The Middle East has many great locations to shoot films or TV shows. But that’s not all it’s for, is it? The Middle East, with its great historical and cultural significance, is also a perfect location for video games. Whether it’s a car racing game, action-adventure, or a shooting game, Arab countries fit it perfectly. It’s proven and it’s already been done. Here are eight well-known video games set in the Middle East.
Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception – Saudi Arabia
The action-adventure video game was released in 2011. The main character, Nathan Drake, finds himself stranded in the desert after a plane crash, and he tries to find out the truth about the accident. He wanders the deserts of Rub’ Al Khali, which is located in Saudi Arabia, as well as parts of Oman, Yemen, and UAE. Also, there are many Arabic-speaking characters that the player would sometimes stumble upon!
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare – Kuwait
The shooting game was released in 2007. In the Nintendo DS version for Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, the player can choose to be any character of many. However, the chosen main character of the game finds himself at the beginning of the game in a Marine training post in the Persian Gulf, by Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, and many countries. His camp gets attacked by Khaled Al-Asad, the commander of the Saudi Arabian Military! The game is heavily based in the Middle East.
Overwatch – Egypt
The 2016 multiplayer shooter game has two teams and many characters with unique abilities. The game takes place in the future, after the Omnic Crisis. Furthermore, robots and artificial intelligence are a thing in that fictional future. Egypt is a battlefield during the Omnic Crisis, where Overwatch helped fight the battle. At one point in the game, there’s an investigation in Cairo into the murder of an Overwatch official.
Battlefield 3 – Iraq
The 2011 shooting game takes place in the future, during the War of 2014. The war takes place in Iraq, mostly in Sulaymaniyah. One mission takes place in Baghdad, and some of them take place in Paris, Iran, and New York City. That is not the first time that the game takes place in Iraq. Battlefield 1 and 2 also take place in the Middle Eastern country.
Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Blacklist – Lebanon
The action-adventure game heavily relies on stealth. It is the seventh edition, and it was released in 2013. In the “Spies vs Mercs” competitive mode, two teams play against each other. Moreover, the map of this mode has many locations all around the world. One of which is a hospital in Lebanon that was attacked by Hezbollah. The spies and mercs fight each other on the premises of the hospital.
Forza Motorsport 7 – UAE
The 2017 racing car video game has many editions. The game is about racing in many tracks to unlock more opportunities. One of the street circuits is in Dubai, UAE. Moreover, in the background of the track, players can see Burj Khalifa. As well as driving through Hafeet Mountain to the Dubai International Airport, they pass by the Mercure Grand Jebel Hafeet Al Ain Hotel!
Transformers: The Game – Qatar
It’s an action-shooter game, released in 2007. The extraterrestrial transformers, Autobots go on missions and fight the Decepticons. There are four missions in the game that takes place in the deserts of Qatar: Blackout at Qatar, Decoy, Ratchet Retaliation, and Leftovers. In Blackout at Qatar, the Decepticon called Blackout, lands in Qatar and steals top-secret data. Furthermore, YouTube is filled with gameplay videos of the Blackout at Qatar mission.
Medal of Honor: Warfighter – Yemen
The shooter video game was released in 2012. Task Force Mako, a Tier 1 team of the U.S. Navy SEALs, had a mission to stop a black market arms deal done by the terrorist group, Al-Qaeda. Task Force Mako hits an Al Qaeda fortress in the mountains of North Yemen and it breaks into a firefight.
Those are just a couple of examples. Meanwhile, there are hundreds of video games set in the Middle East, and a lot of them take place in Egypt! Did that get you interested in playing some video games or not?