sdt

i think they didn't realize that the building was about to collapse, but they really should've chosen a better venue from the start since the place was so rundown

Ehh big n rundown building? Seems cheap. Why not? *Thats what they would think*

Iirc, in the incident it takes inspiration from, the main issue was on the top floor which was added later on when the construction was half way done. That area had the most damage and crack formation. There was even an area where the celing had caved in on the day of the collapse. But usually the mall owners just plastered and fixed things as and when issues arose until the day the top floor completely caved in which caused domino effect and the rest of floors under it collapsed too. Because they compromised on the pillars that were supposed to hold up the floors. They reduced the number of pillars that were actually required and then on top they compromised with materials used to build those remainign pillars so they could not take the load when the top floor collapsed. Also the top floor which was added last minute actually had many heavy weight shops like mostly restaurants and book shop, etc then there were AC units and billboard on top of that floor on the rooftop. So the issues were prominently congested on that floor alone. They even moved the book store I think to take some load off. Rest of the mall looked like it had minor issues initially.
The artist tried depicting it but did not do it justice imo, the mall was not run down as the artist drew which is why so many people got caught into the tragedy. It was trendy place for that time with big brand shops sobit had a lot of traffic. The portion of ceiling caving in the day before the collapse was the reason they shut off the AC units as they did not want vibrations from it causing more area to cave in. They were holding a meeting in building B to decide if they should close the mall to the public to assess the damage the morning it collapsed.

ohhh i get it now, the progression really is weird the choices made were so poor and even out of character

Thanks for the added info! Damn, compromising the needed structural members is the worst thing they can to a building. Some buildings looks fine but yeah, they may be compromised. To add, not all cracks mean "compromised structural stability" but the location of the cracks are crucial. If the cracks are on the load-bearing members (beams, posts, load-bearing walls, slabs), that's when it's dangerous. This is when Retrofitting Works is done -- if retrofitting cannot save it, then demolition is the only way.

Also, the cracks on the story (as drawn by the artist) seem to be on the ceilings. Ordinary people don't actually pay attention to those, especially since they're focused on the events.