Video Game Travelogue Project

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I’ve been wanting to do a video game travelogue project (possibly a podcast and/or video series) and am looking for video games set in/inspired by real life locations. I’d like to start with the United States, ideally one game for each state, though that might be difficult for some states.

States I don’t really have anything yet for are Arkansas, Iowa, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, and Utah, but I’ll take suggestions for everything! I would also love some suggestions for New York and California because there are so many to choose from.

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I love games inspired by real world locations! I’m even in the very very very early stages of making one myself!

For California I will always nominate Rig ‘n’ Roll, because it contains the entire state at a scale that I don’t think anyone has ever done before or since.

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Honest Hearts (which is DLC for Fallout: New Vegas) takes place in Utah! There’s a bit of local history and it’s set in a national park.

I would also like to recommend Draugen, it’s set in a little village in Norway. What sets it apart is that many of the objects and buildings within the game are based on real examples that have been preserved at various museums in Oslo. So for example there’s an 800-year old wooden church in the game..that you can visit IRL!

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I know there are more modern games that use this as a setting but: I have a real fondness for Midtown Madness, it was right in the early days of 90s open world racing but it made it work even on crappy PCs like mine. I’ve no idea how accurate it is to Chicago but for me it felt like it was authentic.

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Yeah it’s got those bridges over the river and uh… pizza places?

That’s about as authentically Chicago as it gets imo

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A national park sound like a great setting for an Utah game. And Draugen sounds awesome!

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Seeing “Utah” sparked a childhood flashback, which will be my recommendation. That being my beloved, janky, N64 flop classic, Vigilante 8:

https://vigilante8.fandom.com/wiki/Vigilante_8#Stages

Two whole stages set in Utah. An embarrassment of riches.

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Oh, I have another example! The Getaway is a GTA-style game set in London, but the twist is that it was designed to be a 1:1 copy of the city.

http://ps2media.ign.com/media/e32001/image/europe/getaway/getaway_1.jpg

So it’s kind of an odd time capsule, I’m not familiar with London but I’m told it was very accurate.

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It’s not US either, but the Vin Diesel drive-em-up Wheelman is set in Barcelona, and the Driver series has some exotic locations like Havana, (Driver 2), Nice, and Istanbul (Driver 3) also.

All these games suck ass too.

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it’s disturbingly accurate, i just wish the game wasn’t such a chore to play

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If ever you want to extend your trip to Japan, “The World Ends With You” takes place in Shibuya, and “ParanOrmasight” in Honjo, both interesting areas of Tokyo.

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Oh, fun! Tried to find a game that’s set entirely in each in your list of states without leaving the borders (so no American Truck Simulator), and it means some seriously deep cuts…

Arkansas: the Redneck Rampage series
Iowa: CarnEvil
Ohio: Shivers
Oklahoma: Nancy Drew: Trail of the Twister
South Carolina: couldn’t find a single one…
South Dakota: A Mind Forever Voyaging
Tennessee: Shiloh: Grant’s Trial in the West
Utah: Salt Lake 2002

Since this was about 20 minutes of research total, I can’t vouch for the accuracy or playability of any of 'em.

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If you want a game set in Iowa, you could play Carnevil, a midway light gun game about a haunted carnival that appears in the middle of nowhere Iowa