Etrian Odyssey 2 Maps

[Dan Smith]

I just wanted to say that your maps are really help me out as reference guides when farming items on some of the more complex floors. Great work.

[Maxine MagicFox]

[Zaraf]

I'm always online You just didn't message me. And checking my log, it shows that you had come online and offline a few times

[20:30] *** "MagicFox" signed on at Wed Jul 09 20:30:36 2008.
[22:04] *** "MagicFox" signed off at Wed Jul 09 22:04:52 2008.
[22:22] *** "MagicFox" signed on at Wed Jul 09 22:22:03 2008.
[22:34] *** "MagicFox" signed off at Wed Jul 09 22:34:22 2008.

Anyway, the first map is looking good With regards to the mouseovers, they are fairly easy to do, and would work very well with the way EO maps are. However, ALL popups are IMAGES. You can't just have "text"...that text has to be an image that is shown as the pop up.

But you could do some neat things with that. Like have a screenshot of the FOE's profile card from the in-game beastiary when you mouseover a FOE, etc.

But like I said before, you should judge if you even think all of this work is worthwhile

[Maxine MagicFox]

[Zaraf]

Taking the FOE screenshots and stuff from the game isn't hard. I could do it all, and have it properly cropped in 15 min I'll do it for you if you want.

[Maxine MagicFox]

[Maxine MagicFox]

OKAY!! OPINIONS!! From everyone, not just Zaraf!

http://www.intothelabyrinth.net/images/examplemap1.jpg

I put them against the map so you could see how it would look that way

Note: YES!! I KNOW! The Ragelope information is INCORRECT!! I had to test worst case scenarios and stuff like that.

Thoughts? Opinions? Don't worry, you won't hurt my feelings if you tell me it's crap. It will just be back to the ole drawing board.

I still have to do Treasure yet, but it's going to be like the Item Point with only one thing listed.

Edit:Oh! Something I forgot to mention. The one card reads "F.O.E. MONSTER" The "Monster" word will change to "Boss" for the black orbs.

Don't ask me about Events or Quests yet... all I know is that's going to be their title and they'll have the "E" symbol. >_> One thing at a time!

[Paranoia]

That's pretty rad.

[Zaraf]

Damn, that looks awesome. I love those info boxes! Here are some suggestions though (although mostly just nitpicky things):

-For the Item Point: Chop box, get rid of the "+" sign before each of the items. Another thing to do is add in the rarity of the various items. So like "Common" or "Rare" after the name or something to indicate your chance of getting that item.

-Instead of "F.O.E. Monster", just put "F.O.E." That is what the game calls them, so it looks kinda weird seeing "F.O.E. Monster"

-You got some nice space to the right of the stats for an image of the F.O.E. taken from the in-game beastiary

-While it looks fine leaving the skills that way (in a line), I suggest putting the items dropped in a list to coincide with the beastiary. So something like this:

Drops
1 - Horn
2 -
3 - Deer Skin

Of course, the numbers would be indented and slightly smaller (like you have already done). In this example, the middle one is empty cause it only has two drops.

-You could also put something like (Conditional) after items which have certain conditions for the FOE to drop them. For example, Golem Arm requires an instant kill spell. You could then have a "Notes" part at the bottom for any extra information which may pertain to that particular FOE. Kinda like how I have the footnotes for certain FOEs on my maps. This part could contain any other info, like how to get the conditional drops, any weird movement or spawning patterns, etc.

-Another thing I think that is useful to have is to put whether the FOE is passive or aggressive. You could put this wherever you want in the box, but it's handy to know if the FOE is going to chase you to the ends of the earth, or just leave you be


I really like your choice of colors for the boxes, and the transparencies make it look awesome

Ok, that's all for now haha

[Maxine MagicFox]

:3 Oh good! You caught the transparancy thing. Actually if you look I realized I used the wrong background. When I was originally messing with things I was going to just take a random section of map and blur it out and do some strange things. It didn't work, but I forgot to trash it. But, yeah, it's going to be transparent. I get too much into a rush when I do things. But you didn't notice so it's all good! (I'm just not as neat as you with my pdf files, either XD. You'd probably scream in horror.)

LOL, you keep wanting to stick an in-game image into them. No, I don't want to do that, and the reason is a simple one: too spoilerish. These are rollovers that are going to appear without too much provocation. So, say a person is down on the 30th floor, but they are stuck with the map. As they are viewing the map and they are going over to the point that the need, their mouse scoots over the point with the FINAL FOE... o_o I consider that a BIG spoiler, wouldn't you?! My view with cheats has always been: "they are HINTs. We are merely here to push them along - NOT give them the entire game."

That being said, I do hate the white space there and will come up with something.

- FOE MONSTER - you didn't catch my memo, did you? The word "monster" will change to "boss" for the black ones. Plus, just having the word FOE didn't look as aesthetically appealing - WAY too much white space after it. (Initially i was going to have "boss" written in the tags).

- Item Points common/rarity - I like that idea, but... ^_^ you'd have to provide me that information. I SUCK at remember even what items you get at an item point, and I don't think anyone, anywhere, has marked the rarity. Oh, the + just kinda stayed 'cause I didn't think they were bad looking, but the original design, they were just going to be like the FOE list with no lines... it looked pretty bad. I spent most of this morning trying to figure out how the FRICK to make that list look nicer.

- Passive/Aggressive - Sounds like we just found what I can stick in that white space where you want an image to go.

- Drops redesign and "conditional" - LOVE that idea!! *Nods* DONE!

Thanks for the opinions!! :3 I'm psyched you like the colors. Of course, for EOII they'll take a green hue, naturally.

[Zaraf]

Yeah, I got a habit of liking to put in in-game images But your thing about it being a spoiler makes sense. I remember having a kind of excitement the first time I would fight a FOE to see what "this one will look like"

Ok, your monster thingy makes sense now.

Yeah, for some reason, I thought those item guide had this info...but looking through them now, I noticed that they don't. Ahh well....

One thing I remembered that I wanted to mention to you.

In my Rune Factory maps, do you notice how when you mouseover the monster machines, that not only does a box pop up that follows along with your mouse, but there is also a still image of a monster that always appears in the same location near the monster machine?

I remembered you mentioned wanting to put on FOE paths...like where they walk and stuff. You can create an image of arrows and such that outline the path the FOEs would walk, and overlay it on the correction portion of the map. Then link it together with the mouseover so that when you mouseover the FOE icon, it'll also display its movement path. When you move the mouse away, the movement path also disappears

Plus, if you use the code from the RF maps, you can click on any hotspot (wherever a pop up occurs) and it'll "lock" the box in place, and you can drag it around and stuff lol

[Maxine MagicFox]

[Zaraf]

LOL Funny how you put Aggressive along a diagonal. I like it. Funnier still is that you spelt "Aggressive wrong" haha

The numbers with the drop section aren't lined up correctly. If you are making these images in Photoshop, I suggest using a separate text box for that part where you have the list of items. That way everything can be left aligned within that box.

The special tag after the Statue Arm is kinda ambiguous. What makes it special? Having a full special section below it doesn't seem to fit either. I think it would be more appropriate to have Conditional after it, and at the bottom, just have a generic "Notes" section. In that you'll be able to put in anything pertaining to the FOE. Including how to get its conditional drop.

Also, don't be afraid to use sentences in the Notes section. Sometimes taking up a bit more space to be clear and conscise is better than trying to sum up everything in 3 words. You can make the notes text smaller if required too (like the way I have my footnotes smaller on the maps).


Also, just from an artistic point of view, since you have the aggressive, passive and stationary thingy at a diagonal, why not try to make it look like "stamped text"? You know like those "MISSION COMPLETE" things you sometimes see in war games and such? haha Just thought that might be an interesting idea

[Kimiko]

The map/popups look awesome Maxine! Must be a lot of work to put it all together though. Or is that okay since you can't play at the moment?

[Maxine MagicFox]