GTA: Vice City speedrunner is 'ultra-copped,' 98 minutes into the game. A former Rockstar developer explains what caused it.

Joshimuz, a streamer from the United States, was 98 minutes into his Grand Theft Auto: Vice City speedrun when a police officer briefly transformed into The Flash in order to arrest him. Obbe Vermeij, a former Rockstar developer, explained how the bug happened in response to what Joshimuz called "an old speedrunning legendary" known as an "ultra-cop".

In a video of the bug in GTA X, Joshimuz has a wanted level of one star - which shouldn't scare a regular GTA player - while making deliveries in a Cherry Pop Ice Cream Truck. As he turns into an alleyway a cop appears from off-screen and zooms straight up to the car door as if he were wearing roller skates. Joshimuz turns to look at the chat when it happens. His character is arrested, and respawns in a nearby police station. "I don't know what to say, wow." "I've never seen Vice City ultra-copped so bad before."

The clip didn't get much attention, but someone was able to explain how a GTA police could discover faster-than-light traveling. Obbe Vermeij, a former Rockstar developer, replied on X that "this is a bug in the 'getting inside vehicles AI'". Vermeij explained that the cop was on his journey to the car's door, but Vice City's open-world environment interfered with his progress. "Then a panic code kicks into that just warps the cop to the car door."

"The code for navigating to the doors of vehicles is very complex as it must take into consideration other characters, the map and open car doors. Vermeij wrote: "(I didn't do any of it).

In Joshimuz’ clip, the only thing between Joshimuz and the cop is a construction worker walking casually down the middle of road. It must have been enough to trigger a code-red to send the cop soaring towards him.

Chrislee_is, a X user, said that they witnessed this when a police teleported onto their helicopter while atop a crane. Vermeij said, "The code treats cars and helicopters the same way. So yeah... any door-entry problem that occurs with cars will also occur with helicopters."

I remember as a teenager, I would ignore missions and drive around GTA Vice City for hours. I swear it happened to me at least once. I remember smashing a button to hijack a vehicle and watching Tommy Vercetti slide toward it. I also remember each time he would zip to the wrong vehicle and I would be stuck driving an 18. If the 'getting in vehicles AI' was so wonky for players, I'm surprised it was also broken for NPCs. Joshimuz will be able to look back at this failed speedrun knowing that it was not a skill issue but rather a piece 22-year-old of code that makes cops superhuman.