The 8-Bit Atlas

The 8-bit Map of the USA is an animated map of the United States in the style of a vintage 8-bit computer game. This pictorial map features 8-bit representations of popular tourist destinations from across the country.

The 8-Bit Map of the USA is just an animated GIF so you can't actually zoom in on areas of the map. If you want to explore locations around the world in a little more detail (as much detail as 8-Bit allows) then you could refer to 8-Bit Cities.


Back in 2010 Bret Camper released 8-Bit City - New York, an interactive 8-Bit map of New York, which resembled the maps used in 1980's computer games.

Since 2010 8-Bit City has expanded in scope and you can now view 8-Bit maps of 18 cities around the world. These 8-bit maps use data from OpenStreetMap which is then processed in a custom rendering engine, built by Brett, to create the map tiles for each interactive city map.


If you want to view a fully interactive 8-Bit map of the world then you should have a look at the Super Mario Map of the World. This interactive map was styled in Mapbox Studio to resemble the 8-bit maps used in the Super Mario computer games.

If you want to learn more about how the map data was styled to resemble an 8-Bit map then you can read the Designing a Super Mario Map with Mapbox Studio Classic on the Mapbox Blog.

The Book Map Quiz

The writer Frank Cottrell-Boyce started an interesting discussion on Twitter recently about novels (and other books) which include fictional maps. Most of you reading this will be familiar with the map from the Lord of the Rings and The Game of Thrones. Frank's Twitter thread also discusses the role of maps in Ursula K. Le Guin's Earthsea Cycle, in Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island and even in John Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress.

If you read the thread on Twitter you can also view all the replies in which other Twitter users add their own examples of books which have fictional maps.

Frank's discussion of fictional maps reminded me of a Guardian quiz which tests whether you can Identify the Book from its Map. This Guardian quiz shows you ten fictional maps and simply asks you to pick the correct book from a choice of four. If you like the Guardian's book map quiz then you might also like The Guardian's Can you guess the city from the literary quote? quiz. This quiz tests your ability to recognize cities as described by famous authors.

You might also like to test your map knowledge with these other Guardian map quizzes:

Can you guess the world city from its cold war Soviet spy map?
Can you identify these cities from their historic maps?
Can you identify world cities from their running heatmaps?
Can you identify these world cities from space?

Medieval Map Wizards

The Medieval Fantasy City Generator is a fun tool for creating random fictional maps of medieval towns. Just choose your size of town or city and the Wizard of Maps will magically create your very own fantasy medieval map.

All the maps created by the Medieval Fantasy City Generator include a number of similar features. Each town or city is centered around a central market place. Each town is surrounded by a city wall. The city wall has up to four gates, where up to four roads enter the city. All of these roads end at the central market. A castle is also placed somewhere along each city's wall.

The Medieval Fantasy City Generator has some development potential. A church / cathedral could be another random element added to each generated map. The generator could also include a random chance of having a river run through the town or city. For now, however, I'm happy to settle for my generated map of Keirstown, the smartest little town in all of medieval Clarkeshire.

The Photo Quiz Map

Map Channels has decided to give the Panoramio API one last glorious fanfare as it slips ignobly into the great software graveyard of Google's many deprecated and abandoned projects. Google has announced that its photo application Panoramio will be shut down on November 4th. This means that you only have a few days to play Map Channel's new Photo Quiz Map.

Photo Quiz Maps uses the Panoramio API to place 10 random photos on a Google Map. The object of the game is to identify where each photo was taken. After you choose a location in Photo Quiz Maps a photo is displayed in the map sidebar. Ten markers are also displayed on a Google Map. All you have to do is choose the marker where the photograph was taken.

You get ten points if you guess correctly first time. If you guess correctly on your second try you are awarded nine points - and so on. If you guess all ten photos correctly with your first picks you can score a total of 100 points.

How many points can you get?

If you like Photo Quiz Map then you might also enjoy Map Channel's Treasure Maps game. Treasure Maps helps you easily set-up and create your own treasure hunt games with Google Maps and Google Street View. If you don't want to create your own Treasure Hunt games you can try to solve one of the three featured games instead.

The Great Global Treasure Hunt

You can now create your own Treasure Map games on Google Maps. Map Channels has released a new simple to use platform which you can use to create your own treasure hunt map games.

Treasure Maps helps you easily set-up a treasure hunt game with Google Maps and Google Street View. You just need to add a few locations (and a few clues to find the locations) and you can then share your treasure hunt game with anyone that you want.

Before creating your own treasure hunt you might want to play some of the games already made with Treasure Maps. For example, the Tour of London treasure map requires you to find and locate 15 famous landmarks in the English capital. Your task is to follow the clues to find each location on the map. A large circle on the map shows you the current search area. As you get closer to the correct location on the map the circle gets smaller, narrowing down the area you need to search and helping you in your quest to find the correct location.

If you create your own treasure hunt game with Treasure Maps you can share the link to the game with your friends or you can embed the game in your own website or blog.

Monday's Map Games

It's always a good idea to ease your way into the working week by spending a little time playing a fun map game. So let's start this Monday with Posio, a multi-player geography game.

Posio is very similar to a lot of other games built with interactive maps. You are given the name of a city and all you have to do is click where you think the city is on a map of the world. However what makes Posio really fun is that you get to pit your geographical knowledge against other players.

As ever you are awarded points based on how close you get to the correct location on each turn.

If you want to clone the game the code is available on GitHub.


If you still need some distraction from work then why not have a go at the Guardian's latest geo-quiz, Identify World Cities from their Running Heatmaps? In this little quiz you need to try and identify ten world cities from the GPS tracks of Strava joggers and cyclists.

For each question you get a map and three possible answers. All you have to do is click on the correct answer. It's that easy!

Street Wars - The Platform Menace

It's time for you to decide whose side you are really on. Are you going to fight for the Dark Side or will you take up arms in support of the Rebel Android forces?

Street Wars: Episode 1 - The Platform Menace is a new Google Maps game which forces you to choose  between fighting for the Imperial Overlord Siths (iOS) or for the Android Rebels. After deciding which side you are on you will be asked to enter your location. You will then be presented with a short introductory report presented on top of a nearby Street View scene.

The game itself is simple to play. You will be shown a number of Street View images. All you have to do is click on a map to show where you think the Street View is located. You will then be awarded points based on how close you guessed to the real location.

After you have guessed the locations of all the Street View images you will be shown your grand total and where you stand in the high score tables.

Good luck! And may the force be with you.

View Your House on an 8-Bit Game Map

The Real Game Map Generator is a clever OpenStreetMap based tool to create an 8-bit game world map from any real world location. Just enter your address into the map and you can create a little game world map of your own neighborhood.

I've no idea how this works. My guess is that the application looks at the color of the underlying OpenStreetMap map tiles and then uses these colors to create the game map. Green colors on OpenStreetMap are likely to be parks, blue is likely to be water and orange will be roads. Presumably the application has a number of set game map tiles which it can then use for each of these features identifies on OpenStreetMap.

The Witcher III Leaflet Map

The Witcher III Interactive Map is a Leaflet.js powered map of Velen and Novigrad within the Northern Kingdoms.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is an action role-playing video game set in an open world environment. The Witcher games are based on the books of the same name by the Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski.

This new interactive map of The Witcher III game world, like most interactive game world maps, includes the option to view important locations within the game. These points of interest can be turned on & off on the map by using the options in the map side-panel.

The Witcher III interactive map also includes a comprehensive search option which allows you to search for important locations within the game by name. The search option is powered by the leaflet-search plugin. Leaflet-search is a powerful customized search engine which you can add to Leaflet map to allow users to easily search for markers/features on the map by a custom property.

The Maps Quiz

Quizzity is a nicely designed map quiz built using the Leaflet mapping library. The quiz itself follows a familiar format, requiring you to pinpoint a series of locations and awarding points for the closeness of your answer.

After guessing five locations you are given your final score, the average distance you guessed from the correct location and the distance of your best answer. Quizzity also keeps track of your best score so there is some incentive to keep on playing.

The source for Quizzity is also available on GitHub.

Zombies on Your Street

Are There Zombies in Your Neighbourhood? is a fun Street View application which allows you to view a zombie walking down your street. Enter an address into the app and you can watch an animated zombie walking down your street using Google Maps Street View imagery.

As the zombie walks down your street you can adjust the viewpoint and even adjust the size of the zombie. You can also grab the URL of your Street View animation which makes it easy to share your zombie Street View with friends.

I couldn't get Are There Zombies in Your Neighbourhood? to work on Firefox or Internet Explorer but it worked fine in Chrome.

The Real World GTA V Map

If you are a big fan of GTA V then you might want to visit some of the landmarks from the game in real life. Apparently many of the buildings and landmarks used in the game are based on real-world counterparts in Los Angeles and Southern California.

The Los Santos Landmarks Map is a GTA V map which compares buildings and landmarks in Los Santos with the real landmarks and buildings that they were modeled on. If you click on a marker on the map or choose a building from the map sidebar you can compare photos of the landmark - from the game and from its real-life counterpart. You can also view a small Google Map satellite view of the real-world building and click-through to view its location on Google Maps.

If you just want to view an interactive map of Los Santos and the location of important locations in the game then check-out the GTA 5 Map.

The Quiz From Above

Quartz has put together a fun quiz which requires you to identify locations around the world from their satellite images. While the game won't win any prizes for originality it is one of the better made games using this now well known format.

One of the biggest problems with asking people to guess the locations depicted in a series of satellite views is in the choice of images. There is always the danger in these types of quiz in picking locations which are either so obscure that most people will be unable to identify the locations or so obvious that there is little skill involved in getting the correct answer.

The View From Above seem to have got the balance of obscure and more recognizable locations just about right. They have also succeeded in putting together a collection of visually appealing and beautiful satellite views. It also helps that The View From Above gives you a choice of two answers for each question, so even if you don't have a clue to the location depicted, you still have a 50% chance of getting an answer right.

Old School Sim City

Who isn't a fan of Will Wright's classic SimCity game?

Would be town planners around the world have had hours of fun building cities in SimCity. Over the years the game has become more and more realistic but has also maybe become a little too complicated for some. Well old school gamers can now recreate the simple fun of the original game in two new online versions of the original classic game.

Micropolis.JS is a port of the original SimCity game created with JavaScript. The game includes all the features of the original game and requires you to build residential, commercial and industrial zones. To ensure that your city continues to grow you will need to plan carefully to ensure you have enough power stations. You will also need to keep your town's citizens happy by keeping crime and pollution to a reasonable level.


3D City is another port of the original game. The game-play is exactly the same as SimCity classic, however 3D City uses WebGL to turn your created town into a proper 3D world. Therefore as your town grows you can pan around and rotate the world and zoom in and out to get a closer look at the buildings sprouting up in your burgeoning metropolis.

Unfortunately 3D City doesn't seem to have a save option, so each time you play you have to start your city from scratch. You will also obviously need a WebGL enabled browser to play 3D City.

The Interactive Map Jigsaw

If you've been furiously clicking away trying to beat your hi-score on MapQuiz then it could be time to take a break and try out a more sedate and relaxed geo-game.

GeoJigsaw is an inspired interactive map jigsaw from Esri. The game allows you to select jumbled up maps from around the world. All you have to do is to put all the jigsaw pieces back together to complete the map.

You can select map jigsaw puzzles to play by location or by difficulty level. If you can't find a map that you like don't worry. You can just zoom in on any location in the world and create your own map jigsaw puzzle.

World Champion Geographer

I am the geographic champion of the world.

Okay, I'm not. That title is currently held by Frederick B. But I am the fifth highest scorer today on the Esri MapQuiz. Which is good enough for me.

MapQuiz is a your geographic literacy game which tests how well you can recognize satellite imagery from different locations around the world. Log-in to MapQuiz with a Facebook account and you will be shown a series of satellite images. All you have to do is guess the correct location from four suggestions.

You are awarded points for each location that you get correct and for how quickly you can answer. After you have completed six rounds of the game you can compare your score against today's top scores, the top scores recorded this month, the best this year and the all time top scores.

I'm warning you though you will have to go some to beat me!

Creating Games with Mapbox

Mapbox has published a nice introduction to web maps, called An Open Platform. The article includes a couple of example maps, created by Tom MacWright, which demonstrate how Mapbox can be used to create non-road maps. Tom's maps demonstrate how you can use your own map tiles with Mapbox to produce other types of interactive maps.

Tom MacWright's Super Mario Brothers Map uses screenshots from the classic Nintendo video game as the basis for an interactive map. The map is a fairly basic example of the video game interactive map genre.

If you browse through the games label on Maps Mania you will find many other examples of interactive maps created with map tiles taken from video game worlds. Using a web mapping platform like Mapbox, Leaflet or the Google Maps API it is possible to not only map game worlds but to add markers to the resulting interactive maps. Markers can therefore be used to highlight important locations within the mapped games.


Tom's other example map is a neat demonstration of how web mapping platforms can also be used to create web games. A Big Maze uses map tiles of a large maze to create a zoomable map, Some simple interactivity has been added to the map by adding hit detection to the maze walls. This means that you can try to solve the maze. When you mouse-over a wall you will be told!


Game on With Mapbox and Tilemill takes this concept a little further. Game On is an awesome little demo of how you can create a simple computer game using the Mapbox mapping platform. The game is hosted on Codepen so you can see at a glance how the game works and even use the JavaScript panel to get clues as to how to win the game.

The game world base map tiles were created with Tilemill. The player's character is a marker added to the map. You can move the character marker around by using the 'wasd' keys on your keyboard (use 'e' for action). Collision detection is created by creating a bounding area polygon for the room.

This is a great little demo of how you can create a game with Mapbox. All the code is there so you could easily create your own fully functioning computer game with this code and the Mapbox platform.

The Best Map of Springfield - Ever!

It is a disgrace that nine years after the release of Google Maps, Google still haven't managed to properly map one of America's most loved towns. Luckily where ever Google fails Esri comes to the rescue.

Look up Springfield on Playgis and you will find a gloriously detailed map of this most famous of American towns. From the world's first ever Kwik-E-Mart to Springfield Elementary School, this Spingfield map has it all. You can even use the map to look up the address of individual families, for example the Simpsons family at 742 Evergreen Terrace.

Even though this is undoubtedly the best Simpsons map ever - I still want more. Where is the Springfield Street View (I bet even Shelbyville has Street View by now)? I also want driving directions. I need to know the quickest way to the Kwik-E-Mart and to the Springfield Nuclear Power Plant (preferably with real-time traffic conditions).

Another thing missing from the map is transit directions. It would be handy to know which bus I should get home from a late night at Moe's Tavern. However, nit-picking aside, this is still the Springfield map I've ever seen. It's quite possibly the best map ever.

Grab Your Jetpack & Explore the World

Over the years there have been quite a few attempts to make interactive games using the 3d capabilities of the Google Earth browser plug-in. YoubeQ is a new multi-player driving and flight simulator which has come closer than most in creating an engaging game using Google Earth.

A Google Earth driving and flight simulator is nothing new in itself. There are already a number of driving and flight simulators which allow you to explore the world in 3d using the Google Earth browser. Where YoubeQ stands out is in its upgrade and player interaction options.

In Youbeq you start off with a Segway at the ESPN World of Sports Complex. To upgrade your vehicle and unlock new locations you need to explore the 3d map. Your incentive to play the game is therefore to unlock new locations and upgrade to better vehicles. Cover enough miles on your Segway and you can upgrade to a jetpack and start exploring the world from the air.

Another engaging aspect of Youbeq is that you can communicate and interact with other players. You can click on player icons and even switch to watching them play the game. You can chat with them via text chat and you can even use a microphone or webcam to talk to them directly.

Sounds on Street View - The Game

Back in March I made a little demonstration map using the Web Speech API. The Speaking Map allows you to click anywhere on a Google Map to listen to the address clicked on being spoken by your computer. The Web Speech API isn't widely supported yet - so to hear the map talk you will have to use a compliant browser. In this case you will probably need to view the Speaking Map in Chrome.

At the time I did wonder if anyone else might use the Web Speech API to create a map which was a little more useful. Internet agency Netro has now created a Street View game using the Web Audio API. This game might not be any more useful than my little demo map, but it sure is a lot more fun.

In the game you are teleported to a Street View location somewhere in the world. The object of the game is to follow the audio clues to find objects nearby. The game is a kind of 'hot or cold' searching game, as you get closer to the correct destination the audio clues get louder. Go in the wrong direction and the sound becomes quieter.

The Day Google Street View Stood Still has a number of levels. When you finish a level you are told how many steps you have taken and how long it took you to reach the correct destination. If you make one of the top ten quickest times you can even add your name to the high-score table.

Hat-tip: Google Street View World