Oh man, I haven’t even finished Vice City [PC version] yet, and I’m already yearning for this one.
Out of curiosity, what’s the soundtrack like? The VC soundtrack was so good I’d imagine it was hard to improve on.
The soundtrack is incredible - almost every track is a highly recognizable song that they probably shelled out some good $$ for.
Beware - apparently some PS2’s are having problems with the game. The word is that it’s a middle serial number - not the oldest ones, not the newest, but one batch in the middle for some reason.
I noticed that too. It doesn’t seem to invite so much purely gratuitous violence in the same way (although it doesn’t prevent it either). I’m not really sure why. I’m even driving more carefully, staying in my lanes and trying not run over as many people.
I think part of it is that the first few missions have not been especially violent, you start without a weapon, and you need to preserve your vehicles in order to complete the mission (which means you can’t just barrel around recklessly until your car blows up, then jack a new one). In the other games I pretty much treated the cars as disposable. So far in SA you have to be a little more careful.
Some cheats would be nice, though. Does anybody have any yet?
There’s a whole bunch of them on gamefaqs
Much thanks, Mikahw.
Does anyone know whether these codes actually cause problems like those in Vice City? I always thought that Rockstar just used that line to cover up for the fact that VC was rushed to the market unfinished, with many obvious and blatant bugs (my favorite: the “random damage while running for no apparent reason”), but the save screen on San Andreas has a huge warning that bugs may “screw up” the game.
I just have to say that OC Loc is my hero. Them’s some mad rhymes G!
Since I don’t have a PS2 I won’t be able to play this until it’s released for PC. Any interesting new differences between SA and VC? The Gamespot review implied that there were no more hidden packages. What are they replaced by? Do the police have any new powers or new units? Anyone had the six star army come after them yet? Do the police units behave a little more intelligently now? (In VC and GTA3, it was the police doing most of the damage while chasing me.) I’ve heard the character can swim and ride a bike now… what else can he do? Any cameos by characters from previous games?
It’s superior to Vice City in every way. Hidden packages are replaced by graffiti tags in Los Santos, horseshoes in Los Venturas and something I’ve forgotten in San Fierra. There’s also oysters to collect underwater.
I’ve not got 6 stars yet, but the police now have motorbikes (and aren’t afraid to use them). You also see police cars involved in shootouts and chases with NPCs other than gangmembers.
You can modify pretty much every aspect of your character’s apperance and performance (e.g., by going to the gym, or by normally proceding through the game. You can improve performance on weapon catagories, cars, fitness, sex appeal, lung capacity, the list goes on).
Haven’t seen any previous characters yet.
I only played for an hour on Saturday and wasn’t all that fired up, specifically:
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It doesn’t appear to have secondary weapons (grenades + shotgun, e.g)
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Recycled cars (Sabre comes to mind)
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The gangster speak gets on my nerves after a while.
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The little icon map at the bottom seemed harder to read. I may have just been tired.
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The graphics didn’t seem to be that much better. Again, I may have been tired.
Also, the back of the case says 1-2 players. Huh?
You guys have made a good case for it, I will purchase my copy and give it some more time.
Bruce, who can “beat” Vice City in a day.
I’ve had it less than a day. It seems cool, but I’m still exploring.
Is there a clearinghouse of game tips? Gamefaqs has very little, and I’m more interested in where to find weapons, health, etc., than mission tips. I’m still in that somewhat frustrating early section, same as in previous GTA game, where I have minimal weapons (the lame weapons “shop” just opened) and don’t yet know where the cool stuff is and am a bit tired of exploring & hoping to find an AK so I can beat the next missions where I keep getting stomped.
I just found body armor at a mall of sorts called The Atrium. It’s about 10 or so blocks directly west of CJ’s crib, 1 block SE of the big freeway intersection in the center of town. Go into the mall, the armor is behind a short wall on the first floor. There’s also motorcycles parked in the garage area. Motorcycles are also parked all around the statium directly east of CJs. I jacked a Cheetah in the downtown area, it’s in my garage now. There’s a handgun that spawns in the backyard of the house 2 to the left of Sweet’s, and a set of brass knuckles under the nearby bridge, on the left as you leave CJ’s cul de sac.
Anybody else have weapon, vehicle, etc. locations to share?
I’ve gotten into the airport by standing on a car and hopping the airport fence. There’s a Dodo and a Jet you can fly. I’ve flown and landed both, and flown around the countryside a bit. If you try to fly into one of the game areas that’s not yet open, your wanted level goes to 4 stars, and a jet fighter blows you up!
There are. I’ve got grenades and shotguns.
Last night I discovered a two-player mini-game. You walk over a skull icon (rampage) and press a button on controller 2. It then opens this game where you and your partner have to kill 15 peds in 3 minutes. It’s a 3rd person view and you and your partner have to stay near each other. It was entertaining for me and my roommate.
There’s a pimp car (pimping is good money early on in the game) behind the gas station/convenience store about 6 blocks west and 1 block south of Grove St. Drive across the railroad tracks and it’s about one more block west.
At the same time? What button fires your primary weapon and which fires your secondary?
(buying the game today, will rtfm then. 
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Definitely feels like a GTA game to me. Have you trained at the gym to get the special move that allows you to kidney punch to bloody death a pedestrian lying on the ground?
Bruce_Daddy, I share your lament about the icons and the map, many of them are damn near illegible. The yellow ‘destination’ marker isn’t always that easy to see either- couldn’t they have just stuck with pink from GTA Vice City?
The map legibility is probably the only real complaint I have. The yellow food icons look too much like the destination marker and the pay and sprays are too hard to find in a pinch.
I’ve had the game for four days now, but only had a decent run of it last night. Wizzed through to the San Fierro missions, and the San Franciso inspired layout is amazing. The missions that require you to cover both sides of the map is a bit annoying.
Oh, and there’s a reference to GTAIII!
For the most part I’m really loving the game - but I have to say, there’s a mission in San Ferrio called “Supply Lines” that is WAY too hard. It took me forever to beat it, and even then it was just luck. That one mission knocked my opinion of the game down a few notches.
Otherwise it’s a cool game- all the characters have such distinct personalities. In particular I really dig The Truth and Woozie.
Love this game. The graphics and engine are similar to previous iterations of the game (hey, the PS2’s graphics capabilities haven’t improved, right?), but I think they worked around that simply by not caring. They improved things a little bit, better draw distance, better vehicle physics, but for the most part, it feels very GTA.
The sheer volume of other stuff they put in, however, is amazing. No load times (except when entering a building or starting a mission), great combat, great driving… I love how ANY car (aside from, y’know, giant trucks and slow-ass vans) can get up to a good speed, especially on the freeway.
The freeways are awesome. In True Crime, running around on the freeway and jacking cars was simple. In SA, it’ll get you killed, as dozens upon dozens of cars will constantly be barrelling down the road at you. Crazy. Best way to cause a huge pileup is to try to steal a car on the freeway.
The stealth missions rock. The one where you have to swipe the rhymes book is sweet… sneaking up behind some fucker and plunging you knife into his neck? Ooch. That’s gotta hoit.
The mountain bike is awesome. I can envision myself using it to ditch rangers out in Hick Country… it handles VERY good off-road. I thought bikes were gonna suck ass… I was wrong!
Customization rocks (though as someone said, buying new clothes is slow… I think it just takes those few seconds to load up the clothing model/texture). The story is pretty engaging, and all the black gangstas really get you talking Ebonics after a few minutes of play. At first, I started feeling bad about screaming, “Fuck you, nigga!” after capping some fool… I, uh, think I get into my games a little too much…