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Comment on Eye of the Beholder: C64 Portparent

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I ended up downloading a program that mapped the level as I played it

What's the program? I've never heard of something similar, and sometimes I've wondered if they exists :)

Maybe https://ase.zorbus.net/ ?

Note that at least one EOB game (probably all of them) involve teleportation traps that you're supposed to have to catch by watching your compass as you move - an automapper would instantly reveal that you'd been teleported, spoiling the effect.

It's definitely a different experience playing with an automapper. I played the game with grid paper as a kid, sometimes memorizing the easier levels and sometimes laboriously mapping out the levels as I went. I played EOB2 with the maps in the official clue book, only referencing them when I was stuck.

When I played again with ASE, I found that I was mostly staring at the map the whole time - literally playing the game on the map itself. A lot of the magic was gone.

When I played again with ASE, I found that I was mostly staring at the map the whole time - literally playing the game on the map itself. A lot of the magic was gone.

I find that with modern games a lot - I spend my time looking at the map and not the world in front of me.

There's also a non-free program called Grid Cartographer which is aimed mostly at tabletop game developers, I think, but it can also be used for playing old RPGs. It supports EOB and EOB2 and a few other games.

http://gridcartographer.com/

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