Cartographers

I love the read and write game but this is a bad mobile app cashgrab on steam without any proper value. Playing board games virtually should take less "hassle" than the original game. Since it either saves time or you'd be able to play it online. No fullscreen No multiplayer Scoring is off (negative value) (...) Just a shame, this could have shone some light on one of my favourite games.

The game itself is great. A nice design of draw-and-write that gives real creative agency to the players and that shines on computer screens when you get to see the various terrains in different colors. Unfortunately, this adaptation is really lacking, primarily (I suspect) because it was a quick and dirty port from a mobile version. Among the issues. 1. Screen is a tiny column in the middle of the your screen, making everything hard to read. 2. Achievements come up silently with no announcement and no explanation of what they are, and they aren't integrated into Steam achievements anyway. 3. Final scoring is opaque. (It's because this is the solo game scoring and there's scant explanation of how it works.) 4. Hand-in-hand with that, no multiplayer play of any type. 5. Setup is annoying with you having to go to a settings page to choose different maps/cards/rules and then start the game. 6. And most of those setups (e.g., the Hero cards) don't have any explanation. (They're buried in the sparse rules page, not listed as mouseovers on the setup page. 7. In fact, there aren't mouseovers or tool tips. They're mostly missing, but some require clicks (another coarse transition from mobile play). 8. THE GAME SOMETIMES CRASHES AFTER A SCORING ROUND. Maybe one game in five isn't playable because all the interfaces die after scoring!!! I mean for $6, the game is probably worth it despite this low level of attention from the developer, but I also suspect my play will be limited due to annoyance with the small screen, the setup, and the lack of multiplayer play. (So maybe you should go play the recently released BoardGameArena version instead.)

no multiplayer cant play with friends :( game seems simple :S

I have extremely mixed feelings about this but I'll give a grudging thumbs up because I love the original game and this is a mechanically faithful adaptation. When I heard there was an app version I instantly bought it on my Android Phone and this is the same as that version. I got even more excited when I saw there was a Steam version since I'm more of a PC gamer than a phone gamer. On the phone it's a pretty good adaptation but [i]nothing[/i] has been done to adapt it for PC. It [i]works[/i] in the barest functional sense that you can play the game, but by default it opens in a very small window and the text is hard to read at the default resolution on a 1440p monitor. There are no visual or display options in the settings and if you press F11 it does fullscreen the game and make it widescreen, but in going widescreen it cuts off the top and bottom of the screen and you can't see crucial information. I eventually found that you [i]can[/i] resize the vertical windowed mode by dragging the edges of the screen, but again, there's nothing that tells you this and you're expected to find out yourself. That aside, the game itself is great, but that's more praising the brilliance of the original designers of the board game than anything done on the digital version. There are critiques i could make that apply to both the PC and mobile versions, such as the lack of real multiplayer but this is a game that's also fun to play solo and even playing with friends it's fairly solitaire except for when you're laying down demons on their map, so doing the multiplayer as a score attack mode is a fairly clever adaptation. Something else I'd critique both digital versions for is the complete lack of sound when you open the game. There is some sound and music while you actually play, but I legitimately thought something was broken or muted when I opened this on the phone. [i]Cartographers[/i] is a great game, but only because the game it's based on is amazing. If you want to play it digitally I'd say get it on your phone and I imagine this'll be pretty nice when I install the Android version on my 11 inch tablet, but this PC version's technical aspects are pretty poor and only skates by on it's still-amazing gameplay.

Сама настольная игра увлекательная и в своем жанре стала первооткрывателем, который задал моду на рол-н-райты, однако вот цифровая версия сделана спорно и в этом нужно разобраться. В настольной игре несколько игроков ходят одновременно, самостоятельно выбирая где и какую из предложенных в данный момент игрой фигур нарисовать. В цифровой версии же это заменено на еженедельный рейтинг. Есть два типа рейтингов. Первый, так сказать "строгий", в котором каждый раз будут выходить в одном и том же порядке и карты подсчёта очков и карты исследований. И второй, так сказать "произвольный", в котором все игроки соревнуются с одинаковыми картами подсчёта очков, но вот карты исследований будут выходить каждый раз случайные. Т.е. вроде бы как это должно избавлять от ожидания хода другого игрока и даёт померяться своим итоговым счётом с другими игроками в идентичных условиях. По сути это же и происходит в настольной игре, только с ограниченным количеством игроков. Но вот что является неоспоримым минусом цифровой версии, так это интерфейс и звуковое оформление, а точнее абсолютно наплевательское отношении разработчиков к этим двум. Стимовская версия тупо перенесена с мобильных телефонов без каких-либо изменений, т.е. всё вытянуто по вертикали. Она даже не запускается в полноэкранном режиме, а если нажать F11, то игра просто обрежется по верхнему и нижнему краям. С натяжкой рекомендую только за то, что сама настолка хороша, а также за то, что разработчики не распилили игру на DLC, а сразу включили в неё дополнения Герои и Undercity.

Bad mobile port. Runs in a tiny window covering 1/5 of the screen

Some visual glitches and the game lacks content but it is fun.

I own the mobile app, and I was disappointed with it then. I knew this was a mobile port, but I bought it anyways so I could leave this review. I went through this effort because Cartographers is one of my favorite board games and it is very disappointing to see the digital version go so poorly. Zero ongoing support. No multiplayer. Terrible tutorial. Terrible, compressed audio when played through headphones. The one new feature isn't even advertised, press F11 for fullscreen. DO NOT BUY THIS GAME. REFUNDING BECAUSE I CAN JUST PLAY ON MY PHONE.

This is an extremely poor implementation of a great tabletop game. It's basically a web app packaged for mobile. It runs in a vertical window. If you click on privacy policy, it opens the publisher website (?) in German without language selection or any controls to go back, so your only option is to close the game and start again. There's no interactive tutorial to introduce the game concepts and explain the rules, instead all you get is the giant wall of text with some diagrams. You're honestly better off playing a mod for the TableTop Simulator at this point.

I recommend this game because it's a faithful digital adaptation of the game. The only downside to this is that it's a straight mobile port. I'll play the game because I enjoy it, but I don't particularly enjoy a vertical window on my PC monitor. I would love a fullscreen option, even if it's just the map sheet in the center of the screen and a nice background image. Other than that one issue, I think the game plays well, and it has expansion content, too.