Hey guys. I think, maps should be labeled to a certain extent. Especially if there are several areas. I added names of towns and caves on my maps so you would know what is what, but also included an UN-labeled map as well for those who dislike a lot of labels on their maps. But the goal of the map as a whole is to provide direction.
If you are supposed to go to "Cape Map Me" and there are lots of locations on the map that aren't labeled, you don't know which is which.
It's also a good idea if you wish to label your maps, try and keep it as clean as possible like, for instance, have your maps legend on the map in an area other than where the actual map is. Have them labeled for locations in a nice numbered or lettered list to the right, left, top, bottom. And, instead of writing the whole name of the location above the town/cave etc on the actual map, you can simply use just a letter, or number and it should match that on the map legend.
I didn't do this with my Gargoyle's Quest II world map but to compensate it I also made that UN-labeled or Unmarked world map as well. Sometimes the design of the game map limits you to how organized you can make your map design and that also should be taken into consideration. It's not always possible to make your maps neat and tidy, and understandable without thinking closely about the game maps design.
A game maps design like The Legend of Zelda (NES) is pretty easy to label without cluttering up the actual map cause you can easily use a grid using A1, A2 etc going across the top and left of the map and marking those locations on the Map Legend, making your map nice to look at and easy to navigate. Some other games use oddball designs and you have to compensate for that to make it look presentable, and pretty.
those are my thought on the matter. Hope this helps some for understanding whether labeled or unlabeled is best. But as mentioned, different mappers like to do it certain ways that they feel present the game player with clean, concise direction.
