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Thanks to video game technology, International travel includes going back in time, solving murders, explosions, stealth missions and high-speed chases. The best part is that this is the kind of travel that doesn't mandate leaving the couch.
So bust open a bag of chips, pop a beer and see what the latest games have to offer the truly weary traveler.
Mashable's Chelsea Stark reports on Ubisoft's latest entry into its popular stealth-mission video game series, Assassin's Creed Unity, a wild romp through the streets of Revolutionary Paris.
The report highlights the immense work and detail that went into producing a game that should satisfy gamers for an abundant amount of hours.
The intriguing part of this game and others, from a travel standpoint, is the ability to tour cities, modern or otherwise, as if they were real-world places. The same interest that is scratched by stepping off the plane is sated the minute you place that wireless controller in your hands.
If this all sounds like a nerd's dream, well, that's because it is. The future of gaming shines a very bright spotlight on designers' ability to bring a location to the forefront of various titles. It's essentially a fantastic time to be a gamer with travel desires.
For Assassin's Creed Unity, gamers are immersed in a detailed 1790s Paris, France. And if you think "detailed" is a throwaway term be sure to check out this video:
Nicolas Guerin, the game's world design director, spoke with Stark about the massive scope of the newest installment, including the all-important ambiance of the city: "To recapture the essence of the city, it is of the utmost importance to extract what makes the streets and the non-landmarks buildings memorable. [These features] all need to 'ooze' with Paris visual identity at a glance."
Stark writes, offering just how in-depth the team went:
"Guerin spent months with his team poring over historical documents and renderings. Then they took to Paris to document the landmarks still standing, taking enough photos to help bring the objects to life in-game. There are 52 unique landmarks in the game, and Guerin said 40 of those are exact copies of spots still in Paris today, including Notre-Dame, the Sainte Chapelle, the Conciergerie, the Pont-Neuf, the Louvre, the Pantheon, the Luxembourg palace, Versailles Palace, the Sorbonne, the Hotel de Ville and the Catacombs."
Even, as Guerin notes, "pieces of the city that have disappeared today and are long forgotten," have been included.
This game, thankfully, is not the only title to make the real world location a near character in the game.
The Associated Press' Derrik J. Lang reports on various games, like Call of Duty and Far Cry, which go to great lengths to make things real. In the case of the new Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, gamers get a good, hard look at a future Seoul, South Korea.
Senior level designer for the game, Colin Munson, explained, "I think designers are on the lookout for compelling places you want to be. It's fantasy fulfilment. That's probably why we always see New York and Los Angeles. We made it a concerted effort at the beginning of development to broaden our levels. Seoul was one of the first that came to mind."
Here is a gameplay video of the Seoul portion of the game-possibly NSFW for general mayhem.
Lang continues, offering that the team behind another popular series infused very real locales into its fictional destination:
"A team of 'Far Cry 4' designers travelled to Nepal while fashioning Kyrat, a fictional nation in the Himalayas entrenched in a bullet-riddled revolt. The Ubisoft game's vistas mirror Nepal's lush forests that give way to snowy mountains."
A video follows that shows designers taking a trip through Nepal with aims on producing the fictional Kyrat:
Fashioning familiar places is nothing new to designers. Los Angeles, past and present, can be seen in games like True Crime:Streets of LA, LA Noire and Tony Hawk's American Wasteland; while also having its likeness mirrored in Grand Theft Auto V and Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.
The Telegraph compiled a list of 15 great examples of cities featured in video games, including San Francisco (Driver: San Francisco), London (The Getaway) and Italy (Assassin's Creed II).
Truly, nothing beats getting out into the world, walking unfamiliar streets, tasting exotic food and meeting the locals.
However, if you want to immerse yourself in non-fictional places while enjoying an over-the-top adventure, you can hardly do better than some of the titles hitting game systems.
Designers understand the need for realism. Thankfully, technology has arrived to meet that demand, whisking gamers well beyond their respective living rooms and straight into a vibrant fantasy world.
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