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1* AccidentalAesop: While Sweet is in prison, CJ becomes a genuinely successful person with his own goals, motivations and methods; but once his brother comes back to his life, CJ starts regressing to being "Sweet's little brother" again and keeps doing what he asks for. It's not hard to see the whole thing as a lesson about toxic family relationships and how trying to please a {{Jerkass}} family member, who keeps acting like your accomplishments don't matter, is not a healthy thing to do no matter how important they are to you. Pretty much the only reason why it doesn't appear to be an intended Aesop is that Sweet's borderline abusive relationship with CJ isn't really treated as such in the game itself, with the former being UnintentionallyUnsympathetic to many.
2* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation:
3** Is CJ a good person? CJ is a divisive character, due to his more {{anti hero}}ic attributes. Some view him as an ultimately good person who has to do bad things to help the people he loves. Others view him as just as much a monster as every other ''GTA'' protagonist. Some people consider his PetTheDog moments (such as his love for his sister, his friendships with various characters, his desire to clean up the streets from drugs and his general tendency to help people in need) to be enough to make him a good person doing bad things. Others find his reprehensible acts (he kills people for a living, he ruined Madd Dogg's life to help his asshole friend) too much.
4** Sweet:
5*** Is he a {{Jerkass}} who ran his brother out of town, blaming him for his little brother's death, and disrespects said brother for trying to get his family out of the ghetto instead of acknowledging that the glory days are long gone [[spoiler:and is ungrateful for CJ both getting him out of jail and making something of himself instead of staying in Grove]] and deserves everything he gets, or a stand-up guy who cares deeply about his home, family and friends, and wants to get everything back to what it was in the [[GloryDays good old days]] and ends up in a deep pile of crap he didn't deserve because of it? [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Q3XcI6s0GU This video analyzes his attitude]].
6*** When he stops CJ from finishing off [[spoiler:Tenpenny]] after his crash, was it really because he didn't want them to be implicated in his death? Or was it because he thought shooting the bastard would be a MercyKill he didn't deserve (in effect if not intent), while [[CruelMercy letting him suffer a slower and more painful death from his injuries]] would be a harsher and more fitting punishment for all the terrible things he did?
7** Was Ryder's dedication to Grove Street genuine up until [[spoiler:his betrayal, and only was persuaded by Big Smoke later, or did he just feign the whole "Grove Street For Life" attitude to make him seem innocent?]]
8*** While discussing Ryder himself, [[spoiler:what was his motivation in the storyline really? Was he intended to become a traitor all along? Or was it a last-second decision on the developers' part? Considering how he is treated as a minor character after his betrayal (so minor that his betrayal is barely even acknowledged in dialogue) and never given a proper death scene, much less any clear reason for his betrayal, one could conclude that Rockstar either had no use for Ryder's character after CJ would leave Los Santos, so they improvised his betrayal at the last second, or that Ryder was originally a side-character who Rockstar suddenly gained an attachment to, so much that they made him one of the main characters and didn't plan his motivation of the game out very well.]] Here's [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n4qKs9WB7no some]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tatWAuDNF8 few]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9puNdLVoz4&t=1s videos]][[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpHMSjkWsuc of his analysis]].
9** There's also CJ's relationship with Ryder. While the latter acts as an asshole towards CJ and doesn't give him much respect, as well as being a bit envious of CJ at times, it's easy for anyone to interpret Ryder's behavior towards CJ more as ToughLove rather than any actual hatred since like Sweet, Ryder too wasn't happy about CJ leaving for Liberty City five years prior, and let's face it, [[JerkassHasAPoint pretty much everything Ryder said about CJ was true]]. [[spoiler:This is what also causes most fans to interpret that Ryder's betrayal was nothing more than an afterthought to find some way to write him out of the story somehow.]]
10** Was Cesar's statement about [[spoiler:Ryder trying to have sex with Kendl really true? If so, was it {{attempted rape}}? Or did Cesar just simply say that to make Carl feel better after showing genuine remorse for killing Ryder? The fact that it was randomly brought up without any evidence or even tiny hints just makes it more confusing.]]
11** Zero is portrayed as a nerd with a penchant for drama but he could also veer into territory of a PsychopathicManchild. His alleged nemesis, Berkley, is never seen nor heard, and the only proof of his existence is a 'Berkley's RC' van that could belong to anyone (these vehicles are seen in one mission only) and Zero blaming him for bringing the lights back on during the casino heist. Sure, someone was opposing Zero during these missions, but being the technical expert he is, enemy vehicles could have been rigged by Zero himself to artificially manufacture a dramatic confrontation. Furthermore, while Berkley's alleged actions are limited to destruction of property and physical harassment, Zero has absolutely no qualms with outright killing his enemy's employees who, for all intents and purposes, are completely innocent people.
12** There's also Big Smoke himself. [[spoiler: One would infer that Smoke may have predicted his own demise throughout the game judging by his quotes of the bible. At one point, he even tells CJ to remember him when he's on top, which may imply that Smoke knew CJ would eventually find out about his betrayal and try to kill him for his troubles later on. This doesn't even mention that many of the chase missions with Big Smoke that involved him subtly trying to get CJ and Sweet killed could have gotten Smoke himself killed as well since he would be caught in the crossfire along with them. Also, at the end of the game, when CJ finally confronts him, Smoke isn't the slightest bit surprised that CJ came around to take him out. All in all, it seems that Big Smoke was expecting to get killed for his troubles and predicted his demise.]]
13*** On a side note, [[spoiler: there's also the theory that Tenpenny had forced Smoke to turn on his friends since it's implied that he paid Big Smoke to kill Sweet considering that in the Introduction video, Tenpenny is shown talking to someone over the phone about how he doesn't care about the person's feelings or principles and forcing that person to do what they agreed to, which would imply he was talking to Big Smoke over the phone. There's also the fact that Big Smoke wasn't shown actually trying to kill Sweet during the Introduction video and that the Ballas did the job instead.]]
14*** A second sidenote for his infamous order. [[spoiler:Was he ''really'' a BigEater or was he just making the order as ridiclous as possible to buy the Ballas as much time as possible to carry out their task?]]
15*** There's also a third sidenote. [[spoiler:Some fans speculate that he was planning to ambush and murder Sweet after he came back from his mother's funeral, but CJ's return [[SpannerInTheWorks forced him to abandon that idea]]; some adherents of this theory go on to suggest that him claiming to mistake CJ for a home invader was an attempt to save face and defuse suspicion, or even that he ''was'' considering killing CJ before CJ grabbed the chair to defend himself.]]
16*** And to add one more to the interpretation, [[spoiler: his final words before his death. Was Smoke genuinely contrite of his actions, or was he just being delusional enough to believe he will be remembered after everything he's done and still expect praise for his success?]]
17** Why did Hernandez [[spoiler:sell out Tenpenny and Pulaski]]? Was it out of guilt over his actions, or to get back at them? Likewise, [[spoiler:was his tackling Pulaski an attempt to take Pulaski down himself, or to give C.J. a chance to deal with Pulaski and Tenpenny in Hernandez's stead]]? Additionally, [[spoiler:was he actually the snitch in C.R.A.S.H., or did Tenpenny try to kill him out of paranoia]]?
18* AluminumChristmasTrees:
19** The in-game commercials feature two ads for a preacher named Mike Andrews who makes a living traveling to poor communities and encouraging his audiences to embrace their poverty. There actually were preachers like this touring areas reeling from deindustrialization around the time period that the game is set. The 1989 documentary ''Film/RogerAndMe'' showcases one of these preachers holding a stadium show in Flint, Michigan ''on the taxpayer's dime'' as part of the city's attempt to rejuvenate its economy and address its unemployment crisis in the wake of multiple General Motors plant closures.
20** C.R.A.S.H. seems like another case of Rockstar having FunWithAcronyms, but [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Community_Resources_Against_Street_Hoodlums Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums]] was a real LAPD gang-crime task force that was disbanded in 2000 following revelations of rampant corruption and criminality in the unit (to the point that some people were referring to CRASH as "the baddest gang in LA"). If anything, the real CRASH was ''worse'' than its fictional counterpart, since when the unit was investigated after the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rampart_scandal Rampart scandal]], over 70 officers were found to have been involved in the illegal activities of CRASH, compared to the three that appear in the game. Frank Tenpenny is even a reasonable {{Expy}} of CRASH's commander Rafaél Pérez.
21** The Bogstandard's sign being upside-down is occasionally considered a bug, but its real-life counterpart, [[https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/39/StandardHotel04.jpg The Standard]], had a sign just like that.
22** While the Drive-Thru Confessions Church in Palomino Creek, Red County may seem like a rather irreverent joke towards the sacrament of confession by Catholics, there was actually a RealLife version of it [[https://abcnews.go.com/US/priest-offers-drive-confession-coronavirus-pandemic/story?id=69726217 carried out]] by an enterprising priest in response to church closures in the US during the UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic.
23* AnnoyingVideoGameHelper: The game features this in the San Fierro series of missions. Every once in a while, one of the villains sends minions on drug runs from San Fierro to Los Santos, and you are able to intercept them and steal their money. It wouldn't be so bad except that when it happens, the phone rings, CJ automatically answers it, and the following conversation [[MemeticMutation has become ingrained in many a player's head]]. You can then choose to either go after them or not, and given the difficulty and how far away you have to drive to get them, a lot of players don't find the monetary award worth it, so these calls become especially annoying.
24-->'''CJ:''' Hey Cesar. The yay leavin' San Fierro, right?\
25'''Cesar:''' Right, but they're using ''bikes'', CJ, and they go ''cross-country''!
26* AntiClimaxBoss: There's a few.
27** "Enough, we settle this here!" The Snakehead, leader of the Da Nang Boys, has you duel him one-on-one with katana. Except he easily goes down in two swings (and no matter what, you swing faster than him), and you're free to switch to your gun.
28** While the mission to [[spoiler:reach Ryder is challenging and the chase is kinda cool, we are never given any reason for his betrayal. He's just unceremoniously killed in a boat explosion if not just shot in the back with a sniper rifle while he's trying to get to a boat, and is barely mentioned again. On top of that, not only does he not shoot back, he isn't even trying to get away, which makes his death rather dull and disappointing.]]
29** Tenpenny is a justified example. [[spoiler:While his accident is the best result for the main characters (his problem killed himself, and he can't be blamed for it), it's a bit disappointing that we don't get to beat the smug out of him.]]
30* AssPull: [[spoiler:While Big Smoke's betrayal of the Grove Street Families gets plenty of {{Foreshadowing}}, the fact that Ryder is his accomplice seems to come out of nowhere. The fact that all his missions involve improving the GSF's strength and the fact that unlike Smoke he has no qualms with directly fighting the Ballas doesn't seem to frame him as someone who is secretly TheMole. While him bailing with Smoke in "Reuniting the Families" may imply that Smoke probably convinced him while they were away from the police shootout, this is not apparent when playing the mission and comes off as flimsy. More conspiratorial fans, pointing out that Ryder is barely mentioned in the dialogue directly following the twist, suggest that having Ryder betray the gang was not in the original script.]]
31* AwardSnub: A slight one with ''[=PlayStation=] Magazine'', when they did their [[TopTenList top ten games of the year]]. They [[LampshadeHanging lampshaded]] it, saying that ''San Andreas'' was the one they were prepared to award the top spot to even before it came out, knowing how good it would be. The editors at PSM said that giving it second place was one of the hardest decisions they had to make, as they felt that denying the first-place spot to ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid3SnakeEater'' (which came out slightly later the same year) would have been the greater snub. ''Official Playstation Magazine'' also snubbed it, putting ''VideoGame/Burnout3Takedown'' at the top of their list. In fairness, ''Snake Eater'' and ''Burnout 3'' are classics in their own right and probably would be uncontested winners any other year (2004 was ''stacked'' for gaming).
32* [[AwesomeBosses/VideoGames Awesome Bosses]]: The run-and-gun chase through the streets of Los Santos against Samuel L. Jackson's DirtyCop, Officer Tenpenny.
33* [[Awesome/VideoGameLevels Awesome Video Games Levels]]:
34** Anytime a mission includes a rail shooter sequence is pretty much this. "Just Business" starts off with a shootout against the Russian Mafia that ended up in one of the most memorable moments early on in the game as well as a homage to [[Film/Terminator2JudgmentDay the truck chase from Judgment Day]]. "Reuniting The Families" cranks up the elements of what makes "Just Business" great in the first place by replacing the Russian Mafia with the SWAT Team and the entire LSPD detachment going for Sweet's head and ends up in an equally awesome rail shooter where you can easily level your [=AK-47=] skill and get the funniest dynamic and banter the four friends would ever had before the inevitable happens. And that's not counting the final level... The only downside would be that these missions tend to give a weapon with infinite ammo, replacing any weapon in that slot, only to later strip you of it after the mission is completed, without giving the previous weapon back, which can be ''very'' annoying if the player had spent money buying ammo for that weapon slot.
35** Despite being somewhat [[UnderusedGameMechanic underselled mechanic that rarely sees action]], the missions that focuses on stealth tend to be really fun, especially that of "The Black Project" and "Vertical Bird". Both missions involves CJ breaking through military facilities and ends up stealing a classified military equipment (a 60 million dollar jetpack for the former and a VTOL jet plane for the latter) that showcases it's strength and let you have a feel to it's snappy controls. Whilst the former simply asks you to escape out of the facility, the latter puts you straight to a dogfighting crash course with up to three hostile jet planes! Both missions can be done with 100% stealth or guns blazing (in case you failed), so it's never a dull moment and keeps you engaged at all times.
36** "Breaking The Bank at Caligula's" may become one contender of the best level for the game, if not for the one below. After setting up the heist by getting the building plan, having all the necessary equipment and vehicles, setting explosives on the river dam, trying to woo on one of the croupier for the access keycard, and most importantly, getting the trust you need from one of the shareholders of the casino, you start off by blending in with other staff members where you had to access the backrooms without suspicion, then lob a tear gas grenade off the ventilation to knock down all the personnel on the basement, before Zero would set-off the explosive in the dam that temporarily disables the electricity in the city. You bring in Woozie and the heist crew, take all the money they can from the vault, then make an escape, if not the fact that Zero bragged on Berkley about the heist sometime before they set up for it. To lower any further damage, Carl went on as a decoy and fight his way off to the rooftop, where you would jump off and chute your way to the building across the casino and steal the SWAT team's chopper and got away safely. Doubles as a CatharsisFactor for both [[TheScrappy Zero]] as Carl went off to [[TakeThatScrappy hit Zero in the face]] for leaking the heist plan and being a pain in the ass for the player.
37** "End of the Line" cranks up what makes all the aforementioned level memorable up to eleven and divides them into a sequential stages until the end of the game. You start off by driving up with Sweet to Big Smoke's crack palace, steal a SWAT water tank and slam the darn thing off the palace's wall, make your way through each floor, fighting numerous gang members and drug manufacturers all the way to the top where Big Smoke awaits, in which you will be fighting him and his fellow bodyguards. Upon [[AlasPoorVillain defeating him and lamented on Smoke's own last words]], Tenpenny came over and aiming his gun at you, knowing that he had no other choice but to bail off the country before they caught up with him. You chase him all the way down outside, jumping off the explosion behind, and ends in a chase sequence where you got to keep your brother Sweet alive and catch him up, where he will take the wheel and you protecting him by shooting every enemy gang and police that come for you which might as well be almost the entire town. [[spoiler:The entire thing is wrapped up with a nice BookEnds by landing in Grove Street.]]
38* BaseBreakingCharacter:
39** CJ's somewhat LighterAndSofter personality in comparison to the other protagonist has led to many debates over whether it's a good thing or not. Fans are also divided between those who like CJ's talkativeness and those who didn't like his [[SirSwearsALot frequent swearing]] and [[TrashTalk trash talking]] tendencies during the game compared to the [[HeroicMime silent]] Claude and the [[TheStoic stoic]] Tommy, to the point that some of the latter camp made a mod to make CJ silent outside of mission cutscenes.
40** Similarly, fans are split on OG Loc. Some consider him as one of the funniest characters in the game due to his lines, other find him annoying for the fact that Carl is willing to spend so much time helping him, and [[spoiler:when Big Smoke betrays CJ, Loc sides with Smoke, along with the fact that CJ lets him live after a wild chase across Los Santos.]]
41* BestKnownForTheFanservice: Three words--[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hot_Coffee_mod "Hot Coffee" Mod.]]
42* BigLippedAlligatorMoment:
43** The opening of "A Home In The Hills" features a dwarf rapping, only to be told off by Woozie for not having enough mass appeal. While the dwarf has a bit of dialogue coming back at Woozie, the entire scene only lasts about 15 seconds, and it's discarded immediately after CJ arrives.
44** One mission involves stealing a jar of green goo from a military convoy for The Truth. When The Truth get his hands on the jar, he looks to it with an amazed expression, says he will call it "Year Zero" and that everything will be explained, and then goes away without any explanation, finishing the mission.
45* BreatherLevel:
46** The Flint County countryside portion. Compared to the grittier, more squalid Los Santos portion before it and the [[ThatOneLevel often very challenging]] San Fierro portion after it, the countryside missions are mostly fairly easy, introduce some of the game's funnier characters like Catalina and The Truth, and take place in [[SceneryPorn an area full of rolling hills, open meadows and towering Redwoods]].
47** Mission wise, there are "Wear Flowers in Your Hair" which allows you to familiarize with San Fierro as you introduced with some of the new characters you will encounter. It's a simple point-to-point driving without time limit.
48* BrokenBase:
49** A relatively mild case compared to other examples, but it's there. While there are many fans who love the game for its vast world, huge variety of things to do and RPGElements, there are also many who feel the game was essentially too much of a good thing, with an excess of filler minigames and LevelGrinding.
50** Among the game's fans, there is the graphics differences between versions. To be precise, the PC version removes the heavy ColorWash the [=PS2=] version has and replaces it with a far more subtle palette, and changes how the car reflections look. Which one looks better depends on who you ask.
51* CameraScrew: In the PC port, it is possible to freely control the camera with the mouse, but if you stop moving the mouse for more than a second while driving, the camera refocuses to the back of the car.
52* CatharsisFactor:
53** [[spoiler: Killing Ryder in "Pier 69" had those who hated him for betraying CJ very satisfied with it]].
54** [[spoiler: ''Finally'' having the chance to kill Eddie Pulaski in "High Noon" after all the times he was being a ''huge'' {{Jerkass}} to CJ with his racial comments and insults to the latter's mother's death. The latter stomping his face in is icing on the cake]].
55** CJ punching Zero in the face is pure '''''SATISFACTION''''' after he snitched to Berkeley and all his very difficult missions.
56** Madd Dogg getting payback at OG Loc in "Cut Throat Business" for nearly ruining said rapper's career and trying to steal the spotlight.
57** [[spoiler: Gunning down Big Smoke in the final mission after his FaceHeelTurn is pure pleasure as well]].
58*** [[spoiler: Frank Tenpenny succumbing to his wounds from his firetruck crash in the same mission after all the crap he put the main protagonist through the whole game is nothing short of satisfaction]].
59* CommonKnowledge:
60** The main conception of the Grove Street Families is that they're against drugs. Correction: They're only against the hard drugs such as crack cocaine. They have nothing against marijuana or even PCP since most of the members of the gang are occasionally seen smoking weed and Ryder can be seen cooking up a batch of PCP.
61** People who aren't used to the [=PS2=] version's graphics often assume it just tints everything orange. The [=PS2=] version actually has a wide variety of color filters depending on the time, weather, and CJ's location, the game just starts with the perfect conditions to trigger the orange filter (Morning, sunny weather, Los Santos).
62** Thanks to the most popular recreation of the DummiedOut mission "The Truth Is Out There", from the GameMod ''Things To Do in San Andreas'', many assume Rockstar intended for the also DummiedOut FBI Truck to appear in this mission. This was just an arbitrary decision by the mod maker [=DeeZire=], there is no actual proof in the game's code that the mission would involve the FBI Truck at any point.
63* CompleteMonster:
64** [[DirtyCop Officer Frank Tenpenny]] is the crooked, self-righteous head of [[Characters/GrandTheftAutoSanAndreasAntagonists C.R.A.S.H.]], using the unit as his own personal gang in a quest to control all of San Andreas. For years, Tenpenny has abused his authority to exploit the gangs of Los Santos for his own profit while turning them against each other and orchestrating bloody {{gang war}}s. Tenpenny eventually throws in exclusively with the ruthless Ballas, supplying them with dangerous crack cocaine with which to flood the streets and turn countless civilians and crooks alike into suffering addicts. To secure Balla rule, Tenpenny ensures the systematic slaughter of smaller gangs, such as [[Characters/GrandTheftAutoSanAndreasGroveStreetFamilies Grove Street]], and in a haphazard attempt on the life of Grove Street's leader Sweet, Tenpenny has a drive-by carried out that kills Sweet's elderly mother. To keep his crimes hidden, [[KillerCop Tenpenny]] regularly [[CopKiller murders fellow officers of the law]] as well as other whistleblowers, either with his own hands or by forcing those like [[AntiHero Carl "CJ" Johnson]] to do his dirty work, threatening the latter with having his brother raped and killed if he refuses. [[TheCorrupter Tenpenny]] is also responsible for the corruption of Big Smoke, making him become the face of the drug empire Tenpenny has constructed, planning all the while to eliminate him. Tenpenny's villainy is so rampant that Los Santos begins tearing itself apart in an outraged riot over his unchecked evil, at which point Tenpenny tries to eliminate loose ends, [[BadBoss leave his allies to die in a fire]], and flee the state to save his own skin. Tenpenny's ambition nearly destroys San Andreas, and to the very end he sneers that those against him were [[KnightTemplar nothing but "trash" to be taken out]].
65** Catalina. See her entry [[YMMV/GrandTheftAutoIII here]].
66* ContestedSequel: Initially, some fans fresh out of ''Videogame/GrandTheftAutoViceCity'' were disappointed in ''San Andreas'' for its grittier tone/atmosphere and more washed out aesthetic, as the 1992 setting had them hoping it would be another cheesy, nostalgia-filed romp. Instead, ''San Andreas'' put nostalgia in the back seat to instead try to give as much of a realistic portrayal of life in 1992 as possible, with the societal problems faced at the time (the crack epidemic and the related rise of crime and violence in the inner cities, police brutality, the anti-gang police units engaging heavily in criminal activity and effectively becoming gangs themselves, the economy being in recession, the infiltration of Russian criminal syndicates into the United States thanks to the Cold War ending) being front and center and driving the plot.
67* CrazyIsCool:
68** The Truth is a crazy stoned old hippie, who just happens to have found an RPG and a couple of flame throwers.
69** Mike Toreno, who insinuates that Hitler killing himself and that the US nuked Japan are just lies. Given his government connections and how he just ''makes things happen'', he may not be lying.
70* CrossesTheLineTwice: The police in San Fierro are either blatant CampGay stereotypes or flatout make rape threats, which wouldn't be funny if the delivery of their lines wasn't so over the top and full of innuendos.
71* CryForTheDevil: [[spoiler: Big Smoke may have been revealed to be a traitor later on. But once you learn what got him to do what he did as he explains in his dying breath, you just can't help but feel sorry for the guy, especially since the game's intro even implies that Tenpenny even threatened him at some point. The fact that CJ even told his dying friend he was like family to him before the latter's demise and was practically in tears afterwards is absolutely gut-wrenching.]]
72* DifficultySpike: San Fierro. There have been quite a few challenging missions up to this point, but now challenging missions become more frequent and even trickier, such as the [[ThatOneLevel infamous]] "Supply Lines". And it just gets tougher from there, with the Bone County/Las Venturas portion being a Difficulty Spike from San Fierro, especially with all the flying missions.
73* DisappointingLastLevel:
74** When the game finally wraps up to a finale, CJ returns to Los Santos and has to completely disregard all his previous success in San Fierro and Las Venturas to represent Grove Street in the local gang wars, forcing the player to finish a significant chunk of the turf wars sidequest before they could move to the very last mission in the game. It's not only particularly annoying thanks to, if you procrastinated on the turf wars until the very end, you'll have to complete the sidequest while all Hell is breaking loose around you as the citizens of Los Santos are rioting, but even if you completed the turf wars before leaving Los Santos at the beginning of the game, your turf war progress is reset as soon as you leave, so your efforts are meaningless.
75** Subverted with the [[MarathonLevel final mission itself,]] which is considered one of the BestLevelEver due to being the most epic final mission of all GTA games.
76* DiscOneNuke:
77** There's a [[HandCannon Magnum]] just a bit to the south of Ganton, an AK-47 at the back of Roboi's Food Mart at northern Los Santos before the hilly suburbs, and an [=MP5=] a ways to the north of where the game starts proper. Do a few ammo runs to those spots, do some [[StatGrinding shooting practice]] with them, and you'll have more than enough firepower for the game's early missions.
78** Killing [[MoneySpider drug pushers]] is a good way to get money and some pistol ammo at the start of the game. Their drops become chump change as the game proceeds and missions start paying out more and more money and you'll be toting either a silenced handgun or a Magnum, but before the gang wars start they're very profitable.
79** The local fire station is a short drive or bike away from CJ's house. It's fairly easy to rack up 10K in 10 minutes or so of firefighting missions, providing your aim is good. Just make sure you move away from the intersection a bit before starting so you don't have to navigate it and put out a fire in 30 seconds. Completing all of the firefighting levels also makes you ''fireproof'', and likewise completing all ambulance levels doubles your health bar, so it's easily possible to be playing early missions with both of these bonuses and tens of thousands of dollars.
80* DracoInLeatherPants:
81** Catalina can be seen as this to plenty of fans. Some of them tend to overlook her psychotic behavior by pointing out how "nice" she looks, and when they do acknowledge it, they try to pass it off as her having a bad childhood. While the comment about a stepfather mistreating his stepdaughter she mentions at the start of the last mission might provide a hint, there is no evidence whatsoever that this has actually happened to Catalina herself since her childhood is never explained in either of her appearances in the two games she was in. So in other words, she has no revealed excuse for her psychopathic ways, and none of her arbitrary outbursts are justified at all.
82** CJ himself is more of a downplayed example. While he is definitely much more humane and has more morals than his two predecessors, many fans tend to make him seem more human than he really is and even ignore his moments where his actions are questionable to say the least (such as murdering Madd Dogg's mansion security members and manager in deference to OG Loc and burying a foreman alive while he's inside the port-a-potty).
83* EnsembleDarkHorse:
84** Mike Toreno. Helped by the fact that he's played by ''Creator/JamesWoods'', and gets some of the best delivered lines in the whole game.
85** Woozie and Ryder also have a lot of fans, [[spoiler:which is why fans were disappointed that the latter became a traitor and didn't get a proper death scene]].
86** Big Smoke, for being BigFun as well as a FountainOfMemes. [[spoiler:Bonus points for his AlasPoorVillain death.]]
87** "[[FanNickname Orange 12]]", the pedestrian who wears a jacket with, [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin well, an orange 12]] on it, for his memorable lines and how frequently players will encounter him throughout the entire state. His quotes are regarded as the best pedestrian quotes in the game.
88* EpilepticTrees: [[spoiler:A theory has emerged in recent years suggesting that Ryder's betrayal was added late in development. The biggest support for this theory is the fact that he has only two new lines after the intro of "The Green Sabre" (both of them being very generic, so they could have been recycled lines from earlier unused dialogue), and that he is not mentioned again afterwards until late in the game. Even though CJ witnesses both Big Smoke and Ryder with the Ballas, he only mentions Big Smoke's betrayal to Sweet and Tenpenny. Tenpenny also orders CJ to stay away only from Smoke. There is also that fact that Smoke is heavily foreshadowed to be a rat, while Ryder is not. While it was commonly believed that Ryder's voice actor became suddenly unavailable during production, MC Eiht has stated that he did all of the lines he was asked to do. It's believed now that the direction of Ryder's character was simply changed well into development and insufficient time was available to fully change it.]]
89* EvenBetterSequel: ''GTA III'' was a revolutionary game unto itself, and ''Vice City'' only improved it further. ''San Andreas'' on the other hand is often considered to be the greatest ''Grand Theft Auto'' game ''period'', with a plot that jumps back and forth between serious and silly, memorable characters, enhanced mission variety, massive map (with ''three'' entire cities to explore instead of just one) and various takes of genre (from gritty gangland ghetto, to vigilante action, to science fiction, to mob drama) being high selling points.
90* EventObscuringCamera: The game had the "Helpful" camera change problem. While driving the camera focuses ''directly'' behind your vehicle, meaning you can't see what's in front of you on the road. There's a button you can hit to move it to a much more useful angle, but as soon as you let go of said button, the camera slides riiiiiight back into crap-town. Of course, you can drive in first person mode, but then you can't see anyone pulling up behind or to the side of you; it becomes incredibly difficult to extricate yourself from the kind of 46-point turn scenario that often comes up when trying to drive through alleyways, and over everything else; and of course not forgetting, the car ''inexplicably gets wider when you're in first person view''.
91* EvilIsCool:
92** CJ and the Grove Street Families are this, so much.
93** While not as prominentaly featured, Los Aztecas might be this for some even more so.
94** The Mountain Cloud Boys are just so [[AffablyEvil friendly and reliable]] that it's almost easy to forget that they're a Triad syndicate.
95** Mike Toreno is an AffablyEvil {{Chessmaster}} [[spoiler:with international influence,]] voiced by Creator/JamesWoods. This is inevitable.
96* {{Fanon}}:
97** Because of their use in many fan videos, it is widely assumed among the fanbase that [[https://wiki.multitheftauto.com/images/c/c5/Skinid219.jpg these]] [[https://wiki.multitheftauto.com/images/4/4b/Skinid187.jpg two]] pedestrians that appear in San Fierro are Lianne Forget and Richard Burns, the reporters from WCTR News, respectively.
98** CJ is almost depicted in fan arts, fan videos, and fan mods, as wearing the white tank-top and blue jeans he wore early in the game, despite CJ ironically having the most extensive customization options before the protagonist of Videogame/GrandTheftAutoOnline.
99** There's a popular fan theory that the ex-wife one police biker may refer to when accusing CJ of being a homewrecker is Barbara Schternvart, a fellow cop and one of the girlfriends CJ can date. This is despite the fact that you can encounter this particular police biker before you can even meet Barbara.
100* FetishRetardant: The Hot Coffee minigame might have originally been meant to serve as a source of fanservice, but the blocky character models that were considered low quality even in 2004 meant there was no way seeing them naked and grinding against each other would arouse anyone.
101* FranchiseOriginalSin: The protagonists of ''III'' and ''Vice City'' were hardened, vicious and unrepentant criminals for whom the violence they commit both in-mission and [[VideoGameCrueltyPotential out-of-mission]] was in-character. CJ, on the other hand, was the first GTA protagonist to be portrayed more sympathetically, making the violence the player can make him commit in-game feel [[GameplayAndStorySegregation out-of-character]]. While this wasn't seen an issue at the time of the game's original release, probably because the game mostly stuck to the wacky tone of the other GTA games of its era, it did become a major criticism of ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoIV'', due to its shift towards a more grounded, realistic, and serious tone.
102* GameBreaker:
103** The [[LethalJokeWeapon Cane]]. Not only does it combine the Katana's speed with the Pool Cue's reach, but the game registers it as a Gift rather than a Weapon (meaning that you don't have to sacrifice an AwesomeButImpractical delight like the Chainsaw).
104** In exchange for being [[ThatOneLevel difficult as all hell]], getting all gold in flight school gets you the Hunter helicopter. Who needs surgical precision when you have a military attack chopper? It also grants effectively infinite money since it makes the vigilante missions a breeze to do endlessly, granting more and more money with each successful level.
105*** Speaking of vigilante mission, if you find Hunter helicopter difficult to control, there's a ''Rhino tank'' you can easily steal from Area 69 just south of aforementioned school, save it and have fun blasting everyone that stands in your way.
106** Right at the start of the game, there is a tedious but laughably easy way to make a crapton of money. Wait until you've got at least a few thousand dollars (and have bought the safehouse in Jefferson to minimize the length of your trips to save), then save your game and go to the Inside Track betting shop in downtown Los Santos and put everything you've got into the horse with the worst odds. You'll lose a lot, but keep reloading and trying again, betting on the same horse, until you do win. Save your game, and repeat the process. Do this enough times, and you'll never have to worry about money again for the rest of the game.
107** Further into the game, same thing with the casinos. Play blackjack or electronic poker in Woozie's casino (where you can save right in it) and reset when you lose, save when you win. If you really like fake gambling and don't mind a little grinding (and hearing the same two fucking songs ad naseum), its a great way to net a few million and spend the rest of the game not having to worry about money.
108** When you finish "Vertical Bird", you get a reward not indicated by the game: the main house of [[spoiler:Toreno]]'s ranch will be chock-full of heavy ordnance, which will re-appear every time you save on the nearby save point. While, in this game, VideoGameFlamethrowersSuck and the rocket launchers are AwesomeButImpractical due to slow rocket speed and high risk of self-damage, there is also...
109*** The [[GatlingGood handheld minigun]]. Each shot deals more damage than the Magnum Pistol, its belt holds 500 of them, it fires ridiculously fast, and no matter what, ''it is pinpoint accurate with no spread''. It's very rare and hard to reach in general and these "world" pickups only give you 200 rounds, so rounding up ammo can be a chore, which is made worse when you have to do missions that end up removing it from your inventory completely, so it's really not worth the hassle. That is, until you finish "Vertical Bird" above. Suffice to say, ''any'' combat mission you have to go through after that one '''is a complete and utter BREEZE.'''
110** In all 3D era GTA games, entering a garage and letting the door close instantly repairs your vehicle for free and also keeps the cars current paint job. It is especially notable in this game for making two tasks incredibly trivial:
111*** Delivering cars to Exports and Imports at the docks gives you a certain amount of money depending on how damaged it is. Because some cars can give you upwards of ''$100,000'', maximizing profit is as simple as repairing the car at CJ's garage and then making the short drive to the docks.
112*** Upgrading weapon skill is usually tedious and it can take a good portion of the game to level just a single weapon. But with the garage repair, it's as simple as shooting a car and closing the garage door when it catches fire. You can get a fully upgraded gun within about four minutes of grinding. And yes, the garage can even repair destroyed vehicles as long as the wreck is in the garage.
113* GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff:
114** The game was popular in developing countries such as Brazil and Indonesia, due to resonating situation as well as the openness of the game and the many things to do in-game.
115** As well as how most of the modding communities were from Brazil, Thailand, Indonesia, and Eastern European countries.
116* GoddamnedBats: The motorcycle police certainly qualify. Not only are they everywhere in the major cities, but if the player has a one or two star wanted level, they will often shoot at CJ. They only have pistols, thankfully, which makes them not very threatening, but annoying nonetheless.
117* GoodBadBugs: Plenty.
118** The most notable glitch is by far the so-called "territory glitch", which allows the player to have all zones in the entire San Andreas map as gang-controlled territories. The original, better known version of the glitch can be triggered by traveling out towards the sea in any direction for approximately 30 minutes: it turns the whole map into gang territories, but it was patched in some game versions. Another version involves throwing satchel charges at the enemies that appear during a gang attack, then detonating them in a non-gang area: it turns only that specific area into a gang-controlled territory, but it works on all game versions. Once an area has been turned into a gang-controlled territory, it can be taken over by the player for the GSF by successfully completing a gang war there. [[https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLAMp4moYwmMhsdBIAZdEKGxq7sfuCfVur This]] Youtube playlist shows how it's done. Players who want to take over the entire San Andreas map should know, however, that some areas are hard-coded to not spawn any gang members (mainly, but not exclusively, around the countryside and the desert), and some of the areas are entirely water-based, which means it can be a pain to acquire them. Furthermore, the original glitch is only safe in the [=PS2=] version, as in the PC and [=XBox=] versions it's rather a GameBreakingBug [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L97xXbFnFWM&t=1431s that can disable the taxi sidequest]].
119** If you don't feel like having to go and defend an area of Los Santos from rival gangs, you can simply enter any vehicle that allows you to do a side mission (taxis, police vehicles, ambulances and fire trucks) and start said side mission in order to cancel the attack on ally turf; the turf will still be yours and the enemies will disappear. The same happens when you save the game or start a mission.
120** The game would occasionally spawn aircraft that had a flight plan going straight into the ground, assuming the player was at certain parts of the game world (the tops of a rural mountain). The dev team discovered this bug when the game was being tested and [[ThrowItIn decided not to fix it]] [[RuleOfFunny because it's funny]]. This bug has been seen in the middle of a crowded intersection, which destroyed several cars and killed many people. Assuredly, worth the price of admission as the bug was not known of at that time.
121** There is another bug where, in some 2-player situations, player 2 can decapitate player 1 (with the sword) and player 1 will respawn headless with blood spurting out of their neck.
122** A cool visual glitch can be triggered while riding the Mountain Bike. Mash the X button while holding the Square button and watch as CJ's limbs stretch, twist, and bend in all sorts of uncanny ways. Do it enough and he'll even start to ''melt into the ground''.
123** While riding a bicycle, it's possible to climb up inclines at angles just shy of ''straight vertical'' by repeatedly mashing the accelerate button.
124** If you play the [=PS2=] version of the game with a tool like [=HDLoader=], the delay between spawning vehicles drops to almost nothing. This is mostly harmless, as the same amount of vehicles spawn, just sooner; however, it interacts badly with the buggy highway driver AI, which results in VERY BIG pileups if you approach certain intersections in Las Venturas on foot, or occasionally spontaneously on some highways with no provocation whatsoever. A well-placed grenade in this situation can set off a neverending chain of explosions that is continually fed by the rapidly-spawning vehicles adding to the pileup as cars are destroyed.
125** Several "ghost" vehicles are in the game. These tend to be due to odd spawn conditions within the game itself, the most famous being the Ghost Cars in the hills of the Back-O-Beyond. They spawn at the top of a hill and roll slowly down, heavily damaged and completely driverless. Others include a "ghost hovercraft" at Bayside and another "ghost" car at Mt. Chiliad, even though that one has a driver. They don't do anything particularly useful other than being usable vehicles, but they are definitely [[AccidentalNightmareFuel creepy]]. And on occasion, dangerous if you don't see it coming. Nothing like an empty car slamming into yours just inches from your face...
126** In Fort Carson, a Beagle airplane can rarely spawn parked near one of the houses, where it makes no sense to spawn (the airplane is too big to fit in the driveway of the house, and also does not have a functioning airway nor large enough room to take off from), and its spawning position is so glitched that entering it causes it to explode due to the airplane taking damage from collision with the house (it almost always spawns with its left wing stuck inside the house). An investigation [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95PAecJd7k4 showed]] (unfortunately the video is only in Spanish) that the Beagle was originally intended to be a BMX bicycle, but after the BMX was coded to spawn in that spot, a reordering of the internal files accidentally transformed the spawning point into a Beagle.
127** Using the jetpack and some careful maneuvering, you can get into some rooms and other areas that are normally contained only within cutscenes, as explained briefly [[http://lparchive.org/Grand-Theft-Auto-San-Andreas-(Screenshot)/Update%2092d/ here]] and detailed [[https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKQnJoNsNBPlLgck7UvgRsffehM0_4UIc here]].
128** The Mulholland safe house can store vehicles on the roof of the garage. This allows it to serve as a helipad.
129** Like the other 3D [=GTAs=], various vehicles are rendered immune to some forms of attack for plot reasons. [[http://www.gamefaqs.com/ps2/914983-grand-theft-auto-san-andreas/faqs/34824 Through various methods]] one can steal them and drive them around unkillable.
130** In a good version of the infamous [[GameBreakingBug Purple Nines glitch]] from ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoIII'', if you've earned Katie and Barbara's dating bonuses (respectively, no penalty for being Wasted or Busted) and start a new game from that save file, the bonuses will carry over to the new file, even if you never date those two for the entire game.
131** The Ammu-nation range glitch. If you enter the shooting range with a different submachine gun, assault rifle and/or shotgun than the one used in the challenge and exit before finishing it, you will double your ammo for that weapon type. Do it enough times and you have infinite ammo. Used with the M4, [=MP5=] SMG and SPAS-12, this glitch easily becomes a GameBreaker.
132** Like all the ''III''-era games, you aren't supposed to be able to use your safe house as a get-out-jail-free card from a wanted level. The cops follow you in regardless. However, in SA you could still save (if you could survive getting to the save icon before the cops rip you to shreds), and resetting would start you over with your data saved and no wanted level. The HD games fixed this somewhat, but there's still workarounds.
133** Additionally, they attempted to fix how easy it was to simply drive into a Pay'n'Spray and lose your wanted level (provided you didn't break any laws for a few seconds afterwards) no matter how close the cops were on your tail as in ''Vice City''; however, you merely needed to be slightly out of their line of sight when you entered and it would work. Later games in the series somewhat addressed this, as you can see on your HUD if you're in the line of sight or not, and the games will allow you the respray if you aren't.
134** Because of the way this game calculates vehicle physics[[note]]cars aren't affected by any forces until you interact with them in some way[[/note]], you can exploit that by placing a monster truck tire on a car, touching the car [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HW3Fb48Wegg and enjoying the result]].
135** For whatever reason, the AK-47 levels up faster than any other weapon, making it viable even after getting access to the otherwise superior M4.
136** Hi-jacking someone's car from the passenger side door then holding down the handbrake button will cause the driver to hilariously drop dead upon being push out of the car.
137** In the [=PS2=] port (at least), if you are riding a bike, you can jump really high by holding L1 to duck and then tapping Circle to shoot just as you let L1 go.
138** When you honk your vehicle's horn, pedestrians are programmed to react startled and annoyed at you. This also happens to apply to police, so if you are at risk of being Busted, you can hold down your horn to stop them in their tracks indefinitely. This can potentially save you if you're caught off guard by a cop running towards your vehicle while you're vulnerable to arrest.
139** If you take one of the hookers into a Transfender body shop, instead of the standard "nothing happens except the car shaking", you will see the hooker bend over to give C.J. oral sex.
140** The game has a half-finished impounding mechanic, which sometimes lets you collect vehicles you've lost from certain locations (like the underground parking at Los Santos police station). The funny part is that since the mechanic is only partially finished, the game doesn't really check for certain petty details, such as, say, whether the spot is [[TeleFrag already occupied by another vehicle]], or even ''what kind of vehicle it is'', resulting in building-sized aircraft being able to spawn inside very cramped spaces.
141* HarsherInHindsight:
142** The several counts of sexual harassment against Creator/AndyDick in the wake of the Harvey Weinstein scandal make several of the nudity jokes in "Gardening With Maurice" rather cringeworthy.
143** The guard in the mission "Madd Dogg's Rhymes" lamenting the game he was playing (specifically, ''[[VideoGame/{{Driver}} DRIV3R]]'') for being a broken mess becomes ''ironic'' when playing the aforementioned mission in ''The Definitive Edition'' which was notorious for being prone to glitches at launch.
144** Seeing Grove Street controlled by the Ballas in the mission “Home Coming” is this considering what becomes of Grove Street in ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoV'', with the Grove Street Families defunct and the street itself under Ballas territory. Double points as a HeartwarmingInHindsight as Lookalikes of CJ and Company appear in the game too.
145** One radio advertisement about self-defence for rich people suggests they send their kids to school wearing bullet-proof vests and stun guns. It is somewhat disturbing to hear a satirical ad suggesting parents should prepare their kids for a potential warzone at school after multiple mass-shootings in the new 10s, especially since the ideas mentioned in the ad wouldn't sound out-of-place with some other suggestions from several pro-gun politicians, like arming teachers, forcing see-through backbags for students and metal detectors at every entrance.
146** Some of Big Smoke's quotes and actions in the beginning of the game are cast in a far different light, when you realize [[spoiler:he ends up betraying you and becomes one of the most powerful people in all of San Andreas.]] The best known quote, "All we had to do was follow the damn train, CJ." is this because it's featured in a mission that is hard to beat. And Big Smoke was the one shooting, leaving some to believe that he was missing the targets on purpose.
147** In [[VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoV another Universe]], characters like [[ConspiracyTheorist The Truth]] and [[TheMenInBlack Mike Toreno]] would've had even more cause for concern. Just ask [[spoiler:[[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt Avon Hertz and Clifford]]]].
148* HilariousInHindsight:
149** This wouldn't be the last time Creator/SamuelLJackson played [[Film/LakeviewTerrace a crooked]] [[Film/Spiral2021 cop]].
150** One of the random (female) pedestrian lines is, "Where's the [[TheMafiya Russian mafia]] when you need them?" The Russian Mafia had a very minor role in this game, but the line becomes extra amusing after ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoIV'' happened to revolve around them.
151** The intro cutscene sums up the HD-era of ''GTA'' quite succinctly: "After [[VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoIV five years on the East Coast]], it was time to go [[VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoV home]]".
152** "When I'm gone, everyone gonna remember my name...Big Smoke!" At the time the rather [[TearJerker tragic]] delusion of a dying, drug-addled man. Nowadays, thanks to the internet, [[FountainOfMemes damn near everyone knows who Big Smoke is.]]
153** Two years after this game, another crime-themed WideOpenSandbox game featuring [[VideoGame/SaintsRow1 a gang dressed in purple]] is released... except its members are the heroes instead of the antagonists. Even more amusingly, they would end up dealing with [[VideoGame/SaintsRow2 a gang dressed in green]] that ''embraces'' dealing hard drugs another two years after that.
154* HypeBacklash: Considering the overwhelming praise both the game and its storyline receives from the diehard fans of the game, as well as their tendency to constantly boast about the improvements over the first two games while concurrently ignoring the flaws, the praise that it receives to this day can get rather irritating and a turn-off for many folks who are just discovering the GTA series.
155* ItWasHisSled: It's pretty much impossible these days to have even some vague knowledge of the game without knowing that Big Smoke and Ryder are traitors, though it was initially a big plot twist.
156* JerkassWoobie:
157** Sean "Sweet" Johnson. Oh god Sweet. Yes, he is a gangster, who says, with pride in his voice, that he robbed people to finance his mother's operation. But all he wants is to build his gang on respect and loyalty rather than money, to keep his neighborhood dope-free and to wreak righteous vengeance on those who try to get his friends hooked on crack. He is betrayed by the people he trusted more than anyone and sent to prison, while said drug dealers run rampant in his absence, nearly sending him over the DespairEventHorizon. Oh, and both his mother and little brother were killed by drug dealers. Sweet might be an asshole but it's justified in a way that [[spoiler:Tenpenny and Pulaski basically ruined his life and other things]].
158** CJ himself as well depending on the situation.
159* JerksAreWorseThanVillains: Catalina is technically an ally of CJ to collaborate with him on multiple robbery missions, yet she comes off much worse than [[DirtyCop Tenpenny and Pulaski]], as while the latter two are corrupt cops who often screw people who work for them over when they are rendered useless, Catalina is a sociopath who continuously belittles CJ and threatens to murder him for the smallest problems, not to mention never making up her mind on whether she loves or hate CJ and fluctuates her mood in the most unpredictable fashion. The fact that she goes as far to [[DoubleStandardRapeFemaleOnMale give CJ an unpleasant experience of her "rack"]] makes her far worse.
160* JustHereForGodzilla: The inaccessible HotCoffeeMinigame certainly gave the game a high degree of notoriety.
161* LoveToHate: Tenpenny. Sure, he's a [[DirtyCop corrupt]], self-serving bastard who's behind some pretty despicable acts, but he's often highly entertaining and gets some of the best lines in the game. [[Creator/SamuelLJackson His voice actor]] certainly helps.
162* MagnificentBastard:
163** [[TheMenInBlack Mike Toreno]] is an enigmatic government agent who engages in several illegal ventures to further US interests. Originally running the Loco syndicate to traffic drugs into Los Santos, Toreno fakes his death before revealing to Carl "CJ" Johnson his true allegiances, forcing the reluctant criminal to assist Toreno in running black ops against enemies of the state and rival agencies. Toreno has CJ engage in missions such as boarding a cargo plane during take-off and bombing it in mid-flight, stealing an experimental jetpack from a research base to attack a military train convoy, and infiltrating an aircraft carrier to steal a Harrier Jump Jet and assassinate protected targets elsewhere in the state. [[AffablyEvil A witty and affable man]] through and through despite his shady nature, Toreno ultimately [[IGaveMyWord keeps his promise]] to release Carl's brother Sweet from prison by calling in some favors.
164** Wu Zi Mu, known to all as "Woozie," is the head of the [[TheTriadsAndTheTongs Triad gang known as the Mountain Cloud Boys]], and serves as one of [[Characters/GrandTheftAutoSanAndreasAssociatesOfCJ CJ's closest allies]]. Despite being blind, Woozie has the [[HandicappedBadass inexplicable ability to drive and fire guns with impressive skill]], and he routinely surprises CJ with his capabilities. Though a polite, peaceful man at heart, Woozie is nonetheless a ruthless gangster who will subject enemies to torture, and even knocks out power to a whole city to mask his criminal activity. Woozie is an invaluable source of intel and resources to CJ in taking down the Loco Syndicate and Da Nang Boys, and near the end, Woozie works with CJ to mastermind the brilliant heist of Caligula's Casino that rips off all the mafia families and leaves Woozie's Mountain Cloud Boys as the most powerful gang in San Andreas.
165* MemeticMutation:
166** Fuck you AND your casino!
167** Troper, you a busta.[[labelnote:explanation]]To save you a possible trip to Urban Dictionary, 'busta' means 'poser', 'coward', or 'snitch'. CJ gets called one a lot by Ryder.[[/labelnote]]
168** You mother-fuckin' piece of shit gangbangin' cocksucka![[labelnote:explanation]]Tenpenny delivers this line in the final mission while trying to kill Carl. Creator/SamuelLJackson's delivery is what sells it.[[/labelnote]]
169** [[AnnoyingVideoGameHelper Hey, Cesar. The yay leavin' San Fierro, right?]] ... Right, but they're using ''bikes'' CJ, and they're going ''cross country''![[labelnote:explanation]]As detailed in AnnoyingVideoGameHelper above, during the San Fierro arc the player will receive an unskippable phone call containing this exact same dialogue twice an in-game week.[[/labelnote]]
170** [[ViolationOfCommonSense Why did you blow up Ryder's car?]][[labelnote:explanation]]During "Ryder", blowing up Ryder's car at the start of the mission fails it, but lets you skip a cutscene later on. Because this is not readily apparent, many people who saw this for the first time would ask this question, and the quote eventually became memetic amongst speedrunners.[[/labelnote]]
171** Ah shit, here we go again. [[labelnote:explanation]]CJ's first line after he gets dropped into Ballas' territory before the introductory cutscene finishes. This meme saw a revival in 2019, where it's used for occurrences of HereWeGoAgain or a repeated ThisIsGonnaSuck event[[/labelnote]]
172** Big Smoke is a FountainOfMemes for the game.
173*** [[ItsAWonderfulFailure All we had to do was follow the damn train, CJ!]][[labelnote:explanation]]A certain [[ThatOneLevel infamously difficult mission]] has him say this every time you fail it.[[/labelnote]]
174*** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6g0mPo-uJM His hilariously long order at Cluckin' Bell]]. "I'll have two Number 9s..."
175*** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I7CuJKjIWYA His introductory cutscene]] gave us two memes based around his [[IncomingHam "YOU PICKED THE WRONG HOUSE, FOOL!"]] line and the "OHHH" sound that he makes when he remembers CJ.
176*** [[ElSpanishO Yo soy El Grando Smokio.]]
177** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YGajN6mUoZQ Ryder, nigga!]][[labelnote:explanation]]During "Sweet & Kendl", after you reach the checkpoint at Grove Street, Ryder can be seen riding his bike around the cul-de-sac and doing wheelies while Big Smoke and Sweet talk to Carl during the cutscene. One of his lines during said cutscene is "I got them motherfuckers though, showed them niggas who's gangsta! Ryder, nigga! G'yeah!" The "Ryder, nigga!" part became a popular meme in San Andreas YoutubePoop videos.[[/labelnote]]
178** New clothes? Nigga, what the fuck is this bullshit?![[labelnote:explanation]]During "Home Coming", after Sweet is released from prison, CJ tells him about expanding operations in San Fierro and Las Venturas, and wants to get Sweet some new clothes, and his brother says this line in response. This is used by people to express opinion towards something disappointing.[[/labelnote]]
179** "Lost everything but my blade!"[[labelnote:explanation]]In "The Da Nang Thang", CJ exclaims this after surviving the helicopter crash as a way of explaining why he loses all of his weapons except a Knife. The quote became notorious among players due to the fact that CJ gets a Knife in this moment even if he wasn't carrying one before, leading to lots of jokes about CJ being able to pull knives out of nowhere in implausible circumstances.[[/labelnote]]
180** The game's theme song (and the "Mission Passed!" theme) itself [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1HarUSq8JeU becomes this regarding its use on]] [[https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/WebOriginal/Vine Vine]], especially with when [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F19rKDzfCI8 turned into]] EarRape. (WARNING! VERY LOUD!)
181** RIP Orange 12 [[labelnote:explanation]]The Definitive Edition uses a pedestrian randomization system to make pedestrians look more varied, similar to the GameMod [=PedFuncs=]. This means the EnsembleDarkhorse pedestrian model characterized by his Orange 12 jacket will not show up as often, and instead jackets with different colors/numbers will, leading to jokes that the original Orange 12 pedestrian was killed by Purple 85 et al.[[/labelnote]]
182** Rinimos [[labelnote:explanation]]Although the Definitive Edition features new models for pedestrians, the developers forgot to make cutscenes use the new pedestrian models, instead using the same ones from 2004 with upscaled textures. One of these is a Grove Street Families member whose jersey usually says "Rimmers", but due to bad upscaling and no one fixing the text, it got turned into something fans have interpreted as "Rinimos".[[/labelnote]]
183** (SOUND OF ALARM GOING OFF)[[labelnote:explanation]]During "Against All Odds", this is how the subtitles describe the betting shop's alarm. The phrase caught on with fans due to the fact that onomatopoeia otherwise never gets referenced in subtitles, and 'SOUND OF [X] GOING OFF' has become a catch-all descriptor for any sound effect.[[/labelnote]]
184** Modding CJ (and to an extent, Big Smoke) into other games with modding capabilities has become something that the fanbase has been doing religiously, to multiple hilarious effects. Expect to see CJ (and Smoke) in games like ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGd6TiYeXKg Yakuza 0]]'', ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xDR1jODNoWI God of War (2018)]]'', ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nNL6S2_0h3s Sekiro]]'', ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8gofn_avrTs SIFU]]'', '''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdkpZnjkVHo Genshin Impact]]'', ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQ0K-4GjfRU Dragon Ball Z Budokai Tenkaichi 3]]'', and ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPTiCfBn9X0 Stray]]'' (yes, that VideoGame/{{Stray|2022}}), of all things.
185** SPRUNK'D [[labelnote:explanation]] [[https://youtu.be/Gq03CWp_-OQ?t=301 While streaming ''The Definitive Edition'' on his channel]] and listening to 80s music, [[{{WebVideo/Vinesauce}} Vinesauce Joel]] managed to accidentally trigger a bug in the game's code by overloading its memory and ''permanently brick his save file forever'' [[MakesJustAsMuchSenseInContext after he spent close to an hour drinking hundreds of cans of Sprunk.]] He proceeded to declare that he "Sprunk'd" the game, and the ridiculousness of the situation combined with the game's reputation as a PortingDisaster resulted in "Sprunk'd" catching on as a term for crashing a game so badly that it won't ever open again.[[/labelnote]]
186* MisaimedRealism: Your character can faint if he doesn't eat enough. However, he can stay for weeks if not months without eating or drinking anything before he even feels hungry. Also, the lack of food doesn't prevent him from running, jumping and fighting like an athlete, and workouts will make him look buff even if he's starving.
187* MisBlamed: Jack Thompson attacked Take-Two for content in games it published, the incident was the infamous "Hot Coffee" discovery. He insisted that Take-Two was the company to create the content, rather than the independent publishers: the game was developed by Rockstar Entertainment. Rockstar itself was hit with this for the same thing - they were forced to rerelease the game with the "Hot Coffee" content completely removed (even going out of their way to make sure ''no'' mods could be installed[[note]]unsurprisingly, one of the most popular downloads for the Steam and "Second Edition" versions is a downgrade patch for people who want to play ''Multi Theft Auto'' or simply be able to install fan-made fixes.[[/note]]), despite the content having already been DummiedOut and only becoming public knowledge by way of a GameMod that ''nobody would be forced to download''.
188* MoralEventHorizon: [[MoralEventHorizon/GrandTheftAuto See here.]]
189* SugarWiki/MostWonderfulSound: [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3EDsu8UBL-g The "mission passed" sound]].
190* {{Narm}}:
191** The serious cut scenes don't work so well if the player has C.J. dressed up in something completely silly (or almost naked).
192** Also, in all of the Grand Theft Auto games you play as at least a VillainProtagonist, whereas CJ comes off as a bit of a NiceGuy, despite being a gangster. It's a little jarring though, once GameplayAndStorySegregation come into play, and has CJ running over crowds of innocent people and beating hookers to death with dildos.
193** One of the ways the game portrays its analogue to the 1992 Los Angeles riots is to make every car on the road smoke up and on the verge of exploding, even police cars, which makes it really silly when cops try to patrol the area and their cars or bikes suddenly blow up.
194* NarmCharm: A lot of people enjoyed making CJ look as silly as possible during cutscenes, and they were disappointed that the clothing customization disappeared in [[VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoIV the next numbered GTA game]].
195* NeverLiveItDown: The mission "[[DisproportionateRetribution Deconstruction]]" has become infamous for showing CJ being much crueler than how the rest of the game tries to portray him as. You can bet that any discussion on CJ's morality will have someone saying any variation of "Well, except for the construction mission".[[note]]For those who are not familiar with the mission: CJ massacres several construction workers and buries one alive because a few of them insulted his sister.[[/note]]
196* NoSuchThingAsBadPublicity: The game encountered mixed results of this. By the time it came out the series' [[OnceOriginalNowCommon shock value had gone down]], but got a huge new boost after the discovery of the "Hot Coffee" sex mini game mod. While the game did get tons of publicity for this, it also led to a huge recall of the game which ended up costing Rockstar tens of millions of dollars.
197* {{Padding}}: Photo Opportunity has you start at your garage in San Fierro, then travel halfway across the state to meet Cesar, and then travel all the way to Angel Pine (this time, being forced to drive Cesar's lowrider)...just so you can take some photographs. And there are no major obstacles while driving other than the typical traffic and geography, making what would otherwise be a very simple mission far more lengthy and tedious than necessary.
198** The return to Los Santos in the endgame and having to reclaim gang territory is considered to be this by a lot of players. Any sort of gang war progress you made have made beforehand is undone and you're forced to reclaim a certain amount of territory in Los Santos before you can activate the final missions in the story with nothing of real interest to break up the monotony as you do.
199* PlayerPunch: Madd Dogg, a famous Los Santos rapper whose rhyme book you steal, murdered his guards, and murdered his manager just to make OG Loc happy. After the Grove Street Family goes to shit, OG Loc rises to fame and can be heard bragging on the radio that he is a hardcore gangster rapper (he still sucks and is still a total wuss when you confront him later). Later on, you see Madd Dogg in Las Venturas attempting to commit suicide because he is a nobody after his career went down the drain. The punch comes from that you were the one responsible for his downfall and Madd Dogg doesn't even know about it. Luckily, you can save him and bring him back to his feet, but Madd Dogg never finds out the truth.
200* PortingDisaster: Some of ''San Andreas''[='=] ports made the OG classic look like a busta.
201** While the original PC version is critically acclaimed due to the much faster loading and support for custom soundtrack, it missed the color filter and proto-post-processing effects of the Platform/PlayStation2 version despite the readme file mentioning "heat haze". The "Frame Limiter" option isn't capping to 30 FPS like the readme suggests, but instead capping to 24 FPS, making the game choppy even on high-end PC released years after the game. Turning it off will make gameplay smoother, but may introduce broken gameplay elements due it rely on 24-30 frame rate mark. There is also the issue of the game's controls not being optimized for a PC experience; the controls were poorly ported from gamepad to keyboard, making several segments such as flying unnecessarily hard, although it's possible for controller users to install [[https://gtaforums.com/topic/562765-ginput GInput]] for modern controller support with the [=PS2=] or ''[=GTA=] IV''-styled controls. The Steam re-release of the game also made the egregious mistake of not including fixes from the previous patches the old version got while adding very barebones controller support, and later removing a fraction of the music due to expired licenses like in the mobile and remastered ports.[[note]]Although in Steam's case, it's later can reverted back to the original retail version thanks to this [[https://gtaforums.com/topic/927016-san-andreas-downgrader/ downgrading tool]].[[/note]] The problems inherent in the original PC port (that is still largely played to this day due to true mod support) are largely fixed by the [=SilentPatch=], available [[http://www.gtagarage.com/mods/show.php?id=25368 here]], fixing the broken widescreen support with Widescreen Fix [[https://thirteenag.github.io/wfp#gtasa here]], and restoring the original skies with the heat haze can also be fixed by [=SkyGfx=] [[https://gtaforums.com/topic/750681-skygfx-ps2-xbox-and-mobile-graphics-for-pc/ here]].
202*** In 2019, Rockstar released another port of the Steam version, this time for their Rockstar Games Launcher platform, and thanks to its new DRM and executable, it will actively check for modified files and it will refuse to launch the game if players attempts to bypass the launcher replacing the modified files by disabling auto-updates.[[note]]Once again, modders found a way around this with [[https://gtaforums.com/topic/936600-san-andreas-downgrader-for-steam-and-rgsc/ another downgarder tool]] and not using the launcher afterwards.[[/note]]
203** For the game's 10th Anniversary, Rockstar out of nowhere removed the original Platform/{{Xbox}} port that was downloadable on the Platform/Xbox360 store and replaced it with an "HD remaster" version... that was actually a port of the ''mobile'' version, and a sloppy one at that. Even ignoring the graphical and frame-rate issues that come from this kind of port, the audio randomly cuts out during cutscenes. Some songs were cut (due to licensing issues), yet if you're willing to deal with the missing tracks, how they were removed caused the radio stations to bug out in bizarre ways. It also introduced game-breaking bugs and crashes on various missions that can make the game virtually unplayable. The Platform/PlayStation3 also has this version, which also replaced its downloadable [=PlayStation=] 2 version, and while it's ''slightly'' more playable than the Xbox 360 version, it also introduced its own unique problems that didn't exist in the original [=PlayStation=] 2 version or the Xbox 360 port.
204** The Trilogy Definitive Edition... See the YMMV page for the whole series for details.
205* RealismInducedHorror: '''Everything''' about Tenpenny and the C.R.A.S.H. is horrific, but even '''more''' horrific is the fact that this kind of corruption ''actually exists'' in places where crime is rampant.
206* RetroactiveRecognition:
207** The overweight Grove Street member's voice actor is Shawn Fonteno (credited as "Solo"), who would later have voiced and motion captured Franklin Clinton in ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoV''. It also made him one of the few voice actors in ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAuto'' to appear in two different universes (SA is part of 3D Universe, V is part of HD Universe).
208** One of the [=LSPD=] cops, an elderly pedestrian found around San Andreas (a white man in a beige shirt and jeans), and Derek from "Tanker Commander", are all voiced by Benjamin Byron Davis. Davis would later go on to play Dutch van der Linde in ''VideoGame/RedDeadRedemption'' and ''VideoGame/RedDeadRedemption2''.
209* TheScrappy:
210** Many consider Zero to be one of the more annoying characters in the game, primarily because of his missions falling under ThatOneLevel (especially "Supply Lines"), his dry SeriousBusiness attitude, and his shrill voice. Even his voice actor, Creator/DavidCross, expressed his dislike for him, and would later mock the character when he returned to voice Zachary in ''[[VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoV Grand Theft Auto Online]]''.
211** Sweet also gained considerable backlash for bitching nonstop about CJ "running away" when it was their mother's idea in the first place to give him a better life and indeed, CJ turned out better for it as he's much more rational minded than Sweet or any of the Grove Street Gang members are. Regardless, in most missions Sweet gives CJ no end of grief over this. And later in the game when CJ offers him a much better life than living in "da hood" can bring, he chastises him for it despite all the [[UngratefulBastard crap CJ went through to bail him out of prison!]] A very common opinion is that it's actually [[BestFriendsInLaw Cesar]] who acts and feels much more like an older brother figure to CJ for most of the game.
212** The radio station has an InUniverse example of this with one of the [=DJs=], Forthright MC from the Playback FM radio station (played by Music/PublicEnemy rapper Chuck D), who is despised by many listeners of the station for being a self-righteous conspiracy theorist and condemning anything that goes against his own ideals and musical preferences. Julio G, the DJ of Radio Los Santos (which plays music from the West Coast, something Forthright MC strongly dislikes and specifically takes shots at) even states that while the music station itself is good, the DJ of the station is wack.
213* ScrappyMechanic:
214** Some players found the requirement to feed CJ periodically (or risk losing strength and health) to be rather annoying. It can be especially annoying if you lose track and find yourself starving in the middle of a mission, especially longer ones like the ambulance and taxi minigames which do not allow you to get out of your car without breaking the streak required to unlock a unique bonus. This is less likely to appear in the PC and later versions (in fact it doesn't appear at all in regular missions), especially if you save (as it resets the unseen hunger meter) or eat something (quicker to do in outdoor vendors and vending machines) before starting the ambulance and taxi minigames.
215** Many missions need you to leave your car, which is annoying especially if you brought your PimpedOutCar to missions like "Photo Opportunity" (where you drive far to nowhere only to switch car).
216** Having to defend your turf from Ballas or Vagos can be this. The "turf is under attack" warning can pop up randomly as long as you are in Los Santos and when you least expect it to (including dates with a girlfriend) and cannot be ignored unless you don't mind losing influence in the city. The turf that is attacked is always random, so tough luck if you are in one corner of the city and the rival gangs decided to attack the other one. Fortunately, saving the game, starting a mission or entering any side-mission (Taxi driver, for example) [[GoodBadBugs automatically cancels the enemy attack on your turf]] and prevents you from having to go and defend it.
217** The highways in this game are dangerous simply because all cars go at ridiculously high speeds and change lanes at complete random. A poorly timed lane switch can wipe out whatever you are currently driving.
218** The racing side activities, unlike the one in ''Videogame/GrandTheftAutoViceCity'', will force you to drive a specific car, making the vehicle customization somewhat pointless. Only two story missions, the lowrider race in Los Santos and the first cross-country race, allow you to bring your own car.
219** For whatever reason, Rockstar Games decided to encrypt every cheat code into hashes; your previous 29 keyboard inputs are kept in memory, and if a hash from those inputs match a cheat code, that cheat activates. While this was likely done to keep each code a secret, the disadvantage of this method is that it allows many alternative codes to activate cheats. Most notoriously, there exists a few combinations of WASD-key inputs that can activate cheats, and as many players will be tapping those keys a lot in quick succession, there are many reported cases of players losing their 100% progress or their speedrun's legality because they unintentially entered a WASD cheat.
220** The rhythm minigames have earned scorn from some parts of the fanbase for it feeling like it was tacked on only because [[FollowTheLeader it was popular with other games at the time]]. Early adapters to HD televisions couldn't complete this mission. And that's not taking into account the [=PS3=] and [=XBox=] 360 Remasters, where the delay in the rhythm is more noticeable. It's telling that Rockstar listened to the feedback and never brought these mechanics back in future GTA games.
221* ScrappyWeapon:
222** You'd be surprised to find anyone who had good use of the flamethrower past the Truth's weedburning mission, because the weapon [[VideoGameFlamethrowersSuck follows the cardinal rule of your typical flamethrowers where they're slow, shortranged, and extremely rare and hard to replenish]].
223** Melee weapons in general, discussed further in UnderusedGameMechanic below. With the exception of the [[OneHitKill knife]], melees are unfavorable compared to every other ranged weapon in the game, especially since the game is designed with long-ranged drawn out combat from the distance, and going up close will more likely get you killed and your body armor can only protect you as much. The Bat swings slow and deals pitiful damage after "Cleaning The Hood" and the Shovel is practically the same. The Katana can easily cut through your opponents like a melted butter but requires you to be very lucky to score decapitation with it, and is not very useful in every other scenario. Chainsaw is [[AwesomeButImpractical monstrously powerful but are nothing worth more than a curiosity at best]] because they're cumbersome to use. Oh, didn't they tell you that equipping one (all but Katana, Police Baton, and the Knife) prevents you from being able to sprint until you holster it?
224** Speaking of melee weapons, the Pool Cue takes the cake for being the worst weapon since not only it's virtually similar to their Bat and Shovel counterpart, but getting the weapon is irritatingly easy that you can accidentally replacing your current, usually rare melee weapon you had if you decided to play a game of Pool at a bar.
225** The Brass Knuckles looks ugly, only deal marginally stronger than your default punches, and effectively replaces your bare handed option. The punching power also rendered moot if you're fighting with martial arts where you kick a lot and deal the same amount of knockback per hit.
226** Since rifles did not have a weapon skill associated with it, there's no reason to buy the Country Rifle over the superior Sniper Rifle, since both weapons requires you to aim manually (except in PC where every weapon must be aimed manually) and the Sniper Rifle is just better at doing its job of taking care of enemies from distance.
227** Maxing certain weapon skill (like Sub-machine guns and the AK's) only improves the weapon performance for that weapon, the skill you got from that weapon will not benefit you for wielding same type of weapon (for example, you can't use your SMG skill on Micro SMG) and had to grind for the weapon skill again. Since certain weapons grows faster compared to others, there's no incentives for you to use that weapon in the same category that's just statistically inferior to the ones you just maxed out, even at same skill rate. The 9mm Pistol and the Micro SMG's are really bad in this regard; sure at max level their fire rate outclasses every other weapon that isn't handheld minigun, but their overall performance gain is not worth the effort to reach that potential since the Sub-machine gun and the other two pistols have tighter spread and in the case of SMG itself, the weapon is bugged so that they gain twice as much weapon skill per kill compared to the Micro SMG's on top of being a common drop in gang wars, ensuring that you don't need to worry about running out of munitions. The only exceptions are the assault rifles (AK-47 and [=M4=]); while you will come across AK's much faster than the M-4 and the weapon also being bugged so it grows faster than their counterpart, the [=M4=] is strictly a superior weapon with larger clip size and tighter spread, so you can still replace your AK with it.
228* SidetrackedByTheGoldSaucer:
229** The Vigilante Car Chase.[[note]]Made much easier with the Hunter attack helicopter or Rhino tank, turning the whole mini-game into a turkey shoot.[[/note]]
230** Package Delivery.
231** The [[NintendoHard surprisingly difficult]] Ambulance Rescue mini-game.[[note]]Unless you're carrying it out in Angel Pine, a small rural town, which is very easy due to the patients spawning only in and around the small rural town.[[/note]]
232** Taxi driving and the shorter Pimping. Put your favorite ear worm or SugarWiki/AwesomeMusic on your custom music player before attempting for better experience.
233** The highly controversial HotCoffeeMiniGame[[note]]At least this one has you [[StealthPun fully in character]].[[/note]]
234** Impromptu demolition derbies on the highway with whoever happens to be around.
235** The horse race betting shops.
236* SoBadItsGood: [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hyl-MN8JdQA OG Loc's rap]]. Let's face it, OG Loc can't really rap for shit. Of course, that doesn't stop the song from being catchy.
237* SpecialEffectFailure:
238** In one mission, you have to follow Cesar to meet up with everyone else for some illegal street racing. CJ's sister, Kendl, is seen riding with Cesar in the cut scene. During the actual game play, Kendl's model is replaced with a female NPC. This is actually her beta model, which was slightly modified and turned into a pedestrian NPC model after she was redesigned. Only her fully rigged cutscene model was ever built for the final product, so she's swapped for her modified beta model for the one time she appears in gameplay.
239** There's a mission where CJ and Cesar need to remain undetected while spying a rival gang. They are shouting the entire time, as the mission was originally planned to take place in a helicopter, and the lines were not re-recorded.
240** Some gang members do hand gestures, with animated fingers. Naturally, the hands are separate models, so the gang member's usual hands are removed to be replaced by the hand models. The result can be jarringly conspicuous, especially with the Vagos, where it looks like their hands are floating off their arms.
241** Kendl's character model in the Xbox 360 and [=PS3=] "Remastered" version. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXg1R_MZzmA&t=203s Seriously, just look at it...]]
242** The mesh smoothing applied to the original models in the ''Definitive Edition'' [[https://www.reddit.com/r/gaming/comments/quszkv/increasing_poly_count_doesnt_always_make_sense/ gets applied to the hexagonal nuts that are part of Tuff Nut Donuts' sign]], turning what was supposed to be hexagonal into perfect circles. A later update fixed the hexagonal nut.
243** One of the negative changes in ''Definitive Edition'' was removing much of the draw distance-obscuring fog, which is a good case study in why fog can be a crucial part of a game's atmosphere. Here, the lack of fog makes it obvious that the world map is a lot smaller than it looks, with it being easy to see cities and major landmarks from across the map, and the entire landmass being visible from the air. In the mission "A Home in the Hills", the fog's removal also makes it clear that the plane you start the mission inside is actually staying perfectly still, ruining the illusion.
244* {{Squick}}: C.J. claims to be afraid of water at one point, after getting a discarded condom on his face while swimming as a child. Ironically, he's the first character in GTA not to suffer from SuperDrowningSkills.
245* StrangledByTheRedString: The game has this as a plot element. Meet the right circumstances and the gal will fall head over heels with you. At least with the first one it's rescuing her from a house fire (that you started). With others it's simply that you have six pack abs or she has a chubby fetish.
246* TakeThatScrappy:
247** At the end of "Breaking the Bank at Calligula's", CJ punched Zero for telling his SitcomArchNemesis Berkley about the robbery and causing the mission to be harder than expected.
248** During dates, Katie may say "OG Loc? OG Joke is more like it".
249* ThatOneAchievement: Serial Offender, which requires you to get busted 50 times. Not only is this a ViolationOfCommonSense because you lose your weapons and some of your money unless you are dating Barbara, but it's extremely unlikely to get through normal play unless you're really, really bad. To make it worse, the game starts having ''significant'' frame drops after getting busted enough times, regardless of the version you're playing on. It's recommended that you get this out of the way immediately after starting and only then.
250* ThatOneBoss: Hunting down and killing Pulaski. When you start the mission, the car you came in (assuming you came to the starting point by car) will usually have vanished. Pulaski drives a Buffalo, a very fast sports car, while you're stuck with a weird looking off road car that handles like crap. If Pulaski manages to get out of minimap range, it's an instant fail. To even get Pulaski to get out of his car, you have to wreck it by either making it flip over via ramming or pumping it full of lead with a drive-by, which is difficult because even the Hunter chopper will need multiple missile salvos to make the thing stop. Even when Pulaski finally bails, he shoots you with a friggin' '''Desert Eagle''', the most powerful handgun in the game which can knock you down. If he knocks you down with it, he'll keep shooting at you until you're dead. Oh, and his health is sky high, requiring a lot of firepower to take him down. Although it is possible to run him over or use explosives, usually your car is near a total wreck by then and Pulaski's gun can bring it to a near total explosion, forcing you to bail. The chase can be made a lot simpler, however, by shooting out the tires on Pulaski's car before he can get in, by arriving with a jetpack, [[GoodBadBugs or by hoping that an airplane crashes into the desert mountains and lands on top of Pulaski]], [[https://www.reddit.com/r/sanandreas/comments/14u3tjy/so_plane_just_crashed_on_top_of_pulaski/ as seen in this Reddit post]].
251* ThatOneLevel: [[ThatOneLevel/GrandTheftAuto See here.]]
252* ThatOneSidequest:
253** The Driving School missions are somewhat easy to get silver in. All gold? [[LuckBasedMission Expect to spend several hours working at it.]] The reward? An average ([[CoolCar but cool looking]]) car (although you can actually find said car rarely as a random Vigilante car). Several stand out above the rest, though.
254*** "Burn and Lap" is ''merciless''. Gold requires a 35 second run, and that is to the wire even on a perfect run. This means losing a ''tiny bit 0.1 second'' will cause you to fail.
255*** "Alley Oop" is also frustrating. You're required to hit the ramp at an angle and complete a full barrel roll while jumping over all the vehicles in front of the ramp and land without causing too much damage to your car. This is almost luck-based mission and you virtually have about 1 second to figure out what the hell you have to do to do the barrel roll successfully. It doesn't help that, at least in the PC version, the tooltip that the game gives you is wrong, as the key you're supposed to press is a ''completely different key'' than the one the game tells you, making this a good case of GuideDangIt as well.
256*** The final mission requires you to drive to the end of the city and back extremely fast without so much as scratching your car. Easy in theory, but luck-based in practice. You can suffer damage simply by moving up a hill too fast, to say nothing of all the traffic you have to dodge.
257*** There is also an unfortunate, but funny occurrence. On PC, the driving school sidequest cannot be done with an old keyboard because the player is required to press three keys simultaneously to do a 360 burnout. One can turn on mouse driving.
258** The Boat and Bike Schools are shorter than the two main schools, but each feature a mission that is ''much'' harder than the rest, especially when looking for gold. The Boat School has "Flying Fish", which asks you to perform a jump with a Vortex - the problem being that the jump distance required for gold is plain absurd, involving a bit of RNG as well as GuideDangIt (as the game doesn't explain you that the same key that makes planes rise can be used to increase airtime here). The Bike School, on the other hand, has "Jump and Stoppie", which asks you to jump a ramp, land, ''immediately'' ride a stoppie (ie: driving the bike with only the front wheel) into the park zone, and park perfectly - which is just as hard as it sounds.
259** The Zero missions in general, but especially "Supply Lines", where you have to gun down a bunch of delivery vans using an RC plane. It's a LuckBasedMission, as the plane has limited fuel and wonky controls (especially compared to flying regular planes in the game) that make you waste fuel trying to correct mistakes. It is probably the most hated mission in the entire series, and it was so bad that even Creator/DavidCross hated doing this mission.
260*** "Supply Lines" is so annoying that the best way to win is to defy normal logic and shoot the vans from street level. That will guarantee you won't miss and it will keep them from running. The RC plane is actually a bit easier to drive on the ground due to its size. This still depends on the couriers keeping themselves somewhat close by, but it does make the mission a whole lot easier.
261*** The PC version (and subsequent re-releases since then including the mobile versions) "fixed" this mission by simply tripling the amount of fuel you are given, with an average run of the mission resulting 1/3 of the fuel left.
262*** Additionally, some early copies of the [=PS2=] version had the entire mission glitched besides the fuel decreasing. Randomly, you could blow up a van and it wouldn't disappear off your HUD, other times losing all your fuel WOULDN'T end your mission, but this bug was often in conjunction with the HUD bug.
263*** Some PC versions of this mission has a sudden change in controller function. Normally, you can shoot with the RC's machine gun with Left Mouse Button, right? But, for unknown reason, after sometime in the middle of the mission, Left Mouse Button's function is ''very suddenly'', without any warning before, changed into ''self-destruct'' which of course fail the mission immediately when the RC Plane is self-destructed. No reason is known for this as self-destructing the RC gains you absolutely nothing but mission failure. This is probably a glitch, but nevertheless this forces you to use keyboard's LCTRL button to use the RC's machine gun.
264** "Zeroing In" can be ''very'' frustrating. The game asks you to steal a moving car, but its front glass is bulletproof and its doors are locked. The only way to get the car is to succesfully perform a PIT maneuver so that the car stops and the driver exits, leaving the doors open. This wouldn't be so bad if the car didn't have one of the most annoying AIs in the whole GTA franchise. The driver will constantly drive at top speed, so it's difficult to reach it to attempt the PIT maneuver (especially considering you're given an Alpha, which is a much worse car than the Uranus you're pursuing). However, the driver also drives so carelessly that she tends to crash against obstacles. However, the game won't let you steal the car if it has stopped due to a crash - [[ButThouMust the car MUST have stopped due to a successful PIT maneuver before it lets you steal it]]. What's worse, the car MUST be in motion so that the PIT maneuver counts as successful. This mission will make you cycle through a loop of "chase at high speed - enemy car crashes and stops - player stops as well and waits for enemy car to start moving again - enemy car starts moving again at top speed - chase at high speed".
265** The level 3 shotgun level in the [=AmmuNation=] challenge can be a REAL pain in the arse. Shotguns are the only weapon which the NPC opponents are practically guaranteed to score consistent hits with, making winning a matter of whether or not you can blast away a piece of the target before they do. AND you have to redo the previous 8 levels just to try it again.
266** The trucking missions where the police are chasing you can be very difficult. Not only do they make you drag the load to one of the cities, which is a long way through the very big and complex countryside, your truck practically moves at the speed of a go-kart, the extra weight makes it easy for the cops to shove you around, it's weaker than a truck is supposed to be, and you have to dodge civilians on top of that. As if all that weren't bad enough, countryside cops in their [=SUVs=] are far faster and more aggressive than city cops. The alternative, driving on the train tracks, still runs the risk of the cops cutting you off and you might get hit by a train in the darkened tunnels. This is especially bad with the final mission, which adds an extra star so SWAT vans start chasing you and forces you to go to Las Venturas, making you stay on the main roads and be hounded by cops the whole way.
267** Taking over gang territories is a simple enough affair... about 95% of the time. The remaining five percent require you to take over strips of territory that are either the size of a building or a single strip of sidewalk. There is ONE tiny street controlled by Ballas that's incredibly hard to see due to its size and color issues in the [=PS2=] era. Many a frustrated players searched helplessly for that last bit of territory. Later versions of the game made the little strip easier to see. Taking over these tiny areas is also complicated by the fact that you need to make the requisite kills inside the territory to trigger the gang war. There are three territories (the area west of the Jefferson Motel, the area around the 24/7 in Temple, and the portion of the bridge connecting East Los Santos and East Beach which is located in Los Flores) that combine both small size and low pedestrian spawning, so starting a gang where in those three territories is an absolute pain.
268** Another example is the cycling races. To start off you need to get yourself to the top of extremely high, steep mountain. Once there you can start several races that require you to hurtle down the mountain tracks on a push bike at ridiculous speeds whilst being jossled and cut off by AI riders. If you cycle off the track (or are rammed) then you almost certainly won't make first place. If you fall off the bike then you almost certainly won't make first place. You will be disqualified if you kill the other racers (you will quickly try to resort to this, although you can at least knock them down with a shotgun but not killing them). One race even involves an obstacle course with narrow balance beams. The worst part is that there is no easy way to restart the races if you fail, so you will have to climb back up the mountain every time you screw up. In fact, the quickest way to get back for another go is to reload a save at your airport base, fly half-way across the state and crash into the summit.
269*** This can be made slightly easier by the fact that while the game will disqualify you for shooting the competitors, it will not do so if you [[SugarWiki/FunnyMoments take a van from the car park/lookout point at the top of Chiliad and park it on the first turn before you start the race]]. The lack of a quick restart is still a complete fucker though, and occasionally the game seems to notice your chicanery and despawn the van when the race begins. Another option is to wait for the other racers to finish, park near the line, then headshot them all. The game only checks against active racers. Finished racers can be killed with impunity and are eliminated if they die.
270** The Quarry missions are generally pretty straightforward, until you get the the final one. This involves the use of a crane to dump bodies in the back of a truck. This would be relatively simple were it not for the fact that said crane has some of the worst controls in video game history. You also have to do this in 8 minutes, as well as doing some other often pedantic activities on that same 8 minute timer.
271** The Bloodring demolition derby. You have to drive through randomly placed checkpoints in a large arena where every car has a passenger armed with a machine pistol to shoot at each other. Each checkpoint adds 15 seconds of time, and you need to get to a total 60 seconds stored. The problem? The other cars are ''also'' driving for the checkpoints. It's very easy for several checkpoints in a row to appear nowhere near you but close to other competitors, making success luck-based.
272** Although the races aren't too bad overall, each set has a few that stand out from the rest. The Los Santos set has "Backroad Wanderer", which involves driving a bike across windy, hilly roads. The San Fierro set has "San Fierro Fastlane", which gives you an Alpha against a group of much better cars. Finally, Las Venturas has two sets, and while all of the races from the depot set are very simple, the airport set compensates by having ''three'' challenging courses, which are only possible because, thankfully, there's no time limit. "Barnstorming" involves flying a Stuntplane, which has one of the worst handlings among this game's planes. "Military Service" involves flying a Hydra, which is too fast to control when in jet mode (especially considering that, as the game doesn't tell you in aircraft courses where the next checkpoint will appear, sharp turns are common here) - so much that people asking for tips are reminded that there isn't a time limit and told to use the hover mode instead, as 15 minutes of slowly flying on hover mode is, on the long term, faster than 1 hour of crashing in jet mode (mobile players being screwed as there's no hover mode there). Finally, "Heli Hell" involves flying a Hunter, which is just too large of a helicopter considering the tight spaces the courses crosses through.
273* TheyChangedItNowItSucks:
274** After the "Hot Coffee" fiasco and the game being re-released on store shelves with the adult content removed to get the game back with an M rating, the PC version got a "Second Edition" (v2.00) reprint that, while including some bug fixes, also included some hard-coded checks that will purposely crash the game if detects any modifications made unlike the initial v1.0 release, which means those that aren't even trying to use the Hot Coffee mod and just want to use fan-made fixes to address other issues leftover in the PC version will find their game constantly crashing, likely as Rockstar's way of [[WhyFandomCantHaveNiceThings spiting modding community]] for digging up the unused adult content.[[note]]The Steam version also had similar checks initially, but Rockstar eventually removed them after realizing it was hopeless to try stopping modders from modding the game after they found ways around these checks.[[/note]] Thankfully, the modding community created a downgrading tool to revert the Second Edition (and Steam) version to the v1.0 release while bundling essential fixes for the game.
275** For the Steam version, a patch was released that added (very limited) controller support, but it also removed 17 songs from the game due to the licenses for the songs having expired and Rockstar not wanting to renew said licenses. What got fans really upset wasn't just the songs being cut, but it was that ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoViceCity'' went through the exact same situation and Rockstar allowed original owners of the game to keep the songs while new owners would get the allegedly cut version[[labelnote:*]]the "cut music" rumor from the current Steam version ''Vice City'' was however disproven as [[https://youtu.be/RjJJ2IzSXCw this YouTube user]] debunked the rumor, however the mobile, the very rare 2013 PC reprints, and the Rockstar Games Launcher versions have the cut soundtrack[[/labelnote]]; Rockstar didn't do the same act for San Andreas. This same problem also affected the remastered and mobile versions.
276** The "enhanced" character models in the mobile/remastered version, while there are few improvements such as better hand models for most of them and some better textures for CJ, many others suffer from poor texture compression that can make the characters look hideous (e.g. the Los Santos policemen), have mismatch colors (e.g. Kendl), have glitched, out-of-place textures seemingly from an earlier version of the game (OG Loc), or ruin facial features (e.g. Tenpenny's broken upper lip, Dwayne's corrupt eye texture). The character models also have specular shine that makes the characters look like they're made of plastic or waxy.
277** The revamped menu in the remastered/mobile versions is also another point of contention with fans that preferred the look of the original menu.
278* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodCharacter:
279** Pun aside, [[spoiler:ever since Ryder's betrayal, he's been pretty much ignored throughout the rest of the game. CJ doesn't even mention Ryder after witnessing the latter and Big Smoke's betrayal and only focuses on Smoke selling him out instead. Then when it's time to kill Ryder, CJ does so without much of a dramatic scene between the two like how Big Smoke's death scene at the end of the game was executed, and Ryder's name is only mentioned once after his demise. The fact that CJ doesn't even tell Sweet about Ryder after informing him of Smoke's betrayal and that Sweet doesn't even ask about Ryder's whereabouts when the former is released from prison certainly didn't help in this case.]]
280*** [[spoiler:To add on to this, this was also a missed opportunity in which CJ and Ryder's relationship could've developed as a love-hate kind of thing, as well as adding in the witty irony of the {{Jerkass}} staying loyal while the NiceGuy is the one who stabs the main character in the back.]]
281** There's also Big Bear and B-Dup, two other characters who were part of the Grove Street Families who would've been perfect as supporting characters who provide missions in the beginning of the game. It isn't helped by the fact that B-Dup is voiced by rapper The Game.
282** Emmet could've been a great supporting character as well.
283** As far as gangs go, Seville Boulevard Families and Temple Drive Families are said by Sweet that they were beefing with each other and have split from the Grove Street Families, yet they hardly play a significant role in the Los Santos part of the storyline, even in the return of the city.
284* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodPlot:
285** You have The Truth, who is the ultimate government conspiracy theorist, and Mike Toreno, who is the ultimate G-Man, and they never meet. What makes this harder is they have a ships passing in the night moment at the airfield when The Truth is talking to you but runs away after he notices Toreno is nearby.
286** The scene in which CJ acquires the garage in San Fierro and discusses with the others on how they would fix it up and start a business with it is completely ignored after the money in Wang Cars, the automobile dealership right across the street, is being generated. Sure you earn the car showroom, but that does nothing to change the fact that the whole discussion on turning the garage into a business still goes to waste when it remains the same as the story progresses.
287** There's also the return to Los Santos after the wake of the riot. We are only given one mission after the riot begins and only relegated to taking over gang territories instead of given missions from other characters in Los Santos in order to put more focus on finding [[spoiler:Big Smoke and getting most of his allies to inform you on his whereabouts]]. Not to mention this was the perfect opportunity to have the Seville Boulevard Families and Temple Drive Families, as well as some of the minor characters in Los Santos (see TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodCharacter above) have an important role in the story, yet they are never even mentioned during the final part of the story. To add on to this missed opportunity, Sweet, who is considered TheScrappy of the game, could've had some CharacterDevelopment by finally seeing the error of his ways and apologizing to CJ for his ungrateful attitude.
288* ToughActToFollow:
289** A lot of gripes about ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoIV'' can be summed up as "it's not as big/fun/varied as ''San Andreas'' is". Considering that ''San Andreas'' consisted of an entire state and had more content than many games combined, it was a '''really''' tough act to follow.
290** ''Videogame/GrandTheftAutoV'' made some fans feel nostalgic, but the realization that the San Andreas featured in ''GTA V'' consist only of single large town with countryside that wrap around made fans feel that the state's rendition is smaller and less ambitious than ''GTA San Andreas''.
291** In general, the character writing in ''San Andreas'' seems to have the largest number of fans, owing to it having a lot of likeable characters, legitimately threatening (or charismatic) villain, as well as strong dynamic between CJ and his relatives.
292* UnderusedGameMechanic:
293** Respect. It's a new stat introduced in ''San Andreas'' that represents CJ's street cred, and the entire Los Santos chapter seems built to emphasize its apparent importance. You're encouraged to wear clothing that provides the maximum Respect score possible (basically, anything green), and Respect is pretty much the only reward you get from most early missions. Ultimately, its effect on the game is to...have more Grove Street gangsters follow you. Grove Street gangsters who are only present in Los Santos, who play no role for the majority of the game's story, who you can only fit three into a car at a time, and whose [[ArtificialStupidity AI is so braindead]] that they are completely useless in an open firefight, though they're useful if you keep them on the wheel.
294** Melee combat. The melee combat mechanism in the game has some depth to it (such as the ability to block, multiple fighting styles with varying effectiveness that you can swap out when needed, and melee weapons having some properties that makes them worth using in certain scenarios), but it's rarely used outside several missions ("Cleaning The Hood" and "The Da Nang Thang" specifically) that [[LeeroyJenkins trying to use them to fight normally is just not worth it and you might end up dead for going up too close]]. Doesn't help that the game is designed with mid-to-long distance combat in mind, with each enemy placed far inbetween each other, ensuring that you had to effectively take care of them from afar, and the body armor only gives you so much protection. The only place where you can practice your melee combat safely is trying it on the unlucky pedestrian that you came across.
295** Vehicle customization. Its only function is to aesthetically modify your vehicle and it serves no purpose other than to look good (all but one modification only affects your car aesthetically), which is rather surprising because of the good amount of modification you can get to each selective car, and certain cars (like Lowriders and Tuners) can only be customized in certain locations in Los Santos and San Fierro respectively. You can't even bring your own modified car to any race (apart from the first racing mission by Cesar) as the street racing game puts you in a chosen or randomized car. Besides, unlike in ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoV'' where personal vehicles store any modification done and retain it when they respawn, in ''San Andreas'' the player must be very careful with any modified vehicle because, if the vehicle despawns or it's destroyed, the modifications are lost forever.
296** Speaking of vehicles and customization, the game features a half-finished impounding mechanic where some of your previous vehicles can be found and retrieved from certain locations. The problems are as follows; your vehicles are not guaranteed to spawn, and random ones can appear instead; the impound garages are restricted areas which can give CJ a 3-star wanted level; as detailed under GoodBadBugs, the system is prone to spawning vehicles inside each other, not to mention it can spawn vehicles that are physically larger than the space it's in. As a result, even if you get lucky and your previous car does spawn in, it can immediately get destroyed, and the wanted level isn't usually worth the while.
297** Stealth. The game has about four-five missions where you are encouraged to be as quiet as possible, and one of them serves as a basic tutorial for the mechanic, with stealth never being required to infiltrate places like military bases, police departments, prisons, etc., in favor of using guns and killing everything in sight before getting to your objectives. Even the missions that do encourage the use of stealth (barring the tutorial) can be completed by making a ruckus, thanks to the fact that the only punishment is usually setting off some kind of alarm that sends more mooks to be mowed down by you. The fact that there's only two weapons that work with it (knives and the silenced pistol) just serves to undersell the mechanic even more.
298** The game has a tendency of introducing one-off vehicles that you had to use for one or more mission, but never ever uses it again for the rest of the game outside of letting players to drive them in the free roam. Some mild examples includes the forklift, which only sees major use in "Robbing Uncle Sam" and a brief moment during "Breaking The Bank At Caligula's", while the more sophisticated examples like the Jetpack or the [[CoolPlane Hydra]] only ever used in one or two mission before being 'retired' out off the mission pool. You can't even use the Hydra to do Vigilante missions unless you have the mod for it.
299* UnintentionalPeriodPiece: A little bit ironic given that the game itself is a period piece.
300** The ads for fictional fast food chain "Cluckin' Bell" satirize the controversy KFC faced in the 2000s over their use of factory farming, which prompted animal rights activists to protest outside their stores. (''Cock-a-doodle-doo! We're a huge corporation! / Cock-a-doodle-doo! And we can't be stopped! / All you protestors can go to hell!'')
301** The street racing and car customization mini-games were a ThrowItIn to appeal to the early 2000s street racing craze sparked by ''Film/TheFastAndTheFurious'', which video games like ''VideoGame/NeedForSpeedUnderground'' and Rockstar's own ''VideoGame/MidnightClub'' were cashing in on at the time.
302* UnintentionallySympathetic: Ryder is portrayed as an asshole who constantly belittles CJ after the latter's return to Los Santos and [[spoiler:is a treacherous {{Hypocrite}} who, unlike [[TragicVillain Smoke]], has no AlasPoorVillain moment after his death, instead calling himself a "[[SmallNameBigEgo motherfucking genius]]" for his betrayal, and his death scene is even written to be more cathartic compared to Smoke as well. Not to mention that the dialogue of Cesar claiming that he tried to bang Kendl made him seem [[RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil much worse]]. However, it's rather difficult for many viewers to view Ryder as a true antagonist since aside from the fact that his attitude towards CJ is still rather tame compared to how C.R.A.S.H. and Catalina had treated CJ (and in all honesty, [[VitriolicBestBuds the way Ryder treated CJ isn't exactly uncommon with most friends]]), Ryder's betrayal was poorly executed since he is barely mentioned afterwards compared to Smoke, and his death scene was very [[AntiClimaxBoss anti-climatic]] and [[DroppedABridgeOnHim unceremonious]], as well as the fact that Cesar's claim mentioned above was randomly blurted out of nowhere without a single hint or evidence beforehand, thus there really is no reason to believe Ryder tried to bang Kendl. Not to mention that [[ForgottenFallenFriend despite being one of CJ's childhood friends, Ryder is still forgotten by even Sweet, as if he didn't even exist at all]]]]. So Ryder ends up being one of the characters the fans end up unexpectedly feeling bad for.
303* UnintentionallyUnsympathetic: Sweet is written to be a strong leader with heart who is expected to share the sympathy with CJ once their families fall apart (and the climax of the game even tries to make it appear that Sweet was right). However, it's very difficult to feel sorry for Sweet when not only does he constantly give CJ a lot of shit for his past mistakes, [[UngratefulBastard he doesn't even show the least bit of gratitude after CJ went through all the trouble to bail him out of jail]], and yet somehow, Sweet gains the temerity to claim CJ was doing everything for himself and even goes as far to call him a perpetrator. Not to mention that [[NeverMyFault he puts all the blame on CJ for the gang falling apart even though Sweet himself is the leader yet did nothing to get them back on its feet between the five years CJ was at Liberty City]] and, at one point, was even willing to give into crack, which makes him a bonafide hypocrite. To say nothing of the fact that Sweet had even gone as far to unfairly compare CJ's ambition to get out of the hood to [[spoiler:Big Smoke betraying his gang to get into the crack game]]. This last comparison is made more frustrating by the fact that CJ, once he is forced away from Sweet and dumped into a trailer park in the middle of nowhere, manages to become renowned as both a career criminal and a legitimate businessman at a scale that is far beyond what he ever could have previously imagined, yet once he returns to Los Santos it's back to street gang loyalties and Sweet framing CJ's successes elsewhere as a betrayal of that.
304* {{Wangst}}: CJ sometimes. Every now and then he loses all of his badassery and gets kicked around by anyone the plot demands, and whines about it afterwards. It's a bit hard to root for someone who (even on missions) robs, kills and ruins the lives of countless innocent civilians and then complains how he has it rough.
305* WatchItForTheMeme: It's a classic by older players that played it. Newer players probably know and see this title just to know the origin of memes such as Big Smoke's order and "Ah shit, here we go again."

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