Carto (2020)

I went into Carto with extremely low expectations. The cutesy watercolor art style just isn’t my favorite, and I never expect too much out of a pure puzzle game. But this does so many things exceptionally well, that I just could not put it down.

First of all, I love when a puzzle game truly works the puzzles into the world. It feels like a symbiotic relationship, not just isolated puzzles slapped on top of some storyline- the mechanics itself does a lot of the world building here.

And the puzzles are outstanding. The main mechanic involves opening your map, and rearranging tiles of the world’s map grid to reorganize how things connect. It sounds one-dimensional, but the game keeps it so fresh and creative and so well engineered for the entire 10 hour run time.

It’s extremely unique, well built, and just a blast start to finish. My only complaint is personal taste, but I found the dialogue and lore to be.. a little generic and cutesy (as expected). But it didn’t matter, the core gameplay is pretty much perfect with only a couple minor frustrating moments. Highly recommend this one.

Life’s been a little hectic recently and none of the games I was firing up seemed to click. Finally landed on Carto, and it was exactly what I didn’t know I needed: Adventure game goals, jigsaw and tile puzzle mechanics (which get reasonably challenging but never impenetrable), and overall warm vibes. My time spent playing this went by very quickly.

I do have some minor presentational nitpicks. The characters are so small and Carto is so desaturated that I caught myself squinting at the screen to make out the characters. The music seemed a little repetitive to my ears, and I sometimes found the dialogue a tad long-winded (which probably isn’t helped by the slow text speed). But these were momentary distractions from an otherwise joyful and relaxing experience.

Someone invented an entirely new puzzle adventure game mechanic.

Let me just say that again, to underscore how critical that is:

Someone invented an entirely new puzzle adventure game mechanic!

This game is absolutely phenomenal. The mechanic they invented for this game is so brilliant, so inspired, that it's a wonder it didn't exist before today. On top of that, the art is gorgeous, like a children's book. Carto is the best game I played in 2020 and it wasn't even close -- nothing else captured me in the way that Carto did, impressing me with its game design brilliance, and charming me with its story, characters, and style.

Carto is a Indie title released this year. It's pretty quick to beat, there are about 10 chapters in the game and it costs 20 dollars. it's rated as 6-8 hours to complete which is a pretty fair price for it, I guess.. maybe make it $15. It was enjoyable for what it was. Carto is a puzzle adventure game where you gather pieces of a map that you use to place on your map screen that adds more parts of the area for you to explore and progress. You'll have to solve puzzles by placing the map pieces in certain positions for a hidden map square to pop up or for the npc you're looking for to show up and sometimes these puzzles might get a little confusing. especially in later stages like the iceberg stuff, when you're trying to get through the ice maze stuff, ugh that was annoying x.x

The art style is very adorable, like Carto, she's so cute lol. I don't believe the ost really stuck with me from what i can remember from it. There really isn't much else to say about this game, it was a decent experience but nothing too memorable. I'd give this game a 6 out of 10, decent one time experience, but nothing I would want to go back to again.

What a sweet and cute game this was!

You play as Carto, an adorable little cartographer girl who has the ability to rearrange the world map at will. This serves as both the main gameplay mechanic and as a narrative device, and it's used in a number of ways that are fun and sometimes quite surprising. None of the puzzles are frustrating, neither are they so easy as to be boring.

As for the story, it's simple yet full of charm. While flying high above the world with your grandma in her airship one day, you get caught in a storm and find yourself plummeting from the airship. You fall to the world below, and will need to use all of your cartographic ingenuity to find your way. Explore the world, make a new best friend, sail the seas, help a people to discover their lost cultural treasure at the icy end of the world, find a way to climb above the clouds, and ultimately, reunite with Granny to tell her about all of your adventures!

All in all, an indie gem not to be missed, a comfy little game just oozing good vibes. Oh, and you get to hug a huge cuddly bear. If that doesn't sell you on the game, I don't know what will.