Born as an April Fool of the Japanese Google, the 8-bit Google Maps is one of the best-known Easter Eggs that Google has ever made. For the pleasure of an internet not tied to money and advertising but pure entertainment, those who had missed it and also those who had only had a quick look, should go back to 8-bit Google Maps and notice how well it has been done, with drawings of the main monuments of the world and also, in some cities, with the Street View view, always 8-bit.
As can be seen from the presentation video of the project (obviously fake), Google goes back in time in the 80s and imagines how a website like Google Maps could have been created if it had been developed with 8-bit graphics that, to be understood, it was that of historical computers such as the Commodore 64, the Nintendo NES or the Sega Master System.
The 8-bit graphics are made all in squares, with few colors, little depth and very low definition, which today makes so much vintage and also becomes a digital art form.
The 8-bit vintage Google Maps could be reached directly from the official site maps.google.it by clicking on the "adventure" button at the top right.
Now, however, it is possible to see Google Maps in the 80s version by browsing the //maps.google.com/?t=8 page and wandering around the cities looking for addresses and places as you would on the normal map.
If you click on the drawn men who are around, you can enter Streetview mode and walk through the streets always photographed in 8-bit colors.
You can also drag on the map the little man drawn as the character of an 80's video game that is located at the top left, above the zoom.
The best thing is to discover the best places of Google Maps 8bit with the drawings of the monuments visible zooming in various points of the map.
Thus you can discover the Colosseum, the Eiffel Tower, the Tower of Pisa, a dragon, the Kremlin, the pyramids, the Loch Ness monster, the aliens in Area51, the Chinese walls, Alcatraz, the Golem, the Statue of Liberty, Mount Rushmore and much more.
All to see is the presentation video of Maps 8bit which, seriously, explains how 8-bit Google Maps works.
Google has published another playful and very nice page to see in Google China, with fish, at: //www.google.com.hk/intl/zh-CN/landing/shuixia/.
In another updated post, all the Google tricks and Easter Eggs .
