Google Earth as game engine

I'm sure the first of many... here's SHIPS, a (er) ships simulator (maybe not quite a game then) built using Google Earth.

In this ship simulation program you get to be the helmsman of your own fleet of ships. "Ships" will take you past worlds incredible scenery at a leisurely pace. All you need to play ships is a small Google Earth plugin.

Actually they make it very clear that SHIPS is not itself a game, but a proof of concept:

"Ships" is a case study / Technology show piece that demonstrates what can be achieved with Google Earth. While map data has a tremendous value for practical purposes, it can also be used as a backdrop for a range of games.

Cory said to me yesterday, what if you could procedurally generate a 3D game map from a 2D real map, just chuck up some buildings? Which made us wonder, could it be possible to go further, and chuck up actual buildings, maybe using textures from StreetView and similar too?

(via)

Comments

[qDot]

could it be possible to go further, and chuck up actual buildings, maybe using textures from StreetView and similar too?

Sure! The place I work at now produces a system that does pretty much exactly this (albeit mostly for mobile mapping, surveying, etc...).

http://www.510systems.com

We have a system that can basically produce a colorized model of a full city with one drive through it. There's an explanation of the system at

http://www.nonpolynomial.com/portfolio/fc2009-point-cloud/

The data for the cloud in that article is also open source, if anyone wants to try actually playing with that kind of data.

[Alex]

Have you seen what we're up to at Near?

We're currently focused on social retail applications, but games are on the roadmap...!

[Gail]

I would rather be on a real ship, but I am sure my husband will be all over this, hogging the computer for hours, sailing round the world ;-)

[rich]

I'm on a boat! I'm on a boat! Poseidon, look at me!

[Google earth tracking]

I do not know Google earth can be used as game engines, but I do use it to track my cell phone.