Can just any old person vote? If so:
Idea - Misj'
Atmosphere - Kastchey
Design - gameboy
Composition - gameboy
Functionality - oraxon
Technique - Kastchey
I feel like Misj's is, on the face of it, the most accomplished of these, but I'm drawn to the maps drawn by Kastchey and gameboy the most.
Katschey has effectively recreated the warmth of the photograph in the pixels of his map, though I'm not sure how functional those text boxes are. I would like to see a version without them, or maybe in the game, they would pop up as you hovered over the hotspots of the different locations.
Gameboy's map has somehow achieved a great amount of detail for the amount of pixels he allowed himself. I especially like the parking lot in the bottom right for some reason. I especially like that this map could be diegetic, like the map of the town in Full Throttle, with a character sprite running around in it. As a minor critique, I wonder if the color of the sand on the beach might not be reversed -- sand drenched with water from the waves being darker than that dried by the sun.
Oraxon's made a nice overhead map, all the locations easy to see because of the labels. I wish there were a greater range of values, so that my eye were drawn more to the locations themselves. I love the place names.
Misj's map is especially interesting, because it's a map that would, in essence, represent a number of maps with slight changes (the dot). As I said, it's quite well done, and probably deserves to win, but subjectively, I'm drawn to Katschey and gameboy's maps more.
Someone has to be the least favorite, and unfortunately for me in this round, that's Puzzler's map, which is a bit too photorealistic for my tastes, which is, again, completely subjective. I actually really like the first draft, the overview map of the town square from a viewpoint only slightly above the roofline. I wish you'd stuck with that one.
Take all of these opinions with the grain of salt that represents the fact that I've never drawn a game background in my life!
