GTA Vice City: The Backstabber's Blues tells Lance Vance's story
A Vice City story mod reveals what Lance Vance was up to while Tommy took over the city: 12 missions, side businesses, an addiction system and a new radio station.
What was Lance Vance doing while Tommy Vercetti took over Vice City? That's the question at the heart of The Backstabber's Blues, a story mod for the original Vice City whose first chapter came out on February 18, 2026. It's the work of Captain Northstar, who revealed it with a trailer earlier that month.
The story
The mod tells the series' most notorious double-crosser's side of things, with a stated goal from its creator: to make you see "the man you love to hate" in a different light. It picks up the loose thread from Vice City's prologue: the 20 kilos of cocaine, the missing three million dollars and the three hitmen behind the ambush. Lance goes after them, crossing paths with events you already know, now seen from a new angle.
What's in Chapter I
- Story: 12 main missions plus 3 strangers' missions.
- Side hustles: five of them, covering pimping, exotic car deliveries, jobs for high-end clients, stealing hot goods and illegal street racing.
- Vehicles and weapons: 11 new vehicles and 3 new weapons. Cars you buy are always waiting in the same parking spot.
- Clothing: 22 outfits, with clothing stores you can now walk into.
- Map: new safehouses, bars, restaurants, hotels and shops, all fully enterable.
- Radio: VCFL Radio, with 18 new songs and DJ Tina Jane.
It also adds two systems you rarely see in a Vice City mod. Addiction: Lance leans on cocaine and alcohol to deal with his grief, and relying on them too much makes the world bleaker, until you check into rehab. Fitness: Lance gains or loses weight depending on what he eats and how much he walks, San Andreas-style.
What you'll need
It installs on top of a clean copy of GTA Vice City for PC, the Steam version included, and isn't meant to be mixed with other mods. It already bundles SilentPatch and Widescreen Fix, and the creator recommends staying at 1920×1080 or below, since most known bugs are resolution-related. There's also a community-made Russian translation.
Our take
This is the kind of mod that proves Vice City still has plenty left to give. Building on a character as well written as Lance makes perfect sense, and the range of new systems (businesses, addiction, fitness, a full radio station) goes far beyond tacking on a few missions. It's only the first chapter, so there's more story to come. Later, in September, Rockstar would publish mod guidelines that ban expanding its official stories, which puts projects like this in a tricky spot.
