Maps are great for decoration and not a whole lot else. Using them to travel is needlessly cumbersome. We can fix that.
Instead of just giving us a mini-map, which I know is never going to happen, give us a special slot in the players inventory. In it you would place a map, and it will display in the left or right corner (togglable of course). The more zoomed out the map, the more useful it is for exploring and getting your bearings. Pressing M would bring up an overlay that takes up the screen.
This way you will need to make maps and combine them, necessitating exploration first beforehand. By doing this, it would actually be worthwhile to always have maps on you to fill and bring back to your base to combine for use in the Map Slot. You will have to physically travel to points of interest and place a banner for them to appear on the map. Locking maps will give you a mini-map of the area as it was when it was locked, and wont update when you travel through the updated area, allowing players to maintain secret areas and POI while still being able to share maps. On multiplayer you could do mapmaking as a profession and sell maps to others.
Essentially, it would have all of the features of maps and map walls as they are now, except portable and much more user friendly, while leaving you to use your offhand for better things. As it is now its simply not very useful to use maps , especially in hairy situations. The best of both worlds.
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