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GTA SA - Why planes crash [WIP name]

Oh my God… this video is taking so long to make. If in August the script looked like this:

Now it looks like this:

The document where we store all kinds of notes for this video is also huge:

The plugin Fire_Head made for me is also expanding. If in August it look like this:

Now it looks like this:

The video and everything around it becomes bigger and bigger. I think we went crazy with this one. Not just because we probably invested more time in this feature than Obbe 20 years ago, but these are just some stupid planes, which tend to crash. It is mind blowing that there is a lot to say.

Recently Fire_Head had finally done reverse engineering the plane AI. Good thing is, we now fully know how the plane navigates in space. Thanks to that a lot of weird stuff can be explained. Yay for that! Bad thing is, we found more strange implementations and oversights. For instance, if the AI sees that the path ahead is doomed and there is nowhere to turn, it takes a decision to turn 180 and reach some specific height. Guess what? This specific height is lower than the highest point in the game. So instead of acceding, the plane descends around Mount Chiliad peak and crashes. Why this specific height isn’t higher, we don’t know. There are a lot of similar questions.

I tried my best to make the script neutral. I mean, we know that Obbe was the creator of this feature, right? But all I do in the video is show bugs, oversight and strange implementations. So, I started to think if I should make a disclaimer before discussing the issues or not. I realized that people might mock Obbe and I didn't want that. So I decided to make one. I had two versions; pessimistic and optimistic. 

First I came up with the pessimistic one. Seeing that this feature is rushed, broken and filled with oddities I assumed that Obbe struggled to make the flybys more stable, but failed. Even if he said that it was fun to implement this feature, the code tells otherwise. Maybe he doesn’t remember. Maybe we are wrong. Doesn’t matter. The idea was to blame hardware limitations, basic AI and a lack of time to make it more stable. So I begged people to not blame Obbe for this feature adding that we all make mistakes. I literally rewrote this part for like 20 times and I still didn’t like it. Then I said screw that yapping and came up with the optimistic one.

The optimistic disclaimer is what I really like. I realized that maybe we were indeed looking way harder at this feature than Obbe did in the past, finding 20 years later all kinds of oversights, bugs and oddities, telling now what’s good and what’s bad as if we had a doctoral degree in flybys, but guess what? It doesn’t really matter. Sure, this feature could be better, but it definitely wasn’t a priority back then, not to mention that other developers seem to like the way it was. Just a clunky thing that makes this game unique. A boogeyman people share stories about. And I personally freaking love this feature for that! I think it is perfect, although it is slightly bigger in the script. It changes the tone of the video a lot. 

I came up with the optimistic version after I watched “Do Liberty City's Power Lines Connect To Anything?” by Any Austin. The power lines don’t make any sense in GTA IV and he proved that. And his conclusion was? It doesn’t really matter. It doesn’t make the game worse or something like that. It is what it is. Something that can be said about the planes too. These are just some stupid planes, which are prone to crash, here is why.

The script is not finished yet, but its structure is final, I think. Some parts feel disconnected from one another. Some other parts need to be paraphrased. In other words, I need to polish it. Maybe add more funny quirks. Good thing is, I now see the light in the tunnel. Still not giving up.

I am not sure about the others, but sometimes when I take a shower or just relax, I start rephrasing some sentences from a script. If I come up with something decent I immediately try to write it down somewhere. If I don’t, I will never remember how I said that in the past. Youtubers curse, I guess. 

I still want to ask questions to Obbe, but the problem is, he definitely doesn’t remember it much. Recently I asked people on Twitter if they ever witnessed a plane falling from the sky like a rock. Obbe theorized that the plane might spawn very high in the sky and done a dive bomb. Sadly, it isn’t the case. It is impossible. The plane just crashed into the interior and fell down while Carl was still exiting the interior. As simple as that. I will explain the details in the video. This is why I still have no clue how to ask the questions. I have a strong feeling that I have to explain things first then ask, because otherwise it would be pointless or create more questions than answers. So I also was preparing a document for Obbe briefly explaining how his feature work and left there some questions. I rewrote it at least 3 times. With all news finds we made it became outdated... again. lol

Now I think that it would be just better to send the script and ask if he has something to add. The problem is, I am not sure if he would read so many pages and if he would remember something interesting or explain why he did it like that 20 years ago.

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Thank you for watching and supporting me. I hope to see you soon!