Topic: External site using VGMaps content?

[ricardosallin]

Hello people!

I recently came across this website that claims to be a [url]"better VGMaps"[/https://vgmaps.de]

Despite the ".de" domain, the site is in Brazilian Portuguese (with some pages in English), and it looks like it was created with AI and populated by web-scraping maps from VGMaps. It seems to host the same maps found here, though it’s missing newer submissions. For example, my own maps, from May 2025 onward, aren’t present.

They even have a "Scoreboard" listing the top mappers (which, admittedly, is a fun idea 😄), and a News section with posts like [url]"Better VGMaps expands its online presence"[/https://vgmaps.de/news/better-vgmaps-expands-online-presence.php]

Has this come up before?
Does anyone here, or Jon, know about them? Did they contact VGMaps at any point?
Do you know if this is authorized or otherwise legitimate?

I just wanted to flag it and check with the community before jumping to any conclusions.

Thanks!

Sallin

[Cyartog959]

Hello people!

I recently came across this website that claims to be a [url]"better VGMaps"[/https://vgmaps.de]

Despite the ".de" domain, the site is in Brazilian Portuguese (with some pages in English), and it looks like it was created with AI and populated by web-scraping maps from VGMaps. It seems to host the same maps found here, though it’s missing newer submissions. For example, my own maps, from May 2025 onward, aren’t present.

They even have a "Scoreboard" listing the top mappers (which, admittedly, is a fun idea 😄), and a News section with posts like [url]"Better VGMaps expands its online presence"[/https://vgmaps.de/news/better-vgmaps-expands-online-presence.php]

Has this come up before?
Does anyone here, or Jon, know about them? Did they contact VGMaps at any point?
Do you know if this is authorized or otherwise legitimate?

I just wanted to flag it and check with the community before jumping to any conclusions.

Thanks!

Sallin

Such a site that claims to be the so-called, self-proclaimed, "Better VGMaps" is obviously begging for, and obviously is, in my purview, plagiarism against the original creator behind the true VGMaps, the mappers, and its perpetual cause without proper authorization, let alone proper permission from said creator. I immediately consider it a fake site.

If they never contacted VGMaps nor its staff before, its definitely not a complete associate of VGMaps. Human made content is what truly matters to VGMaps. Web-scraping from the likes of plagiarists, especially non-human bots(which should not be counted as real mappers, to know), is definitely considered an offense. And, it definitely goes against preservation and can probably hold dangerous malware against unsuspecting people(an obvious probability, to be sure).

Nobody did bring it up... but such plagiarizing against VGMaps cannot go unnoticed. It should be halted at once.

Jon, hope you're here to read this, because this matter is urgent.

The scoreboard, however, does sound like a neat addition for VGMaps(can't even believe no one thought of it before). May even create some good competition. That may need to be taken up to Jon for actual consideration.

To everyone else out there, even Sallin, watch yourself for sketchy, unauthorized knock-offs. They can be very dangerous.

[FlyingArmor]

Oh yes, some of us are very familiar with that website. Yes, it's unauthorized and no one was asked beforehand to have any of our maps put up there.

I think Jon brought it to my attention about two years ago, since so many of my maps were present over there. I eventually e-mailed whoever owns that site to have my maps taken down, but I just got an AI response asking for all my real world details to determine whether I was the "legitimate copyright holder". Obviously I wasn't gonna give all that away to who knows who (especially someone hiding behind a clanker), so while unfortunate, we just have to live with that website existing.

But I have the hope that most people who happen to find their way there would see through the highly polished facade it puts up and recognize that the true source of the content comes from this place (which has been around FAR longer), complete with its human, hand coded jankiness.

[dark_lord_zagato]

Jon also pointed this out to me a few years ago and asked me if I knew anything about it. I told him I had no idea they were hosting my maps until he brought it up.

"Better VGMaps" has never contacted me by any means to ask permission to host my maps.

I would not have given them my permission to host my maps on their clone site if they had asked me.

Better VGMaps is hosting my maps without my consent.

It is unfortunate, but as FlyingArmor says, there is very little we can do about it. We can play a game of Whack-A-Mole with that site, and just watch it pop back up on different hosts each time it gets knocked down, but that seems like a waste of effort. I'm just going to do my part to tell people about the real VGMaps, and if they ask me about the plagiarized site i'll just tell them the truth about it...

[Cyartog959]

Oh yes, some of us are very familiar with that website. Yes, it's unauthorized and no one was asked beforehand to have any of our maps put up there.

I think Jon brought it to my attention about two years ago, since so many of my maps were present over there. I eventually e-mailed whoever owns that site to have my maps taken down, but I just got an AI response asking for all my real world details to determine whether I was the "legitimate copyright holder". Obviously I wasn't gonna give all that away to who knows who (especially someone hiding behind a clanker), so while unfortunate, we just have to live with that website existing.

But I have the hope that most people who happen to find their way there would see through the highly polished facade it puts up and recognize that the true source of the content comes from this place (which has been around FAR longer), complete with its human, hand coded jankiness.

You got the heart to stand your ground, bud. And it's very noble you did.

We can sure hope, but we should also pray for people to wise up to all that and for that facade to stop someday, too.

It's charm. Human, hand-coded charm that tethers our hearts so warmly. Never forget that. 

[Cyartog959]

Jon also pointed this out to me a few years ago and asked me if I knew anything about it. I told him I had no idea they were hosting my maps until he brought it up.

"Better VGMaps" has never contacted me by any means to ask permission to host my maps.

I would not have given them my permission to host my maps on their clone site if they had asked me.

Better VGMaps is hosting my maps without my consent.

It is unfortunate, but as FlyingArmor says, there is very little we can do about it. We can play a game of Whack-A-Mole with that site, and just watch it pop back up on different hosts each time it gets knocked down, but that seems like a waste of effort. I'm just going to do my part to tell people about the real VGMaps, and if they ask me about the plagiarized site i'll just tell them the truth about it...

Seemingly, for the present, but one day, that will be stopped... One day...

You got a great task ahead, alongside your usual mapping routine, and you have my support!    Give the good word of VGMaps, and wisen up those people.

Remember, we're with you all the way!

[FlyingArmor]

You got the heart to stand your ground, bud. And it's very noble you did.

Honestly, I'm really not all that concerned over my maps being over there. I'm being attributed properly, for one thing. And once my maps are up online, I have no control over where they may end up. There have been a number of people who have asked permission for hosting my maps on their websites over the years, but even if they had not asked but still properly credited, I'm still fine with that.

I was just curious what the response would be, and I was not at all surprised a clanker was used even for e-mail correspondence, given the nature of everything else on that site.

[mechaskrom]

They haven't contacted me about hosting my maps either. It's pretty obvious that it's an unauthorized clone of the real VGMaps.

But like FlyingArmor, I don't really care. It's very hard to control things you've uploaded online. I've found my maps on some very strange sites, some even made changes to them (e.g. removed my name) which at least Better VGMaps hasn't.

I guess the biggest problem with Better VGMaps is that it might be stealing traffic from the real VGMaps. Most people who contact me about my maps found them via Better VGMaps (I always tell them to visit the real site instead) which is a bit worrying. I wonder why Better VGMaps seems more popular in search engine results than the real VGMaps?

[JonLeung]

Hi everyone, Jonathan Leung here (or "JonLeung" or "JonLeung1"), the guy who created, has always owned, and has always run and put up the content for the original "VGMaps.com: The Video Game Atlas" since the beginning back in May 2002, and still owning and running it today, and still intending to do so for the foreseeable future.

(I saw when this topic was posted in the forums but I was busy with other things at the time, and then there was Christmas stuff, so I haven't had a chance to respond in the forums until now.)

This is my word on the matter.

Yes, I have indeed known about "Better VGMaps" for a while now, since probably 2023.  I have also occasionally responded to others' emails (from concerned and curious mappers) during that time, and there was a brief discussion on the VGMaps Discord server earlier.

The short answer is, as has been stated earlier by others, "Better VGMaps" is a knock-off site.  It has no affiliation with my VGMaps.com: The Video Game Atlas.  "Better VGMaps" has very clearly harvested the content from VGMaps.com, without my permission.  I was not informed of its creation by its creator, and all the mappers that I have talked to about this also say they did not hear from "Better VGMaps", nor gave them permission to use their maps on that site.  Attempts to communicate with them have been fruitless.

If you hear only one thing from me about this, I would say, do not give "Better VGMaps" any attention.  Why go there anyway?  VGMaps.com still has more content, as "Better VGMaps" hasn't harvested many of the obscure platforms yet, and they don't keep up with the updates as I put them up.  So don't bother with them; they don't deserve it.

...

To elaborate if you want a longer answer: It is ridiculous, and I have indeed attempted to get them taken down.  I was successful at knocking them down, twice, through DMCA takedowns when it was at other URLs.  But it resurfaced.  It was at another site before, maybe a couple times, then took a .ru domain, and now it's at .de.  When attempting to take it down again, I got some notification (the only communication I've gotten from them) about legal action if I tried to disrupt their "business" again.  Now, I wasn't put off by this; I've got some stuff prepared if it comes to that, and am always amassing more proof.  I will not say what I am specifically doing about that at the moment, but you would think that over 23½ years of being on the Internet, as thankfully archived by The Internet Archive Wayback Machine at https://web.archive.org/web/20020301000000*/vgmaps.com, and other longtime references like these forums, that have existed long before that knock-off first appeared, would already be plenty of evidence as to which is the original.

But that's if legal action needs to be taken.  I'm thinking that "Better VGMaps" might just go away eventually if people don't give them attention.

That's actually why I didn't mention it in the forums... it's like the "Streisand Effect" (so named after singer/actress Barbra Streisand didn't like someone taking pictures of the California coastline to document coastal erosion, which ended up including photos of her residence - and when she told everyone "don't look at my house", inevitably, everyone who heard that got curious and looked at her house, so she would've been better off not saying anything in the first place), so, I figure, there's no point for me to mention it if it's only going to give them the attention they are probably seeking.

Seriously, someone that's so lazy as to use AI to generate images and blurbs including cheesy "testimonials" is bound to eventually get bored/tired of any actual work of maintaining and updating it, if that's what they actually want to do.  What is their aim, anyway?  Is it really someone that wants to replace VGMaps.com?  Would they actually want to do the work that it takes to accept others' submissions, sort them out, upload them, etc.?  Or maybe they just don't care about doing updates, they just want to have enough to appear to make my site redundant... but that's not going to happen, as I own VGMaps.com - and now other variations that direct to the .com URL - and I don't plan on letting them go.  Why would I?  And I certainly wouldn't bow to someone just taking maps that others originally or only intended for my VGMaps.com.

Whatever they're doing, they are clearly antagonistic towards me.  I haven't made many maps myself, but the ones that I have, they've either removed them, or have reattributed them or replaced them with others.  For example, my Maniac Mansion (NES) map is no longer there, and my maps for Super Mario Bros. 3 (NES) and The Legend Of Zelda: A Link To The Past (Super NES) have been replaced with Rick Bruns's maps.  Clearly they're just removing my work in particular if they think I would use them as evidence against them in some legal action.  If anything, the specific scrubbing and redaction of just me but not others makes them look more suspicious (as if it wasn't bad enough already) to anyone with common sense.

Earlier, when my maps were still on "Better VGMaps", credit for them was given instead to "Climate Change".  I don't get what that's about.  Maybe they think I'm a joke, and think climate change is a joke, though it wouldn't surprise me if they had "climate change-denial" levels of idiocy...

They're "biting the hand that feeds them".  If they did take me down - which they wouldn't, but if that is their aim, that I would somehow give up on this, so that they think they lay claim to the catalogue of maps and replace VGMaps.com - I don't imagine that they would do the work necessary to accept and sort out new submissions (it's actually more work than you might think), and then the video game mapping world would be worse off.  Not to toot my own horn, but come on.

There's lots I could speculate about why they are doing it or why they don't do it this other way, but I don't want to give them any ideas on making it "better".  But, hey, they think they know "better" anyway, don't they?

The level of audacity reminds me a lot of someone who I called out many years ago (those who have long been in the VGMaps.com community might know who I'm talking about) for similar levels of digital kleptomania, and that makes me wonder if it's the same person.  Other than that, I have no other "enemies", and don't understand how I would have made any more.  There are a lot of stupid people on the Internet that clearly need to get out more to see how real people behave.  I mean, we're talking about 17 or 18 years ago.  If it is the same person, wow, they really need to get a life; they're old enough to know better.  If it's not the same person, that's even more messed up, because I don't get how I could make enemies by... making a web site hosting video game maps?  I don't think I've done anything with YouTube or anything with social media to make enemies.  I've disagreed with some people on social media over stuff, including political stuff that I probably didn't need to fall into the rage bait for, but those were usually brief occurrences that I can't imagine someone being so mad about it to then copy my web site and maintain it for over two years in some weird roundabout retaliation... it doesn't make sense.  All I know is that they are messed up.

If people are hearing about "Better VGMaps" more than VGMaps, maybe "Better VGMaps" is actually better at actively posting about it.  As I've found when randomly Googling "VGMaps" sometimes, posts on random forums will be like "hey, check out these maps from (whatever game)" and link to them on "Better VGMaps".  When that happens, I usually give them the benefit of the doubt (as it might not NECESSARILY be "Better VGMaps" themselves), and I register just to post and point out that VGMaps.com is the original.  When I do, people often respond (whether the original poster or others) and are quite understanding about which is the real deal and which is the knock-off site.  Still, the links are out there.  Which is a reminder that I should be talking about VGMaps.com more on social media... I'm on X/Bluesky/Facebook too much as it is, but I post about random geeky stuff when I ought to be mentioning VGMaps.com... or working on YouTube videos, which I could also mention VGMaps.com more in.  (I had a whole blurb about my "JonLeung1" YouTube channel here, but I deleted it as that could be saved for another time...)

...

So, to wrap this up... Though I have concerns, I'm not worried, as I am confident that VGMaps.com would win over "Better VGMaps" if there was any kind of legal motion.  I should take more effort in promoting this, the original VGMaps.com, and I fully expect that "Better VGMaps" will either give up, or keep burning through their resources, but to what end?  VGMaps.com is still going to be here, if I have anything to say about it.

Again, my suggestion is to not bring up "Better VGMaps".  If someone else does, just kindly explain that VGMaps.com is the original, and actually better.

And that is my word on the matter.

[Cyartog959]

Thanks for responding, and you know what?

You've got plenty more friends than "enemies", and your family's with you, too, even your brother.

No falsified knock-off nor inhumane mockery of VGMaps is gonna tear down the good name of the largest, ever-growing video game map atlas in existence, nor its mappers and friends that support true authenticity, aesthetic, and charm, from all aspects of VGMaps, especially the basics, we've completely grown to know and love!

To emphasize the support from us, never give up and never stop fighting and protecting our cause and purpose. And keep your backups thriving, just in case, to protect all of it. You never know, but it never hurts to anticipate and keep everything safe.

Mappers will always keep on contributing to the ever-continuing effort, and however the good word is spread, VGMaps will always continue to live and thrive!

Clearly, those that try to claim otherwise lack talent, and they should've known better than that. Their knock-offs' shoddy qualities are truly unworthy. And, whatever propaganda they think is "right" to claim and smear against you are pure LIES. None of what they mentioned has anything to do with whatever they try to pin you on whatsoever. It'll only ends up giving them more trouble than they are trying to create it against you. All that'll backfire on them badly.

Whatever attention they'll try to take, we'll refuse it and keep on ignoring them. You couldn't have put your advice more fittingly!  We don't give fakers what they want! No way!

Nevertheless, plenty of us stand with VGMaps and all of its preservation efforts across gaming and mapping history, and more will join in as we keep on going! We keep on mapping!

Once again, Jon, everyone that truly believes VGMaps.com is the original real deal is with you ALL THE WAY. Never forget that. 

[JonLeung]

Thanks, Cyartog959!

I know those of you in the VGMaps community, for long or for short times, know what's up.  Thank you for your support!
As I said, I'm not worried.  At all.  Whoever they are can't undo over twenty years of history.

Hey, look, even Google's AI overview knows what's up:

Funny that it's using the map of the Water Temple from The Legend Of Zelda: Ocarina Of Time, by Peardian, but I shouldn't be surprised; for a while it was the one map that people on reddit actually liked linking and relinking to.  (I don't go on reddit much anymore since it always feels so vile...)

The AI overview is drawing a lot of that info from this very topic here on the VGMaps forums, but hey, now we know that if anyone asks that question to Google, that's what they'll get.

Assuming people trust AI.  That's a WHOLE OTHER discussion...

[VGCartography]

Much of the internet has fallen to the AI menace. There are even AI ghouls imitating us over on that fake website. These forums are like Helm's Deep, a last human enclave against the encroaching scrapers of darkness.

[Cyartog959]

Much of the internet has fallen to the AI menace. There are even AI ghouls imitating us over on that fake website. These forums are like Helm's Deep, a last human enclave against the encroaching scrapers of darkness.

Don't get all dramatic on us about that. Best thing now is pray for that to be halted. Really. It won't last for long. Just continue on your projects and ignore.