Holidaying in a Game: Eight Great Destinations

Brainstorming for summer-themed articles, the LadiesGamers team thought it’d be fun to imagine ourselves holidaying in video games. Here are eight places I’d like to visit, though I may not stay very long!

Pretty But Precarious

The best landscapes are also the most hostile.

LadiesGamers Uncharted 4
The ride you’ll never forget.

Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End looked so beautiful that I ended up buying a PS4. Travel and adventure lovers, take note of this one! Pros: Explore ruins on a snowy Scottish coast, blanketed with purple heather. Roam Madagascan wilds by jeep. Crash in that cool beach house from the game’s epilogue. Cons: Armed gunmen, everywhere.

The Banner Saga series is the epitome of painterly landscapes. Pros: Amazing vistas; awe-inspiring statues of ancient gods; songs and stories around the campfire. The ultimate Viking-like experience. Cons: Primitive toilets, limited rations, and doomsday.

LadiesGamers Banner Saga
It’s not glamping, but the scenery is exquisite.

Built to Chill

Safe spaces can be found in these simulation games.

LadiesGamers Animal Crossing New Horizons DLC
A first-world problem.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons offers an endless number of holiday spots. When I’m bored of my own island, I can visit other players’ wonderful creations. Pros: Proper toilets. My own AC home dedicates an entire upper floor to the bath experience. After the last major update, I can now cook my favorite meals or buy them. Cons: Might never return to my real life.

The Garden Path isn’t actually out yet. But the demo made it look like the perfect slow holiday if you like camping and gardening. Pros: Connect with nature and nice neighbours. Cons: To be determined, after the game releases.

Relaxing at the pond in the Garden Path

The Tourist Package

What about games that are actually about travel?

LadiesGamers The Touryst
Island tourysm.

The Touryst has you play a tourist. Pros: Discover ancient monuments and their secrets. Lounge on the beach. Or get fit scuba-diving and jumping on roofs and trees. Cons: If you don’t love the beach, you’re stranded.

80 Days will take you around the world, though you don’t have to do it in 80 days. Pros: Visit up to 170 of Earth’s cities in an alternate 19th-century steampunk world. Perfect for globetrotters who prefer variety over depth. Cool vehicles abound. Cons: Whirlwind tour.

LadiesGamers 80 Days
Day 60, Yokohama: Where I joined the circus because I was robbed blind.

JRPG-Flavored

Fancy some JRPG flavour? Well, why not.

LadiesGamers Final Fantasy 6
Aboard the Blackjack in Final Fantasy 6.

Final Fantasy games often feature an airship. Wouldn’t it be nice to fly around the world, safe from monsters below? FF6’s Blackjack even has a casino aboard. Pros: Access to minigames, lots of minigames. Cards, blitzball, chocobo racing, arcades, you name it. Cons: Airsickness. But travelling any other way is tediously slow.

Eastward isn’t a JRPG but takes inspiration from the genre and East Asia. It’s the prettiest 2D game I’ve played in recent years, and I’d love to soak longer in this pixel beauty. I’d start with a quiet village stay in Greenberg, then check out New Dam City, where all the fun happens. Pros: Bathhouse, bars with live bands, gacha machines, a full-blown video game called Earthborn, shopping at Dragon Market, mouth-watering cuisine. Cons: Forests infested with monsters. Impending bio-weapon disaster.

LadiesGamers Eastward
Stopping by a quiet grove in New Dam City.

So there you have it: eight random (but possibly attractive) holiday destinations. Whether you’re a homebody or a daredevil, I hope you find at least one of these spots worth checking out (in your dreams).

Even in worlds of our imagining, I suspect there’s no perfect vacation. Can you think of a great videogame vacation?

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