Those are pretty tough cars and can take some abuse.
Back in high school one of my friends got one as a trade for some Isuzu Trooper parts. We used to give that car [censored] just for the fun of it. It idled really high, so you would have to stand on the brakes or shift to N when stopped. This was a good excuse to do a neutral drop from every stop every time. There was no air filter at all, and it didn't have a straight panel on it. We would frequently kick the car, hit it with boards, whatever. One day it lost steering and started screeching...my friend popped the hood with it running and we found a hose for the power steering spraying fluid all over the engine compartment...stuck the hose back on and continued driving. I think this car was eventually towed away by the city as an abandoned vehicle. I know for sure it got the yellow tow away sticker at least once. It never broke down, but parking was scarce and people didn't like seeing it parked on the street in a nice neighborhood.
Another one of my friends managed to find an AWD 5-speed that was pretty clean. That one was a nice car at first and ran well, but became a POS after much abuse. It saw plenty of mud. One of the CV axles needed to be replaced, but I can't remember any other mechanical issues.