. Set in 1986 in Vice City, a fictional city modeled after Miami, the story revolves around Mafia hitman Tommy Vercetti, who was recently released from prison. After being involved in a drug deal gone wrong, Tommy seeks out those responsible while building a criminal empire and seizing power from other criminal organizations in the city. The game uses a tweaked version of the game engine used in Grand Theft Auto III and similarly presents a huge cityscape, fully populated with buildings, vehicles, and people. Like other games in the series, Vice City has elements from driving games and third-person shooters, and features an open world gameplay that gives players more control over their playing experience.
Upon its release, Vice City became the best-selling video game of 2002. Until July 2006, Vice City was the best-selling PlayStation 2 game of all time. Vice City also appeared on Japanese magazine Famitsu's readers' list of the favorite 100 videogames of 2006, the only fully Western title on the list.[4] Following this success, Vice City saw releases in Europe, Australia and Japan, as well as a release for the PC. The game was later bundled with its predecessor in the Xbox compilation Grand Theft Auto: Double Pack; both games were later bundled withGTA: San Andreas in Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy. Vice City's setting is also revisited in Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories, which serves as a prequel to events in Vice City. In December 2012, Rockstar released Vice City for iOS andAndroid platforms as celebration for the game's 10th anniversary.
Contents
[hide]Plot
Tommy Vercetti, a loyal former member of the Forelli Family, has just been released in 1986, serving 15 years for killing 11 men in the Harwood District of Liberty City in early 1971, earning him the nickname The Harwood Butcher.[5] Tommy's old boss,Sonny Forelli, fears that Tommy's presence in Liberty City will heighten tensions between the other Liberty City families and bring unwanted attention to his organization's criminal activities.[6]
To prevent this from happening, Sonny ostensibly promotes Tommy to a capo and sends him to Vice City under the guardianship of a crooked lawyer and Sonny's contact Ken Rosenberg to act as their buyer for a series of cocaine deals for Sonny, whose interest is to expand his family activities down the South and to overrun the Liberty drug market with the high-end cocaine from Vice City, hoping to create a monopoly on the Liberty City drug ring to establish the Forelli Crime Family on the top.[7]
Soon, Tommy and his bodyguards are awaited at the Escobar International Airport by Ken, who gives them an info about the deal and takes them to the docks, where they are awaited by the Vance Crime Family, a prominent drug kingpins of Vice City, and their leader, Victor Vance, who arrives in the chopper. As they settle the deal, they are ambushed by several armed and masked men, who kill Victor and Tommy's bodyguards. Tommy narrowly escapes with Ken from the docks, and as a result, he ultimately loses both Forelli's money and the cocaine in the process. Ken drives to his office, while Tommy returns to his hotel.[8]
When Tommy informs Sonny of the ambush, Sonny loses his temper and threatens Tommy with the consequences of attempting to cheat the Mafia. Tommy promises to retrieve the money and the cocaine and kill whoever was responsible for the ambush.[9] Towards this end, Tommy meets up again with Ken at his office, who leads Tommy to retired colonel and mid-level drug dealer named Juan Garcia Cortez, who was Victor Vance's contact and who organized the deal between Vance's and the Forelli's. Cortez expresses regret about Tommy's bad deal and promises that his own lines of inquiry are being made to find out who masterminded the ambush plot. Tommy also meets Cortez's daughter Mercedes, who becomes Tommy's confidante shortly thereafter.
While Tommy waits for the outcome of Cortez's investigation he meets cocky 21-year old British record producer Kent Paul, real estate mogul Avery Carrington, and a mysterious man, who introduces himself as Lance Vance, younger brother of Victor, and the underboss of the now-defunct Vance Crime Family, who wants revenge for the death of his brother and also wants the Vance Crime Family back on the map.[10]
As time passes, Tommy befriends Cortez and begins to do regular work for him as an errand boy and hitman. On one such job, Tommy is called in with Lance to protect the deal of a drug baron named Ricardo Diaz during a deal with the Cubans, looking to buy some high-end cocaine. During the deal, Diaz is ambushed by a gang of Haitians, but Tommy is able to kill them and save the deal, as well as Diaz's life. Consequently, Diaz begins hiring Tommy for his own agenda. Tommy takes this work because it pays well, in spite of his distaste for Diaz. On another errand for Cortez, he plans to meet a French courier in order to retrieve missile chips stolen from the French government. The deal is ambushed by several French agents and Tommy later kills the courier, who fled the ambush with the chips, retrieving the items.
Tommy learns from Cortez that Cortez's own lieutenant, Gonzalez, was partially responsible for the ambush on Tommy's cocaine deal since he is the only person besides Cortez to know about the deal, and Cortez asks Tommy to kill Gonzalez as a favor, since he was a man who he did distrust and was working behind his back. Afterwards Cortez voices his suspicion that Diaz might have been behind the ambush. Tommy initially continues the status quo to prepare for his attack, but his hand is forced when Lance attempts to take revenge by himself and fails, forcing Tommy to rush across the city and rescue him from the junkyard in which he is held. With the die cast, the two move quickly to raid Diaz's mansion and execute Diaz. With Diaz dead, and Colonel Cortez fleeing the country to escape the French, the established drug empires in Vice City quickly crumble and Tommy and Lance personally take over, becoming Vice City's drug kingpins.
Tommy becomes the head of his own organization, the Vercetti Crime Family, distancing himself from the Forelli Family and Liberty City and more interested in personally controlling Vice City than being Forelli's puppet. But the more powerful and rich Tommy gets, the more Lance begins to exhibit paranoia and sociopathic behaviors, to the point that he begins to abuse his own bodyguards and constantly calls Tommy in states of hysteria, losing his mind over being just a powerless second-in-command as he was under his brother for the past 2 years. Tommy begins to suspect that Lance is up to something.
Tommy makes alliance with Umberto Robina's Cubans against Auntie Poulet's Haitians, even though he is at the same time hypnotized by Poulet's voodoo into helping the Haitians as well. However after Tommy and Poulet part ways Tommy and the Cubans sneak explosives into the Haitian drug factory disguised in Haitian gang cars and blow it up, effectively ending the conflict and putting the Haitians out of business, enabling the Cubans to take over Little Havana. Umberto then becomes Tommy's partner. He also becomes friends with Big Mitch Baker, a leader of the biker gang and a Vietnam veteran, with both the bikers and the Cubans becoming protectors of Vercetti family business.
As his drug business expands, Tommy buys assets in nearly bankrupt companies such as a car lot named Sunshine Autos, a cab depot Kaufmann Cabs, a popular night club called The Malibu, a local boathouse, a print shop, Print Works, an ice-cream company, and an adult film company, all of which he turns back into competitive businesses. He also becomes a personal bodyguard to glam metal band Love Fist, and pulls a major bank heist. He starts to control almost all the assets and ties of Vice City: Sunshine Autos as a chop shop, Kaufmann Cabs for money laundering, The Malibu Club for dispatching drugs, the ice-cream company for the production of drugs and the film company to control the underground movie scene.
Eventually, the Forelli family discovers that Tommy has gained control over entire Vice City and without having sent a single dime back to them. Sonny is enraged that Tommy has become independent and is hustling him, and sends collectors consisting of high-ranking Forelli members to force money out of Tommy's assets. Tommy disposes of them, but after they injure the elderly operator of his print shop of counterfeit money, he decides to cut Sonny and the Forelli family out of his business, severing his ties with the Forelli family.
An angered Sonny arrives in Vice City with a small army of mafiosi, intent on taking their tribute by force. Sonny and his henchmen soon arrive at the Vercetti Estate. Just as Tommy attempts to give them their tribute in counterfeit money, Sonny reveals he is the one who set Tommy up fifteen years before, sending him to kill the eleven men who were expecting him since he was feeling that Tommy would himself take over Sonny's business. Lance then exposes himself as a traitor, revealing Tommy's attempt to fool Sonny, and also admitting to informing Sonny about Tommy's activities in Vice City. Lance explains that he did it because Tommy started to disown him and didn't treat him equally, and wanted him dead so he could rebuild the Vance Crime Family and the fortune he had with his brother. An enraged Tommy starts a gunfight.
In the ensuing battle, Tommy first chases, ridicules, and finally kills Lance, then storms downstairs, where he faces off with Sonny, eventually killing him in the main hall of his estate, where Ken awaits, shocked about the events, but Tommy reassures him that everything is fine. With his enemies vanquished, Tommy establishes himself as the undisputed crime kingpin of Vice City.
Setting
The game is set in 1986 in fictional Vice City, which is based heavily on the city of Miami Beach, Florida. The game's look, particularly the clothing and vehicles, reflect (and sometimes parody) its 1980s setting. Many themes are borrowed from the major films Scarface, Carlito's Way, Goodfellas and Blow, along with the hit 1980s television series Miami Vice.[citation needed] Vice City also parodies and pays tribute to much of 1980s culture in the cars, music, fashion, landmarks, and characters featured in the game.
Ricardo Diaz's opulent mansion and the climactic battle which takes place in it are very similar to their counterparts inScarface.[11] Another reference is the game's overall storyline, as it is highly similar to the film, as is the design of the final mission. There are also more subtle references, such as an apartment hidden within the game with blood on the bathroom walls and a chainsaw (in a nod to the film's "chainsaw torture" scene),[11] or the pair of detectives who come chasing Tommy in a car resembling the Ferrari Testarossa after a three-star wanted level is attained, who look like characters portrayed by Don Johnsonand Philip Michael Thomas in Miami Vice.
Characters
Main article: List of characters in Grand Theft Auto: Vice City
Vice City features dozens of characters, many appearing only in the cut scenes which describe each mission. The voice-talent includes Ray Liotta as protagonist Tommy Vercetti, Tom Sizemore as Sonny Forelli, Robert Davi as Colonel Juan García Cortez,William Fichtner as Ken Rosenberg, Danny Dyer as Kent Paul, Dennis Hopper as pornography Director Steve Scott, Burt Reynolds as Avery Carrington, Luis Guzmán as Ricardo Diaz, Miami Vice star Philip Michael Thomas as Lance Vance, Danny Trejoas Umberto Robina, Gary Busey as Phil Cassidy, Lee Majors as "Big" Mitch Baker, Fairuza Balk as Mercedes Cortez, and porn actress Jenna Jameson as Candy Suxxx. The voice of the taxi dispatcher is provided by Blondie singer Debbie Harry.
Although the main character is not the same as the one in Grand Theft Auto III, Vice City contains a few characters from GTA IIIat an earlier point in their lives. Donald Love, a business tycoon in GTA III, makes an appearance as an apprentice to real estatemogul Avery Carrington. The one-armed Phil Cassidy from GTA III appears in Vice City as well, with both arms intact, and one mission actually explains when and how he lost his arm.
Several of GTA III's radio hosts can also be heard in Vice City: Lazlow, who was the host of Chatterbox, the talk radio station inGTA III, is the DJ for the hard-rock station, V-Rock, in Vice City (he mentioned in passing in GTA III that he used to be a DJ on a rock station). Toni, the burned-out, female disc jockey of Flashback 95.6, the 1980s music radio station in GTA III, also appears as a young, club-hopping DJ in Vice City's pop music station, Flash FM. Finally, Fernando, a self-glorifying procurer of women ("not a pimp... a savior", he claims) who appeared on Lazlow's show in GTA III, runs Emotion 98.3. Also naturist Barry Stark, a caller for Chatterbox in GTA III, appears as a guest on VCPR in Vice City.
Gameplay
Because Vice City was built upon Grand Theft Auto III, the game follows a largely similar gameplay design and interface with GTA III with several tweaks and improvements over its predecessor. The gameplay is very open-ended, a characteristic of the Grand Theft Auto franchise; although missions must be completed to complete the storyline and unlock new areas of the city, the player is able to drive around and visit different parts of the city at his/her leisure and otherwise, do whatever they wish if not currently in the middle of a mission. Various items such as hidden weapons and packages are also scattered throughout the landscape, as it has been with previous GTA titles.
Players can steal vehicles, (cars, boats, motorcycles, and even helicopters) partake in drive-by shootings, robberies, and generally create chaos. However, doing so tends to generate unwanted and potentially fatal attention from the police (or, in extreme cases, the FBI and even the National Guard). Police behavior is mostly similar to Grand Theft Auto III, although police units will now wieldnight sticks, deploy spike strips to puncture the tires of the player's car, as well as SWAT teams being rappelled down from flying police helicopters and undercover police units, à la-Vice Squad. Police attention can be neutralized in a variety of ways.
A new addition in the game is the ability of the player to purchase a number of properties distributed across the city. Some of these are additional hideouts (essentially locations where weapons can be collected and the game saved). There are also a variety of businesses called "assets" which the player can buy. These include a film studio, a dance club, a strip club, a taxicompany, an "ice-cream delivery business" (acting as a front company), a boatyard, a printing works, and a car showroom. Each commercial property has a number of missions attached to it, such as eliminating the competition or stealing equipment. Once all the missions for a given property are complete, the property will begin to generate an ongoing income, which the increasingly prosperous Vercetti may periodically collect.
Various gangs make frequent appearances in the game, some of whom are integral to story events. These gangs typically have a positive or negative opinion of the player and act accordingly by following the player or shooting at him. Shootouts between members of rival gangs can occur spontaneously and several missions involve organized fights between opposing gangs.
Optional side-missions are once again included, giving the player the opportunity to make pizza deliveries, drive injured people to a hospital with an ambulance, extinguish fires with a fire truck, deliver passengers in a taxi, be a vigilante, using a police vehicle to intercept (and kill) criminals, and the ability to drive a bus, transporting fare-paying passengers. Monetary rewards and occasional gameplay advantages (e.g. increased health and armor capacity and infinite sprinting) are awarded for completing different difficulty levels of these activities. Different sums of money are awarded for landing trick jumps in motorcycles or fast cars depending on the number of flips and height achieved.
Vehicles
In total, there are about 114 types of vehicles[12] in the game (including non-maneuverable vehicles and remote-controlled vehicles), compared to the approximate 60 in GTA III[citation needed]. Taxicabs, automobiles and boats return from the game (along with many others), while new additions include helicopters and motorcycles (a citywide ban in 2001 in GTA III prohibited their use in Liberty City). The car physics and features are relatively similar to that of GTA III, and some cars were added to the game, including a sportier variant of a luxury car, while some vehicles from that game were highly modified.
The Skimmer plane is the only flyable fixed wing aircraft in Vice City, and because it features pontoons and is normally found inwater, it is a floatplane, a type of seaplane. It can land almost anywhere, in contrast to the jets in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. It has been noted that the Skimmer's design is almost exactly like the Dodo airplane in GTA III. Vehicle performance varies with location, some vehicles performing better off-road or on the street, while others perform better in the air or on land.
Soundtrack
Main articles: Grand Theft Auto: Vice City soundtrack and Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Official Soundtrack Box Set
Vice City includes a large collection of licensed music from 1986 and before. It can be listened to by means of various in-car radio stations. Each station covers a particular music genre, such as rap music (Wildstyle), rock (V-Rock) and (most predominantly)pop music (Wave 103, Flash FM). The tracks are for the most part works from various real-life artists, such as Megadeth, Electric Light Orchestra, Judas Priest, Quiet Riot, Toto, Blondie, Talk Talk, Iron Maiden, Motley Crue, Ozzy Osbourne, David Lee Roth,INXS, Michael Jackson, Teena Marie, Rick James, Kate Bush, Bryan Adams, Go West, Luther Vandross, Kool & the Gang, A Flock of Seagulls, Frankie Goes to Hollywood, Spandau Ballet, Grandmaster Flash & the Furious Five, Hashim, Corey Hart, Laura Branigan, REO Speedwagon, and Eumir Deodato. Additionally, a talk station (K-Chat) and a public radio debate show Pressing Issues (VCPR) are included. The radio stations and the game's storyline also feature a fictional heavy metal band called Love Fist. The multi-CD soundtrack to the game was an instant best-seller.
In addition to music and interviews, the stations also include satirical commercials, such as the Degenatron, a fictional video game console ("Save the green dots with your fantastic flying red square!"), likely a parody of the Atari 2600. The commercials and the game setting are consistent: Degenatron advertisements appear on billboards, and ads air for stores in which the player can actually shop, such as Ammu-Nation. Months before the release of Vice City, Rockstar Games created a Degenatron "fansite", which allowed users to actually play the "emulated" games. There is also a commercial for the "popular" weapons store Ammu-Nation ("We even have the rocket launcher that was used when we whipped Australia's Ass"), a deodorant named "Pitbomb", which is a parody of Right Guard, and a car called the Maibatsu Thunder, a parody of the Mitsubishi Starion, which was a favored import sports car of the day.
The Windows and Mac versions of the game allow users to import MP3 songs, allowing them to hear their own music through vehicle radio when tuning to an extra radio station called "MP3". To be able to do this, the user must copy their MP3 files to a specific folder installed by the game.
Reception and sales
| Awards | |
|---|---|
| Golden Joystick Awards | Ultimate Game of the Year 2003, PS2 Game of the Year,[13] |
| GameSpot's Best and Worst of 2002 | Best Music on PlayStation 2,[14] Best Action Adventure Game on PlayStation 2,[15]Game of the Year on PlayStation 2[16] |
| IGN's Best of 2002 | Best Adventure Game for PlayStation 2 (Editor's Choice and Reader's Choice),[17]Special Achievement for Sound (Reader's Choice),[18] Best Game of the Year for PlayStation 2 (Editor's Choice and Reader's Choice)[19] |
| 1st British Academy Video Games Awards | Best Design, Best PC Game, Best Action Game, Sunday Times Reader Award for Games, Best PlayStation 2 Game, Best Sound |
Grand Theft Auto: Vice City was released to universal acclaim from critics and fans alike. The game received ratings of 9.7/10 from IGN,[20] 9.6/10 from GameSpot,[21] 5/5 fromGamePro,[22] and 10/10 from Official U.S. PlayStation Magazine. The game has a score of 95 out of 100 on the review compiling website Metacritic making Vice City the sixth-highest-rated PlayStation 2 game on the site.[23] It was also generally praised for its open-ended action and entertaining re-creation of 1980s culture.
Of the iOS port, Mark Brown of Pocket Gamer wrote that Rockstar did "a commendable job of bringing a stone-cold classic to mobile" but that "controls let the package down".[24]
The readers of Official UK PlayStation Magazine voted it the fourth-greatest PlayStation title ever released.[25]
As of 26 September 2007, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City has sold 15 million units according to Take-Two Interactive.[26] As of 26 March 2008, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City has sold 17.5 million units according to Take-Two Interactive,[27] making it thefourth-highest-selling video game for the PlayStation 2. As of 2011 Grand Theft Auto: Vice City has sold over 20 million copies.
Mobile version
On 26 October 2012 Rockstar Games announced that Grand Theft Auto: Vice City would be released on iOS and Android for the game's tenth anniversary,[28][29] following the tenth anniversary release of a mobile version of Grand Theft Auto III in December 2011.[30][31] The game was released for iOS on 6 December 2012; the Android version was slightly delayed and was released on 12 December 2012.[32]
There are a few differences between the console versions and the mobile versions of Vice City, including updated graphics and character models, and custom controls with a fully customisable layout.[33] Some features exclusive to the iOS versions includeiCloud save game support, and the ability for the player to create a personal playlist using the music on their device.[34]
Controversy
Like Grand Theft Auto III, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City has been labeled as violent andexplicit, and is considered highly controversial by many special interest groups, some of whom suggest that parental supervision is necessary when young people play this game, since children were never the game's intended audience. The ESRB rated this game "M" for Mature. In Australia, it was censored in case of it receiving a refused classification rating in which the ability to pick up a prostitute was blocked, so the game could be given a MA15+ rating. In 2010, these small cuts were added back and the game still retained its MA15+ rating.[35]
In November 2003, Cuban and Haitian groups in Florida targeted the title. They accused the game of inviting people to harm immigrants from those two nations.[36]The groups' claims of racism and incitement to genocide attracted a good deal of public attention towards Vice City. Rockstar Games issued a press release stating that they understood the concern of Cubans and Haitians, but also believed those groups were blowing the issue out of proportion. Under further pressure, including threats from New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg to "do everything we possibly can" if Rockstar did not comply, Take-Two (the game's publisher) did agree to remove several lines of dialogue.[37] This seems to have largely satisfied the groups who raised the complaints, although the case was then referred to a state court, downgraded from the initial decision to refer the case to afederal court.[38] In 2004, a new version of the game was released, removing and changing those lines of dialogue.[39]
In February 2005, a lawsuit was brought upon the makers and distributors of the Grand Theft Auto series claiming the games caused a teenager to shoot and kill three members of the Alabama police force. The shooting took place in June 2003 whenDevin Moore, 17 years old at the time, was brought in for questioning to a Fayette police station regarding a stolen vehicle. Moore then grabbed a pistol from one of the police officers and shot and killed him along with another officer and dispatcherbefore fleeing in a police car.[40][41] One of Moore's attorneys, Jack Thompson, claimed it was GTA's graphic nature — with his constant playing time — that caused Moore to commit the murders, and Moore's family agrees. Damages are being sought from the Jasper branches of GameStop and Wal-Mart, the stores from which GTA III and Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, respectively, were purchased and also from the games' publisher Take-Two Interactive, and the PlayStation 2 manufacturer Sony Computer Entertainment. The case Strickland v. Sony was heard by the same judge who presided over Moore's criminal trial, in which he was sentenced to death for his actions. In May 2008, he was criticised by Judge Dava Tunis for unprofessional conduct during the Strickland v. Sony case.[42]
In September 2006, Jack Thompson brought another lawsuit, claiming that Cody Posey played the game obsessively before murdering his father, stepmother, and stepsister on a ranch in Hondo, New Mexico. The suit was filed on behalf of the victims' families.[43] During the criminal trial, Posey's defense team argued he was abused by his father, and tormented by his stepmother.[44] Posey was also taking Zoloft at the time of the killings.[45] The suit alleged that were it not for his obsessive playing of Vice City, the murders would not have taken place.[46] Named in the suit were Cody Posey, Rockstar Games, Take-Two Interactive, and Sony. The suit asked for US$600 million in damages.[47] The case was dismissed in December 2007, as New Mexico held no jurisdiction over Sony or Take-Two. Thompson was later disbarred.[48]
In late 2012, the PC version of the game was temporarily pulled from digital stores, including Steam, due to a music licensing issue with one of the songs in the game. The song in question is believed to be "Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'" by Michael Jackson, though Rockstar Games has not confirmed this.[49]
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