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Comment by lifebeyondfife | Hacker News Reader

I realised after playing GTA 3 that I knew the streets of Liberty City - it was a real location in my head that I could visualise and navigate. I suspected that playing games in real world locations was going to be a big thing in the future.

So I blogged about it http://lifebeyondfife.com/81-real-games-html/ (I'm not a game developer and had other things to work on). Excited to see others are getting closer.

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I once had the most crazy and surreal feeling of deja-vu when I visited a weird tourist area behind my hotel in San Fran the first time I had ever been to the US. The place was called "Fisherman's Wharf" (or something like that) and I had avoided it during my stay because of the crowds.

Finally I wandered down there to see what the fuss was about and had this crazy feeling of having been there before. I knew EVERYTHING about the place: where steps and shops were - where Alcatraz was... and as I walked to the edge I said out loud "...Sea lions?". And walked around the corner and there they were. Scores of them!

I was starting to freak out, when I turned around and noticed a red hand-rail that lead up to the second floor and realised... Tony Hawk Pro Skater IV.

Similarly the Santa Monica Pier from Vampire: The Masquerade — Bloodlines — although it's not a perfect recreation.

It's not an open world game, but racing games work the same way these days.

I know almost every corner of the Nürburgring at this point. Hell, I was watching a video of the new Porsche 918 (1) a few weeks ago and I was puckering accordingly knowing how much speed he was carrying into certain sections.

(1): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_AuhjpQPs1M

This sort of landscape memory has happened extensively with entirely unrealistic, fabricated worlds too, though (cf. MMORPGs (World of Warcraft) and even games such as DOOM).

Surely the fact that there are people out in the real world conversing with one another about places in your fabricated one is a selling point rather than something to be discouraged?

Oh agreed. Perhaps though because Liberty City wasn't a true fantasy land but a large scale imagining of, essentially, a city made to look like New York, it got me thinking about playing a game in a location I already knew in real life.

I could talk about how I love the land of Hyrule, but I'd also like to play a game based in the city streets and countryside of my own country too.

Mm I see what you mean. The Assassin's Creed series might be a step in that direction (they carefully mimicked very old cities rather than modern ones). :)

Forgive me if I repeat your blog post - I've only yet skimmed it (due to time).

I'm honestly surprised we haven't more open-world games set in Manhattan - it's probably the most recognizable geography in the world. Of course, there would probably be licensing issues out the wazoo... I wouldn't be surprised if there was a copyright on the likeness of Time Square.

We built lower Manhattan as part of the demo data used to wow investors and test the rendering tech.

We were hoping that most of the licensing fees would pour the other way: Macdonalds, Gas Stations etc. Our artists mocked loads of those up to show how pretty we could make them.

(and we were sure loads of kids would enjoy smashing them up with toy tanks)

Spiderman 2 is a decent recreation of Manhattan, but it is not exact.

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