Mid.

This game tells you no lies. You watch at the trailers, and that's exactly what it looks like.

Pros:
+ Cards are interesting and there is a decent variety of them

Cons:
- Monsters are hideous (in the bad way)
- There is not story
- There is no objective
- It gets really repetitive, very fast
- This theme has nothing Lovecraftian in it; not even close

Verdict:
A boring yet challenging fighting card game, maybe for niche players.

Long description:
You are a biker and you cross a desert full of monsters. The trip is made of three steps, each of them composed of three encounters, and ending with a boss. During the first step, each encounter has one monster, in the second, it has two, and in the third, yep, it has three.

You fight monsters in two ways: in each passing second your character shoots at the monster and deals one damage (but so does the monster to you) and you play cards (and the monster does as well). Cards have a cooldown before the effect applies once you played it. Better cards have longer cooldown, needless to say. Each card is withdrawn once played. You get back all your cards by the end of the encounter (so you have to play more and more long-term strategies as you go further in your trip). You `build' your deck by choosing between two cards at several points of the trip: at the very beginning, after the first encounter of each step, or something like that. It means your deck is made of a very limited number of cards.

And that's all. No objectives, no story, no lore, nothing. Pure card game with some weird and ugly theme. It may please some for its challenge and is strategic-thinking.

I wanted to like Cards of Cthulhu. I really did. The art style and the execution are clean, simple and accessible. The gameplay loop is repetitive ad infinitum, even for a rogue-lite. Its art style is reminiscent of Heavy Metal Comics.

The game itself has nothing to do with Lovecraft let alone Cthulhu. This in itself is flagrant false advertising. I paid the full price of $2.99 and while the game has replayability it has a life-span of less than 2 hours before I officially lost interest.

Brilliant artwork cannot save an otherwise dull and repetitive game that seemingly never ends and that’s not a good thing. It’s not worth more than 75 cents. Especially when Hand of Fate was recently on sale and Elder Scrolls Legends and Infinity Wars are free to play. Do the maths. Save your money. Invest elsewhere.

Simple and repetitive. Enjoyable for a limited time but that's all. The most important thig is that, I collect Lovectraftian games and and usually like them even if they are bad. I've bought this one because the Cthulhu name but believe me, there is no Cthulhu in this game. Not recommended.

An entertaining game, to say the least. Like card games, you have to defeat a sequence of enemies with your deck. After each boss your deck increases, but so the number of enemies. Unlike regular card games, the battle takes place in real time, so plan your deck and use the cards in the right moment is crucial. I like the concept (card game with real time battles), but I feel variety of cards could be improved for the sake of the strategy. It shouldn't keep you from playing though.

I'd place Cards of Cthulhu in a Casual+Strategy category. It's a good choice if you're looking for something in your library if you have a few minutes spare, but nothing stops you for playing it for a whole hour.

Now for something more detailed:

PROS:
The cards strategy + real time battle thing. I'm not really a RTS guy. I can go through the first wave of enemies easily, but after that things starts to get quite challenging and get your strategy ready is crucial.

The art is amazing. Kudos!

A great pick when you want to give a break of your job (hey, I'm a freelancer, I make my own rules :) )

CONS:
I feel the game could improve on the variety of cards. When you think of card games, big part of the fun is building your deck. More cards >> more strategy thinking >> more fun.

Also, maybe an improved deck building screen could help to expand the game experience and add more value to the gameplay.

The lack of a tutorial or introduction makes you feel a bit lost at first. It won't stop you from playing, but a little more polishing in the intro would be great. Maybe something more about the Cthulhu myhtos.

TL;DR : A good casual game that mixes card strategy and real time battles. Worth the buy.

Fun casual collectable card battle game. I played for around 1.5 hours and just beat Cthulhu. You can play more if you like and collect more cards and defeat harder modes. I'm guessing it would take around 5 hours to obtain all the achievements.

+ Fast paced, hard to put down, addictive
+ The art style and monsters are really colorful and well drawn, original designs
+ Lots of cards to collect, intricate fast paced battle system, you have to think and act quick
+ Lots of value for only $1, hours of gameplay
+ Good sense of progression, never stuck, always unlocking new stuff

- The monsters are not H.P Lovecraft designs, the last boss is a funny looking Cthulhu but the rest of the monsters are just original monsters. Would have been better to include Dagon, Nyarlathotep etc...
- If you don't get the right cards, its nearly impossible to win
- Sometimes the battles can be a bit too fast paced, causing you to accidentally play the wrong card

Overall Rating: 7.5 / 10 !

Game is fun for about an hour or so, after you finish it once, you unlock hero mode, which is exactly the same as normal mode except a bit harder, after that you get nightmare mode which is again, exactly the same except a bit harder. Decent time waster if you get it atleast 50% off, wouldn't bother paying more for it.

Saw the game on a Let's play, and it looked really cool. Though all the game has is 4 Bosses. I got through all of the bosses in my 2nd Try and already beat the game. It literally only took me 15 minutes to beat the entire game, and there ain't even more to it.
There is no Main Screen, there is no more story, no endless mode, nothing.

Very disappointing for a 5€ Game.

~~~ Update ~~~

After the release of the heroic Mode for the Game the game has a bit more content. It added more cards to the pool and the enemies are significantly harder to beat. It is still lacking some sort of endless mode, and a VS mode to fight your friends would also be a really cool Idea. But the developers stand behind their game and keep updating it. Still a lot of potential to grow into. After the Update, I would say it is worth the 5€.

For $1 you end up fighting Cthulhu with hairy legs, a beer belly and probably drunk. 10/10

Amusing for a minor spell but it's too repetitive to encourage any kind of extended engagement.