It looks like most of the smaller (older?) buildings up to four and five floors came through without massive damage. The midrise buildings did get hammered, but not all of them. I wonder if it will turn out to be buildings from a specific time period that collapsed. But I have no idea how building codes have changed in Venezuela.
Obviously living in tepees and stick huts with thatched roofs is a wise choice. We have been underestimated aboriginals and sub-Saharan Africa ....
I suspect it has to do with period, rigidity and that taller buildings may have more engineering in them and more steel reinforcement. Mid rise tend to be just more blocks stacked up. Shorter structures would have less inertia suggesting the whole building moved as the earth moved instead of taller ones where the base moved and the top did not move in concert.
The whole subject of structure survival is well studied and documented of course but not always well followed. I see that Hotel Tamanaco, built in 1953 and designed by a US firm survived and is in use for emergency services. As I recall, n the dimming of my memory, it Tamanaco survived other earth quakes that have happened there with one in ‘67 being fairly large.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_earthquakes_in_Venezuela