The ex-GTA leader whose blog was snuffed out by Rockstar talks about San Andreas' biggest bug and why a lot of swearing is hidden from players.

The original GTA series on PC is still the best way of playing those games. Not the bloated Definitive Edition 2021. SilentPatch is a mod which fixes all the bugs and errors that are still present in Rockstar's PS2-era games (opi?). SilentPatch, a mod that fixes a whole bunch of bugs and errors still left over in Rockstar's PS2-era opuses (opi?

It's so good that Obbe Vermeij, former Rockstar technical director, who served in this role on GTA 3, Vice City and San Andreas 4, as well as several handheld games, has endorsed it (via GamesRadar). Vermeij wrote that "GTA is not an exception" to the rule of games having bugs. SilentPatch is recommended if you want to play original games.

You know what? He's right. Despite that, I must admit that Vermeij seems to have a lot of issues with his babies, which are more likely to be a result of a dev-brained approach than anything that the average player would encounter.

He says that "the worst bug that [Rockstar] missed in GTA: San Andreas" wasn't that which let players drive exploded vehicles (which is, to be fair - great), or that which made mission text remain on the screen longer the higher the resolution. Vermeij regrets "the one with the front end map that causes random things to change when the player leaves the map." This sounds like something that would be a major concern for Rockstar's technical director, but it means very little to me as a player. I don't think I've ever played a Rockstar title outside of the map.

Vermeij was then asked to do an impromptu question and answer session about his work on the games. How many of the bugs in the games could be traced to him? "I won't count, but um... Quite a number." Why are there so many models in the game with swear words in their filenames. "Anything not visible to the players will have swearing." Just a way for developers to stay sane. What does he make of the remasters? He hasn't tried them yet, but he heard that "most of the bugs have been fixed now." "They were rushed."

Vermeij has a lot more to tell, but it could be a while before we hear the juicy details. It's the same guy who wrote a blog last year to talk about his experiences and got Rockstar's attention, leading to their unceremonious closure. What did he say? "Maybe I will try again in 10 or 20 years."