GTA:VCS a kick in the nuts?

[bayushi]

I love this game. I really do. For $20 you get a lot of value. Memorable characters, great music, alot to do ... However, some of the missions are a kick in the nuts ...

JIVE DRIVE is the primary example.

*Rant Below*

Anyhow, last night I am playing Vice City Stories on my PS2. I'm on this mission called Jive Drive, where Victor the Protagonist has to pick up his brother Lance from the airport. The trouble is, you have been killing Cholo gang members left and right. They show up to smoke you. Enter the mission, Lance Drives while you sit in the gunner seat (shotty). You take out the 2 cholos in front of you, then you peel out of the airport, 2 cholo cars pull up behind you and start blasting. You need to pick your shots and try to take out the gunners as they shoot at you. Be careful that you don't blow up the cars too closely to you, or your car will take massive damage. You go over a ramp and out of the airport, there are Cholo roadblocks all over the place, so you have to keep firing all over the place. Shoot at Cholos, wash, rinse repeat. Eventually, if you are still in one piece, Lance will drive the car off of a ramp and you land in a vacant lot. Mission accomplished right? WRONG! Uzi wielding Cholos ambush you and you have to keep an eye on Lance's health while taking them out and making sure not to get yourself killed. The camera is angled in such a way that you cannot see where the enemy is. *Braaaaaaaaaaaaaap* I'm dead. MISSION FAILED. Start Again.
Ok ... *Reset* Bla bla, Lance ... car... airport...jump. Alley ok. *Braaaaaap* Lance is Dead. MISSION FAILED.

*Reset*
Bla bla, Lance ... car... airport...jump. Alley ok. Eureka! All the gang members are dead and you and Lance survive. Mission accomplished right? WRONG. You now have a 2 Star rating for killing the gang members. Find a car and take Lance to his hotel. Ok... Let me see. Here is a Cholo car right here, but I can't open the door ... WTF. Here come the police, no can't take their car as I can't take it to the Paint & Spray to lose the wanted level . Let me grab this Gremlin type car. Where's Lance? He is jacking off to Hustler magazines in the alley. Arrrggghhh. Let me go get him. I need to back up the car. Unseen police man yanks me from the vehicle. You're Busted! Mission Failed!

MOTHERER!!!

Another time, I was hanging on for dear life as I only had a sliver of health left. Let me stand behind this car and get out of the way of this Ambulance which is barreling down the street to get to some injured people. The ambulance RUNS me over. The ambulance RUNS me over. Dare I say it? MISSION FAILED.

Granted, if you die or get busted you get to use the Trip Skip feature by taking a taxi which takes you back to the Airport. Thing is, you still have to activate the cut scene, , , Bla bla, Lance ... car... airport...jump. KABOOOM!!! Your car took too much damage. MISSION FAILED.

YOU ROCKSTAR! How about splitting the mission into 3 parts and letting me start from the beginning of each segment: 1) high tail it out of the airport 2) the alley 3) the Getaway.

I sat there spitting out bile, feeling like Moe of the 3 Stooges, smacking himself in the face. Wise Guy eh? Woo Woo Woo. After 2 hours of this, now 11 P.M. I had had enough. YOU Rockstar. How about releasing a game called Punch You in the Balls Repeatedly? I'm sure you'd have the game design down pat.

Seriously, where is the fun? Why am I torturing myself so much, just so I can advance the story by a fragment? I'm getting too old for this shit...

the thing is, I am obsessed. I need to get to the next level. Just one more try.

P.S. please don't retort with "Don't Suck" ! I don't claim to be an amazing game player, but I question bad game design like this, where the player is constantly punished by having to wade over and over and over again to get back to the mission start point, activate it, and repeat it ad infinitum. Allow a player to save at any point. Any point. What? Makes it too easy? Like I give a ! I have other shit to do and I may have to exit out of my game at the drop of a hat. Hey, how about a slider to adjust the difficulty of the game? If I want to beat Ninja Gaiden while blind folded I would play ... Ninja Gaiden while blindfolded. Here I am simply trying to play the game so I can get to the next level and unlock further missions.

I'm getting too old for this shit.

 

[VAD3R or Fro]

That mission was hard. Even WITH cheats.

 

[Roufuss]

I found that mission easy, but it's some of the ones AFTER that, that are incredibly hard.

And yea, having to replay the entire thing with all those cutscenes... I sold mine shortly after.

 

[Puffa469]

It took me a few tries to pass that mission, but I was never frustrated with it.

Before you start the mission make sure you have full health and body armor, and some sub machine gun ammo.

 

[The 7th Number]

Yeah that was a hard mission. Took me a few tries. There is a pay n spray right near there i believe, get in a car and go spray the car so the cops go away. And shoot the gang members, if you use gernades that will for sure give you more cop stars. If you think this is hard, wait till you get to "Unfriendly Competition" That mission is probably the hardest in the game. But i feel your pain, so many times i would die or get busted while triyng to do a mission. What is even crazier is in the mission i mentioned above. There was a cop in the road on a motorcycle and a guy was shooting at me. The cop did nothing. Then i shoot the guy and the cop runs after me and busts me. WTF? I guess i can be shot at in plain site and the cops dont care.

Here is a little tip. If you go to the movie studio, when you enter the first garage on the right has a nice machine gun in there up the stairs. I hear its the only place in the game its found. Really works well. Shoots long distance and kills in almost one shot. Plus it holds like 100 bullets per round. Grab that and it will help you alot.

 

[snakelda]

THe mission I thought was the hardest was....I think it was a Diaz Mission.You had to take him all the way in the top left and make a deal with the army,you are ambushed and have to snipe the snipers.Then take the weapons back to diaz.It's hard because the enemys just shoot you a couple times and you're dead.

 

[billyweed]

I agree, I thought the Diaz mission was the hardest. I also agree that this was a great game for the price, and gave me that GTA fix that I need every once in a while.

 

[trunks982]

Aside from that, I still cant beat the chainsaw mission on the ship in LCS.

 

[shieryda]

No offense, OP, but that rant made me laugh.

It's weird how some of the ported GTA games seem harder than the PS2 "exclusive" titles were. There were a couple missions in LCS that gave me fits, too.

 

[IAmTheCheapestGamer]

The chainsaw mission in the tanker(or whatever) in LCS had me fuming too. But, I eventually learned it was an annoying pattern. Run to the other end of the ship, shoot or chainsaw the guys who come into range, repeat.

Kinda monotonous, if you ask me.