Google Maps meets 'Grand Theft Auto'

Who would have believed Google's geographic Web services could actually get your adrenaline going?

Granted, these aren't real video games, but two Web sites are pushing what can be done with interactive interfaces to Google Maps and Google Earth.

The first, taking advantage of Google Maps' new ability to work with Flash applications, lets you drive a car, bus, or truck around Google Maps. It won't bat an eye if you drive through a building or into the ocean, but Katsuomi Kobayashi, the programmer from Osaka, Japan, who wrote it, was happy to note that the software can display images at 40 frames per second vs. 20 at best for JavaScript. And it uses less CPU power, too.

This rudimentary game lets people drive various vehicles around Google Maps. Here I'm taking a semi through Tokyo traffic.

(Credit: Geoquake)

Another novelty is a flight simulator for the browser plug-in version of Google Earth announced at Google I/O a week and a half ago. (This is different from the flight sim that works with the Google Earth standalone software.) It works with recent versions of Firefox, Internet Explorer, and Flock, but on Windows only.

This basic flight simulator works with the Google Earth browser plug-in.

(Credit: Barnabu.co.uk)

Again, the software is crude by gaming standards, but it does illustrate what can be done these days inside a browser. I'm among those who are interested to watch Google Earth abilities gradually pop up in Google Maps and in the browser. It's easily conceivable to me that we'll soon be seeing all manner of games that run on the 3D models of the real world that Google and Microsoft are building. Lower network latencies, faster server responses, and higher network data capacity all point in that direction.

(Via Google Geo Developers Blog and Google Maps Mania.)

[leedash13]

I produced a similar game to the first example for a class at Drexel University (Philadelphia, PA) that also includes collision detection and whatnot, but you're limited to the Drexel campus...

http://www.pages.drexel.edu/~ldd62/DIGM265/

-Lee

[jrm125]

I enjoyed. If you ever make it again, have the map rotate to match the keys.

Plus for some reason, my car eventually just ground to a halt. Not sure why, but good job!

[reconfigure]

Related ideas that have been around for quite awhile are at http://smart-city.re-configure.org and in this proposal - http://tinyurl.com/2xadkl

It is part of the goal of http://www.earth-intelligence.net to develop some of these things.

Anyone who wants to get ahold of me = reconfigure[at]gmail.com

Jason

[earthdriver]

I've just developed a 3D Driving "simulation" for the GE pluging.. -> www.DriveTheEarth.com

Check it out :)

[earthdriver]

http://www.DriveTheEarth.com

[benjaminstraight]

Cool app to play with.

[bg134521]

Wow thanx! hentai
I had so much fun with this app!
this is great

[bg134521]

I made a similar application to the first example at at Columbia anime vidsUniversity

[littleone43]

looks good

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