iPhone game · free · no location
Every step draws the world.
You're a mapmaker in a valley lost in mist. Your real-life steps become ink, and the ink reveals the map, tile by tile: hamlets, a lake, ruins, a mountain pass — and the people who live there.
Map I
A hundred steps, one drop
Your iPhone's pedometer (or the Health app, Apple Watch included) counts your steps. Every hundred becomes a drop of ink. A tile near camp costs about ten drops; the further out, the more it takes.
The whole valley takes about 225,000 steps: two months of ordinary walks.
Map II
The valley and its landmarks
127 tiles around camp: meadows, forests, fields, hills, scree, marshes, a lake and a river. Thirteen landmarks, drawn in ink, wait under the mist.
- The Mapmaker's Camp✦
- The Mill2 tiles from camp
- The Old Bridge2 tiles from camp
- The Orchard3 tiles from camp
- Willow Hamlet4 tiles from camp
- The Chapel4 tiles from camp
- Heron Lake4 tiles from camp
- The Watchtower4 tiles from camp
- The Spring4 tiles from camp
- Stag Glade5 tiles from camp
- The Ruins5 tiles from camp
- High Farm5 tiles from camp
- Windy Pass6 tiles from camp
Map III
Twenty villagers, twenty stories
Reveal a landmark and you meet the people who live there. Each asks for a walk — and tells the rest of their story when you come back. The last mapmaker left for the pass thirty years ago; his notebooks lie somewhere.
Mireille
miller · The Mill
"A mapmaker! The last one left for the pass thirty years ago. Come back once you've walked around my fields, three thousand steps."
1,800 / 3,000 steps since you met
Gaspard
ferryman · The Old Bridge
"The toll is a story. I'll tell it if you walk until your shoes sing: four thousand steps."
4,000 / 4,000 steps since you metWaiting for you with their story
Ondine
fisher · Heron Lake
"The herons know where the fish are. Walk around the lake, six thousand steps, watching them."
2,400 / 6,000 steps since you met
Barnabé
hermit · Windy Pass
"Here you are at the edge of the map. One last path remains, the longest: twelve thousand steps."
0 / 12,000 steps since you met
House rules
A game that never punishes you
- No penalties
A day without walking costs nothing: the ink waits.
- Nothing to buy
Steps are the only currency. No purchases, no ads, no subscription.
- No location
The valley is imaginary: play anywhere, even on a treadmill.
- A suggested goal
A little more than your seven-day average, never imposed.
- Wheelchairs too
With Health, pushes counted by Apple Watch count as steps.
- Never counted twice
Each day is counted once, even if you open the app ten times.
The notebook
A travel notebook, and the valley on your Home Screen
The notebook keeps the villagers you've met, the places you've found, your steps over the last seven days and sixteen achievements (Game Center optional). The "Today's ink" widget shows your steps and what's waiting for you.
Your data
Your steps stay in your pocket.
- 01No account
Your game is saved on the iPhone, nowhere else.
- 02No location
Arpent never asks where you are: only how many steps.
- 03Read-only
With Health, Arpent reads your steps and writes nothing.
- 04Free, no ads
No purchases, no ads, no tracking.
The mist lifts right outside your door.
Free on iPhone. English and French.
Coming soon to the App StoreMap drawn by code, set in Baskerville (1757). No real place was mapped.