GTA: Vice City Stories – Brand New Interview

If you’ve been chomping at the bit for more news on Rockstar’s latest entry in the GTA series, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories, you can slow down for a bit, we’ve got your fix. The fellas over at Eurogamer recently sat down with R* Leeds to chat about the title’s progress and imminent take-over of the PSP platform upon its release. Here are some of the best bits from that interview:

Eurogamer: Apart from the obvious feedback you received – I’m thinking primarily about comments concerning mission length and variety – what lessons did you learn in making Liberty City Stories that have influenced the design of Vice City Stories?

Gordon Hall: With Liberty City Stories the development team at Leeds were very much dealing with a platform in its infancy, and with any platform it takes some time to come to terms with the development tools. A lot of the missions were built with a handheld in mind… namely, quicker and simpler mission types. While happy with the decision, having a chance to create a new title in the universe on the PSP, we opted to go with longer and more diverse missions. What we did not want to do was replicate Liberty City Stories in a different city; we wanted a whole new game set in this universe. Doing so required a new visual setting, and a fresh gameplay feel.

At the same time our ears are always open and constructive feedback by fans is taken on board. We are always looking at ways to improve what we do and this time around our newfound experience has enabled us to work really hard to make the missions even more varied, dynamic and action-packed than before with multiple ways to tackle them by land, sea or air.

The Studio is known for its ability to compress data, achieving the previously unachievable. This kind of grim determination to prove people wrong pays dividends when you are faced with the task of putting a game like Vice City Stories on a PSP, a platform many industry pundits said could never render such a game in a good light. We have moved on from our experience on Liberty City Stories to a place that is truly very interesting indeed.

Eurogamer: We’ve been told that Rockstar Leeds has made huge leaps in terms of the technological capacity of the PSP and the amount of content it’s possible to include. With this in mind, is it realistic to expect the PSP to support something as gigantic as San Andreas in future?

Gordon Hall: Technically feasible? I’m not sure, we’ll have to see. With every project we ship for PSP we uncover new ways to squeeze the best out of the machine. This has meant that in the year between Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories we’ve been able to more than double the city size capable of fitting on a UMD. Who knows, at that rate we’ll be able to go bigger the more we know and the more the technology moves on. Can’t rule anything out in terms of being able to fit San Andreas on there, but whether we’ll actually do it or not, that’s another matter! All that I know at moment is I am very excited about Vice City Stories, and even more excited about fans’ reaction to this game. We will always try our best to push the boundaries on each consecutive title; who knows what the future might bring.

If you’ve been chomping at the bit for more news on Rockstar’s latest entry in the GTA series, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories, you can slow down for a bit, we’ve got your fix. The fellas over at Eurogamer recently sat down with R* Leeds to chat about the title’s progress and imminent take-over of the PSP platform upon its release. Here are some of the best bits from that interview:

Eurogamer: Apart from the obvious feedback you received – I’m thinking primarily about comments concerning mission length and variety – what lessons did you learn in making Liberty City Stories that have influenced the design of Vice City Stories?

Gordon Hall: With Liberty City Stories the development team at Leeds were very much dealing with a platform in its infancy, and with any platform it takes some time to come to terms with the development tools. A lot of the missions were built with a handheld in mind… namely, quicker and simpler mission types. While happy with the decision, having a chance to create a new title in the universe on the PSP, we opted to go with longer and more diverse missions. What we did not want to do was replicate Liberty City Stories in a different city; we wanted a whole new game set in this universe. Doing so required a new visual setting, and a fresh gameplay feel.

At the same time our ears are always open and constructive feedback by fans is taken on board. We are always looking at ways to improve what we do and this time around our newfound experience has enabled us to work really hard to make the missions even more varied, dynamic and action-packed than before with multiple ways to tackle them by land, sea or air.

The Studio is known for its ability to compress data, achieving the previously unachievable. This kind of grim determination to prove people wrong pays dividends when you are faced with the task of putting a game like Vice City Stories on a PSP, a platform many industry pundits said could never render such a game in a good light. We have moved on from our experience on Liberty City Stories to a place that is truly very interesting indeed.

Eurogamer: We’ve been told that Rockstar Leeds has made huge leaps in terms of the technological capacity of the PSP and the amount of content it’s possible to include. With this in mind, is it realistic to expect the PSP to support something as gigantic as San Andreas in future?

Gordon Hall: Technically feasible? I’m not sure, we’ll have to see. With every project we ship for PSP we uncover new ways to squeeze the best out of the machine. This has meant that in the year between Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories we’ve been able to more than double the city size capable of fitting on a UMD. Who knows, at that rate we’ll be able to go bigger the more we know and the more the technology moves on. Can’t rule anything out in terms of being able to fit San Andreas on there, but whether we’ll actually do it or not, that’s another matter! All that I know at moment is I am very excited about Vice City Stories, and even more excited about fans’ reaction to this game. We will always try our best to push the boundaries on each consecutive title; who knows what the future might bring.