To play is to escape. Discover a new territory, a universe that sprang from the overflowing imagination of a development team, and forget for a moment everyday landscapes. But to play also sometimes amounts to finding oneself in familiar territory: New York, London or Paris are thus part of a long list of cities modeled in our favorite titles, whether by means of a partial or total reproduction, of a realistic or fantasized vision, of a successful… or failed achievement.
We are interested here in Paris, the scene of many titles released in recent decades. With its many historical monuments, its easily recognizable style and its worldwide fame, the French capital is a prime location for video games wishing to
take advantage of its aura before, in turn, shining in the sales rankings. But far from the only purely financial objective, several of his productions have also been able to reproduce or sublimate all or part of
the City of Light with sometimes very different approaches.
Paris as the main playground The historical approach
And inevitably, when we talk about Paris in the video game, one name regularly comes to the fore: Assassin's Creed Unity. It must be said that the title is particularly impressive in terms of modeling and rendering of the city, depicting with great fidelity several districts and major buildings of the latter. Some historical liberties have certainly been taken, such as the integration of the spire which was in reality only built several decades after the French Revolution, but from Notre-Dame to the Louvre Palace via the Place de la Concorde, it's hard not to be enthusiastic about the meticulous work of recreating the capital, which has also experienced renewed interest last year with the tragic fire of Notre-Dame.
