Those are awesome maps. My maps, like so many other peoples’ are on gridded paper and look like crap. But these really are pieces of art. Thanks for the trip down memory lane.
And can you imagine the hue and cry if people had to do this kind of mapping now? That era is definitely dead. I’m mostly (but not entirely) glad.
Jesus, Ned, thanks for setting the bar so low for the rest of us.
Awesome maps! Can’t believe you guys kept those. Map making added an extra level of immersion, that’s for sure. But I loves me my modern in-game map & compass.
These are wonderful maps. The Zork map brings back all the time I spent trying to figure out the layout.
Your maps are much more creative than the maps I made of Wizardry I and Bard’s Tale – just plain grid paper. I do not miss having to map out mazes with teleporters and spinning squares.
You could hand-design certain rooms / areas and randomize the rest, sort of like Diablo did. You’ll probably still want some randomization within the hand-designed areas, though, but the players will still appreciate the care given to those areas.
Awesome Maps, I wish I was more artistic. That looks like it would make playing games more enjoyable.
Terrific maps, Ned! Nothing brings back memories like that stuff.
I remember Wizardry came with a little pad of yellow graph paper, but I burned out on mapping that after a few hours. Every other game I played I just memorized, with the exception of Bard’s Tale. I paid some weird old dude from Arizona who was wearing a Pistol Pete’s Pizza T-shirt $5 to write me a strategy guide, which he did (complete with maps) from memory. I didn’t believe it when he marked one of the rooms “4x99 Berserkers,” but found out the hard way that he was right.
Another thing I remember doing is using neon colored markers and a compass to mark range circles around all the AA and SAM sites printed on the F-19 Stealth Fighter map. I don’t think it improved my odds of weaving my way through the enemy defenses, but it sure did look cool.
I love maps (speaking of Bard’s Tale, I spent hours poring over the map printed on the inside cover), so thanks for the great thread. Wish I hadn’t thrown out all my old stuff .
That is what I was planning yeah. I think I saw it in Stone Soup and really liked that concept.
I never played those games, but if I were to play one now, I would definitely print out and use one of your maps Ned.
I recently picked up a box of old games I packed up and stashed at my parents’ place when I went off to college in the mid-nineties. Half of the contents were the old grey Infocom game boxes, many with my old graph paper maps folded up inside. Still even have my map for Enchanter! (It looks terrible, though - I didn’t even draw the turtle.)
Just wanted to chime in and say that these maps are awesome.
I vaguely remember doing some maps, although I can’t remember for which games (not the old Infocom games, though, I’ve never played those). They must’ve sucked, anyway, since I couldn’t draw a straight line to save my life.
When I pirated Hero’s Quest 2 in middle-school, I had no idea that the map of the city of Shapeir was copy protection. Instead, I mapped out and drew out the entire city by trial and error.
I also would like to add that those maps you drew are awesome. I’ve always admired people who can draw, best I could ever do was drawing square boxes and sometimes if I really wanted to change things up, circles and rectangles!
I have all my old maps, from virtually every RPG that came out between 82-89, along all of the NPC conversations transcribed for all the Ultima games and many others. Yes, that means I wrote out every word in the game. Serious OCD.
PICS or it DIDN’T HAPPEN! :)
Someone start some blog thing!!
If you all don’t I am going to do something myself. Only thing is I don’t know if wordpress.com supports user submitted posts (approval required), that would be grand.
I have been wanting to start this blog for YEARS. It would be called the Dagger and Map and we would totally score a book deal.
Would anyone object to me posting these pics at Boing Boing?
I wouldn’t mind. :) I’d only request proper credit for my scribblings.
Thanks everyone for the kind words. If you get the itch to play an old text adventure but don’t want to hand draw your maps, I recommend a mapping tool called Trizbort. It’s pretty much made for Infocom games and works quite well. The maps are pretty plain but you’ll be able to get from one area to another without being eaten by a grue.
There are a few Infocom games I’ve never played that I may get to eventually. If I end up mapping them by hand I’ll post the results here.
Also, Desslock has me beat by about a jillion. Sure, I have pages of notes from Betrayal at Krondor and Ultima IV but I still stopped short of transcribing entire games!
Time to dig out my old maps of The Bard’s Tale. Oh Skara Brae, how you tormented me with your 32 x 32 mazes that repeated infinitely off into every direction.
