Caves of Qud

I'm giving this game a thumbs up with a caveat that it's for a very specific kind of player. You have to be into 2D roguelikes with turn-based combat. You have to enjoy the particular post-apocalyptic cyberpunk atmosphere that the game is going for. And you have to have a great deal of self-control to not ruin your own experience. Qud is a fantastic roguelike and a horribly, horribly broken game. You can play through the game blissfully unaware of the cracks in the fabric of the universe, but once you realize the cracks are there, you have to specifically avoid stepping on them because they ruin the game if you use them to your advantage. Specifically I'm referring to three mechanics which give you every reason to make your own gaming experience less fun in order to gain an advantage in the game: 1.) infinite reputation grinding, 2.) infinite merchant refreshing, and 3.) infinite item duping. All three of these things are possible to abuse very early on into the game, and they give you the possibility to throw away hours of your time to make the game as easy as you want, exchanging difficulty for tedium. If you want to spend sixteen hours walking up and down the desert for no reward other than reducing the number of enemy factions attacking you, then you can do that. If you want to check the merchant, walk five tiles on the world map, and then check it again, you can do that as many times as you want until the item you want shows up. If you want to duplicate the merchant who sells the merchant duplicating liquid, then you can do that and refresh him ad infinitum till you dupe him again and again into 100 liquid merchants. Yes, the game is that broken, and it's kind of fun to break it at first, but it very rapidly deteriorates into a disgusting experience if you play the game that way because it is not only tedious, it is in a technical sense optimal. Compared to breaking the game, every other "fair" way of playing the game ends up feeling bad. If you put these flaws aside, Qud is a beautiful game with intricate character building and a fascinating world. Play Qud and enjoy it for what it is, but don't try to optimize it. Keep your hands inside the rollercoaster at all times, and enjoy the ride.

it's legitimately one of the most impressive game in like a decade in the scope of freedom of character development and how dumb you're allowed to go in what you're doing. an absolute masterpiece. the biggest piece of advice you can be given is run away when it gets dangerous. there's no downside to doing it! heal up and try again or come back later when you're stronger.

Quite possibly one of the best/coolest old school RPGs in existence. Do let the procedural bits fool you, this lore is THICK and DEEP. I shot a turtle, fell into a portal while fleeing and ended up in a literal warzone with multiple factions fighting. I hid like a lil bitch till the explosion stopped then darted out to loot the bodies for some FANTASTIC gear. Smug with my bounty, and still utterly lost, I walk through a doorway and get lit up by 30 turrets... because I ignored the 'keep out sign'. Dead. Wonderful. This game is wild, fun, complicated, and endless. 11/10, will buy as a gift for friends. Edit: Wonderful game for the steamdeck, which is where I play it. They should add OLED support, that would be neato. :)

it may seem unapproachable but when you chew through the difficulty curve at the start, this game becomes a beautiful masterpiece and a piece of proof that a traditional roguelike done well can still annihilate most modern games through sheer freedom and engagement

The gold standard of traditional roguelikes, and closer to the "Bethesda-like" formula than most games which say they are. There is a main quest and a main sequence of dungeons to do, but you're not locked into it. You can play a full run just venturing into the underground or exploring the overworld. I love it. However, the build variety they talk up is just a marketing gimmick. There's really not as many options as they make it seem: there's really only 4-5 archetypes available. But they're all still pretty fun.

Was fun at first, then got incredibly tedious and boring, especially when you have seen most of what the map offers.. Although most roguelikes suffer from this, this one takes the cake. Gave it like a 6 month break and I just can't get back into it.

The only really addictive and fun game that you can play in the office and still have your manager congratulate you and give you a promotion for playing. Cause damn son your new spreadsheet with custom macros is looking wild.

I was really hoping I would like this one since I like games such as project zomboid, Enter the Gungeon, and Kenshi but its just not clicking. Maybe I need more time with it, and maybe I need to watch more videos explaining the mechanics but right now it just feels like its missing something those other games are not.

Some highlights: * Punch myself in the gut to trigger my on damage phasing effect, and walk through a boulder. Realize later I have a jackhammer and could have just destroyed it. * Found a large source of fresh water. Got so excited I accidentally empty a waterskin on myself. Waterskin contained cloning draught, which shortly after produces a friendly clone. Named him Toasty Jr. * Think "That fall looks like it could kill me." Look into the future, and confirm jumping down the hole would kill me. Later return and cook a meal that reduces fall damage. Fall 4 floors and skip an entire dungeon. * Get ambushed by a large predatory fish. It manages to bite off both my hands. Regenerate them before I've even run out of the water. Hunt the fish by projecting a hologram of myself into the water, and shooting the fish when it attacks.

This is the best rogue-like that exists. The game is so deep and narrative that you can forget what the main story line is. You can forget that there is a main story line. You can forget that there are caves in the Caves of Qud and spend hours just wandering around, meeting people, getting in adventures. Water is the currency in the game because it is rare. But it is actually really easy to get, just really heavy when you carry a lot. So you want to use gems to carry your wealth. But that isn't really wealth. Secrets are wealth. The game is full of traps but you walk into each one with clear warnings that you are walking into a dangerous trap. You can always walk (or sprint) away and do something else. Each death you die is your own fault. This game builds on a timeless genre and would be timeless itself if they stopped development today. They are still making improvements and expanding the story. It deserves every award it gets. Live and drink

It takes some effort to get into but once you figure it out, very fun.

[TL:DR] Lacking in QOL features and with poor early quests, Caves of Qud morphs into a cool experience with constant frustrations. But there is a depth and complexity here that respects (laughs at) my intelligence, and I wish more games followed this example. Like, seriously mate [hr][/hr] [h1]PROS [/h1] - Deep world map and environments - Interesting NPCs who lay down meaningful truths about the world - Range of items, skills, and builds - Cool reputation mechanic that I still don't understand - WALLS of text filled with LORE. Literally mate - You can turn into a dog - I appreciate that the dev included the option of ROLEPLAY (checkpoints) for people who don't want to grind another 28hrs after an unfair death, albeit checkpoints that can be quite far back [h1]CONS [/h1] - Quality of life features: 1: No mass disassemble of ALL scrap 2: No loadouts. Because it's really fun equipping the drill and then re-equipping weapons + backpack + shield every time 3: No mass recharge energy cells 4: Awkward inventory/trade screens. The picture icons at the top are minuscule and hard to distinguish. The faded text of the inventory headers is hard to spot at a glance 5: Not knowing which vendor sells which item (like in Grit Gate where NPCs have the same model and shuffle around the map). Sometimes I just want to buy ammo without clicking 10 people before finding the dude I need. There is a feature to find a specific person but it would be useful to see at a glance what type of trader they are 6: The trivial things that the game should just explain, that lead to unfair deaths (or maybe I'm just salty) --{ Fine }-------------------------------

This is frankly one of the best games I've played in years. It achieves a level of immersion that shouldn't be possible with it's tile based graphics. It's world, it's systems, it's gameplay, all incredible. Even the steep learning curve is somehow part of the charm. While it's not for everyone, I have to recommend it to those who like something unique, something special, something challenging.

Extremely good if you like deep games and also very different from anything I've seen so far. Great freedom of action.

I played a bunch through the years with permadeath, never got too far. I was waiting for 1.0 to give a proper Roleplaying mode playthrough a try (RP mode allows checkpoints at settlements, so you can restore if you die). I wanted to see the story and places I've heard about. It's still a bit of a challenge with the checkpoints, but it really allows you to explore without too much worry. The QoL improvements are welcome, I am used to the old text/ASCII menus, but the new UI is great and allows me to move quickly with KB, mouse or both. There is also controller support. The world is massive, impossible to see everything. It kinda feels like a single-player MUD sometimes, with the visuals and text really creating some great images in the mind. The sound design is another spot that really shines. Sound in a rogue-like is sometimes non-existent but CoQ really immerses you in the jungles, tribal villages and caves with the eclectic sounds and music. Top notch. Amazing game. If you like CDDA (large open world) or ToME (a lot of cooldown based attacks) and want a far-future/surreal/sci-fi environment then check this out.

A labour of love. Caves of Qud is different. The developers made it to be played. No shareholders. No suits. No one told them no. It shows.

This is an awesome game! So much re-playable and very deep RPG mechanics. I've had a great time just learning how-to play and creating characters/builds. I'd recommend this game to anyone who likes deep system driven RPGs. The art style might not be for everyone, if you give it a chance though you'll see that it works really well for this type of game.

One of the most beautiful experiences to be had, game wise. Exploring the randomly generated Caves of Qud is awesome discovering a massive variety of peaceful creatures or hordes of horrific abominations eager to destroy you. Each new playthrough has a unique seed, meaning different legendary locations, npcs, and different CAVES. Be careful when traversing deep, it is easy to get lost and without an easy staircase leading to the surface, you may dehydrate to death without enough water for the journey. It is a bunch of pixels looking similar to an Atari video game from the 80s. However, beneath the surface is a massive labyrinth of depth reaching the deepest pits of gaming possibilities. Play as a mutant and use four arms to equip 4 axes to decapitate 4 limbs from your enemies. Or a psychic mutant who can teleport and control people's minds, unless they can resist your attempt. Convince an alligator to be your friend, and join you on a journey that may end in tragedy for both of you. Pick a true-kin human, pure and unmutated, and have fun searching every CAVE in QUD looking for an actual useful cybernetic to use. Or just waste your very few credits on crap upgrades that handicap you for the rest of the game; But you do get more skill points. So theres that. Cool game needs Aliens otherwise 9.6/10

This game is amazing and unique. Very nostalgic. Too bad I suck at it.

That is just the best real classic style roguelike fusion with finest quality of life enhancement... beautyful (in case visual minimalist approach doesnt scares you away)

Deepest RPG I ever played. Very fun exploration and customization. Mutation are very interesting. Very Retro Aesthetic, Not for everyone, but go past the look and there is an infinite replayability game with dept like very few.

Generates fun stories. Very RPG. Great atmosphere/setting

Very fun game, The dev's have taken a lot of time and dedication for this game and you can tell! Don't get me wrong the game is very hard but there is a lot of love that was put into it.

found a weird hostile clam tried to attack it get teleporter to bumfuck nowhere tried to run got lost in the jungle died to some goats with guns 10/10 will qud again

Something really charming about this game and I'm enjoying the skill and mutation system. I've played almost 40 hours and only explored like 10 percent of the map MAYBE. If I had anything to add I wish we could play as other races besides mutated human and true kin. LET ME BE A SENTIENT OOZE!

I was skeptical at first due to the graphics but this game is an absolute blast. Ive only played a tiny amount compared to others I see leaving reviews but I can see myself playing this for hundreds of hours. I came from other "sandboxy" style games like Rimworld and this scratches a very similar itch for me personally. 10/10 - would get killed by a rock throwing baboon again.

One of the best games of all time. I played without looking anything up, and had an excellent time. Every run is a story, and I enjoyed all of them.

I haven't beat the game yet; I keep getting distracted with side goals. It's fun though.

Steep learning curve, but once it clicks it's the GOAT

I love Path of Achra, and this is like a cozy version, while I curl up with my mutant 7 arms, 2 faces, and stinger. I recommend you play on Roleplay after you die the first few times to learn the game since sometimes you only learn something after death. One of my top 3 games in the last few years I think.

I really like most of the game but dear god why does the lost mechanic have to exist, I have gotten lost a tile away from Grit Gate and the game still said I was lost despite me knowing exactly where I was and how the game should have known where I was when I am at a major landmark. JUST LET ME OUT OF THE CAVES.

I havent managed to get very far. Still trying a bot-mancer build and havent survived long enough to make any bots. Haha. Haven't tried the game any other way. But it's cool, the world has its own interesting feel about it. I appreciate the original fantasy biology herein. A negative (for me, not for everyone) is that some of the writing is so abstract that I find it ventures into rambling; sometimes the writing can feel like it's written by a 16 yr old who's trying to impress me rather than to communicate. It's a bit 'artsy-fartsy'. But some of it's good; like descriptions of items from the perspective of someone who lives in such a world. Other times, it just feels try-hard, no offence. Perhaps it's a stylistic choice. Anyway, it's cool, and I think there's a lot of content in this game that i'm looking forward to discovering.

A niche game, but an unparalleled masterpiece in that niche.

Honestly bought this on an impulse and now it's my favorite game of the year so far. Tons of depth and replayability. Gives a good amount of tension without being overly random or unfair.

I have almost 500 hours in this game and bought it purely because Sseth told me I could have 6 hands, each wielding an axe. This game is likely my favorite game of all time. It is a sandbox game which challenges you to break it. The writing for this game is amazing; each monster, each object you look at, each item you observe, all have incredibly written paragraphs explaining what the item looks like. I recommend this game to people who want to walk away from finishing a game feeling like the did everything they could, then loading up another run a month later and trying to do everything all over again. This game is an absolute masterpiece. 9.9/10, I just hate decarbonizers...

one of the best games like this out there. love the options and how everything progresses

Don't be fooled by the graphics on the store page, they do not get in the way at all, this game is incredibly deep and immersive, and despite having randomly generated parts, it has super deep lore and a reputation system to put any major rpg to shame! After booting it up I kept playing and by the time I looked at the time it was 2:30am, highly recommend.

Just go for it! Once you play a little while and get used to the game, and the looks, its a fun time!

Every time I think I have a grasp on this game, it's world and the mechanics of it all, some new "thing" shows up. Doing some new "stuff" I've never seen. Which leads to me ending up in a puddle of myself... It's amazing. 10/10

Incredible! One of the most imaginative and expansive fantastical experiences you can have on a screen! Dive into it. Die. Dive in again. Do whatever you want, and then go further still!

The procedural generation of the world and the story is great at keeping the game fresh, with the chaos it mixes in. It is a good challenge to players, but may require patience for new players to learn the works. Honestly the art style is incredible, if you can appreciate this format. I feel this game has incredible potential for second version already. Caves of Qud is in my opinion one of the best roguelikes, though if you check my steam profile I haven't played many, I have experienced many roguelikes on youtube as well, but I am not really much of a roguelike enthusiast- this game draws me in with the worlds and themes of circular timelines, its quite alluring, even though I am not much of a roguelike player. I have zero complaints of this game, but a few minor suggestions, only with sprites-it would be nice if what characters had equipped could be reflected on their sprite, and if gigantic creatures actually looked gigantic, even though they intentionally take up the same space, solely relying on imagination seems a little harsh. Sand Worms, the Girsh, etc should be so much more intimidating visually, because if your character sees them, their presence would be making them sh*t themselves most of the time. If there was a second version, I could see the exploration and diplomacy being expanded upon. Perhaps instead of one continent, there could be vast treacherous seas of Qud, and maybe it could go even deeper underground where things get even wackier. Maybe multiple continents. If the world size tripled from this game, I would be ecstatic, though that's not to say Caves of Qud feels congested, it just feels like it could be possible. I could see it being either a prequel or a sequel to the time you enter into joppa, maybe even during Resheph and his armies chasing back the plagues, as the stories tell. This game being upscaled would be any gamers wet dream, and I see a lot of potential for it. Kingdoms of Qud- with diplomacy, more exploration, more crafting, skills, mutations, etcetera.

Very fun game. Incredibly creative and incredibly frustrating. 9/10. + Rewards creative thinking, can sell lava for cash ~ No home base, cloning merchants is dumb - Everything kills you, everything, kills, you... :(

The art direction and world building for this game is peak, I love how chilly and fun and whimsical everything is, but I have no patience for any of the randomly generated world history. As versatile as the sandbox is, it also takes me FOREVER to make progress sometimes, though I just played one Roleplay mode straight through and haven't gotten to any of the breaking exploits. OST is amazing, a blend of synths and ambiance into very earthy and tribal patterns.

Caves of Qud is only half real. The other half is, in the best way, all in your head. Calling this game a great roguelike or great RPG or great immersive sim or even a great piece of post-apocalyptic literature would be underselling how gob-smackingly well it brings together the best elements of those genres. On top of the incredible systems and writing, the enchanting music and visual design elevate Caves of Qud to be not only one of the best games I've ever played, but one of the most engrossing pieces of media I've ever engaged with.

This game is complicated, weird, and fucking awesome. Its hooked its teeth into me like very few games have. 4 Runs in and I barely understand anything its amazing.

If you've played lots of rouge-likes you're going to love this. Equally unforgiving at times, but an amazing world of monsters, alliances, history, artifacts and more. I want to know how this story is going to end and see if I can survive to the end.

This is a game with a grand promise and lacking execution. It promises you the ability to do anything in a post-apoc sandbox, and that part isn't a lie. You can do anything, but most of what you'll do is die. Unfortunately, learning through death is exhaustingly time consuming. You encounter a new creature, you die, you need 5 hours to get back up to level. You get a decent build, you like it, you encounter something new, you die. New character. Go into a new biome. See a weird guy. He uses Sunder Mind on you. He and the borders of the zone are both more than 10 tiles away. Die. What'd you learn? Oh, never go to this biome, it has a 2% chance to execute you. As you learn each system, the fun vanishes. At first water management is hard. Then realize you can just hold beaded bracelets and copper ingots to have tons of money in lightweight format. Now you have $500 or $1000 in dram. Money and water are no longer factors. Do Golgotha a few times. Learn that the "right" way to do it is to stuff specific foods to make yourself immune to poison and disease (or just break down walls and skip the entire dungeon!). Try more mutations. Learn that precognition lets you fish for effects and defeat the RNG. The whole game is this way. Its a puzzle to be solved, but with each solved piece you no longer have any reason to try anything else - but you still have to go through the motions of the puzzle! The game promises a wide open field, and it is. Unfortunately, that field has two states: invulnerable godking mashing attack to wade through endless enemies, and "oh, that's new, I wond--and I'm dead". Time to go do the first 5 hours of the game. Again. Looking at steam achievement rates, only 1% of players have actually finished this game. Given the hundreds of hours of experimentation necessary (or more realistically, all the reading guides to find out the handful of staggeringly OP builds and then rerolling until you land on one), the relative unimportance of the story, and the late-game enemies that will just delete you until you find their workarounds, I understand why only 10% of players even make it to Golgotha and so few bother finishing up.

This is an extremely cool game with some incredible mechanical depth regarding tinkering/cooking/character skills. I can't praise it enough for what it's accomplished in those areas and I look forward to seeing what Freehold games does in the future. They should be extremely proud of what they've made. But, I feel comfortable leaving a "negative" review as a flag for other players like me, since it won't make a dent in the review score: This doesn't really succeed as a "story generator", if you were brought here by reviewers who described it as such. if I were to compare it to Dwarf Fortress, Kenshi, or RimWorld, I think those succeed as story generators because of the dynamic which exists between the characters in your party. Even in cases like Rim or DF, where the proc-gen is front and center, it's the relationships between the characters that allows your imagination to fill in the blanks and see the "story" they all share emerge. Someone gets kidnapped? You now have a mission to rescue them. Two friends, but one dies? Everything the survivor does will be imbued with that sense of loss. Unfortunately due to CoQ's single-player character focus, the narrative (even imagined one) of that character relies entirely on their interaction with the world and it's inhabitants. NPCs don't really offer a lot in this regard and are quite static, and since you can't build a party or anything, you either survive, or die. There's no room for a story outside of: "you fight and die, or your fight and live". A lot of the examples reviewers give serve as a good overview of the games true variance; they all offer the illusion of variety, but all ultimately boil down to players having the same experience with slight differences of the same mechanics. "I transformed into [object] and fell in love with an [object]" "I was [mechanic] and then [mechanic], then I died" It's really interesting and cool as what is it; a series of mechanics, but as someone that came here for what I was told was an RPG story generator, I was let down by the proc-gen world, proc-gen lore, and proc-gen books. Those do well in DF because I'm then shaping a new colonies story to add to those, whereas I don't get that experience here. I felt no real value or adventure in auto-exploring identical ruins, fields, forests, and jungles, complete with multiple randomly placed doors and copy pasted enemies. I felt little difference from area to area (besides the incredible soundtrack) and ultimately, I didn't feel like an adventurer discovering the secrets of the land, I felt like a gamer, watching numbers go up - and that was all. No environments outside of the scripted ones ever gave me the feeling of history or life, just populations of things to either slaughter or trade water with.

It's a combination of an old-school Roguelike, and a CRPG. Help I'm addicted. I haven't even tried a second build yet and I'm 440 hours in at time of writing.

Boring, broken, unfinished mess of ideas. It's more of a developer's self-promoted demo than actually a game. There are tons of roguelike games better, some of them are even free.