Let’s talk about the building that every GTA V player has looked up at, tried to get on top of, and at some point either base-jumped from or got killed on. The Maze Bank Tower is the tallest building in all of San Andreas 1,050 feet of pure Los Santos ambition and over a decade later the community is still finding new reasons to go up there.

Here’s everything worth knowing about it.

What It Actually Is

The Maze Bank Tower is the crown jewel of the Pillbox Hill skyline and the headquarters of the fictional Maze Bank financial empire in Los Santos. The Tower stands 1,050 feet tall, which is actually 32 feet taller than its real-life counterpart. It is the tallest building in the State of San Andreas and the second tallest in the entire GTA series, only after the Rotterdam Tower in Liberty City.

It’s modelled directly on the U.S. Bank Tower in Downtown Los Angeles right down to the distinctive cylindrical crown at the top. The real building has 73 floors. The in-game version has 72 stories. Rockstar didn’t miss.

Getting Up There: Nobody Takes the Stairs

Here’s the first thing every new player discovers there are no stairs or elevators accessible from street level. Getting to the top of Maze Bank Tower requires all of a player’s resourcefulness. None of the routes to the top involve getting inside a lift.

The community has developed three standard methods for reaching the rooftop:

The helicopter approach is the most common. Grab a Buzzard or any chopper and land directly on the helipad. Simple, reliable, and the default method for players who own the CEO office.

The jet landing is the community flex. Players land a Lazer jet on the rooftop by approaching the tower, flying toward the mid-point of the structure, taking a slight dip downwards before exposing landing gear, reducing speed, and doing a near-vertical climb up the side of the building. It looks nearly impossible until you see it done perfectly at which point it looks obvious.

The parachute drop is the most cinematic. Gain altitude above the tower in any aircraft, exit the vehicle, and freefall onto the helipad from above. It’s the entry method that makes you feel like an action movie villain. Nobody is going to argue with that.

What Players Come Here For

The base jump off the Maze Bank Tower is the activity the community never gets tired of. In a mission featuring Dom Beasley, Franklin meets him at the roof of the Maze Bank Tower where Dom convinces him to jump off. The two leap from the Tower and navigate through the city before landing on the back of a Flatbed travelling along Power Street.

That mission introduced the jump to millions of players and they never stopped doing it recreationally. The freefall from 1,050 feet over downtown Los Santos, city grid spreading out in every direction, threading between skyscrapers before pulling the parachute at the last possible second it’s one of the most consistently thrilling player-created experiences in the entire game.

The Sumo IV adversary mode turns the rooftop into a vehicular battle arena that the community loves for its absurdity. In Sumo IV, players form two teams and use cars to force the opposing team off the edge of the helipad. The falling cars are knocked out of the round. Pushing someone off the top of the tallest building in the city in a compact car while hovering 1,050 feet above Los Santos is exactly the kind of experience GTA Online exists to create.

Sniper duels between rooftops are a recurring community event that the tower enables naturally. The elevation advantage from the Maze Bank roof creates sightlines across virtually the entire Pillbox Hill district. Organised PVP players use it as the anchor point for long-range duels between nearby skyscrapers it’s one of the few competitive PVP formats in GTA Online where position and map knowledge matter more than reflexes.

The CEO Office: Worth It or Not?

This is the conversation the community keeps having and the answer is genuinely divided. In GTA Online, the Maze Bank Tower office can be purchased from Dynasty 8 Executive for $4,000,000, making it the most expensive Executive Office in the game. After purchase, players can register as CEO and access SecuroServ features.

It is the representation of success in GTA Online. By purchasing this office, you get access to the tallest building in Los Santos, situated in the middle of downtown for easy access to multiple missions. You also get access to the highest helipad in the game, making it a great place to enter and exit with a flying vehicle without worrying about other players shooting you down.

The honest counter-argument is equally valid though. The Maze Bank Tower is the most expensive Executive Office. Unless you want the prestige of having the most expensive office, it is not worth the price tag. It comes with the most inconvenient helipad — it is high up in the air so it takes longer to fly to and has the most stairs when walking up from your office to the helipad. It also has bad personal vehicle spawns.

The community consensus in 2026 is pretty consistent: Players who want to buy this office may do so if they have the money for some it really is about the view of Los Santos from the tallest building in the game, and who can blame them? But if efficiency is your priority, the general GTA Online rule applies here never buy the most expensive version of something. The offices all have the same interior options and garages. It is really just the location and the view from the window that is different.

Buy it if you want the prestige. Skip it if you want the best value. Both are legitimate choices and the community respects both positions.

The Stunts That Keep Going Viral

The community’s obsession with the Maze Bank Tower rooftop as a stunt canvas never fully fades. Players have managed to deliver a cargo truck to the top of the Maze Bank Tower using two Deluxos flying inside the rear of the truck and using their cars like a jet propulsion system to push it all the way up. That clip circulated widely and spawned dozens of attempted copies, each trying to one-up the original.

The jet landing challenge is the one that keeps recurring. New players see it done, assume it’s impossible, then spend an evening at the Tower until they nail it. Some players have mentioned that they like to do this little stunt to keep on top of their game and that it is not as challenging as one might think. That’s the classic GTA loop something looks insane, someone does it cleanly, and suddenly everyone is trying it.

The Building Nobody Fully Notices

Here’s a piece of Maze Bank Tower trivia that even long-time players miss. Despite being a relatively prominent building among the Los Santos skyline, the Maze Bank Tower actually makes fewer story appearances compared to the Union Depository to the north and the IAA and FIB Headquarters to the east.

And the building’s in-game lore is quietly fascinating. In Jock Cranley’s campaign video, it is claimed the tower was built prior to 1985. For a city that runs on financial corruption and shady deals, a bank tower built in the early 1980s fits the aesthetic perfectly.

Why You Should Actually Visit

If you’ve never stood on the Maze Bank Tower rooftop and looked at the city below you, you’re missing one of the most purely cinematic moments GTA V offers. The entire Los Santos grid stretches out in every direction the coast to the west, the airport runway to the south, the Vinewood Hills to the north, and the industrial east side all visible simultaneously from one vantage point.

It’s the view that makes Los Santos feel like a real city rather than a collection of missions and waypoints. Everything Rockstar built is visible from up there and there’s something about seeing it all from 1,050 feet that makes the scale of the world suddenly click in a way it doesn’t from street level.

Go up there. Base jump off the west face. Pull your parachute late. There’s a reason the community has been doing exactly that for over a decade.

Quick answer there is only one military base in GTA 5, and it’s called Fort Zancudo.

Fort Zancudo is the only military base in Grand Theft Auto V and in the HD Universe so far. If you’ve been hunting for a second base somewhere, you’re not missing anything this is it.

Where Exactly Is Fort Zancudo?

The GTA V military base is marked on the map as “Lago Zancudo,” just south of the North Chumash beach and southwest of Mount Josiah, with the Lago Zancudo swamps and the town of Harmony nearby.

The tricky part? It doesn’t show up on the standard in-game map. You’ll only see it on the satellite view look for the runway tip touching the northwest shoreline.

The easiest landmark to use: find the Great Ocean Highway tunnel on the west coast, and the base sits directly above it.

What’s Inside the Base?

Fort Zancudo features one main airstrip, a secondary airstrip, three large hangars, several smaller hangars, a munitions depot, rows of blockhouses, a fire and rescue station, a refinery, an Air Traffic Control tower, and a main office.

The vehicles are the real prize. The three main reasons players raid Fort Zancudo are the P-996 LAZER fighter jet, the Rhino tank, and the Buzzard attack chopper all of which cost millions to buy legitimately in GTA Online.

Fort Zancudo’s fleet is composed mainly of standard issue military vehicles including the Rhino, Cargobob, Buzzard, P-996 LAZER, and the Titan.

What Happens When You Go In?

Don’t expect a warm welcome. Entering Fort Zancudo’s airspace by plane or helicopter will put a 2-star wanted level on the player, and a radio warning will be issued shortly after, the wanted level increases to 4 and guided missiles will be launched.

On the ground it’s even worse. If the player enters the base by ground undetected, a four-star wanted level will be obtained shortly after being spotted by personnel this sounds the alarm and mobilises anyone on site, whether in a vehicle or not.

The Three Ways to Get In

1. Drive through the checkpoint

fast bikes and supercars can sometimes slip through before guards react. High risk, low survival rate.

2. Use the highway ramp

There are conveniently placed rock formations that can serve as a ramp as you leave the highway tunnel close to Mount Chiliad at speed, this will send your car flying over the barriers and into the military base.

3. Parachute in

Fly up high and parachute onto the base. The jets will shoot down your aircraft if you linger in restricted airspace, but they’ll ignore you once you exit it and parachute down. Most experienced players use this method.

The Easy Way In GTA Online Only

If you’d rather not get shot at, buy a hangar. Since the 2017 Smugglers Run update, players have been able to buy hangars within Fort Zancudo in GTA Online if they do so, they will be granted access to the base and the military personnel will not be hostile towards the player.

Three hangars are available, ranging from around $2 million to $3.25 million on the Maze Bank Foreclosures website. Expensive, but it means free base access for life. Although, should the player attempt to steal a vehicle or fire a weapon, the soldiers will still attack.

What About the NOOSE Headquarters?

GTA 5 also has a secondary law enforcement compound worth knowing about the NOOSE HQ. The easiest way of finding the NOOSE headquarters is to travel on the highway leading out of Los Santos to the east, and taking the first exit on your left a short ways out.

The big difference from Fort Zancudo? You won’t get a wanted level for going here. Located to the east outside of the city of Los Santos, you’ll find an armed Buzzard helicopter waiting on the roof of the main building and you won’t accrue any wanted levels for accessing this location. Free Buzzard, no heat. Most players don’t know this exists.

Quick Reference

Bottom line

Fort Zancudo is the only true military base in GTA 5. It’s dangerous, heavily guarded, and absolutely worth raiding at least once. Just bring armour, have an exit plan, and know exactly which vehicle you’re going for before you step through that gate.

In a game that celebrates chaos, Del Perro Pier is the one place where players actively choose not to cause any. Based almost one-for-one on Santa Monica Pier in California, it’s GTA V’s most human-feeling location full of pedestrians, ocean sounds, carnival lights, and a vibe that feels genuinely relaxed in a city that never is.

And that contrast is exactly why the community loves it.

What’s Actually on the Pier

Del Perro Pier is more than just a pretty waterfront it’s a fully packed destination with real things to do. The pier is home to many attractions, notably the Pleasure Pier amusement park, featuring iconic rides like the Leviathan roller coaster and the Ferris Whale, along with shops, restaurants, and a viewing area with telescopes. It’s one of the most detail-rich locations in the entire game, and most players only scratch the surface of it.

Del Perro is widely known for its beach and the world-famous Pleasure Pier tourists can be seen wandering the streets, taking selfies, and uploading them to social networks like Lifeinvader. Rockstar packed the pier with ambient life that makes it feel genuinely populated and alive, rather than just a static backdrop you drive past on the way to a mission.

What Players Actually Do Here

The Ferris Whale is the pier’s most iconic attraction and it’s actually rideable. The Ferris Whale allows players to switch between first-person view and a cinematic view, offering a better look at the pier from above. It costs $8 to ride in story mode and $10 in GTA Online, and riding it unlocks a Social Club icon for linked accounts. It’s one of the few moments in GTA V where you genuinely stop and look at the world from a peaceful angle.

The Leviathan roller coaster is where things get less peaceful and more hilarious. GTA Online fans know that Del Perro Pier is possibly the most family-friendly location in the entire game but the Leviathan has a habit of turning wholesome group outings into something resembling a Final Destination scene. Riding it with a full lobby of friends is one of the most genuinely funny co-op moments the game offers, and Reddit clips of group Leviathan rides going spectacularly wrong are a consistent community favourite.

The telescope viewing area at the end of the pier is one of the most underused features in the game. At the end of the pier there is a viewing area with telescopes through which the player can look out at the Pacific Ocean and the view from there, particularly at sunset, is one of the quieter beautiful moments the game hides in plain sight. Most players walk straight past it every time. Don’t be most players.

Night driving along the beachfront with the pier in the background is the community’s single most recommended “peaceful” GTA experience. Del Perro Pier is renowned for its bright, vivid colours that shine at night the neon from the Ferris Whale and the Leviathan is visible from across the city and from the air, casting colour across the ocean surface in a way that looks almost cinematic. Slow-rolling the Great Ocean Highway at night with the pier lit up on your left is genuinely one of the game’s best sensory experiences.

The Missions That Made It Famous

Del Perro Pier has more story mode presence than most players remember. One of the game’s most memorable early missions Daddy’s Little Girl ends here, with Michael and Jimmy bike riding to the pier before things go predictably sideways offshore. The mission ends at Del Perro Pier when it’s revealed Tracey has been hanging out with porn stars on a yacht offshore, causing Michael to angrily dive off the pier to confront her. It’s one of the sharper character moments in the whole game, and the pier is the perfect setting for it.

The pier also plays a starring role in one of the most satisfying endgame missions. In The Third Way, Trevor is sent to Del Perro Pier to kill FIB agent Steve Haines, who is filming an episode of his TV show while riding the Ferris Whale. Pulling off that hit mid-ride, with the pier lit up below and the city in the background, is the kind of only-in-GTA moment that the community still talks about years later.

Why the Community Keeps Coming Back

Del Perro Pier works because it offers something GTA V rarely does genuine calm. The vibrant atmosphere and unique structures make it an ideal location for in-game photography, especially during sunset, and the pier is a hotspot for random events where players can encounter unique situations and side missions.

It’s the one location in Los Santos where arriving slowly and just looking around is the right move. The ocean sounds, the carnival music from the pier’s announcement speakers, the neon reflections on the wet boardwalk at night Del Perro Pier is Rockstar’s most atmospheric location, and it rewards players who take five minutes to actually exist in it rather than just pass through.

For a game built around speed and destruction, that’s genuinely rare. And the community recognises it every time they find themselves parked on the beachfront at 2am, engine off, just watching the Ferris Whale spin.

Most GTA V locations announce themselves. The Diamond Casino glitters from across the map. Mount Chiliad dominates the skyline. The Maze Bank Tower punctures the clouds above downtown. The Great Chaparral Mine Shaft does none of that. It sits quietly in the hills between Los Santos and the desert a boarded-up wooden door in a rocky hillside that looks like absolutely nothing, offers no map marker, and hides one of the most atmospheric and narratively rich experiences in the entire game.

The community keeps rediscovering it in cycles, and every time, it feels like a genuine secret.

Finding It, The First Challenge

The mine shaft doesn’t appear on your map, there’s no mission waypoint pointing to it, and the entrance looks deliberately unremarkable. The Hidden Abandoned Mine in GTA V is a secret underground location situated in the Great Chaparral region of Los Santos County, near the base of Mount Josiah, north of the main highway. The entrance to the mine is marked by a wooden doorway that looks out of place in the rugged mountain terrain.

You can’t just walk in the door is sealed and the game never tells you that. The player can enter the mine by destroying the door it can be done through explosives, RPG, or the Railgun. That requirement alone acts as a natural filter. Players who stumble across it casually and don’t have explosives on them often note the door, move on, and forget about it. Players who come back prepared discover one of the most genuinely atmospheric interiors in the game. The community has been passing this location around in guides, Reddit threads, and YouTube videos for over a decade and new players still react to it like they’ve found something nobody else knows about.

What’s Inside, The Part Nobody Expects

Once you’re through that door, the mine shaft immediately feels different from every other GTA V interior. The mine reveals a network of tunnels with mining tools and railway tracks for mine carts, though most tunnels lead to dead ends and some are blocked by indestructible barricades. The darkness is genuine the light inside the mine is limited, so you should equip a flashlight or use guns with thermal scopes to ensure visibility. In a game that’s mostly played in bright daylight or under neon city lights, the pitch-black claustrophobia of the mine shaft is a genuinely jarring tonal shift and the community loves it for exactly that reason.

The wooden supports, scattered tools, dead ends, and branching tunnels create a layout that feels authentically historical rather than game-designed. The mine shaft is filled with wooden supports and old mining equipment, creating a claustrophobic and spooky atmosphere. It’s one of the few interior locations in GTA V that feels like it existed before the events of the game like you’re entering a place with a real past rather than a space built specifically for a mission. That sense of age and abandonment is what gives the mine shaft its atmosphere, and it’s what keeps players coming back to walk its tunnels even after they’ve found everything inside.

The Murder Mystery, Why This Place Actually Matters

The mine shaft isn’t just a spooky room it’s the final chapter of one of GTA V’s most underappreciated side missions. The Murder Mystery is a returning-player exclusive side mission that tasks Michael with investigating a cold case buried inside the Vinewood film industry. It starts with cryptic messages carved into walls across Los Santos, leads through a trail of evidence pointing toward something dark in the hills, and ends here — in this mine — with a body at the bottom of the shaft.

The story behind the body is genuinely dark, told entirely through written clues. The letter reveals that Fred Quincy wanted Isaac to produce a cartoon film called “Bip the Dog,” while Isaac wanted to make a live-action film with another studio. Because of this, Quincy killed Isaac and hid his body in a mine in the hills. A Hollywood producer murdered his associate over a cartoon dog dispute and buried the body in a remote mine it’s the kind of bleak, absurd, quintessentially GTA V story that the game hides in places most players never go.

The payoff for solving it is one of the most unique rewards in the game. A film canister bearing the name of Richards Majestic Productions can be found next to the body, and finding the body solves the Murder Mystery and unlocks two vintage Noir filters for the Snapmatic on each protagonists’ cell phones.

These aren’t just cosmetic unlocks they apply a full-screen black-and-white vintage film filter to the entire game, turning Los Santos into a noir cityscape that genuinely looks incredible. With the Murder Mystery solved, you can modify your display with two new Vintage Noir filters these can be accessed by visiting the body in the mine, or by calling the new Isaac contact on your phone to cycle through them.

Activating the Noir filter and cruising downtown Los Santos in black and white is one of those player-created GTA V moments the game never advertises and the community that’s discovered it treats it like a private club membership. It changes how the entire game looks and feels, and it’s locked behind a side mission most players never find, ending in a location most players walk past.

The Secrets That Surround It

The mine shaft sits inside a wider cluster of hidden content that makes the Great Chaparral area one of the most discovery-rich regions in the game. A letter scrap related to the Lenora Johnson mystery can be found near the mine’s exterior, adding another layer to its enigmatic background. The Lenora Johnson murder investigation is a separate collectible chain entirely and the fact that its evidence sits just outside the mine entrance means players who find one often discover the other by accident.

The original version of the game handled the mine shaft completely differently which is part of why it still surprises players. In the original release of Grand Theft Auto V, the mine shaft is inaccessible — its only purpose was to serve as a landmark for a nearby letter scrap collectible. In future editions of the game, the mine shaft has a fully modelled interior that can be accessed by destroying the outside door with an explosive. Players who started on last-gen consoles never had access to this interior at all meaning a significant portion of the community discovered it years after they first played the game, which is exactly the kind of discovery that generates the most excited community posts.

Why the Community Keeps Rediscovering It

The Great Chaparral Mine Shaft works because it rewards curiosity above everything else. No mission sends you here unless you’re on the Murder Mystery chain. No map marker highlights it. No NPC mentions it. You find it because you’re the kind of player who explores who looks at a boarded-up door on a hillside and wonders what’s behind it instead of driving past.

The discovery of the abandoned mine and its secrets has intrigued GTA players and encouraged exploration and theory crafting within the community. The presence of the body and the film reel has sparked much speculation among fans, with theories linking the mine to unsolved mysteries and hidden storylines in GTA V. Over a decade later, the mine shaft still generates first-time discovery posts on forums from players who’ve owned the game for years. Veteran players respond to those posts with the same warmth every time because everyone remembers the first time they blew that door open and stepped into the dark.

In a game built around spectacle, the Great Chaparral Mine Shaft is the location that proves the quietest secrets are often the best ones. It doesn’t announce itself. It doesn’t reward you with a cutscene or a marker. It just sits there in the hills, waiting for players curious enough to bring explosives and a flashlight and delivers one of the game’s most memorable moments to everyone who does.

Most players drive through Paleto Bay early in the story, complete the bank heist, and never come back. That’s a mistake the community has been quietly correcting for years. In 2026, Paleto Bay has had one of the most significant reputation turnarounds of any location in the game and the players who discovered it early have been quietly living their best GTA lives up there while everyone else was getting blown up in downtown Los Santos.

Here’s why the community is finally paying attention.

What Paleto Bay Actually Is

Paleto Bay is a small coastal town sitting at the northwestern foot of Mount Chiliad in Blaine County far enough from Los Santos that most players treat it like the edge of the map, and close enough to the mountains and ocean that it feels like its own complete world. It is situated northwest of the Paleto Forest, west of Procopio Beach, and sits on the coastline of the Pacific Ocean. It is mainly a residential area with some shops.

The town is modelled on real California coastal life, and it shows in every detail. Paleto Bay’s coastal location with the Great Ocean Highway running through it, small town atmosphere, and adjacency to a coastal bluff and large national forest bears similarity to the town of Morro Bay, with elements of Big Sur and Cambria in the Central Coast region. Rockstar clearly built this place with love it just took the community a decade to properly appreciate it.

The Paleto Score The Mission That Put It on the Map

No conversation about Paleto Bay is complete without the Paleto Score, and for good reason it’s one of the most chaotic and entertaining heists in the entire game. Many missions in the game happen here, including one where players rob a bank, making it an exciting place to visit. The Paleto Bay area plays a big role in the game’s story because many important missions happen here.

The setup is delicious. Lester tells them that the Blaine County Savings Bank can be robbed as it is used to store all the dirty money of the cops of Paleto Bay. You’re not just robbing a bank you’re robbing the corrupt cops who were using it to fleece their own residents. The brazen takeover of the bank, heavy suits of body armor worn by the crew, and the large shootout with the law enforcement officials is reminiscent of the February 28, 1997 North Hollywood bank robbery.

The escape sequence through Paleto Bay’s main street is the moment players remember most. What starts as a contained bank job rapidly escalates into a full military response the crew fighting through the town in heavy armour while the entire Blaine County law enforcement machine descends on them. It turns Paleto Bay’s quiet main street into a genuine warzone, and the contrast between the sleepy small town aesthetic and the absolute mayhem happening on it is perfect GTA storytelling. A Cargobob brings a Rhino tank into action because of course it does.

What Players Actually Do Here in Free Roam

The Great Ocean Highway coastal drive through Paleto Bay is consistently cited as one of the best “chill drives” in the game. The road hugs the Pacific coastline heading north from Los Santos, with the mountains to your right and the ocean stretching out to your left and by the time you reach Paleto Bay, the combination of dense forest, coastal cliffs, and small-town atmosphere makes it feel like you’ve genuinely left the city behind. It’s the drive players take when they need the game to slow down.

The area around Procopio Beach hides one of the game’s most extraordinary secrets a sunken UFO on the ocean floor. The UFO can be found beneath the water north of Paleto Bay, not far off the shores of Procopio Beach. Players will have to either scuba dive or take a submarine into the watery depths to get a closer look. It likely crashed into the water long ago, as plants and other sea life have begun to cover its surface. This is the only UFO in the game that doesn’t require 100% completion to find making it genuinely discoverable for any player willing to dive deep enough.

The underwater world around Paleto Bay is one of the most underexplored regions in the entire game. Players use scuba gear to explore the deep oceans, where they encounter old shipwrecks, sunken planes, and even a UFO near Paleto Bay. There are hidden packages on submerged plane wreckages, collectibles scattered across the ocean floor, and enough underwater geography to spend a full session exploring without ever firing a weapon. For players who’ve seen everything Los Santos has above water, Paleto Bay’s coastline opens up an entirely different game beneath the surface.

Why the Community Has Quietly Fallen in Love With It

Paleto Bay’s biggest appeal in 2026 is the one thing Los Santos can’t offer peace. The further north you run your GTA Online operations, the fewer griefers bother making the drive. Veterans who’ve been playing for years have started relocating their session activities to Blaine County specifically because the chaos-to-breathing-room ratio is dramatically better up there. GTA Communiy describes it as the “retirement home of GTA” and that framing is genuinely accurate.

Unlike the desert areas of Blaine County, this region has dense vegetation growing around it. Paleto Bay has a very safe and friendly environment or at least, as safe and friendly as a GTA location can be. The forest, the mountains, the ocean, and the small-town layout combine into something that feels meaningfully different from the urban sprawl of Los Santos. It’s a slower, quieter, more atmospheric corner of San Andreas and after a decade of non-stop Los Santos, that’s exactly what a lot of long-time players are looking for.

For a game that built its reputation on urban chaos, it says something that one of its most beloved locations in 2026 is a quiet coastal town at the edge of the map. Paleto Bay didn’t change. The community finally caught up to what was already there.