SEE HERE.

A custom tool was used. It may be pretty useful to add life in mapping.

Those specific maps are very cleverly designed and I'm impressive from a visual stand point.

Saying so, in terms of gameplay they would be terrible. The detail does not match, neither do the tiles. They look confusing, they're over-sized. Players have no point travelling through them. No boarders or direction for players, they'll get confused how to transfer on and off them, and too many sudden narrow then wide spaces.

So they won't be useful for developers, you won't see the pixel art on-screen in-game either. In-game it'll look like a random mess.

So in terms of adding life to your game maps, they don't add life to maps at all, they take life from them.

However, it sounds like this tool can be very useful in saving time if the designers knows and plan ahead the maps considering gameplay views.

If you are thinking "how can I make annoying maps that look impressive outside the game?", then this tool will be useless for you.

I agree with mudducky, they're not practical, it seems like a lot more work than just mapping normally. It's hardly 'special' or 'cool' mapping though.

That's exactly the point I guess.

This is quite amusing... But in the point that mudlucky said one problem is that some points of VX needs to be fix and you still have to do some changes to the map. You can't be sure at all if all will go according to your perception of the result... Anyways this looks like a useful tool... Hope to use it sometime...

Peace Out, Freedom

It's more of an artistic play with mapping than actual practical mapping. But that's pretty cool!

Well, on my World Map, I made a "crescent moon", then I turned it into a bird(little chicken) just for fun. I also made a snake... Anyway, they are good only for visuals. But I'll use them anyway, like making riddles... or caves when certain Switch is activated... etc. Think of The Legend of Zelda - Wind Waker...

Wow, that's so conceited. Transferring pixels to tiles for quick placement and he was going to charge for that otherwise? I guess that's to be expected from a person who sold Eternal Eden for $20 (which I thought was $21 too much).

I fail to see any worthwhile use of this utility. Mapping (nicely) with VX is already difficult enough without making things more complex by converting an image into a map. While it can be fun too see with a serious zoom-out, the map must look awful in-game.

And if he actually intended to charge for this... I won't say it's a rip-off, but... well, I say it after all. It's a rip-off.

My view of mapping nicely is not something that visually looks fancy and like eye-candy, though sometimes it can be too, but rather gameplay-wise fitting. What does that mean exactly?

Here is an example. Very useful advice givenl by mark333.
http://www.rpgmakervx.net/index.php?showtopic=28381

Addition to this, players can think of creative ways to make use of events on the map. Adding interaction and puzzles with their designs. Linking maps together and creating reason for players to explore maps, then rewarding them for doing so, can be a lot more fun then some eye-candy map that is too narrow and confusing to find the exit.

The RTP tiles are all perfectly fine and setup for that and yes it is difficult at first, but once you learn the basics every map starts becoming a lot easier. If you struggle with waterfalls and mountains, look at the sample maps, look at the screenshot threads around the communities, look at the tutorials around the communities. Then start to practice creating some waterfalls and mountains with the RTP and soon enough you'll find them easy.

So I have to disagree that it is difficult to map something nice. At least gameplay-wise and in the long-run. Both of which is what is really what is important.

Sure if you wish too and can make eye-candy maps with the gameplay principles in mind, then do so. I agree that could be more difficult and hopefully worth-while, but VX by default is not hard to map something nice with. You decide as the developer if you will make it simple or complex.

If you currently struggle making good maps due to the zoom and scales, try placing grids on your maps. That's currently what I am doing and it's helping a lot. Tools, Options, Grid, Valid. 17 by 13 is a good choice since that's the game screen size. It's not always going to give you an accurate grid depending on your size, but it gives you a good idea how you can actually shrink sizes of maps to be a lot smaller.

Thanks
I was trying to be nice and share, that's all.

@mudducky: I was speaking personally there. The main reason why I use XP over VX is because I have big problems with VX mapping. If you speak about mapping in general, my view on it is that it must look nice and of course be gameplay fitting.