Where'd my flames go?

For Xmas, I got time to play more GTA3:SA. Grabbed my Broadway from the garage, but the flame paint was gone! Wack. Also ran into the basketball save bug where saving in Mad Dogg's mansion makes all the basketballs in the game disappear. Aggravating. I've been running a number of the asset missions, as up until now I'd only gotten the Roboi Food Mart and Vendant (sp?) Meadows airstrip. Found out I needed to finish driving school to buy Wang's Cars (har har), so did that in an hour or so. Had left it without finishing earlier, as the tasks are pretty tedious. Now have Wangs, the Valet, Meadows, and Roboi. Also finally shelled out for high respect clothes.

Was surprised to see a decent amount of character development happen within a non-required mission set. That's either bad design for minimalist gamers like me, or a good reward for completists. I'm coming down on the bad design side; it was only boredom and luck that had me start these missions back up, and the bonding between Caesar and CJ and the development of Kindle (CJ's sister) is pretty important context for the last few missions I'm running.

One part of the game that I was upset I didn't take advantage of fully before moving on was the gang war "minigame". I'm happy to see the game ends with it, give or take, as you grab your brother out of prison and start taking back the neighborhood. Like I just mentioned, doing the Wang's Cars missions helps set up a Sweet vs. Kindle, hood vs. escapism tension in the proverbial plot. Sorta fortuitous that I came back to those missions now (about two real-life years after playing San Fiero the first time).

GTA:SA remains the best alternative to my WoW addiction, as I can play for a week without shelling out for a month. Wish I had a ready platform for GTA4 when I finish, but neither of my computers quite make the minimum cut.