In the earliest days of Grand Theft Auto's shift to 3D, flight was a luxury. Helicopters were introduced in Vice City, but it wasn't until San Andreas that we got to fly a plane—or, more accurately, a plane with wings. There is a plane in Grand Theft Auto 3, but it's barely functional, with stubborn controls and clipped wings that make it a nightmare to fly. The infamous Dodo—appropriately named after the flightless, extinct bird—could be found parked in a hangar at the Francis International Airport after completing a mission called Grand Theft Aero. I remember seeing it at the time, and feeling a surge of excitement as I sprinted towards it. "Is that a plane?!" Then I climbed inside and realised that, while it was indeed an aircraft, I couldn't actually get the thing into the air.
But players found a way, and after some searching on the internet I managed to get it aloft and see Liberty City from above. "We were making a driving and shooting game, and even that was radical at the time," Rockstar said in a fan Q&A. "The Dodo was never meant to be flown much at all. It was just a fun thing that people went crazy with when they figured out various bugs that let them fly it." It's a tricky process, involving keeping the plane as level as possible by constantly tapping down on the D-pad. Fail to do so and you'll lose control, and probably end up exploding in a ball of flame, or drowning in the water surrounding the airport. Every time you die you have to run all the way back to the hangar to try again, which makes learning the tricksy ways of the Dodo a real test of patience.
Once you're in the air, it's clear Liberty City was never meant to be seen from this perspective. Skyscrapers pop in and out of view and most buildings are missing roofs and other top-down details. It's even possible to fly to a chunk of normally inaccessible city used in the game's opening cutscene. I remember hearing whispers about this on the internet back in the early 2000s—of the fabled 'Ghost Town', which some claimed was actually a whole new city hidden in the game. In reality it's just a handful of static streets, made for the bank heist at the beginning of the story. This was one of the earliest examples of Rockstar games generating their own myths and urban legends, which continues to this day. I never made it to the 'Ghost Town' myself, alas. I really sucked at flying the Dodo.
There were also rumours that the Dodo's wings were cut off because of the impact of 9/11. Some content in Grand Theft Auto 3 was changed in the wake of the attacks—according to Rockstar, a mission that “referenced terrorists" and "a few cosmetic details and pedestrian comments." But the Dodo was, apparently, always this much of a pig to pilot. There are mods for the PC version of Grand Theft Auto 3 that let you restore its wings and fly it properly, but that's missing the point. The Dodo is memorable because it's terrible. Keeping it in the air for more than a few seconds is a real challenge, which makes getting over to another island, or even the Ghost Town if you're particularly skilled, a legitimate accomplishment. Having attempted to fly it myself recently, I can confirm it's still hard as nails.
Rockstar says the upcoming re-release of GTA 3, Vice City, and San Andreas will feature 'modern gameplay enhancements', which I hope doesn't extend to 'fixing' the Dodo. It's time for a new generation of GTA fans to experience the frustration, and brief thrills, of attempting to conquer the skies in this piece of shit. It's also a reminder of when we weren't quite so spoiled as gamers—where flying for a few seconds in an open-world game was something to get wildly excited about. Nowadays you can do pretty much anything in these games, in any kind of vehicle, effortlessly. But back then, at the dawn of the new millennium, we had to earn that right. Yes, the Dodo is objectively bad, but that's why people still talk about it today. It's the worst vehicle in video game history, and I love that about it.