I actually played through some of the old Wizardry games again. I built myself a mapping application in Python so that I didn't have to keep track of graph paper. It's a bit crude; maybe I should clean it up and post it on my site sometime. :)

There's something comforting about making your own maps. But, I think that you can't go too wild with the maps if you're going to require people to draw them out.

There was an indie game with robot exploration, the name escapes me now. They put in a "draw your own map" system in the game which just annoyed me more than not having a mapping system at all. No way I want to try to deal with drawing freehand maps with a mouse or laptop touchpad. :P
 

There's a DS game with draw-your-own-map in it (and possibly a sequel) but while I think it's cool that they did that I have no interest in drawing a map with the DS stylus. Mapping a PC game by hand is much more comfortable, I have paper by the computer anyway and I can look at the screen and draw stuff.

.... Still, I'll only draw pretty small maps by hand. Lazy!
 

I enjoyed drawing my own maps on graph paper, but I wouldn't want to do that again. However, I DO want an automap that I can make my own (and that doesn't tell me things my character hasn't discovered for himself).

I mean, I want the computer to take the tedium out of mapping, but I want it to be free-form enough to easily add all the notes I need, myself. Sure, let the computer automatically label shops and such for me, but let me note buildings I wasn't able to enter, doors I haven't even tried, NPCs who wouldn't talk to me, etc. Can developers take the tedium out of mapping while leaving in the fun - and the value - of a personalized map?

In other ways, I disagree with the author of that article. I never once resurrected a character in Baldur's Gate (or most other games). When one of my characters died, I just reloaded a saved game and tried again. If you put a resurrect feature in a game, how many players will actually use it?

And I never liked puzzles. OK, I love strategy, I love tactics, I even love logistics - those are puzzles, sort of. And I love to figure out clever ways to accomplish a mission (IF there are multiple ways to do so). But traditional adventure game-style puzzles, where there's only ONE solution,... ugh!

I agree that I hate to see an enemy on a map where my characters couldn't possibly have that knowledge. But I'd love to play a game where my characters would hear enemies, or get clues in other ways, preferably based on their skills (tracking, etc.). Hmm,... for that matter, I still remember hearing the monsters in Daggerfall. You couldn't tell where they were, but you could tell when they'd caught your scent. It used to scare the crap out of me. What fun!
 

I remember when Ultima Online was in beta, and the mini-map wasn't available, except as a spell.

The result was TONS of players got lost all the time, and flooded the queues with requests for help. Even in a 2D isometric game with only eight cardinal directions to go in.

Granted, I think one of the troubles was that with the repeated tile graphics, it was pretty easy at times to miss distinctive marks. And Origin did almost TOO good of a job, creating city layouts that were twisty and confusing, like a real medieval city.

Anyway, when the game hit release, the mini-map was a standard part of the game, and a bit of fun was lost in the process, I think.

I wonder myself how interesting a modern 3D CRPG would be if there was no map, no navigational compass, and a lot of widespread forests and areas to get lost in.
 

I remember player EverQuest without maps. And yeah, some of those dungeons got nasty. I remember spending time hiding & sneaking in the maze in the temple of Cazic Thule, trying to memorize it (after a particularly nasty party wipe one time... 'Cuz half of the group didn't know how to get out, and only got lost deeper in the maze and we had to recover their corpses...)
 

@Whiner: How exactly is drawing maps on a piece of paper positioned next to the computer more convenient than having the whole thing seamlessly integrated into the game experience at all times (as in the Etrian Odyssey games you referred to, where mapping takes place on the lower screen and navigating on upper)?