Dissapointing is the best word I can use. Vice City was such an awesome game that I bought this one solely on faith. I was returning it 5 hours later, amazed by how boring it was.
First off the missions seem so much more mundane and moronic. Instead of beating up people who aren't paying protection money for example... you are spraying graffiti. The music is best left off... very off.
I hate to say this, I am not racist but African-American gang culture is less interesting and even more obnoxious than Italian gang culture. I wanted every single last character to die of a sudden congenital heart defect. Vercetti had brains, these guys have more f-bombs (not that we care, afterall if you bought this game you should expect it).
There were some good stuff to point out. The graphics were better and more smoothly animated. Load times were significantly better as well. Samuel Jackson.
My advice rent it before you buy it. At 50$ I don't want people to be suckered into buying it and then realizing like I did that they have burned 50$. You may like it and realize that I am crazy. Good for you... All I know is my roommates were amazed at how ludicriously boring San Andreas was in comparison to Vice City. We fired up Vice City after returning San Andreas, so the story had a happy ending after all.