Who hasn’t clicked around on Google Maps or Street View and wished they could actually experience these places virtually instead of just looking at a series of still or satellite images?
With the newly announced “Immersive Mode” we should now come a big step closer to this dream. With it, Google expands the map service with impressive city views, which are even supposed to show the real prevailing weather and the current traffic situation.
This brings Google Maps closer to its competitor Microsoft and its widely acclaimed Flight Simulator, which in turn uses real-time data from the Bing service. This is also used by the players for much more than just beautiful sightseeing flights at sunset.
Flight simulator as a role-playing game
This is how you have fun in the open world
Virtual restaurant visit included
Like google in his own blog explained that thanks to advances in computer vision and artificial intelligence, billions of street views and aerial photos have been combined into a digital image of the world.
This is intended to help people plan their excursions by conveying the atmosphere of possible travel destinations in advance. You should also be able to scroll through the current and expected weather conditions in real time. A predicted shower then rains directly on your head.
Atmosphere, weather, traffic and even the ambience of the restaurant can be experienced in just a few simple steps.
In participating restaurants, the doors should even be open and you can enter like in an open world. Theoretically, the ambience of a restaurant can be absorbed and evaluated before the table is reserved.
With virtual environments designed in this way, it should be easy for Google or interested modders to run the whole thing sooner or later in front of a cockpit and thus enable a direct comparison with the flight simulator. But even he does not stand still and continues to expand his copy of the earth:
2:57
MS Flight Simulator teases scenic World Update 8 in trailer
Five model cities will start
Whether for a virtual city tour or for specific travel planning, you should be able to use the new mode later this year. Only Los Angeles, London, New York, San Francisco and Tokyo are fully modeled at the beginning, but other cities are already planned.
Incidentally, the requirements for your own end device should be minimal and the function should be usable “on practically any smartphone”. We assume that in return at least a stable and fast internet connection must be available.
link to Gfycat content
While the immersive mode also invites you to explore comfortably from home, the so-called “Live View” is also being greatly expanded. The augmented reality software uses your camera to show you helpful (navigation) tips about your surroundings, but is also being exploited by the first game developers.
Incidentally, it wasn’t all that long ago that a tinkerer got Google Maps to work on the first Nintendo console and basically went in exactly the opposite direction. However, it is doubtful whether the new mode can also be integrated there:
Google Maps on the NES:
Looks like Civilization from 1991
Are you looking forward to the new immersive mode and how often do you actually use Google Maps for navigation or sightseeing? Let us know in the comments!
