Beware of the Cartographer: 50,000 wishlists without a cent of advertising, and a map that becomes the real hero

There are games that make the map a menu you check between two objectives, and there is Beware of the Cartographer, which makes it the main character. Behind this game of mystery and measurement hides Tohu Bohu Games, a small French studio that pulled off a rare feat: gathering 50,000 wishlists on Steam without spending a cent on advertising, save for a trailer. We spoke with Florence Noé, cofounder and programmer, and Emmanuel Corno, cofounder and narrative designer, to understand what makes their cartographer so intriguing.

A cartographer caught in a conspiracy

The pitch is a hook. "You play Georgelin Brugnon, an 18th-century cartographer tasked with mapping a region claimed by two empires to allow the tracing of a border and a peace treaty," lays out Emmanuel Corno. But nothing goes as planned: "Although Georgelin is from the region, he is very poorly welcomed, and above all faces strange phenomena and a conspiracy against him and the other cartographers." The result is a game of mysteries, puzzles and moral dilemmas, where measuring a territory is never a neutral act.

The intended experience goes beyond mere puzzle-solving. "We want to give them an experience of exploration, of reasoning, but also of shifting perspective," explains Emmanuel. The idea is beautiful: by talking with the inhabitants, players put something other than measurements behind the places printed on the map. Geography becomes human, and that is the whole point.

The origin and a title that intrigues

The project's origin lies in a reader's passion. "Beware of the Cartographer is an idea by Quentin Vijoux," recounts Florence Noé. "He was passionate about a book called Les Erreurs dans les Cartes by Benjamin Furst. From there his first reflections were born." A scholarly starting point for a game that questions what mapping means.

The title itself was chosen carefully to spark curiosity. "We were precisely looking for an intriguing title, one that arouses the curiosity of players," details Florence. "Something that quickly makes it clear that our cartographer is not welcome on the lands he has to map." Mission accomplished: the name sounds like a warning, and it is one.

Inspirations ranging from Outer Wilds to Lynch

Tohu Bohu Games does not hide its references, and they are demanding. "In video games, we really love 1:1 scale games where what the person playing does is the same thing the character does," explains Emmanuel, citing The Case of the Golden Idol and Outer Wilds. The studio also draws from outside video games: "In literature, the game is influenced by Kafka and certain novels such as Les Arpenteurs du monde. On the cinema side, we wanted to get close at times to the so-particular atmosphere of Lynch's films." A final influence, from tabletop, says everything about the subject: A Quiet Year, "which addresses the question of one's relationship to territory".

This cocktail gives the game a rare identity, at the crossroads of the cerebral puzzle and the uncanny. And above all, it places the map at the centre of everything. "Beware of the Cartographer puts the map at the heart of the game, not only in the story it tells but also through its gameplay," Florence stresses. "Here the map is not a pretext but the medium on which stakes that go beyond Georgelin play out."

Measure, sketch, trace borders

The mechanics translate this ambition into concrete actions, and they are original. "The main mechanic is exploration and measurement," describes Emmanuel. "Using historical tools, you observe the landscape and measure the angles and distances between the different places, then deduce their position on the map." A visual novel loop is grafted on with a clever twist: "You can modify certain answers by dragging a sketch of an observed place onto the choice button."

The game's signature is the end of each chapter. "Each chapter ends on the tracing of a border, a mechanic inspired by the puzzles of The Witness, but which adds narrative dilemmas to them," explains Emmanuel. Tracing a line on a map is no longer an abstract puzzle: it is deciding the fate of people and places. The studio claims originality throughout, down to the details: "Even the dialogues have their own systems that you will not find in other games."

A hand-drawn world, down to the last detail

Nothing is left to chance, and above all nothing is procedurally generated. "The world of Beware of the Cartographer is entirely hand-drawn," affirms Florence. "Each level is designed from the different places planned by the scenario. Their placement relative to each other on the map depends on the stakes of the current chapter and the path we want to offer players." The level design is therefore inseparable from the narrative.

The art direction, led by Quentin Vijoux, an illustrator and comic book artist, gives the game its so-particular character. "Quentin wanted a world imbued with magical realism, but still with a coherent and deep lore," recounts Emmanuel. "We made sure the visuals teem with small details both to tell that, but also to invite you to lose yourself in them." A care that explains why some players spend hours in it.

Learning Godot and abandoning 3D

Behind the result, there is a long apprenticeship. "This is our first game on Godot, we had to learn a new game engine," confides Florence. The path was winding: "We fumbled a lot between 3D and 2D, which drastically changed the gameplay but also the way of creating levels." The studio had to code its own tools to meet the game's constraints, "many preview tools to create panoramas coherent with the level's map".

The biggest sacrifice was in fact technical and aesthetic. "In its early iterations, the game was in 3D," reveals Emmanuel. "Luckily we abandoned those versions, the game had much less character." A brave choice that, in hindsight, made all the difference.

Players who decorate the map for hours

The first feedback surprised the studio, in a good way. "I was surprised at how much players loved the game and invested in it emotionally," recounts Emmanuel. "I saw some people spend half an hour decorating the map with the stamps." A strong sign of attachment for a game still in development. The community has already influenced the project, notably on quality of life and by pushing the studio to make "the dialogue choices more consequential".

The turning point came at a convention. "At Stunfest 2025, we really felt that the game was going down very well," Emmanuel remembers. The confirmation that they had something special.

50,000 wishlists and the "shlagos strategy"

This is perhaps where the story becomes exemplary for any independent studio. Tohu Bohu Games gathered 45,000 wishlists in four months without an advertising budget, and now counts 50,000. Yet the initial goal was modest: "7,000, because it is the threshold from which the Steam algorithm starts recommending your game," Emmanuel notes.

The method, the studio humorously calls the "shlagos strategy". "Very simply: do not spend one cent, except for the trailer. As soon as it is free, we say yes, for example taking part in an event or making a social media post, so as to maximise our visibility." An owned caution for a small studio, and a formidable efficiency. The real trigger was the trailer: "After being posted on IGN's channel, it was massively recommended by the YouTube algorithm. It also performed well on TikTok and Insta." Events like the AG French Direct or the Women's Day Fest did the rest, taking the game out of its usual circles. For Emmanuel, the essentials come down to three things: "the Steam capsule, the trailer and the game's name."

Why to watch it closely

Asked what advice he would give a beginner developer with no budget, Emmanuel stays lucid: "It is difficult, because we also owe a lot to luck," while recommending the resources of the site howtomarketagame.com. Success has not derailed their ambitions, which remain intact, and that is perhaps what makes the project so healthy.

There remains the question that interests us: why should InsertCoins.press readers add Beware of the Cartographer to their wishlist right now? "Because it is the best way to support a small team like ours that works without generative AI and puts a lot of love into its game," answers Emmanuel. Florence adds: "Because we always seek to create new ways to play while telling impactful stories, and Beware of the Cartographer is a perfect example of that." A poorly welcomed cartographer, a map that becomes a character, and a studio proving you can carve out a place without a cent of advertising: there is every reason to keep an eye open.

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Comments gathered from Florence Noé and Emmanuel Corno, cofounders of Tohu Bohu Games. Beware of the Cartographer is expected on PC.