Catan - Console Edition

Written by Elliot Hilderbrand on 11/22/2023 for SWI  

When my wife and I got married, we didn’t know what to do with ourselves. We had spent the past year preparing for our wedding. I always thought it was funny how people said they had spent all their free time planning and prepping, only to find out it was true. Once we were married, we said to each other, “Well, what now? What are we supposed to do now that we don’t have to prep and plan all the time?” We got into board games. I had friends who had recently become board game people; it looked like fun, so we joined the club.

Like many, Settlers of Catan was our first real adult board game. I’ve played Monopoly, Sorry, and who can forget Mouse Trap, all the big ones. But Settlers of Catan was different. It was good, no, excellent. It felt mature, refined, like something adults in their late twenties who don’t want to have kids do. It was me, it was my wife, it was us. We introduced every friend we had to the game, and they also loved it. It became the staple of our hangouts. We bought expansion after expansion. I became a frequent member of the Catan subreddit. Settlers of Catan opened my eyes to the world of board games. My love for this game is why I feel so hurt by this version of Catan.

I don’t even know where to begin. Maybe with how bare bones and basic it feels. When I turned Settlers of Catan on for the first time, I knew I was in trouble. The loading screen feels slow, and the frame rate stutters when you begin to see the waves of water. The voiceover isn’t bad though. You’re asked if you know the rules of the game. I decided I wanted a refresher to ensure I knew what I was doing. Three short, straight-to-the-point videos explain how the game is played. Having played countless times before, I found them easy to understand and didn’t feel like they left out much. After each video, a black screen stays on your screen. You can’t simply play the following tutorial video. 

I decided to jump into a game. For my first game, I decided on a quick-start game. Everything is already placed; you are ready to play the game instead of setting up the island and placing your two settlements. Settlers of Catan is slightly different from traditional board games you might have grown up with. This four-player game has you attempting to build up an island by collecting resources and spending them in a number of ways to enlarge your presence on the island of Catan. You aren’t moving in a circle; in fact, you have no piece on the board that is specifically you, but rather your presence in the game is represented by your infrastructure. Instead of trying to be first to finish you are tying to amass victory points, the first to 10 wins. You can earn points in a number of different ways. Having the longest connection road, or the largest army. You can upgrade your settlements into cities or even draw cards that give you victory points.

Settlers of Catan plays out the same way in the video game version as it does in the traditional board game. While you may think that is great, it isn’t. When it becomes your turn there are a number of options to take. You roll dice, collect resources, build, or trade resources with other players. The trading option is where Settlers of Catan: Console edition really hurts itself. Trading resources is a vital part of the game and playing with the AI is terrible. When playing against human opponents, deals can be made; scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours kind of thinking. With the console version, that important aspect is missing. There is no, I’ll take a sandwich today and pay you back tomorrow logic with an AI opponent. It’s all straightforward, I’ll only give you this resource if I have zero need for it, no real human thought going into playing. Games take twice as long to play because there is no actual trading going on. I found that on most turns an AI players does offer a trade, but they are all horrible. The trades offered have no back and forth, make no sense, and feel like a waste of time. In the end, that hurts Settlers of Catan: Console Edition. It doesn’t make the game unplayable, but it is in that conversation.

There are two expansions available, they are not expensive, but, I feel they add little to the game. One adds new characters you can draw from a certain deck when you pay the resource fee. They do add some new elements, but thankfully nothing game-breaking. The second expansion adds five new board layouts. Same feelings, nothing game-breaking, and not much missed. I felt for the price, with both sold separately for under $10 that there isn't enough to gain in picking them up unless you see them on a heavy discount.

There are a few other little items that I found not to enjoy, but I feel they are a me problem, not a problem most might find when they play for themselves. The music feels like it might have been recorded in a bathroom. Too low, and choosing to turn up the volume does not improve on the sound. The music is repetitive and didn’t move my needle in the least. The Console Edition frequently has forced shut downs. Those shutdowns only happened after the game was over and when the game would attempt to load back to the default screen. It might be faster just to force close the game and reload instead. Lastly, I found the controls confusing for about an hour. I found myself hitting one button expecting something to happen, but found I was hitting the wrong one. It also took me some time to realize I needed to back out of a menu in order to offer a trade to the others. The real problem with controls came when I tried to play with my wife. She loves the game, but had a horrible time with the controls. Nothing felt intuitive to her.

Not everything is the worst. Settlers of Catan: Console Edition does allow for a second screen. You can scan a QR code to bring up your card hand onto the second screen. That way you don’t have to pop up the button every time you want to take a look at your hand. I appreciated that, as I find myself constantly looking at my cards, trying to think of my next move. The second screen was basic and simple, but it works for what it is trying to help with. I would love to see more done with that, or to see the gameplay element put into practice in more games, really, any game that has you dealing with cards would be perfect.

Settlers of Catan: Console Edition is a case study on how not to bring a board game to the digital world. When you select the game and begin to load in you can tell you are in trouble. Choppy load screens, graphics that look outdated a console generation ago, and a soundtrack that feels derivative of the classical music it is attempting to sound like. I had little fun with the Console Edition. The core of Settler of Catan is here. The rules have not changed, but the lack of a human element, especially with the AI opponents makes this a hard sell. Trying to get someone who is not video game savvy to play was a struggle. Trying to find players online is like finding an oasis in the desert, an illusion. Many board games have made the leap to video games successfully, Settlers of Catan is not one of them.