I could have sworn there was a tool out there for creating level map images for NES games. Am I wrong? Is it the feature of an emu I am not remembering? Ten minutes of Googling and searching this forum seem to say "Yeah, you're wrong."
There might be tools for specific games, but there's no way one single tool will be able to rip maps from several games because each game stores maps differently. People who make level maps often reverse engineer the level encoding techniques or hack the games to take full control of the camera (allowing them to move around freely to take screenshots).
Bisqwit's animmerger, in combination with a recorded gameplay video, will
mostly DWYW, but it's not automated.
That makes sense. Thanks tokumaru.
Thanks lidnariq, I'll check out animmerger.