As I said on the podcast devoted to this topic, my series on maps has generally been interested in a very few themes. How do maps express exploration and how do they represent the world they purport to show. On the first theme we have the very evocative Seven Cities of Gold and the more historically accurate Europa Universalis. Representation is in all of them, but the wargames Sid Meier’s Gettysburg and Combat Mission stand out for how they capture the look and feel of geographic and topographic features on the battlefield.

And, as I said on the podcast, I have one great regret in this series – I didn’t pay any tribute to the developer designed maps you find in many very good RTSes – Company of Heroes, Dawn of War, Command & Conquer. This is partly because it’s ironically harder to find a map philosophy when a dozen maps are all specifically designed for a micro-purpose than it is when those maps simply follow general rules according to a script. And it’s partly because I haven’t played every map in those games enough times to get a sense for what they are trying to do besides make sure each side has equal access to resources and choke points and hiding places.

A couple of games almost made the cut. Supreme Commander‘s campaign missions start you on a big chunk of a map with one objective and then, once you complete that, the map expands to give you another one. And another one. It takes hours. But it does really interesting things to your sense of distance and force dispositions. Alpha Centauri has a living map in the sense that the map can be an enemy, and the more efficiently you exploit the map to your advantage, the more hostile it becomes. The map design transition between Medieval: Total War and Rome: Total War is a fascinating revolution, but I did Rome in the last feature series.

The take away on map design:

1. Good maps are not synonymous with boards. The analogy between a game map and a game board is natural but misleading. On a game board, pieces move across the cardboard usually to stake a claim or mark a location. So much more interactivity is possible in the electronic space and a big part of that is finding a way for the map to respond to player action. Discover the map. Break the map. Transform the map. (Rise of Nations maps do not change their shape in response to human action, but the navigable space does because the cultural borders can expand and contract.) There are exceptions – a good Dominions map, for example, presents a new world through exaggerated terrain representation and the like. But for the most part, a game map should reflect, in some way, what a player is doing to the virtual world.

2. Exploration should be about both promise and risk. Too many games, I think, see exploration a little naively. You push back the darkness and find new lands and new resources. This makes the game more about effectively steering your little explorer guy around. Now, risk should not be understood simply as imminent death. But there should always be a chance that something will go wrong – even if it’s simply wasted time. One of the problems with many strategy games – even great ones – is that you can press an auto-explore button and let the computer do the mapping for you. If exploration is to matter, there should be a trade off for taking the easy route.

3. Information on the map should be immediately clear. We can’t forget what maps are for – they are visual representations of data – locations, resources, routes, points of interest. Though it’s difficult to get every bit of information you need on one screen (Europa Universalis has a half dozen map modes) the data the player needs on screen should never be more than a single click away, with no more than a couple of more to take advantage of that information. Though a lot of old time gamers still complain about 3D (for God’s sake, get over it) if the height of an object matters than I should be able to tell relative height at an instant. Different grades of black and brown and gray do nothing for me here, and marking marsh hexes with a slightly off-green color is not always helpful.

4. Let your map be a character. This is related to the first point, but is a little more philosophical. An interesting map is one that has a personality, one that speaks to the player through more than simply moving across it. A good game map resists. It entices. It follows predictable rules but can surprise.

So that’s it. No really profound insights.

A sidenote: In the post-recording chat after Episode 14, Tom Chick asked if I had pitched this series to anybody who would pay me for it. Given how slowly the thing got finished, it’s a good thing I didn’t. Not sure who would have paid for it anyway.

But I enjoyed writing it and will probably move on to a more normal posting schedule in the next few months. I have lots of other series ideas, but they can wait till fall.