Grimrock

I really do hate putting suggestion posts up but this one time I want to do it because this is IMO a very good & rather obvious feature for dungeon crawlers.

It's just as the title suggests, what you guys think about actually drawing your own maps while playing the game? I was always a fan of dungeon games growing up, the whole drawing out the dungeons was pretty satisfying. Then I played Etrian Odyssey awhile back, a very nice turn based dungeon crawler that has map making as one of it's core features.

Basically since the game is in squares you just have a grid layout over the map then on the sidebar somewhere offer a bunch of symbols and colors. Simply paint tiles & draw lines for walls. I know people don't like "taking ideas" but I felt like allowing a player to actually draw the map easily in game fits perfectly. It'd be a nice feature to at least be allowed to be modded into the game.

This could also be conveniently added to the "old school" section. Since it won't have auto-map features anyways a player could simply choose whether or not to draw the map in the game or outside. You wouldn't need to bother those who want the auto-map feature. It also fills that little gap between gamers, the ones who would maybe like to map but just don't want to go through the hassle of gather the supplies to do it.

Anyways that's my two cents, I'm looking forward to the game regardless.

I really like this idea, keeps everything on the computer, yet still hearkens back to hand drawn classic feel

Stonekeep is the example for a journal; you can even erase the auto-generated entries and rewrite them. It (probably) would not be hard to allow an almost 'editor-like' functionality to draw the map on a page.

*My suggestion to this would be the ability to add map scraps found in the dungeon, to the user made maps; as either an overlay, or [assumed] transcribed... not unlike John's notebook mod's treatment of spell scrolls. The designer might need only append the placement coordinates to the item definition.

I like the idea for oldschool mode. One problem that would make it not work as well here as in Etrian odyssey is that on the DS you have two screens, that meant you could map and play simultaneously. It's less fun constantly clicking up a map, writing, clicking it down, etc. Thats probably slightly more inconvenient than paper. (Well that's just my opinion, most people would rather that than paper)

A small mapping feature could be kept onscreen, but that runs in stark contrast to grimrocks philosophy of a very simple uncluttered screen.