![]() Despite Gameloft bringing in a writer involved with TV masterpiece The Wire, the writing suffers in this sequel. Groan-worthy one-liners dominate conversations, characters are paper-thin constructions with one-dimensional personalities, and missions feature one predictable situation after another. It's a cliched beginning to a threadbare plot used as an excuse to load the game up with missions.įrom scenario scripting to dialogue, it's poorly written throughout. The inkwell has gone dryĭisappointment begins with the story, which casts you in the role of no-nonsense country boy Johnny who drives from the Florida panhandle down to seaside Miami to save his troubled little brother. This is a game that has enough shortcomings that it doesn't need comparison to Grand Theft Auto to look bad - poor writing, plain gameplay, and inconsistent presentation make for an underwhelming experience. The presence of Rockstar's series on iPhone and iPod touch can't be blamed for the lacklustre nature of Gangstar: Miami Vindication, just as you wouldn't lash out at a great chef for making other chefs look inferior. It doesn't take much to see that the success of the former has everything to do with the strength of its design and storytelling. While it's unfair to review Gangstar: Miami Vindication in comparison with Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars, there's value in juxtaposing the two games. If the presence of street races and a drug-trading mini-game doesn’t float your jet-ski, there’s always the opportunity to wander around blasting civilians and out-running the cops (or shooting them and hijacking their cars, of course).Įven if the individual elements may not be strong enough to carry a game on their own, the overall experience vindicates a high score.Try as you might, there's no ignoring the elephant in the room. ![]() This being a sandbox title, there’s more than just the characters and missions to the game. It doesn’t hurt that the graphics are detailed and well animated, or that the script is one of the best I’ve seen for a Java title for a long time. One moment you’ll be leaping off a boat onto a jet-ski, the next you’ll be tearing it down the street in a stolen sports car with the cops hot on your heels, leaping out to plug a few mobsters before diving behind cover. It's the world around it and the way these separate gameplay elements work together that makes Gangstar: Miami Vindication such a compelling game. The car controls are a little too sensitive, the shooting is fairly plain, and the stealth sections, while fine, are nothing special. ![]() Taken as individual sections, Gangstar’s gameplay isn’t quite as compelling as more focused titles. The missions themselves are varied and well done, often taking the form of a driving section (or two), cover-based shooting, and sneaking around, although there’s plenty of variation on these themes over the course of the 70+ missions. In true Grand Theft Auto style, to do this he has to complete seemingly unrelated tasks for a series of characters, before being led to the next person of interest slightly higher up the underworld food chain. Johnny has fallen into a little bit of trouble with one of the biggest gangs in the area. The plot this time revolves around Johnny, a country bumpkin (according to other characters anyway), who comes to Miami to find his little brother. The third entry in the Gangstar series takes place in one of America’s most diverse cities – Miami – and while there are a lot of areas that could be stronger, the general feel of the world it inhabits is one of the best for an open-world mobile game. Yet despite all these different areas, there’s always a general ‘feel’ from every major city in the world that’s unique to that place. It’s part of the reason why one road can be utterly different in looks, wealth, and feel from the next one. Cities aren’t just individual masses born out of thin air, but villages and communities that have been absorbed over time as the central mass expanded out.
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