Lagos in video games: every game that lets you visit Lagos

Lagos is one of the biggest cities in Africa, and for a long time it barely appeared in video games. When it did, it was usually a single level in somebody else’s story. That has changed fast. In 2026 alone, Lagos developers put out a string of browser games that turned the city into the whole world, not just the backdrop.

Here is every game we could check that lets you visit Lagos, from the big studios to the bedroom developers. If we could not confirm a game’s setting from a reliable source, we left it out, so this list is honest rather than complete. Tell us what we missed.

Lagos as a level in big console games

Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare (2014)

The best-known Lagos appearance in a major game. Sledgehammer Games’ near-future shooter, released in November 2014 for PlayStation, Xbox and PC, has a campaign mission called “Traffic” set in Lagos in 2055, during an international summit. You chase a kidnapper’s convoy through the city’s famous traffic, jumping across the roofs of buses in a powered exoskeleton. Lagos traffic, it turns out, is still Lagos traffic in 2055.

Ghost Recon: Future Soldier (2012)

Ubisoft’s squad shooter, on PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and PC, takes its team to several countries, Nigeria among them, for a mission to rescue a captured CIA officer. The game does not make a big deal of Lagos by name, so treat this one as “Nigeria”, not “Lagos”.

Lagos made by Lagos: the Nigerian games

The more interesting story is what Nigerian developers have built. These games do not visit Lagos. They live there.

Okada Ride (Maliyo Games)

One of the early Nigerian mobile hits, from the Lagos studio Maliyo Games: you guide a motorcycle-taxi rider through Lagos traffic. It is a simple game, and a pioneer: proof, more than a decade ago, that a Nigerian street could carry a game.

Idansquest (Hfrogames, 2025)

A free endless runner on Android and iPhone from a three-person Nigerian studio, set in Lagos, in which Idan, a fresh graduate, runs through the obstacles of life in the city.

Lagos Run (2026)

A browser game that went viral in late September 2026. You drive a yellow danfo from Ojuelegba to Yaba, picking up passengers and fighting traffic. No download, and you can add it to your home screen and play offline.

Surviving Nigeria: Lagos (2026)

A free multiplayer open-world game set in Lagos, played in the browser with no sign-up, from a Lagos-based developer. You hustle, make money and climb a leaderboard against other players. Our page of games like Surviving Nigeria has more on it.

Lagos Life (2026)

The biggest of the lot so far. Lagos Life launched on 1 October 2026 and passed two million players in about a week, according to its creator. It is a browser life simulator on a phone or a computer: pick a starting profile, get a job, earn virtual naira, pay rent and meet other players in a shared Lagos. Its virtual money has no real value and cannot be withdrawn.

Makoko: Blood and Water

A game on the Epic Games Store whose listing says it is set in a real-world location inspired by Makoko, the Lagos waterfront community where many homes stand on stilts in the lagoon. We could not check more than that, so look at the store page before you buy.

AJ Cities: the estate on the edge of Ajegunle

And then there is ours. AJ Cities is a free open-world browser game set on the edge of Ajegunle, where Navy Town meets Kirikiri. It runs on a phone or a computer with nothing to install, and it is for adults (18+).

It does not try to fit the whole of Lagos into a browser. It goes deep on one small corner instead. Abraham Adesyan Estate is a fictional walled estate with one main street, June 12 Street: a face-me-I-face-you rooming house, a free clinic, a family with three guard dogs, a restaurant feeding soldiers from the training facility, and Prizm, a purple club owned by a retired prison warder. Across the road is the wall of Kirikiri prison. Container trucks from the ports grind past. The generators start up when the power goes. The sky follows the real Lagos sun, so if it is evening in Lagos, it is evening on June 12 Street.

You play AJ, deported from London, with ₦2,500,000 to pay the gate police before they will open the estate gate. The map is our own original layout, not a copy of real streets, and every character is invented. The real place behind it is Ajegunle, the neighbourhood everyone calls AJ City.

Lagos games at a glance

Why Lagos works so well in games

Games love a city with rules you can feel. Lagos has them everywhere: the danfo conductor shouting the route, the agbero collecting at the park, the police checkpoint, the generator that decides when the evening starts, the hustle that makes every walk a negotiation. A game can teach you those rules by letting you break them. That is why the best Lagos games so far are not about landmarks. They are about getting by.

Want to go deeper? Read about the history of Lagos, or the difference between Lagos Island and the Mainland.

Which big video game has a Lagos level?

Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare (2014) has a campaign mission called Traffic set in a near-future Lagos.

Is there an open-world game set in Lagos?

Yes. Surviving Nigeria: Lagos and AJ Cities are both free open-world browser games set in Lagos. AJ Cities is set on the edge of Ajegunle.

Is the estate in AJ Cities a real place?

No. Abraham Adesyan Estate and its people are invented. Ajegunle, Navy Town and Kirikiri, around it, are real parts of Lagos.