Map Showcase and Review Thread

Semolous said:

Another 2 cities from my game

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You can't use the automated brick road automated tile. It has ground surrounding it, and your surrounding is another brick path.

Also, I must say, your cities are too.... linear. They're too geometrically correct. Everything's so parallel. Try displacing the houses and buildings a little. Move them a few tiles in any direction. Make their position random, if you know what I'm saying.

Also, there are no details. I wouldn't place a city on a bricked path. I'd put grass around the bricked road, to make adding trees, flowers and other "random details" possible. The way you're making it has a lot of empty surfaces.

LightningAlex said:

You can't use the automated brick road automated tile. It has ground surrounding it, and your surrounding is another brick path.

Also, I must say, your cities are too.... linear. They're too geometrically correct. Everything's so parallel. Try displacing the houses and buildings a little. Move them a few tiles in any direction. Make their position random, if you know what I'm saying.

Also, there are no details. I wouldn't place a city on a bricked path. I'd put grass around the bricked road, to make adding trees, flowers and other "random details" possible. The way you're making it has a lot of empty surfaces.

Click to expand...

I get what you're saying. Thanks for the input!

A revamped version of one of my cities

View attachment 71259

That is much better. Although it's still too square-like for me. It looks fine, I guess I just really hate maps with a perfect layout.

One problem, though, the roof of the building in the bottom right corner is cut off. Add it to the third layer.

Semolous said:

A revamped version of one of my cities

View attachment 71259

Click to expand...

It kind of reminds me of Canalave City.

First off, you should make a tree-border around the city, so that the player cannot see outside the map boundaries.

Secondly, I think it'd look nicer with "harbor-fences" lining the wateredges. (You know those white big thingys.)

And lastly, the Gatehouse in the lower right corner looks really bad.
Check some official maps to learn how to do a proper one.

For now: 7/10
If you fix the things I said, probably: 9/10

Nostram City. Was originally Nostram Town, but when I built it too big I decided to rename it to "City" xD

tImE said:

It kind of reminds me of Canalave City.

First off, you should make a tree-border around the city, so that the player cannot see outside the map boundaries.

Secondly, I think it'd look nicer with "harbor-fences" lining the wateredges. (You know those white big thingys.)

And lastly, the Gatehouse in the lower right corner looks really bad.
Check some official maps to learn how to do a proper one.

For now: 7/10
If you fix the things I said, probably: 9/10

Click to expand...

I'm not entirely sure what you mean by 'the Gatehouse in the lower right corner looks really bad' Could you please explain?

Semolous said:

I'm not entirely sure what you mean by 'the Gatehouse in the lower right corner looks really bad' Could you please explain?

Click to expand...

the bottom of the tree shows above where there should be a roof covering said tree bttom

The 3rd version of my city

View attachment 71280

Make some holes in the fence and put the lampposts back near the water.
And the gatehouse is still a little too small.
Great work though!

tImE said:

Make some holes in the fence and put the lampposts back near the water.
And the gatehouse is still a little too small.
Great work though!

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How would you recommend making the gatehouse bigger?

Semolous said:

How would you recommend making the gatehouse bigger?

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Like this.

tImE said:

Spoiler:

Like this.

Click to expand...

How's this? Better? worse?

View attachment 71282

Much better!
One row of lampposts are still in the wrong place, though.

tImE said:

Much better!
One row of lampposts are still in the wrong place, though.

Click to expand...

Which row do you mean and how?

LightningAlex said:

Nostram City. Was originally Nostram Town, but when I built it too big I decided to rename it to "City" xD

Click to expand...

Hey, here's my opinion on your map:

Firstly, there's not any unity between the buildings of the town. If you use multiples of the same sprite for each town, it gives each town a specific feel, making them much more memorable and much less 'oh, another random town. Cool, i guess.'. It gives each town identity and just generally looks better.

I'd also reccommend expanding it out on every side, and building a solid border of trees all around (except for entrances to other routes of course). There are a couple of points where it looks like not quite the entrance to a new route, but just like you missed a spot of trees to complete the border.

The bench sprites are disproportionate to the buildings as well, which makes them look funny. It looks kind of like a BW sprite was but into a RSE game.

The mountainy bit in middle doesn't feel necessary either.

Overall rating: 4/10
If you fix these things, maybe a 6 or 7. Sorry, I just don't really like the design of the map - it looks haphazard. I know what a pain this is to hear, but I think you should get a really solid idea of what you want the town to be, and then give it another try. Just the other day I completely redid one of my earlier towns, and as difficult as it was, it looks much better now. Sometimes when you have the inspiration you can punch something really good out straight off the bat, but you won't always be so lucky unfortunately : (

LightningAlex said:

Nostram City. Was originally Nostram Town, but when I built it too big I decided to rename it to "City" xD

Click to expand...

First off, you are trying to make the trees, paths, lakes and mountains look way too "natural".
I know what you are trying to accomplish, but it rarely looks good in a Pokémon game, especially not with FRLG tiles.

Secondly, you don't have a specific "theme" for the city. You are using a ton of different houses, with no regard to how the player is supposed to recognize the city. Pokémon games often use a set color scheme to set towns and cities apart for the player to recognize them.

Furthermore, you have way too many open spaces with nothing in it except flowers. You should keep these to a minimum. Empty spaces are fine if they make sense or containt something, for example, a garden for a house, etc.

Lastly, using small snirkly roads doesn't work well with Pokémon games. They work better in games with pixelmovement rather than 4 direction tile movement. And having only 1 tile wide spaces for the player to move through makes it feel too cramped for the player.

I give this a 5/10.

Of course, this is all according to my opinion. If you prefer this style you are using, that's fine, however if you want to see an example of this map in more of a "Pokémon style", check the spoiler.
I remade your map as I have learned to make maps.

tImE said:

First off, you are trying to make the trees, paths, lakes and mountains look way too "natural".
I know what you are trying to accomplish, but it rarely looks good in a Pokémon game, especially not with FRLG tiles.

Secondly, you don't have a specific "theme" for the city. You are using a ton of different houses, with no regard to how the player is supposed to recognize the city. Pokémon games often use a set color scheme to set towns and cities apart for the player to recognize them.

Furthermore, you have way too many open spaces with nothing in it except flowers. You should keep these to a minimum. Empty spaces are fine if they make sense or containt something, for example, a garden for a house, etc.

Lastly, using small snirkly roads doesn't work well with Pokémon games. They work better in games with pixelmovement rather than 4 direction tile movement. And having only 1 tile wide spaces for the player to move through makes it feel too cramped for the player.

I give this a 5/10.

Of course, this is all according to my opinion. If you prefer this style you are using, that's fine, however if you want to see an example of this map in more of a "Pokémon style", check the spoiler.
I remade your map as I have learned to make maps.

Spoiler:

Click to expand...

I'd have to agree with tImE on this. I generally like to use 1 colour scheme when doing cities or towns, and I try to fill only the spaces that need to be filled. Hell, I've even had to completely redo some of my older work.

Evilrake said:

Hey, here's my opinion on your map:

Firstly, there's not any unity between the buildings of the town. If you use multiples of the same sprite for each town, it gives each town a specific feel, making them much more memorable and much less 'oh, another random town. Cool, i guess.'. It gives each town identity and just generally looks better.

Click to expand...

Actually, that's one of the things I plan to fix at the very end of the game. Having each house different makes it easier to name the maps ("Green house", "red house", etc.). I do it to not get confused when making the "Transfer player" events. Complicated, I know, but I have my weird methods of avoiding confusion xD

Evilrake said:

I'd also reccommend expanding it out on every side, and building a solid border of trees all around (except for entrances to other routes of course). There are a couple of points where it looks like not quite the entrance to a new route, but just like you missed a spot of trees to complete the border.

Click to expand...

The trees are there - they're just not visible on the image.

Evilrake said:

The bench sprites are disproportionate to the buildings as well, which makes them look funny. It looks kind of like a BW sprite was but into a RSE game.

Click to expand...

Yeah, that's true. I replaced them, thanks for the advice :)

tImE said:

First off, you are trying to make the trees, paths, lakes and mountains look way too "natural".
I know what you are trying to accomplish, but it rarely looks good in a Pokémon game, especially not with FRLG tiles.

Secondly, you don't have a specific "theme" for the city. You are using a ton of different houses, with no regard to how the player is supposed to recognize the city. Pokémon games often use a set color scheme to set towns and cities apart for the player to recognize them.

Furthermore, you have way too many open spaces with nothing in it except flowers. You should keep these to a minimum. Empty spaces are fine if they make sense or containt something, for example, a garden for a house, etc.

Lastly, using small snirkly roads doesn't work well with Pokémon games. They work better in games with pixelmovement rather than 4 direction tile movement. And having only 1 tile wide spaces for the player to move through makes it feel too cramped for the player.

I give this a 5/10.

Of course, this is all according to my opinion. If you prefer this style you are using, that's fine, however if you want to see an example of this map in more of a "Pokémon style", check the spoiler.
I remade your map as I have learned to make maps.

Click to expand...

I would like to thank you for taking the time of remaking the map. But, honestly, I really, really hate the "not natural" pattern of cities. I love the benches you put in, and I replaced the ones on my map with them, but the rest... just way too "square-like".

Again, thank you both for your advice, and I definitely won't ignore it. I'll change the map, but I just can't make it too similar to cities from actual Pokemon games. It's one of the few things that really bothered me with them. I guess it's just two different styles.

LightningAlex said:

Actually, that's one of the things I plan to fix at the very end of the game. Having each house different makes it easier to name the maps ("Green house", "red house", etc.). I do it to not get confused when making the "Transfer player" events. Complicated, I know, but I have my weird methods of avoiding confusion xD


The trees are there - they're just not visible on the image.


Yeah, that's true. I replaced them, thanks for the advice :)



I would like to thank you for taking the time of remaking the map. But, honestly, I really, really hate the "not natural" pattern of cities. I love the benches you put in, and I replaced the ones on my map with them, but the rest... just way too "square-like".

Again, thank you both for your advice, and I definitely won't ignore it. I'll change the map, but I just can't make it too similar to cities from actual Pokemon games. It's one of the few things that really bothered me with them. I guess it's just two different styles.

Click to expand...

Unfortunately Cities, in general, tend to be un-natural. They're man-made. How could they be natural at all.