Would you believe me if I said the place that I would love to live, more than anywhere else in the world, was a place that I fell in love with due to a video game?
Well, it’s true.
Some years ago, my brother bought a used Xbox 360. He had it for all of a month before deciding that he hated the Xbox and Microsoft with a passion, and asked if he could swap with me. I thought he was joking because I, at the time, had a used PlayStation 2 that I primarily only had because I liked playing the old Crash Bandicoot and Spyro games. Considering he had about 20 xbox games as well, and he just wanted to switch back to having a PlayStation, regardless how old the system was.
As I only cared about Crash Bandicoot and Spyro, both of which I could play with emulators on my laptop if I so desired, I said yes. And I found myself in possession of a Xbox 360 and a whole bunch of games that I’d never even heard of. Some I thought were stupid, some I tried because I’d heard people speak well of them (I soon discovered that Call of Duty was not for me; I found it incredibly stupid.)
And then there were the three that stood out: Assassin’s Creed, Assassin’s Creed 2 and Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood.
Now, I decided to play them in order and I must admit, I nearly threw in the towel playing the first Assassin’s Creed. I found it interesting, don’t get me wrong, but I didn’t see what the big deal was about the game. I finished it and decided it was just ‘meh’.
And then I started Assassin’s Creed 2…and I fell in love.
Not just with the game, though I did love it. No, I fell in love with Italy.
It wasn’t so much the culture, or the language. I did pick up some words from the game that I verified using Google and English to Italian dictionaries, though probably at least half of those were swears. No, it was the architecture that I fell in love with. The art. The history.
For those who have never played the Assassin’s Creed, Assassin’s Creed 2 and Brotherhood follows the life of Ezio Auditore da Firenze, son of a banker. When his father, older brother and younger brother are executed, he discovers that his father is actually an assassin, and his enemies are the ones responsible for his death: The Templars. The people he hunts are from powerful families that actually existed: the Pazzi, the Barbarigo and the Templar Grand Master, none other than Rodrigo Borgia, AKA Pope Alexander VI.
Assassin’s Creed 2 is set in 1459, during the Reniassance period. As an interesting side note, Ezio also becomes friends with the biggest artist and architecture known to Itly from that time period: Leonardo da Vinci. The game is set in Florence, Monteriggioni (a walled Medieval village), San Gimignano, which is in the Tuscan countryside, Flori and Venice.
Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood, on the other hand, is primarily set in Rome from 1499 onwards, during the Borgia’s rein of terror.
I fell in love with the gameplay, but what really drew my attention was that it’s a fictional game that is set during real events. Playing it, walking Rome or Venice around from the point of view of Ezio was as real as if you were walking the streets of Italy during the Renaissance. Granted, you can’t exactly climb the St. Mark’s Basilica or the Colosseum like Ezio does, but you can certainly go to the locations and immerse yourself in the spectacular architectural wonders.
If I could go anywhere, live anywhere, I would choose somewhere in Italy. Maybe not the locations above; I think I’d prefer the Amalfi coast, simply because I’d prefer to live on the coast more than anywhere else.
I’ve always liked Italian food – I can never say no to a good lasagne or pizza – but everything about Italy and the Italian culture is fascinating to me. The history, the art, the culture, the archicture. One day, I’d love to go there to explore, to immerse myself in the beauty.
All because of a video game.
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