Victor Vance

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Vic Vance
Victor Vance as depicted in Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories
Victor Vance, as depicted in Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories.
Game series Grand Theft Auto
First game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City (2002)
Voiced by Dorian Missick (Vice City Stories)

Victor "Vic" Vance is a fictional character in the Grand Theft Auto video game series. He serves as the playable protagonist in Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories, and also as a minor character in Grand Theft Auto: Vice City. Vic's father is from the Dominican Republic and his mother is White American. Vic Vance is the older brother of Lance Vance.

Contents

[edit] Appearances and role

[edit] Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories

Victor Vance is a 28 year old corporal in the US Army, stationed in Vice City's Fort Baxter under the watch of Sgt. Jerry Martinez. He enlisted to financially support his dysfunctional family: his mother Janet is a drug addict, and his brother Pete suffers from severe asthma. At the beginning of the game, Vic is persuaded by Martinez to shelter drugs and a prostitute on the base in exchange for money. However, both are discovered in Vic's barracks and Martinez allows Vic to take the fall. Vic is dishonorably discharged and his promising career ended.

Once back on the streets as a civilian, Vic is given work by local gun-runner Phil Cassidy, an associate of Martinez. Phil is in conflict with the Cholos, a large street gang muscling on his business. Vic is then referred to Phil's brother-in-law, Marty Jay Williams, the leader of the Trailer Park Mafia, and his wife Louise. Vic increases the Trailer Park Mafia's power in Vice City by stealing multiple businesses and assets from the Cholos, whom Marty also despises. Eventually Louise, tired of Marty's abuse, leaves her husband to live with her sister, Mary-Jo. Vic begins seeing Louise in secret, but both of them are eventually found out by Marty. Infuriated, Marty kidnaps Louise with the intent of turning her into one of his whores. Vic rescues Louise and kills Marty, disbanding the Trailer Park Mafia and allowing Marty's businesses to falls into Vic's hands.

At this time, Vic's brother Lance contacts him with an offer to "double-team" Vice City together. When Lance arrives, he seems more focused on getting a slice of the huge drug trade in Vice City than in legitimate business. Vic is reluctant to sell drugs, which he sees as a dirty business. Seeking a supplier, Lance hooks up with a shady figure named Bryan Forbes, who helps them steal a cocaine shipment and elude the authorities. When Lance discovers that Forbes is an undercover cop, both brothers take him to a warehouse and interrogate him. Lance wants to get Intel on a major drug shipment, but Forbes's information is fake and only leads the Vance brothers into trouble. They decide to give Forbes one more chance to give them the information they need, however he chooses to trick Vic and Lance into walking into a bar owned by gay white supremacists. The brothers have no choice but to shoot their way out. Fuming, Vic returns to the warehouse to punish Forbes, only to find that the crooked cop has managed to get free. Left with little choice, Vic kills Forbes before he can escape. Lance is distraught, however, because Forbes has died before he could tell them about the big cocaine shipment coming in.

Lance later pieces through the papers at Forbes's old apartment and determines where the shipment will take place. He convinces Vic to cooperate by telling him that his old enemy, Jerry Martinez, is overseeing the transfer of the coke. The Vance brothers successfully ambush the deal, stealing two trucks full of cocaine and hiding them on the other side of the city. Feeling confident, Victor calls Martinez to ask him how it feels to be backstabbed. Jerry informs Vic that he has "fucked us both"; The shipment belonged to the Mendez Brothers, Diego and Armando Mendez, the two most powerful and feared druglords in the city. They will kill everyone who took part in the failed deal, including Martinez himself. Martinez announces he is planning to turn state's evidence in order to protect himself.

Vic and Lance know they cannot survive going to war with the Mendez Brothers; They travel to the Mendez Compound on Prawn Island for an audience with Armando and Diego. At first it seems like the Mendez Brothers are willing to forge an alliance -- but first Vic and Lance must frame Martinez and pin the blame for the coke theft on him. Then they have to have to reimburse the Mendez Brothers for the money they lost on the botched drug shipment. Once their debt is clear, the Vance brothers are summoned again to the Mendez Mansion to be offered a deal: Hand over all of their businesses to the Mendez Brothers and then get out of town. Vic and Lance refuse, and in retaliation they are both knocked unconscious and driven to an oil refinery in Viceport to be disposed of.

Before they can be shot, Vic draws the fire of Mendez's men toward one of the gas tanks, causing it to explode and incinerate his would-be executioners. Vic rescues Lance and escapes before the oil refinery implodes. With Phil, Lance and Umberto Robina's help, the Vance Crime Family defends their businesses from the inevitable counter-attack by the Mendez Brothers. In the wake of the battle, Lance recognizes that they need more than backup to survive next time, and gets in contact with Ricardo Diaz, another drug lord. Diaz offers his protection in return for helping him liquidate his drug competition.

In the midst of this, Jerry Martinez drops out of witness protection. Eager for revenge, Martinez kidnaps Louise, who is viciously beaten before Vic rescues her. Martinez sends Vic a pager message in which he says he raped her and also says he promises to see Louise again soon. It is later made clear that Martinez has cut a deal with the Mendez Brothers. Armando's men capture Louise again, and Vic confronts Armando at the Mendez Compound, killing him in a blind rage. Vic races upstairs to find Louise dying.

Soon after, with the help of Diaz and Phil Cassidy, Vic returns to Fort Baxter and steals a Hunter attack helicopter. Diaz bids him farewell as Vic takes off in the chopper to mount an assault on the Mendez Office Tower located downtown. In a three-way shootout on the rooftop, Vic finally kills Martinez along with the surviving Diego Mendez. After these harrowing experiences, Vic and Lance both decide to leave Vice City, to lay low for a while off of the large profits made from Vic's business. Before they leave via helicopter, Lance mentions that has gotten hold of 20 kilograms of cocaine and has stashed it out of town, but Vic angrily tells him to get rid of it.

[edit] Grand Theft Auto: Vice City

Vice City's depiction of Victor Vance, as he is about to engage with Tommy and his escorts. Lance Vance can be seen in the background.
Vice City's depiction of Victor Vance, as he is about to engage with Tommy and his escorts. Lance Vance can be seen in the background.

Victor "Vic" Vance first appeared in the opening cutscene of Vice City, in which he was killed by gunmen during an ill-fated drug exchange with Tommy Vercetti, one of the only (along with Lance Vance) survivors of the attack. In his first appearance, Victor speaks in a distinctly Latin accent. Victor's death staged the rest of the game's events, forcing Vercetti to root out the men responsible and re-acquire the 20 kilograms of cocaine and money he lost.

Victor returned to Vice City in the titular game, set two years after Vice City Stories, to sell cocaine to mobsters who were looking to gain a foothold in Vice City's drug market. Vic and Lance were brought out of drug-selling retirement by Ken Rosenberg, who was acting under orders from his mob associates to locate a dealer from out of town.[1] Rosenberg was allegedly referred to the Vance brothers through Colonel Cortez. It is assumed that the 20 k's of cocaine that Vic was going to sell to Vercetti are the same drugs that Lance had been sitting on since the conclusion of Vice City Stories.

Before the drug deal can go through, Vic is gunned down, along with Tommy's escorts Harry and Lee, by men working for a territorial drug lord named Ricardo Diaz. There is debate amongst fans over who exactly is killed in this cinematic (see Pete Vance).

[edit] References

  1. ^ Ken Rosenberg: There's this retired Colonel. Colonel Juan García Cortez. He's the one that helped me set up this deal far away from Vice City's established thugs, ok? (Cutscene from Vice City mission, "The Party")