Point-and-Click Map

You'll be seeing this a lot, but very briefly.

"Here is the map. Where do you wish to go?"

— Gwonam, Link: The Faces of Evil

A variety of interactive video game maps where the player doesn't steer the player character across the map but only has to click on the destination location to instantly go there. (Older games that have no mouse functionality, or console games, often use the directional keys instead of a cursor to make a selection, but they still count in the spirit of the trope.) Essentially, it functions like another game menu, albeit stylized and pretty. Optionally, it will have smaller-scale maps to act as sub-menus.

Accessing the global map often requires either reaching the edge of the current location or interacting with a special transporter item or character, overlapping with Warp Whistle (though not all Warp Whistles present themselves as world maps). When "traveling", the path may be tracked on the map to conceal the level loading sequence. En route, the player can be optionally interrupted by a single Random Encounter (rarely more).

At the beginning of the game, only a couple of destinations will be available, but more will be added to the map later, either by exploration (finding hidden exits from known locations), by accepting quests that lead you there, or by exploration and completing certain quests on site. If the destination has several entrance points, your original location will often determine to which of them you will teleport.

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Examples:

Action-Adventure Games

• ANNO: Mutationem: Whenever Ann enters her vehicle, the map is displayed on the screen with a cursor to choose the destination.

Adventure Games

• Each Detective Grimoire game uses a point-and-click-map to travel around each location.
• Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People uses a "map" which is constructed by the player; as more locations are discovered, the player can add them as stamps anywhere on an empty sheet of paper, and even move them around. Clicking on a stamp instantly moves you there.
• Touch Detective has the town map appear on the touch screen to quick travel towards an area whenever it pops up.
• Quite a few of the Reality-On-The-Norm games, such as Defender of RON.
• The Longest Journey had several point-and-click maps: Newport (accessible only in the subway), Marcuria (accessible by reaching the edge of a location), the Northlands, and the Alais Island. In all cases, new locations had to be unlocked by solving puzzles or advancing the overall plot.
• All five Monkey Island games feature point-and-click maps. The sea map in Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge provides increasingly weird excuses for why you can't go anywhere except for the three main islands:
  Captain Dread: "We can't go there, mon. That's the Forbidden Icosahedron!"
• Broken Sword: The Shadow of the Templars had this for travelling between its several international destinations (France, Spain, Syria, Ireland...), but later games tended to just send you from one location to another when you'd found the clues you needed.
• Paradigm uses a postcard the title character found inside a mailbox, inside a mailbox, inside his mailbox (yes, really).
• King's Quest:
  • One of the earliest known examples is from King's Quest III: To Heir Is Human, where said map is an actual Magic Map found in the wizard's bedroom. A gag in the Fan Remake done by AGD Interactive features a pirate finding the map among the protagonist's possessions and pointing at it, causing him to disappear.
  • There is an obtainable magic map in King's Quest VI: Heir Today, Gone Tomorrow. King's Quest III and King's Quest VI are the only ones in the series to feature them, and they are also the only ones in the series to star Prince Alexander.
• Three of the five Quest for Glory games have them, Quest for Glory II has one of the city of Shapeir (the Fan Remake adds one in for Raseir as well), and Quest for Glory III and Quest for Glory V have them for their respective lands.
• Many Hidden Object Games, especially more plot-heavy games like Mystery Case Files and Dark Parables, have this feature to help minimize the amount of backtracking the player needs to do to complete the various puzzles and tasks to move the story forward.

Platform Games

• The Legend of Zelda CD-i Games; Link: The Faces of Evil and Zelda: The Wand of Gamelon have menus like this.
  Gwonam: Here is the map. Where do you wish to go?
• The Super Mario Bros. franchise:
  • Super Mario Bros. 3: Every world has a map. Players select a level by moving Mario (or Luigi) on the grid (image◊). Hammer Bros. wander around the map, and attack Mario if he meets them. Each world has an airship that can fly around the map.
  • Super Mario World uses a large overworld map and six sub-maps. After Mario or Luigi completes certain levels, the terrain changes and forms new paths.
  • Super Mario Galaxy 2: While the first game used a Hub Level, the second game used a map screen, accessible from the bridge of your spaceship.
  • New Super Mario Bros.: The maps are linear affairs that progress from one level to the next. New Super Mario Bros. Wii uses 3D rendered maps, similar to the 2D maps of Super Mario Bros. 3 (even including wandering Hammer Bros).
  • Super Mario Odyssey uses a standard map screen that's accessed by tossing Cappy onto the globe that sits on the Odyssey's deck, zooming onto it so you can choose which kingdom you wish to travel to.
• A staple of the Donkey Kong Country series, including Donkey Kong Country Returns: There is one large map depicting the entire world, with each destination represented by a smaller map containing the actual levels.
• In Prince of Persia (2008), the map of the City allows you to instantly travel from any already cleansed level to any other. The game simply explains it with Elika's light-fueled teleportation power.
• Sonic Adventure 2 uses a world map like this as its level select screen.
• Eryi's Action features one. Even the map is trying to kill you.
• Dust: An Elysian Tail uses one to navigate between larger areas.
• Ghostbusters (1990) allowed you to choose where you wanted to go: Home Sweet Home; Apartment; Wooden House; High-Rise Penthouse.
• Shovel Knight features a world map system similar to the one in Super Mario Bros. 3, with stages, towns and other locales accessed by moving your character over their icons. Specter Knight's campaign ditched that in favour of a simple menu accessed by a mirror portal.

Puzzle Games

• Antichamber: One of the walls in the main room has a map of all the areas you have visited, as well as their connections to every other room. Can be useful for restarting puzzles or moving to different puzzles when stuck.
• The Cabinets of Doctor Arcana has one in the Library, which you won't be able to see until you're able to get in there (roughly a third of the way through the game). It shows all of the rooms on the first, second, and third floors of the manor, and indicates which ones you have unlocked and where you've located the keys you seek. You can click on any room you've unlocked to be taken there instantly; however, the map only goes in one direction, because it doesn't leave the library. Expect to do a lot of backtracking.
• This Starry Midnight We Make: The place where all the cutscenes / locations are activated from, the Basin for making stars is accessed, and saves are made.

RPG — Eastern

• Final Fantasy:
  • Unlike many earlier installments, Final Fantasy X and its sequel utilize a map selection-screen for traveling by your Global Airship. You can also input coordinates to access secret areas.
  • Final Fantasy Tactics used this for the main map, but you could actually still wind up in Random Encounters when crossing green (monster-filled) locations. Final Fantasy Tactics Advance had you build a map in this fashion, with the random encounters replaced by wandering ones, and Final Fantasy Tactics A2 had another predefined map.
• Mega Man Network Transmission: From Lan's room, selecting the Map from the PET menu will present a point-and-click map of ACDC Town where he can jack in Mega Man to various places to explore the cyberworld, visit Higsby's shop, or enter the Net Battle Simulator.
• Pokémon franchise:
  • In all of the titles in the main series, the Fly ability uses this interface to transport you to your chosen destination.
  • Pokémon Colosseum and its sequel Pokémon XD: Gale of Darkness, unlike most Pokémon games, use a world map selection screen for travelling between locations.
  • The Pokémon Mystery Dungeon series also uses a world map to move between destinations, although the only destinations aside from the home town/base are dungeons. A few dungeons require one party member knowing an HM move (like Fly, Surf, or Dive) to access.
  • This is how you get around in the Pokémon Trading Card Game Game Boy game.
• Legend of Mana: You get to place destinations on the map as you go, which has an effect on the monster difficulty in that area.
• Legaia II: Duel Saga features a map selection screen for picking which town or dungeon you wish to visit. Once you acquire your pirate ship you can select destinations across water. Later in the game you also acquire a flying dragon, and any time you select a non-adjacent destination, the game shows the dragon flying between destinations rather than your party leader running across the map.
• The Legend of Heroes: Trails series utilizes this once the Global Airship is available, allowing the heroes to quickly travel around to every major area they've traveled to.
• Tales Series:
  • Tales of Phantasia Narikiri Dungeon (Game Boy Color sequel to the original game) uses this due to technical limitations.
  • Tales of Symphonia: Dawn of the New World also features this.
  • Tales of Berseria uses this for sailing, since the game's set in Ocean Punk world, but lacks overworld map.
• Xenoblade Chronicles 1 gives players the option to travel between maps, via its quick travel function. Which is a good thing, because there's 20 maps and they're friggin' huge! Of course, if players prefer, they can take the scenic route.
• Sailing in Dubloon is done by talking to Timber and picking a location on the Treasure Map. Maps can be found throughout the game world that add new locations to that map, broadening your horizons (so to speak).
• This is how you moved ashore in the original Uncharted Waters: clicking on one of up to nine buildings on the port map took you there immediately. This was removed from the sequel in favor of navigable Three-Quarters View maps.
• Rogue Galaxy: While you can use save points to warp between locations within the same planet, interplanetary travel is controlled via a map screen.
• Breath of Fire IV: You travel across the map using fixed routes; Random Encounters occur as a "?" appearing above the player's head, allowing the player to enter a generic field to fight monsters and/or locate items (but are otherwise not mandatory).
• All three Shadow Hearts games utilise this form of map screen. Bigger areas like England and New York are split up into sub-maps where you can choose where you want to go in them.
• In Slayers (SNES) you select the destination from a list, and Lina's sprite immediately moves to it. By selecting "Other lands" you can switch between larger regions, for a total of six region maps.
• The Ogre Battle series has a map then minimap with the point and click interface.
• Lunar Legend replaces the overworld with a simple map selection screen. Lunar: Dragon Song does this to towns as well.
• Child of Light features an overworld, but the Map of Lemuria allows you to travel to any visited place (excluding a few dungeons) by clicking their icon on the world map.
• Dark Cloud and its sequel Dark Chronicle used this. Dark Cloud's version was a literal map given to Toan by Dran for the express purpose of making his journey easier.
• The Reconstruction makes use of this form of map, allowing you to select through the five main areas in the game: Wadassia, Nal, Fortifel, Berylbrine Outpost, and Do'Ssha. The cities themselves forgo traditional exploration for this method as well, allowing you to choose who you want to examine, whether it be one of the playable characters, an quest-giving NPC, or an NPC who will take you to a different area on city.
• Rakenzarn Frontier Story uses two. You use one to select which world you wish to visit. Once you leave an area in that world, you can then select which area you want to visit next.
• Super Mario Bros.
  • Super Mario RPG: The map is divided into several screens progressing in a circular fashion, and you can travel between any available destination at any time.
  • Mario & Luigi:
    • Minion Quest: The Search for Bowser, the alternate mode of the Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga remake, uses this in two layers: one as a standard world map, and two for selecting missions.
    • In Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story, navigation inside Bowser's body utilizes one to make backtracking easier. Especially since there are certain parts where you have to go back to repeatedly (i.e. the area where the Bros. play a minigame to make Bowser grow big).
  • Paper Mario:
    • Paper Mario: Sticker Star: Instead of being one giant world to trek across, much like the other Paper Mario games, this game uses a world map system that is like a mix of Super Mario World and Super Mario RPG, because of the fact that each level has tons of exploration, secret exits, and some levels can be entered early (although you cannot progress any further if you do not have certain moves/items).
    • Paper Mario: Color Splash: Like Sticker Star, except with the areas not using the standard numbering convention (e.g., World 1-1). The map starts out in sepia tones, but gradually refills with color as Mario finds Paint Stars.
• Rakenzarn Tales moved to this from an Overworld Not to Scale type for version 4. It gives the option of either selecting your destination from a list or manually scrolling the world map to find it.
• Panzer Dragoon Saga presents the overworld this way; you can also press a button to get an overview of how far the forces of both General Craymen and the Imperial Fleet have advanced in occupying the continent.

RPG — MMO

• The planetary maps function as this trope in Star Wars: The Old Republic for the purpose of fast travel and taxi destination section. Though, of course, you have to unlock individual travel destinations on foot before you can co there. Also, the galactic map, accessible once you get your own starship, works like this.
• In Granblue Fantasy, all islands and the quests provided therein are accessible by simply clicking on them. Additionally, the Arcarum Map is this, and the "locations" are represented by nodes, in which the player can freely move back and forth once discovered.
• This is the primary interface for Kingdom of Loathing. You go from the Main Map to one of the nine sub locations, and then maybe to sub-sub locations, until you get to a point where you can adventure.
• Starting missions in Warframe is done by accessing your orbiter's navigation console, which presents you a 2D map of the Solar System with mission nodes that are unlocked by completing missions in adjoining nodes.

RPG — Western

• All Infinity Engine games featured this in some form:
  • The Baldur's Gate series had the maps of the Sword Coast and Amn (I and II, respectively). The first game's map had a rather obvious square grid structure, where if you wanted to unlock the location east of you, you had to reach the east edge of your current location, etc.. Also, the travel times were tracked on the In-Universe Game Clock: further destinations resulted in longer travel.
  • Planescape: Torment uses it to let you move around Sigil, with more locations unlocked as you figure out ways to move around the Chaos Architecture of the city.
  • Ditto the Icewind Dale series, with the maps of the eponymous region.
• Like Baldur's Gate, which some of its devs worked on, Neverwinter Nights 2 and its first expansion Mask of the Betrayer use this model. Contrast with the first game which had you hoof it from place to place, and the second expansion Storm of Zehir which uses an overworld map.
• In the Dragon Age series:
  • Dragon Age: Origins had the map of Ferelden (Amaranthine in the expansion) that functioned similarly to Baldur's Gate II. Destinations were unlocked by exploration and quests, you could get ambushed, and there were sub-maps for the Deep Roads and Denerim. Due to lack of an in-game clock, however, you were always Traveling at the Speed of Plot.
  • Dragon Age II had the map of Kirkwall (by day and by night), as well as the Wounded Coast region nearby. The random encounters were removed (there was only a single plot-triggered one).
  • Dragon Age: Inquisition is similar to Origins, except it has a map of Orlais in addition to Ferelden. The world map actually exists in-universe as the centerpiece of the title organization's war room, from which its operations are launched. Also, you now have to unlock individual locations on the map by having the Inquisition scouts reconnoiter them for you and establish the first camp in each area. The only exceptions are quest locations which are (temporarily) available at certain quest stages.
• Mass Effect has several layers of these, going from a map of the clusters in the galaxy, to the stars in the cluster, to the planets in the star system. In the sequels, only the top Portal Network level of the galaxy map is point-and-click; to move within star systems and from star to star, you have to manually navigate the ship.
• Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines had the map of Los Angeles, accessible by speaking to a cabbie. The four major hubs (Santa Monica, Downtown, Hollywood, and Chinatown) were unlocked as the main quest progressed, while additional quest locations were added to it as you picked them up. There were no random encounters while traveling.
• In The Elder Scrolls series:
  • Daggerfall opened up the sandbox with all cities and dungeons marked on the province map. However, you had to acquire corresponding quests to know where to go next. Travel was only possible from outdoors locations.
  • Although Oblivion is an (almost) seamless Wide-Open Sandbox, its in-game map of Cyrodiil functions like this for those who don't have time to enjoy the Scenery Porn. Apart from the main cities, you have to visit a place to be able to quick travel to it, though it's possible to get a given location marked on your map to make it easier to find.
  • Skyrim modifies the Oblivion approach: you can't go anywhere via quick travel before you've been there the old-fashioned way, but the larger cities (Markarth, Riften, Solitude, Whiterun, and Windhelm) have stables outside the city wall where you can hire a cart to take you to any of the main cities: the five named above, plus Dawnstar, Falkreath, Morthal, and Winterhold.
• Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas (which use the same engine as Oblivion), as well as Fallout 4 have a similar system (you had to visit a place to quick travel to it), however the map starts off with no markers whatsoever.
• Evil Islands features multiple locations connected only via travel points. Accessing them summons the world map, where you can choose to travel either to the adjacent area's travel points or any area you have previously unlocked by completing quests there.
• In another Russian RPG, GoldenLand (a.k.a. Heath: The Unchosen Path), the world map is accessed on reaching the edge of the location. From there one can travel to any available location, from permanent hubs to temporary quest locations. The progress is tracked on the map and you can be ambushed along the way.
• BloodNet's is a map of New York with several markers on it, with more appearing as the game progresses; clicking on a marker brings up a list of all the locations in that area.
• Although all levels in Path of Exile are randomly generated, their position on the map of Wraeclast is static, allowing your progress to be tracked on it. The world map helpfully shows you which levels feature Waypoints and which of them you have already activated, and, when called from a Waypoint, allows you to instantly travel to any other activated Waypoint.
• The Master-level Town Portal spell in Might and Magic VI to IX uses this. With the exception of VI, you have to have visited the target towns before teleporting to them, though thankfully the game tracks that even before you get the spell.
• Arcanum: Of Steamworks & Magick Obscura gives the option to quick-travel to known locations and unknown coordinates on your world map. Given the fact, that journeys can take ingame weeks and real life hours, and that 98% of the world contain nothing but monotonous, empty landscape, you will learn to make use of it before reaching the second town.

Other

• Fate/Grand Order:
  • Each singularity has its map to navigate. The most notable is America's which shows which area each faction is currently in control of during the story and where other characters not in your party are battling.
  • All crossover events and the Halloween, Summer, Onigashima, and GudaGuda Strange Tales of the Imperial Holy Grail events have these. Unlike the story maps where everything is slowly unlocked, certain nodes were time-locked and would only open after a certain day or would only be unlocked after obtaining event items. The first Halloween event's map stands out since it had several hidden details on it that hinted at what times new quests would be available for each day.
• In Magia Record: Puella Magi Madoka Magica Side Story, this is used to navigate single-raid events and most of Chapter 7.
• No Man's Sky has one that shows systems within its massive universe. Selecting one system gives you information about it (assuming it had already been explored) as well as an option to engage your ship's Hyperdrive to go to that system.
• Dawn of War: Dark Crusade: Travel is limited to neighboring provinces until you conquer the planet's spaceport, at which point the map becomes this trope (except for strongholds).
• While Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity uses the same map as the one from Breath of the Wild, in lieu of exploration, the player will just choose markers on the map to go through missions and quests.

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