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Google Maps 'Cube' advergame flexes some of WebGL's muscle

Google Maps 'Cube' advergame flexes some of WebGL's muscle

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We've seen games based on the playground that is Google Maps, but now there's an official one. It's called Cube, and in Google fashion, it of course runs in your web browser.

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Google Maps Cube screenshot
Google Maps Cube screenshot

We've seen games based on the playground that is Google Maps, but now there's an official one. It's called Cube, and in typical Google fashion, it all runs in your web browser. The game itself is very simple — just tilt the surface of the cube to roll a marble around the map, bumping into (newly-enhanced) 3D landmarks and buildings in cities like New York, San Fransisco, Paris, London, and Las Vegas to get to your target as quickly as possible. Of course, the whole thing is a bit of a promotion for Google Maps, and each level shows off features in the service like traffic, bike maps, and navigation. Whether or not that sounds fun to you is a different matter altogether, but it's an impressive demo of some of the power modern browsers offer with WebGL (yes, this will run just fine in browsers other than Chrome).