Watch this recently unveiled demo of the Outerra Engine, which makes photo-realistic virtual worlds from real world data. The effect is pretty amazing:

Click here to download and try this tech demo for yourself -- it's available for PC, if you have the graphics power to play it. According to the developer, it's already being used for an upcoming MMO called Anteworld, "a world-building game on a massive true-to-life scale of our planet." As for how Outerra uses real world data, the overall idea sounds pretty brilliant. According to Make Magazine: