From countless books, video games, movies, and TV shows, you will have come across an equally countless number of breathtaking universes, cities, places of living... all teaming with life. The multi-planet system of Star Wars, 2000-meter tall New Alexandria of planet Reach from Halo: Reach, a colorful neon Vice City from GTA: Vice City, the open fantasy world of Skyrim, the bright and futuristic Earth in Overwatch... the list goes on.
So, with that, I ask you: What is the best and worst place for you to live in, given a choice?
Best place
For me, the best place for me would be New Alexandria from Halo: Reach. Well, at least in its heydays before, ahem, spoilers, it was invaded by The Covenant. I am a sucker for more than a thousand meter tall (according to the gameplay, buildings are actually that tall) skyscrapers, even though I have a crippling fear of heights. I love the balance of nature, as well as a booming metropolis. New Mombasa from Halo 3: ODST come in at a close second. Playing the campaign was a whole new experience for me, to explore the empty city all by myself, to appreciate the architecture.
Further edit: I might have contradicted myself that while I love nature, I actually love New Mombasa too, even though it does not exactly show nature reserves in the game. To be fair, based on Halo 3, Tsavo Highway seems to connect to a natural place, so there's that.
More further edit: Planet Sirius from Serious Sam 2 is also a runner-up. How does it look like? Well, feast your eyes on this.
Honorable mention goes to Rapture from Bioshock, which I thought about, but heck no... As much as I love the plasmids, did you see what the ADAM do to your body and mind? No... just no.
Worst place
On the other hand... I would hate to be a civilian stuck in Liberty City from GTA 4. I mean... holy crap, the whole city is just muted - little to no color, and there's no nature to go around; every single place you go is industrialized, and the water is heavily polluted. I'm not exactly a crazy hippie (nothing wrong with that, mind you), but I just like somewhere to walk around after a day's work). Yeah, I mean there are city parks, but meh, it's so small! Oh, and don't forget the crime and drugs, as well as a crazy psychopath going around shooting wildly (I assume that I will live there as a typical citizen, not the protagonist of the GTA games).
Not to mention the products they have. Take a note at something as innocent as an energy drink:
Sprunk is a carbonated lemon lime beverage claimed in a Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas radio commercial to contain "10 times the caffeine and sugar", mixed with mercury, ether and benzene, and packaged in fragmentation grenade-shaped cans.Holy shoot, that crap would kill you after just one can.
The whole city is just insane. I appreciate GTA IV as a game and satire on real life, but the city is a hellhole.