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Made an animated runthrough of a bunch of the Castlevania maps:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zFCkC9RUTxY

Pretty niche audience for this kind of video but it's fun to make as a flip-book through the map basically. Started on Tomb Raider II today.

Question about the Elw Dimension map... I've wondered for *years* if those two side islands were actually present on the map, and I'm curious as to whether what's shown in your map is all that's actually there, or if that's just all you were able to get without any sort of tools. If it's the latter, I guess some sort of "overworld walk through walls" code would be in order...

Still, nice to finally see "actual game graphics" maps for Filgaia. I'm genuinely surprised none existed until now. Good job! Heck, all of your PS1 maps are pretty dang amazing! Looking forward to seeing more of them in the future!

Thanks! It is indeed the latter - I couldn't find any code for walk through walls/enable plane or other tools on Elw map/etc. so I can't see those bits either! But you can open the map in-game with select and they are shown, I suspect they are there... I've never tried to hack out PS1 codes before, although I did a bit on NES/SNES back in the day. Would be a fun project, I would definitely like to improve the missing areas in the current one.

Just submitted a map for WILD ARMS on PS1. Was quite surprised there wasn't one already, many 2D RPGs from that era were done long ago. Unfortunately I didn't figure out a good way to extract data from the disc, so I resorted to the ol' screenshot mapping technique.

https://twitter.com/vgcartography/status/1485790802106327042?s=20&t=LiFzQ7yjtm8LOvKWhE2UEQ Here is a short timelapse doing a small portion of it. Took probably 3-4 nights a couple hours each to finish? One of my favorite games from the era.

Fun doing a new map of an old-style game!

I just submitted the first few maps for Xenogears to the site: https://www.deviantart.com/vgcartography/gallery/81393244/xenogears Trying to follow your footsteps on the FF7 masterwork with another RPG from the era.

Reviving this ancient thread to share a link I found:
https://www.vg-resource.com/thread-37086-post-660862.html#pid660862
Rufaswan has some download links there for all 3 DS games that have probably 80% of the background stuff represented. Things aren't tiled or stretched or whatever and some bits are missing, but overall it would represent a nice starting point for those - I referenced it for some Castlevania maps I worked on recently that I'll submit soon. I know this is probably long since past, but for anyone feeling like mapping some beautiful 2D pixel art, OoE doesn't have much out there already.

Can you share with us a couple statistics that would be fun to feature if possible?
- number of maps
- number of contributors
- first map(s) you hosted (which one and when?)

Thanks!

I'm at 1.5 years working from home after what we thought would be a couple weeks quarantine turned into this. I actually quite like it, my wife works at home as well and it has given us a lot more opportunities with our toddler and less time commuting/preparing/running around. Many house projects completed. I work for a university and they are reluctant to force people back anytime soon.

It has also given me time to explore many hobbies, starting a journal, cataloging books and games and digital data and all of that. Near the end of 2020, after years of dabbling with little game-related infographic projects, I started a more focused effort to make some maps for Grand Theft Auto III because I just went for the PS4's platinum trophy and felt the materials out there didn't do a great job communicating visually, given we could now fly around the map in noclip.website and the like. I made some little images in powerpoint (didn't want to learn photoshop), updated the guide, ended up recording a short youtube video about it and had a good time. Started poking around what other similar resources might be available for games from my childhood. Eventually went so far as to rename my twitter account and sort of separate "me" personally and "VGCartography map account" that had become my standard relaxation activity once the rest of the family went to bed.

https://www.deviantart.com/vgcartography/gallery
I haven't done a good job keeping VGMaps updated with my output over 2021 (Jon, I will email you about some of these - just finished Mega Man Legends and Tomba maps were all remade) but I've spent more time on these graphic projects than I have playing video games this year probably. There isn't a ton of engagement though - twitter is only good for fleeting impersonal interactions, reddit is a little better but similar - not much conversation, can't ask for advice, etc. I've wished this forum was still more active as it seems like it once was, and to Terra's point about dying out I've wondered if Jon/I/someone started a discord server for game map people it might bring more engagement?

I don't love discord/slack because it's difficult to look back in time, but it would be fun to have a more active place for people to put heads together. I've had the most luck for old PS1 games trawling their discord communities for efforts to extract assets (how I mapped Mega Man Legends, Tomba, others) and I do think there is an audience for it - not long ago someone made a viral tweet about StarFighters76's GameFAQs maps and shortly afterwards they joined twitter and several hundred people followed them. Is that a blasphemous idea?

Thanks! Tomba is one of my favorites. In general most of my favorite games from the NES/SNES area are well-covered here but the PS1 era not as much, understandably because the areas are 3D and not easily extracted so your options are either drawing maps from scratch or trying to pull out the assets in some form like I've done here. Anyone interested in PS1 work, happy to answer questions here/twitter/etc. Every game is different but some are easier than others.

Tomba 2 will be along in the coming months, here is a preview map for the sequel: https://twitter.com/vgcartography/status/1429861130709708802

I shortened it on the Escape Route map so it wasn't needlessly big, just a sample of each part, but the full game map I think is what the intention was. In reality it can last for a while if you have bad aim, but the cliff you end on is meant to be the same coast you originally swim up to I think.

Metal Gear Solid is up.
https://vgmaps.com/Atlas/PSX/index.htm#MetalGearSolid

I made a short YouTube video explaining how I made it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PihXtAKtb2A

Among other things, a cleanup of Tomba and Vagrant Story along with maps for Mega Man Legends and MGS2 are in the plans. Want to revisit Tomb Raider as well.

Nice one Jon.

Resident Evil (2002) maps from going for platinum recently:
https://twitter.com/hatersgonnahate/status/1409615780250066945

Want to do a bit more error checking/cleanup before I submit though.

I love seeing 3d maps rendered in an isometric perspective like this, even though they're not always easily "readable" because rooms will overlap with one another and ceiling geometry is sometimes visible.
Also, because of the primitive graphics of the game, it's not always easy to tell where edges are located. When older 3D games are rendered like this, I've always wondered how much better/worse it would look with a visible outline around edges.

Thank you for such an amazing video, and I'm glad that you'll be making maps for the next two games as well.
Can't wait to check out the maps by myself!

Thanks! Yeah, I often get confused by perspective when trying to find the best angle overall for each level, reminds me of that bit in Indiana Jones 3 when the perspective shifts and he realizes he's on a bridge. Peardian's Ocarina of Time iso maps are my favorite, but TR's levels fit together a bit differently and it's difficult to separate a single room so I wasn't able to achieve that level of clarity (partially why only the overhead map parts are labeled). For TR2 and 3 with a lot more verticality, I might try separating floors a bit more and trying more severe angles maybe.

Finished and submitted TR maps to the site! I also used the base maps to make this Youtube video breaking down the parts of various levels + some infographics: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GiToc0SYkds

I've been sharing classic Tomb Raider maps as I assemble them. Most are on my Twitter feed, a couple examples:
https://twitter.com/hatersgonnahate/status/1377198997740347393 - TR2 - 40 Fathoms
https://twitter.com/hatersgonnahate/status/1376192309650411523 - TR - Palace Midas
The isometric maps for TR1 are done but need cleanup pass and labels etc. Haven't finished topdown map for 2/3 yet but maybe ready in a week or two.