The best virtual city in gaming

[endtherapture]

What is the best city in gaming for you that's ever been made?

We've had a lot of cities in games, from the many large cities in the AC games, to the Imperial City in Oblivion, to Baldur's Gate and Neverwinter in the Forgotten Realms, to Liberty and Vice City in the GTA games.

For me it's Athkatla in Baldur's Gate 2, quite comfortably. The entire city is not mapped and instead the game focuses on 5 key areas of the city and a main plotline or dungeon for each region. However there's a huge amount of inns, taverns, houses, temples and tunnels in the game which just makes it feel really busy. The fact that the entire city isn't mapped out just gives you a huge sense of scale, and the actual art of the maps are handcrafted and really detailed which gives it a sense of business and that something like the Imperial City can't really match. It just feels lived in and real and the density of the areas as well as the sound effects make it appear authentic.

 

[Flammablezeus]

Liberty City in GTA IV. It actually feels like a living, breathing city. I've never played another game that makes a city that believable. When GTA V comes out on PC I'll be happy to see how they improved on it.

 

[Nereus77]

Another vote for Liberty City, GTA IV...

 

[sanquin]

A second vote to the Citadel from Mass Effect. That place looks amazing to live in if you ignore the fact that (SPOILER! ) it's tech made by ancient space squid murder machines, which will be coming to get you too.

 

[Gethsemani_v1legacy]

My vote goes to Rapture from BioShock and its sequel. Both games gives us a glimpse of this supposed Objectivist utopia and how it has fallen from grace. The games also gives us a good idea about how life in Rapture must have been before the civil war started. Not to mention it is gorgeous and the atmosphere in both games is fantastic.

 

[duwenbasden]

All my cities from SimCity 2K/4. Every other virtual city doesn't compare.

Explorable? SimCopter still exists.

 

[Scarim Coral]

Does Isle Defino from Super Mario Sunshine count? I so want to visit there when I go on a vacation!

 

[rgrekejin]

Rapture, no question. I loved the locales in New Vegas too, but few of those could really be considered "Cities", and those that were weren't really the most impressive location in that game.

 

[Ambitiousmould]

Gran Soren from Dragon's Dogma. Most of the more modern RPGs (especially Elder Scrolls) have a hard time creating cities any larger than a small village. Even the imperial city is pretty small when you think about it. But Gran Soren managed to feel really quite large, and had a sprawling, maze-like feel that I think most high fantasy cities should have (generally being inspired by historical settings and whatnot). It's just a shame that the rest of the world in that game was so small.

 

[nekoali]

hmm. A difficult question. I want to say Paragon City, from City of Heroes. It was a huge metropolis and there was always something going on. The different zones had their own unique feel to them, often as not. Unfortunately it suffers from the MMO syndrome where very little ever changes. Ruined zones remained the same after years of supposed reconstruction work. Muggers spend day and night for years trying to steal the purses from the same women. The same gangs are hanging out on street corners no matter how many of them you beat up and send to jail.

The various cities of Skyrim are fantastic as well. Nicely put together, peppered with NPCs mostly going about their daily routine. They feel fairly alive.

My favorite though is probably Washington DC from Fallout 3. Prowling the streets of an alternate future of a city I have visited before.... It's amazing seeing and walking through landmarks I've actually been at. Point Lookout is a close second, it reminds me a lot of a sea side resort town in Maryland I lived in growing up. Only you know.. with fewer swamps and mutant rednecks.

 

[happyninja42]

hmm. A difficult question. I want to say Paragon City, from City of Heroes. It was a huge metropolis and there was always something going on. The different zones had their own unique feel to them, often as not. Unfortunately it suffers from the MMO syndrome where very little ever changes. Ruined zones remained the same after years of supposed reconstruction work. Muggers spend day and night for years trying to steal the purses from the same women. The same gangs are hanging out on street corners no matter how many of them you beat up and send to jail.

Yeah, I miss that game. It was fun running around fighting crime.


My favorite cities would have to be Empire City, and possibly New Morait from inFamous and inFamous 2. I loved how they changed over time, as you did side missions to try and fix the city, and how the civilian reaction to you would change as your karma went up/down.

Empire City was probably my favorite though, I really felt like I was making a difference in that city. A visible, tangible improvement, reflected in the cleaner streets, more people walking around, and how they cheered Cole when he would zip around town, their personal hero and guardian.

 

[Randoman01]

Haven City from Jak and Daxter was really cool. I enjoyed that place.

 

[small]

i liked chicago from watch dogs but still you cant beat steelport from saints row. death, destruction, a puckish rogue and her band of merry sociopaths running around, alien invasions, zombie invasions, giant soft drink can monsters and all the japanese gameshow madness you shake a decapitated head at

 

[leberkaese]

Some people mentioned Rapture, I'll go with Columbia from Bioshock Infinite.

I can understand, if some people like Bioshock 1 more than Infinite, but I think, with Columbia Irrational Games made a more interesting city.
Both are having a completely different atmosphere (and Rapture also has a Bathysphere, heh! ... sorry) so it's maybe unfair to compare them directly, but overall I enjoyed Columbia a lot more than Rapture. It's a gorgeous city, I could stare at it for hours.

 

[laggyteabag]

Cloudbank from Transistor is certainly my favourite; aesthetically, at least.

 

[silver wolf009]

What is the best city in gaming for you that's ever been made?

We've had a lot of cities in games, from the many large cities in the AC games, to the Imperial City in Oblivion, to Baldur's Gate and Neverwinter in the Forgotten Realms, to Liberty and Vice City in the GTA games.

For me it's Athkatla in Baldur's Gate 2, quite comfortably. The entire city is not mapped and instead the game focuses on 5 key areas of the city and a main plotline or dungeon for each region. However there's a huge amount of inns, taverns, houses, temples and tunnels in the game which just makes it feel really busy. The fact that the entire city isn't mapped out just gives you a huge sense of scale, and the actual art of the maps are handcrafted and really detailed which gives it a sense of business and that something like the Imperial City can't really match. It just feels lived in and real and the density of the areas as well as the sound effects make it appear authentic.

Gotta ask: Are we talking lore based, or actual gameplay based?

Because High Charity definitely wins the lore competition. It's basically a Rhode Island sized mushroom shaped flagship, and it just doesn't give a fuck. I whip it out whenever Warhammer fans jerk off the size of Imperium ships.

As for actual gameplay, I want to say Fortune City from Dead Rising 2. Glitz, glamor, basically and actually Las Vegas 2.0. It's just fun to look at, not to mention find all the hidden goodies and the tiger.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

Rapture/Columbia for inventiveness, aesthetic, and general mise en scene.

Britain from Ultima or Kelethin from Everquest for nostalgia.

Stormwind from WoW or Steelport from Saint's Row for "I've spent so much time there it feels like I live there".

 

[Soviet Heavy]

New Vegas for its logical layout. It takes up almost a quarter of the map, and the various suburbs and farms all make perfect sense in the context of the setting. Huge cash crop farms to feed the populace, Westside being a small farm town with a produce co-op, Freeside being a lawless urban sprawl, and the Strip itself not beholden to anyone but Mr House and the Three Families.

 

[The Madman]

Athkatla from Baldur's Gate 2 and Stormwind from World of Warcraft are the two that stand out to me.

Athkatla because it's actually one of the only examples I can think of where a city in an rpg actually feels like a city. It's huge. There are adventures to be had wanderings its streets, crimes to be solved, journey to be had. I've always loved city adventures in D&D but they're so rarely done right in videogames with the exception of BG2, which not only gets it right but does it brilliantly.

And Stormwind is just really nice looking and fun to wander, plus the music is amazing. Both old and new music alike.

 

[MysticSlayer]

Colony 6 from Xenoblade Chronicles was nice. I liked seeing it evolve over time from essentially just a crater in the ground to a nice little town. It even broke from most of the cities in the game in that it had people from every race there, which sort of made it symbolic in the struggle. Then again, building it up is probably the biggest side quest in the game, spanning a vast majority of the story (I think I got to it after like 20 hours and continued building until I was about 145 hours in). After that investment of collecting materials to build buildings and trying to get people to move to the town, it is sort of hard to not feel a strong connection with it. The nice aesthetics and music helped too.

I guess some others that I remember fondly are:
Empire Bay (Mafia II): Mafia II is a game that I constantly criticize for its wasted potential. Every bit of it screamed that something more was being made but cut for one reason or another. Few areas saw them building something great only never to do anything with as much as the city itself. Still, what was there was captivating. It is just a shame the game never encouraged you to explore what it had to offer.

Colombia (BioShock Infinite: I think if I had to choose between Rapture and Colombia, I'd go with Colombia, simply because I find it more pleasing to look at. It had a great atmosphere dripping with things to say (just like Rapture), and the way it deteriorated over the course of the game was quite interesting to follow and made it feel a little more alive than Rapture did. Overall, both it and Rapture are great, but like I said, I just prefer Colombia.