Topic: JonLeung's Requests

[Cyartog959]

I think its neat to keep track of any game's maps in progress via colored indication. The blue marking helps, but I think for games that may have one or more mappers working on them, maybe a different color would help to better differentiate.

Other than that, your changes to your list are good.

[JonLeung]

To be absolutely clear, since depending on the number of posts per page, my last post might be on the second-last page now and my explanation isn't visible if viewing this last page, the blue coloration is NOT for marking progress.

Please don't impede any actual progress by claiming they're being worked on, when they might not be, and confusing would-be mappers into thinking someone called dibs when they're actually more than okay to do!

Cyartog959 may have just made the case for me to remove coloration if it will instead scare people away from doing them if they misunderstand its purpose.

[JonLeung]

JonLeung (that's me!) has started maps for Beyond Shadowgate (PC), a point-and-click adventure game that is a sequel to the NES version of Shadowgate including keeping its gameplay and 8-bit visuals.  (Note that this is not the same as the Turbo Grafx CD of the same name from 1993.)

I made them while I was also working on this unboxing and review video:

The maps that are up now are the unmarked ones.  It started out with all rooms being in their "initial" state, but some rooms are not QUITE how they look when you first enter.  For example, there are a few "rooms" in Torlin Forest that are shown with the creatures you encounter there, though that's not the true "initial" state as some only show up when you move or try to do anything, but I opted to show the creature as that's the main point of the room.

I might also replace the dark rooms that need a lantern, as it might be more useful if they were shown when they are lit up. 

I do plan on releasing another version of the maps that would be marked, but I likely won't be indicating EVERYTHING on them, just some stuff of interest like missable rooms (of which there are only a few), where the branch for the best/worst endings is, that sort of thing.  It's more a question of wording and formatting.

I have screenshots of (hopefully) every variation of every room.  Some rooms have multiple things that can be in multiple states (like numerous items to take or not, or doors that can be open or closed) which led to some rooms getting like 60 or 72 variations just because of my insistence of capturing every combination.  Since you usually can't put items back down, that meant a lot of quitting and reloading and getting them in a different order to get all these permutations of possibilities.

As I do want to make a "Screens" collage featuring every variation of every room, like zagato blackfist did with Shadowgate, Deja Vu, and Uninvited on the NES, I should probably decide if all that was really necessary or just to show two variations (like every item not taken vs. everything taken, as opposed to ALL combos of some items being taken and others not).

One room in Themiere Mansion has a clock puzzle, with the hands having to be in a different position per playthrough, determined randomly.  I decided it wasn't worth the trouble to get every combination (in a room that already has many) multiplied by every possible combination of the position of the hands on the clock.  I could just show the clock combos separately...  but really, I might have overdone it.

I'll figure it out, eventually.

[JonLeung]

Ricardo Sallin has mapped out Xexyz (NES)!

That's pronounced "zeck-sees" or "zeck-sis", apparently (but hopefully it's the latter, since that's how I sang it in my recent music video at about 2:40 into it)...

I know there are many NES games still not mapped, but it surprises me when a colourful platformer goes this long without being mapped.  While it's not on the highest echelon of NES classics, I think it's still a decent enough game that the Xexyz-sized hole being filled in today by Ricardo Sallin does feel satisfying.
(Try saying "Xexyz-sized" quickly...)

Thanks, Ricardo Sallin!

[JonLeung]

VGCartography has hit me with a bunch of PlayStation game maps to publish here, they'll certainly be up, but it won't all be right away.  But I certainly prioritized Final Fantasy IX and Parasite Eve!

This double-helping of PlayStation games has also doubled up the number of fulfilled PlayStation requests thus far.

I didn't spend a ton of time with the original PlayStation back in the day as I probably should have, but the games I did play I certainly enjoyed, especially these two Square offerings.  I've mentioned here multiple times why I played Parasite Eve essentially four times to truly finish it, and Final Fantasy IX is among my favourite Final Fantasy games ever.  It's nice to see maps of them here now.

There will be even more PlayStation maps from VGCartography up here soon, look forward to them!  Thanks again, VGCartography!  Your work continues to be amazing.

...And on another note, if anyone's wondering, I am still working on my Beyond Shadowgate (2024, PC) maps.  I decided to make "maps" just showing every single possible screen (like what zagato blackfist did with the NES games Shadowgate, Deja Vu, and Uninvited), including all the ridiculous combinations and permutations of all the variable things on each screen.  Kind of ridiculous.  I think I have them all, and all assembled, too, it's now just a matter of putting on my name and etc. on them, so hopefully I'll be able to show those soon...ish.

[JonLeung]

Okay, I got around to finishing Beyond Shadowgate (PC).

I'm not sure if I want to do a "marked" version, but to make up for that () if I don't ever do that, even though it's maybe more work, is that I made a version showing all the possible variations of all the screens in the game.  Maybe I need to come up with a better term than "Screens", but that's how I referred to them in zagato blackfist's submissions for the NES games Shadowgate, Deja Vu, and Uninvited (which inspired me to get all of those screens) as well as many other games, especially on the NES page...

Yeah, we're talking about over 1700 variations, yikes.

If a room has a single item in it that can be taken, there's two: one with the item there and one with it taken.  If there's a door that might be open or closed, that doubles it again.  For most rooms there aren't too many combinations.  But for some, there can be multiple items or multiple states, leading to exponential numbers of possibilities.  I tried to map them all as much as I could!

Believe it or not, I captured most of them in my playthroughs.  Since items can't be put down after they've been picked up (unless being used) and almost all doors can't be closed after they've been opened, it required a lot of saving and loading to be able to get the various combinations.  While I thought I was pretty good at getting all the combinations that I knew of per room, I kept finding stuff that I missed, like how the Wraith can appear in most rooms in the first half of Castle Shadowgate.  In this and a few other instances, mechaskrom's paint.net plugin that he made when I asked about comparing pixels made it easy to isolate differences (in cases where I couldn't just copy and paste rectangular or simple shapes), and from there, to copy over the right pixels to create combinations that I know are possible in the game, even if I hadn't actually done them in-game.  If the game didn't have such a rigid save system, it would be a lot easier...

Here's one example of many combinations for a single room.


And in yet another room in Themiere Mansion, there's a clock, and there are way too many combinations with that, so I just included images of what all the 16 possible clock faces could be - I wasn't going to multiply the already numerous screens by 16!  And there are lots of skeleton death images there because while most monsters in the game that jump at you and kill you have the decency to cover up many of the variables in the room, this skeleton doesn't block the door (with three states) or the clock (with four states), so it appears 12 times!


Yeah, there are a LOT of ways to die in this game, so I marked deaths (and impending deaths) in red.

If you actually use these when playing, you might find them upside-down at first glance.  That is, earlier rooms are shown at the bottom and later rooms are shown at the tops of these images.  That's because this game moves from "south" to "north".  So it generally works, except for the cursed Themiere Mansion (once again), where the basement/dungeon areas appear above the second floor, since you do go to the second floor before you go to the basement.  But these are just showing combinations, if you want to find your way around, referring to the actual map with room connections makes more sense.

I can't believe it's mid-August, as this game came out last September.  Sheesh!  I enjoyed putting it together, and it was a good reminder of how much work even simple maps can be, but man, I got other projects to do!