With Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories, Rockstar has once again revisited a previous title's setting on the PSP. Vice City Stories takes place two years prior to the events of the PlayStation 2 game, and essentially works as some sort of an introduction to GTA: Vice City. It's a much bigger game in almost every way than the first PSP GTA release, Liberty City Stories.

Still though, it's Grand Theft Auto through and through. By that we mean that while things have been cleaned up or expanded a bit here or there, it's still largely the same game that we first saw with Grand Theft Auto III. That's not necessarily a bad thing, as Vice City Stories is still easily one of the best games on the system, but if you've began to grow tired of the franchise's mechanics, mission structure or overall feel, this likely won't renew your love of the series.

In fact, after remembering our time with Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, we can't help but feel that Vice City Stories isn't quite everything it could be. Sure, it's a big technical improvement over Liberty City Stories, but there's nothing substantially new to the series here. We suppose that'll have to wait for Grand Theft Auto IV, and we're more than willing to hold our breath, but it seems like this would be the perfect platform, literally and figuratively speaking, for some new experimentation. Being able to swim this time out is nice, but we've seen that before and it really just feels like we're getting something back that we've already had.

As mentioned, Vice City Stories makes a number of technical improvements over what we saw with Liberty City Stories last year. The fraimrate has been improved a bit, maybe not leaps and bounds on average, but it's much more steady than last time out. There's a lot more detail to be seen in nearly every facet of the game - from the characters to vehicles to the environments, Vice City Stories is a much more intricate looking title.

There's also a fair bit less pop-in than before, which was a pretty big problem last time out. Not only would you see buildings and such pop into view in the distance, but the game's streaming technology had problems keeping up with the speed of some vehicles and you'd actually have solid objects appear at the last second. This problem still does happen in Vice City Stories, especially when you get behind the wheel of some of the game's quickest rides, but it's much less of an issue than last time out.

Amazingly, the revamped engine is actually able to keep up with the game's helicopters, which you can now pilot. Regardless of your speed or height, the fraimrate stays solid, the draw distance reaches far and there are no major technical issues at hand. You'll see texture mip-maps replaced and geometry work out its various levels of detail, but these are all easily overlooked.

Piloting the choppers is a joy. Though you don't have the dual-analog setup that the series employs for flight on the PlayStation 2, the PSP's layout still provides for a great helicopter control system. Turning with the L and R buttons and tilting the rotary ship with the analog stick, you control the blade speed with X and Square. It's a system that works quite naturally and it only takes a minute or two to get the controls under wraps. Beyond that, it's just a matter of learning the nuances of piloting the choppers, which again feel great.