Freedom in all its glory and fun.
GRAPHICS: 9
The graphics in Grand Theft Auto: Vice City are great. Period. The game looks incredible, the draw distance is unbelievably high (being able to see almost the whole map if you find a good vantage point), the models are very detailed (vehicles being the order of the day) and the textures, although not crisp, aren't very blurry either. Strangely, the game runs better than GTA III despite being released later as it uses a clipping technique, while GTA III drawed everything, even what you couldn't see. There are two things I didn't completely like about the visuals, apart from some textures:
1) The cool "motion blur" effect from GTA III is dead and gone in this game.
2) Although the world draw distance is amazing, the object draw distance isn't. For example: you see a sports car (which, by the way, look a lot better here than in GTA III) stopped at a corner, turn around, and when you turn back you find out it has mysteriously disappeared.
SOUND: 10
The sound in GTA Vice City is perfect, and is surely the best part of the game. The voice acting is incredible and the characters sound really great, the sound effects are top-notch, including everything from engines roaring to a "crunch" like effect that plays when you run over someone, passing through a lamppost falling, pedestrians yelling at you after a close call, gunfire, etc.
The music is excellent. The game features 9 different radio stations (including two "chat" stations and the "Espantoso" station, with both music and commentaries in Spanish) and the possibility to put your own songs into a game folder and play them in an in-game 10th radio station. These stations play lots of kinds of music, like pop, rap, soul, hip-hop, rock, heavy metal, etc. (I love V-ROCK!!)
GAMEPLAY: 9
Gameplay is another of the strongest parts of this game. Freedom has never been so fun: you can drive around, kill people, stir up trouble, do a huge variety of sub-missions (from drive passengers to their destinations a la Crazy Taxi to kill criminals as a policeman), and a lot more things. The game is VERY long, ranging a good couple of days to complete. There are a lot of vehicles (cars, trucks, motorbikes, boats and helicopters) and a lot of ways to achieve a single goal. The game is very open-ended and incredibly fun.
The only complaint I have about the gameplay is that in most of the later missions the game, instead of looking for smart and innovative ways to make things harder, just throws a bunch of armed gangsters at the player or rises his/her wanted level by several stars. Apart from that problem, gameplay is perfect.
The good:
¤ Crisp, detailed visuals.
¤ Excellent SFX and voice acting.
¤ Perfect soundtrack.
¤ Great variety.
¤ The game is very long and has amazing replay value.
The bad:
¤ Annoying clipping.
¤ The game lacks innovation in some of its missions.