Masked Marauder

Well then here is an idea that you might understand and which just might work: PLAY the effing game YOURSELF and find your own damn "FUN" places to do your crap instead of expecting other people to tell you everything!

Now that you mention it, I have seen FPS mods out there, somewhere. I am fairly certain that I saw one for SA. How they work, IF they work, I do not know either - because I have never used one, which is also why I can not remember where I had seen them. Do some searching and you should be able to find some. That is all of the help that I have for you.

Since I do not know your system specs, you will have to decide for yourself if your hardware is up to snuff. If you changed the FPS limiter setting then I am going to guess that you adjusted other video settings as well. If this was my situation, I would restore the game default video settings and cycle through them one or two at a time when adjusting them. That way you know what helps and what to not mess with and you can switch them back easily. Also, my machine has an nVidia control panel that allows for customizing video settings for individual games. If you have something similar that you have changed settings with then try restoring that to the default settings as well. Sometimes advanced options are best left alone.

Okay, that would have been too easy of a fix of course. If I remember correctly, SA like VC and III has a frames per second limiter in the video options. If you turned it off turn it back on. Strange things happen if the FPS limiter is off, even with high end machines. If that is not it then try switching any of the advanced video options that you may have adjusted back to the game default settings, like anti-aliasing or screen resolution. If that STILL does not fix it, then see if your system has DirectX version 9.0c installed. If not, try upgrading. Also check that your video drivers are the correct ones for your graphics card and are up to date.

Yup, that is the same controller that I have (mine is cordless). It is that little button with the red light right above the left stick. It is hard to read but it says "MODE" on mine. If yours is not cordless then it might be above but centered between the two sticks. It seems to work best with the red light toggled off. I do not have SA installed right now, so I can not send you a handling.cfg. If toggling the analog button does not solve your problem, then perhaps someone else can send it to you.

Mods? Perhaps, if they alter or swap the "handling.cfg" (or whatever the file is called for SA). USUALLY if I notice anything wrong with the controls it is because I accidentally bumped that little analog button on or off.

Ouch! Viruses? Bummer! You are welcome, glad to try at least. Good luck disinfecting your machine.

Are you using a joystick controller or a keyboard and mouse? If a joystick, perhaps toggling the analog button on or off will make a difference.

Yeah, that would have been too obvious huh? Well, I guess that you are going to need help from someone who is more knowledgeable about VCMM than I am.

My logic would say no, because VCMM runs separately from Vice City. It should still at least show a list of the VCMs that are available to install, regardless of where your version of Vice City came from. Try downloading a different copy of VCMM maybe? I do not know how many versions are floating around these days, but mine says version 1.0. Wait, I just had a thought. You open the downloaded archive with WinRar, then browse in the extraction path to the folder "vcm" and extract the files, right? WinRar MAY be preserving the authors folder structure from the archive and VCMM can not find the VCM file. In other words, extract the archive to a folder then try manually dumping the VCM file in the "vcm" folder instead of letting WinRar extract everything. Then you know for sure that it in the right location and that WinRar has not added extra folders. You never know, it can happen sometimes with archivers. I am really hopeful about this possibility.

@Fuzzy168: How do you play at all without a CD? The game constantly reads from it, which may explain why there is no audio in the first place. Also, audio files are very large and there are lots of them. Which is why most pirated copies do not include them. It would be very difficult for someone to just email them to you. Plus any site that MAY have them available for download is most likely a warez site, so try that at your own risk. Help with pirated software is not condoned here at TGTAP from my understanding. @tommyvercitti: There is a "Deluxe" version of Vice City? Who made that and what is the difference from the original version? Is it Vice City with a bunch of popular mods included?

@tommyvercitti: Yup, the same thing would happen to me with Vice City. My screen would suddenly get all distorted and I would use the same fix: Escape, ALT-Tab out to the desktop, then resume and it would be fine until I quit playing. @Fuzzy168: I heard about a glitch with this mission. In fact, it happened to me at least once. Is the wall invisible but with collision geometry? Right in front of the clothing store entrance where you are supposed to pick up the Cuban gang outfit but you can not get to it? There was a fix for this somewhere, but I do not remember where I saw it. Even so, if you used the fix, you would probably have to start the game all over because it most likely moves an object (either the wall or the clothes pickup) which USUALLY screws up save files. If I locate the fix or find out anything else I will let you know.

Vehicle mods by different authors, right? Crap... I was really banking on that last idea. Well, these next ideas may be reaching a bit, but is your operating system set to hide unknown file types? If it is, perhaps that is why they do not show up. Or maybe if you have an anti-virus/ anti-malware program running it is trying to "protect" your system from something that it regards as suspicious. Maybe turning it off temporarily could work. If I think of any other possibilities I will post them here. If you have not done so already, try looking through the Mod Installation Help threads in the forums. I have seen threads around the web of other VCMM users who were having problems, but I never bothered to read them because I have not had any troubles with it.

Okay, I thought of one other possibility. You said "the mod that I am trying to use is not listed". Are you trying to install just one VCMM mod? The same one every time? Try your luck with a couple of different VCMM mods. Perhaps the VCM of the one that you wish to install was not scripted/compiled correctly. VCMM authors have to have a basic knowledge of scripting for the mods to work properly so perhaps the problem has something to do with that.

Which is why I am glad to have my duct tape and coat hanger PC. (sputter sputter bzzzzt... KICK) Ah, there it goes. I stopped buying consoles after PS2 and see no need for me to buy another one ever again. But, to each his own.

All rightee then. Let's see if we can get to the bottom of this. Here is what works for me, with VCMs that I have made: I extract the VCM file to the folder "...\vcmm\mods\vcm\". I run VCMM, the mod is listed, I click on it once to select it, the 'Install' button becomes active, and then I click 'Install'. Looking at your screen shot, it appears that you are browsing to the folder "mods". Try going one folder further to "vcm". That should work for you. If it does not work, MAYBE the VCMM has to be installed in your Vice City game directory, but I really do not think that it matters. If I remember correctly, you have it installed in the default setup location, which should be okay. (I installed VCMM where I felt like putting it.) The only other thing that I can think of is if you have to be logged on to Windows as an administrator. For the heck of it, and so I could pay closer attention to what's what, I associated vcm files with VCMM with "Windows - Tools - Folder Options - File Types". If none of these suggestions work for you then I am stumped.

I also used to stand in that dirt lot (the construction site) just north of the garage in San Fierro. If you stand at the top of that ledge that slopes down to the street (with the trolley tracks) and far enough north (but not too far) the beat cops will not bother you and you can easily pick off vehicles with a mini-gun or a rocket launcher. Because it is mostly open you should be able to take out most helicopters with a RPG without taking much damage. It is also nice because you have a save point nearby in case your health gets dangerously low. Be advised though that the street cops start to come after you as soon as you set foot on the garage lot again so do not let your health get TOO low. Also across the street in the train station is a good spot. If you have an ample supply of molotovs and flame thrower propellant stand away from the entrance and you can roast anything and anyone on the other side of the wall. Use your mini-gun to obliterate anything that gets near the entrance. Helicopters can not get to you, so I do not know how much your criminal rating will increase using this method. If tanks are involved did you know that you can take out the driver by shooting the small gap between the access hatch and the lid? Find a wooden power pole or something similar to get behind so that they can not squash you and try taking them out with your mini-gun or assault rifle. Strangely enough, sometimes if the tank is moving when you do this, the driver ends up being dragged along underneath and the tank keeps right on going! Sometimes the tank will start and stop moving as you move. Weird glitch or something. Another was inside the big hangar at the desert airstrip just inside the hangar door. If you keep facing north most police vehicles will meander around the safe house. Some will come towards you from the east down the embankment from the road. You can easily duck further inside for cover if you need to or step outside and take out some helicopters when the coast is clear enough. Just keep in mind that the slow moving hangar door may close behind you if you wander too far outside.

Thanks for the efforts, Chris. I hope that visitors make use of your additions. Clever change to your signature, too. *L*

What is "nfs underground" and what do you mean by "car converter"? Convert what to what?

I have not attempted modding GTA4, but try a search at the Autodesk 3Ds Max site for plug ins and it will give you a list of what is available. There are also help and discussion communities/forums available from the site as well. You can also try here for plug ins and import/export scripts: http://www.wunderboy.org/

I am guessing that you already tried not feeding your Beefcake 4000 CJ. Remember that it takes long time to starve him to 90 pound weakling and saving your game restarts the food time cycle. IF you are sure that your friend used cheats already then it probably would not matter if you tried the opposite cheats and went from there.

Welcome. Glad to help.

"dx8vb.dll" is a Microsoft DirectX file. You may need to reinstall or update DirectX. There should be plenty of mod installation help in the San Andreas modding section of the forum topics.

@MrLlamaLlama: I honestly did not think that too many people would pay attention to this thread. *L* Yes, it is easy for a few thoughts to turn into a few long paragraphs when discussing something like this isn't it? I find myself using analogies a lot. Not because I think that people will not understand, mostly so that I am sure that the point that I was trying to make came out right. I liked the viewpoint of religion carving a sense of morality so that we at least do not resort to a "eat or be eaten" existence. And yet... One could say that it's human nature to get irate when someone does not see things our way. I live in the U.S., a capitalist society, which could be loosely interpreted as "more for me, less for you" or "me first, you last". Maybe less IS more? Small wonder that we tend to be so defensive, even offensive, about personal beliefs. I am thinking that it is easy for even some of the most devote God-fearing church goers there are to forget everything that they think they know about God once they step back into everyday "eat or be eaten" life. Ironically, it is everyday life where (I am thinking) God would like those who believe in Him to set a good example. Perhaps those who think that they are basking in the light are more in the dark than they realize? "When I think that I know it all, then I actually know nothing at all". There are also the factors of forgiveness to consider, and all of that good stuff. But, like you said, I do not wish to go overboard with my perspectives. I certainly do not have all of the answers, and I will not pretend that I do. But one last thing. I heard, or read, a month or two ago a quote from the Bible: "Remember, they hated Me first".

I consider myself to be the last person who would want to take part in a religious discussion, along with politics. Mostly because I just do not want to take part in a "holy war" as I call it. But to idly sit by and say nothing is no better than opening one's pie hole just to hear one's own head roar. Born and raised Protestant Christian. Am I better than anyone else? Do I look down on others of different faith or beliefs? Do I think that I have it right and everyone else has it wrong? Certainly not. With that said, a comment was made that seemed to say "God, if you are out there, show yourself and maybe I will believe". If the stock market was nothing but a sure thing, EVERYBODY would be playing and where would that leave the global economy? Would a writer put the climax of mystery novel in the first chapter or at the end? My religious background centers around faith. There are formal interpretations of what faith is, but I will spare everyone all of that. It is basically the belief that there is something more in store for me beyond the finite limit of my short time here. I have faith that when I leave this world that I have more to look forward to besides being tits up holding a lily while taking an eternal dirt nap in a horizontal phone booth. Simply put: there HAS to be something more. IF there is not, what am I out by believing? I hope for something more; for something that I don't give much thought to on a regular basis: my soul. The God that I know is a God of love. We have interpreted the Bible in a myriad of different ways, but He never instructed us to hate or kill each other because of our own meager attempts at understanding Him. I do not think that it pleases Him to fight each other over who is right and who is wrong. We probably ALL have it wrong in His eyes. Which is why He summed it up very simply for us: Love Him, and each other - in our everyday lives. If that's all that He requires of me then no problem. Which is why I took the time to type all of this. Not to preach, or convert, or damn everyone else to unholy hell. Just what He asks of me.