Not sure if the community is interested in deal posts and digital implementations so why not try both?
The Steam Summer Sale is on and it includes a bunch of digital boardgame implementations. Unfortunately the “boardgame” and “tabletop” user tags are a bit polluted so have to wade through the noise. Here are some standouts I see (USD prices), please add yours in the comments.
- Aeon’s End - $1.94
$14.99 - One Deck Dungeon $0.99
9.99 - Scythe - $7.99
$17.99 - Sentinels of the Multiverse $0.99
9.99 - Spirit Island $12.48
24.99(all time low I believe) - Tabletop Simulator - $9.99
$19.99 - Wingspan $9.99
19.99
Note that some publishers do matching sales on mobile so for example One Deck Dungeon is on sale on Android too.
Edit: relevant BGG forum post with some more
Over several iterations the Spirit Island app became good enough. However, as much as I love the game, it is immensely difficult to play in digital. Even when on my large monitor, I cannot show everything at the same time and I need to switch between maps and cards and I find it makes for much added difficulty. I have stopped playing the digital version. I have not played Scythe enough to be able to say anything about that app.
Thanks so much for sharing. I think spirit island is already complicated enough, might be really detrimental to try the digital version to see if I like the game.
One of the biggest pitfalls of Spirit Island is that the rulebook is a terrible teaching tool. The app is a significant improvement on that giving you a pretty indepth tutorial.
But if you can learn it in person or via TTS that’s probably ideal.
there were some really decent TTS mods when I Last used TTS. in any case I highly recommend finding someone to teach you the game if you don’t know it already. I have more than once encountered people saying they didn’t enjoy the game only to change tune after getting a teacher. It is not even that the rulebooks are bad. It is just a lot of moving parts.