Real Life Game: West Creek Apartments, Peoria AZ

Not much to look at during the day.

Pictured: Phoenix, Glendale, and Peoria. 

The West Creek Apartments in Peoria AZ are literally across the street from Phoenix. See that road in the far right? Thats the road that separates the two cities. To make it even weirder, a few blocks away is Glendale.

The reason why they are so important is because it was one of the first places that I saw videogames in real life. It was so important, that I actually made sure to see the other week while visiting Phoenix. It is a lovely apartment during the day. In fact, the building across the street is just as cool looking.

It's an office building, not a church, or last stand against Sandista.

If you are looking at this, and wondering why I thought it was cool looking, thats because Google Maps is during the day. At night is when everything starts to look cool.

A beautiful place, peaceful even.

At night the design of the lights, and the sidewalks makes it look like the ground is missing. The first time I walked through here, it was dark, and all I could see was parts of buildings, and the lights. It felt like I was walking through some strange void. All I could think about the Ways from the Wheel of Time series. They are travelling paths in the dark between places through magical means, and tainted by some dark thing. It was odd to see how things moved, and yet appeared silent.

This was during a fairly bright night. When its darker, it gets even creepier.

Phoenix itself is an odd place. If you asked someone about great architecture there, they would act as if you were crazy. The truth be told, the most amazing places are apartments. The rest of the city is almost entirely suburbs of the same house over and over again. When you arrive at an apartment, it feels completely different.

Across the street, the nice business building becomes something else, and sort of glows. My camera didn’t get it well enough, and I don’t know if this next picture will be any help. 

Once again, an office complex, nothing more.

As I walked along the paths, I kept feeling like I was on a quest, and that attackers were everywhere. The way was fairly narrow, but it never felt that way. In fact, if you ever look at the building from inside, you will feel like the complex goes on forever.

West Creek is an example of a building that almost feels like a book, or a game. It would be on my list of spots to give out tours to wandering travellers. The feeling of darkness, and light is very strong at night, and really should be experienced.