Hasta La Ideas

UK studio Zaha Hadid Architects has collaborated with software developer Epic Games to create a parametric-style version of London that players can build on in the video game Fortnite.

In the Re:Imagine London game, Fortnite players are dropped into a creator-made island on London’s waterfront, which has been populated with curved buildings in keeping with Zaha Hadid Architects signature style.

Players can form their own parametric architecture with readily designed modules, combining them into their desired buildings on sites near recognisable city landmarks such as St Paul’s Cathedral, Tate Modern and Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre.

The multiplayer game aims to encourage players to explore urban development and community engagement by inviting them to create walkable areas with sustainable and mixed-use buildings, according to Zaha Hadid Architects.

“The experience facilitates rapid optioneering through an engaging and exploratory approach to negotiating the complexities of the urban condition to build collaboratively in a contemporary context,” said Zaha Hadid Architects.

“The build content within Re:Imagine London is crafted in various scales as pre-composed spatial scenes, expressing architectural, geometric and spatial features consistent with out built works while contributing to the planning and constructional awareness of configured solutions.”

Zaha Hadid Architects used Epic Games’ Unreal Editor for Fortnite (UEFN) to create Re:Imagine London, intending to add an educational component to the game and gain insight into how UEFN can be used for practical architectural purposes.

It continues the studio’s research carried out by its Computation and Design Group (ZHA Code), which investigates applications in urban planning, platform design, spatial content creation and user experience.

The studio created six building typologies of modules for players to build with – walkway, structure, park, commercial, office and residential.

These can be arranged on four buildable sites in the game, named Puddle Dock, Trig Wharf, Blackfriar’s Bridge and Bankside.

As players begin placing the modules in Re:Imagine London, they automatically form complete buildings.

Zaha Hadid Architects is one of the UK’s best known architecture studios. It recently revealed photos of the Central Bank of Iraq skyscraper nearing completion in Baghdad and is designing a nightclub and casino for a marina in the Bahamas.

The images are by Epic Games and the video is by ZHA.

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