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Grand Theft Auto V video game glitch lets players ride down skyscrapers

Laws of physics take a holiday

Ride your bike off a skyscraper and you’d expect to not so much ride as plummet to a very messy death. That’s the way it’s supposed to work in ‘realistic’ video games too, but a glitch in Grand Theft Auto V means players can cheerfully ride down the side of skyscrapers.

Apparently, the game’s physics engine interprets falling off a building on a bike as riding down the side of it, and doesn’t take into account the small matter of a vertical slope not being something you can ride down even if you’re Danny MacAskill.

According to games website MotoringCrunch.com, riding down skyscrapers in now the happening thing in the game’s online multiplayer mode.

Developer Rockstar Games is expected to fix the glitch soon, so if you’re a gamer and want to find out what it’s like to ride down a skyscraper, you’d better move quickly, or watch this animated GIF:

John has been writing about bikes and cycling for over 30 years since discovering that people were mug enough to pay him for it rather than expecting him to do an honest day's work.

He was heavily involved in the mountain bike boom of the late 1980s as a racer, team manager and race promoter, and that led to writing for Mountain Biking UK magazine shortly after its inception. He got the gig by phoning up the editor and telling him the magazine was rubbish and he could do better. Rather than telling him to get lost, MBUK editor Tym Manley called John’s bluff and the rest is history.

Since then he has worked on MTB Pro magazine and was editor of Maximum Mountain Bike and Australian Mountain Bike magazines, before switching to the web in 2000 to work for CyclingNews.com. Along with road.cc founder Tony Farrelly, John was on the launch team for BikeRadar.com and subsequently became editor in chief of Future Publishing’s group of cycling magazines and websites, including Cycling Plus, MBUK, What Mountain Bike and Procycling.

John has also written for Cyclist magazine, edited the BikeMagic website and was founding editor of TotalWomensCycling.com before handing over to someone far more representative of the site's main audience.

He joined road.cc in 2013. He lives in Cambridge where the lack of hills is more than made up for by the headwinds.

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8 comments

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Raleigh | 10 years ago
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The cycling in GTAV is pretty funny in general.

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jarredscycling | 10 years ago
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I always knew cyclists had super powers

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cera | 10 years ago
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I reckon that counts as strava terrorism, and it's definitely against their community guidelines

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Wolfshade | 10 years ago
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Reminds me of my commute, unfortunately the "downhill" segment has been flagged on Strava as hazardous.

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Gkam84 | 10 years ago
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I am loving the gif, I wonder if we can see something like that in Road Bike Party 3....

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farrell | 10 years ago
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Do the brakes work?

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aslongasicycle | 10 years ago
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Even though this sort of incredibly irresponsible behaviour that promotes all people except me because I am me to throw themselves off high buildings with bikes without thinking about the risks I am heartened to see that the protagonist is wearing a helmet which would no doubt protect a cyclist falling from 800ft and I for one long for the innocence of long winter clubruns without the threat of watt meters or falling off buildings and if you don't believe me I once rode down the Empire State Building on an old red 7 speed Rourke in Reynolds tubing and if it wasn't for my helmet I feel certain I would have died and I demand an apology.

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notfastenough replied to aslongasicycle | 10 years ago
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aslongasicycle wrote:

Even though this sort of incredibly irresponsible behaviour that promotes all people except me because I am me to throw themselves off high buildings with bikes without thinking about the risks I am heartened to see that the protagonist is wearing a helmet which would no doubt protect a cyclist falling from 800ft and I for one long for the innocence of long winter clubruns without the threat of watt meters or falling off buildings and if you don't believe me I once rode down the Empire State Building on an old red 7 speed Rourke in Reynolds tubing and if it wasn't for my helmet I feel certain I would have died and I demand an apology.

Take heart though, at least you weren't cut by the rough edge of a split velopac...

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