Caves of Qud review

Our VerdictCaves of Qud is a genre-defining achievement in play, story, and roleplaying freedom.

Our Verdict

Caves of Qud is a genre-defining achievement in play, story, and roleplaying freedom.

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Need to knowWhat is it?A sprawling science-fantasy RPGExpect to pay:$30/£25Developer:Freehold GamesPublisher:Kitfox GamesReviewed on:Radeon RX 6800 XT, Ryzen 9 5900, 32GB RAM (but it runs on a potato)Multiplayer?NoLink:Official websiteCheck Amazon

Need to know

What is it?A sprawling science-fantasy RPGExpect to pay:$30/£25Developer:Freehold GamesPublisher:Kitfox GamesReviewed on:Radeon RX 6800 XT, Ryzen 9 5900, 32GB RAM (but it runs on a potato)Multiplayer?NoLink:Official websiteCheck Amazon

Check Amazon

Caves of Qud is a traditional roguelike RPG in form, a top-down, turn-based game that relies on text and simple-yet-evocative graphics to convey its world. It doesn’t stick hard and fast to permanent death, though, instead letting you choose whether you want save points and even tweak how much fighting you’ll have to do. Nor does Qud stick hard and fast to the traditional roguelike rules of having an opaque, frustrating user interface and arcane, entirely keyboard-driven control scheme—it even plays very well on a mobile PC like the Steam Deck.

You make your character from a variety of archetypes that describe normal humans or the far more numerous mutant inhabitants of Qud. You then build in a relatively freeform way, choosing new skills, upgrading your abilities, and gathering equipment for a dizzying and thrilling array of possibilities. From there you set off across Qud from your starting village in true RPG sandbox fashion, choosing to follow or not follow the many quests and whimsical distractions you may come across. A lot of that will involve carefully delving into the ruins of the ancient civilization of the Eaters of Earth, fighting the strange and deadly creatures you find there, and pilfering their treasures.

Each playthrough has the same world map but randomizes nearly every local area according to a complex system of generated histories chronicling the sultans who ruled Qud in ages past. What they did then influences what you find now, where you go, and what you can expect to find there—and it integrates that generated history into the main story quest’s fixed objectives in clever and subtle ways that you might otherwise think had the hand of a designer behind them. Though it may take you a hundred hours to really get to grips with and master Qud, a seasoned player can burn through the main story in 15 hours.

Layer qake

Image1of4(Image credit: Kitfox Games)(Image credit: Kitfox Games)(Image credit: Kitfox Games)(Image credit: Kitfox Games)

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(Image credit: Kitfox Games)(Image credit: Kitfox Games)(Image credit: Kitfox Games)(Image credit: Kitfox Games)

(Image credit: Kitfox Games)

An adventurer in Caves of Qud approaches a statue of a sultan from a previous age.

(Image credit: Kitfox Games)

In Caves of Qud, the player’s character is surrounded by a throng of hostile hyenafolk and plated worms.

(Image credit: Kitfox Games)

Inspecting a dagger in Caves of Qud, which has an engraving detailing a duel between one of Qud’s sultans and a political aspirant, after which the sultan had the defeated claimant “launched into orbit."

(Image credit: Kitfox Games)

In Caves of Qud, the players converses with Yurl, a sentient plant.

Pure-blooded “normal” people have become one of many different successor species and ancient genetic engineering combined with reality-altering phenomena have unleashed a tidal wave of strange creatures onto this world—the many talking plants, for example, barely register as exciting compared to a Twinning Lamprey, which exists in a strange quantum state where only when both its bodies are killed simultaneously will it die. Qud is a world where you start off fighting Hyena-people in a swamp with a bronze dagger and end it clad in zetachrome armor made of forgotten matter from the start of the universe, fighting mecha and cosmic terrors while wielding an eigenrifle that fires a subatomic particle beam capable of piercing through every single thing on the screen, friend or foe.

Rich storytelling

Get weird

Your character’s traits and background will be just as rich as the world’s. You might play a True Kin, one of the last unmutated remnants of old humanity close enough to their biology and genome that the Eaters' technology, robots, cybernetic implants, and miracle medicines still recognize and work for you, enhancing yourself with cyberware like extra-large hands and firearm hardpoints to wield four two-handed chainguns at once. You might instead be a mutant with a beak, wings, night vision, and talons whose mutations grow in power so that they can sunder steel. Your mutant might have psychic powers like cryokinesis and telepathy and disintegration. You might even play as a purely physical chimera that grows twelve arms, or a purely psychic esper who becomes so powerful that their Glimmer attracts extradimensional hunters and predators from beyond our own universe.

(Image credit: Kitfox Games)

The player reads one of Caves of Qud’s randomly generated books, producing the passage: “Live and drink, Moon King."

Stay weird

Random generation can of course make or break a game like Qud. Sometimes it’s against you in the most hilarious ways, sometimes it’s just frustrating as you plumb some deep stratum praying that the next chest has some upgrade—please, any upgrade—for your gun or armor. Sometimes it’s for you as it spits out a unique relic that feels purpose-made to fit just the character you wanted to play—as a sword-wielding knight I once found a shield that could reflect enemy lasers back at them.

Your tolerance for unpleasant, run-ending (or save-reloading) surprises has to be pretty high as you first discover things like which robot is armed with missile racks and how to kill a Twinning Lamprey and how when you see a biblically accurate angel you should just run away. You can contract infections or lose a limb, but to enjoy yourself those must be interesting problems to solve or situations to exploit, part of your overall story rather than frustrations. The fun to find in Qud is about learning—reading the flavor text for hints, figuring out which randomly-generated named creature to befriend, and carrying a variety of tools for different situations. Always have an EMP grenade on hand, for example, to deal with wayward robots. You have to be willing to try and fail and to learn when it’s better to run away, consolidate your gains, and try again tomorrow. Every challenge in Qud was not hand-made to be beaten. Quite the opposite, in fact.

(Image credit: Kitfox Games)

The player characters fires an energy weapon at a crypt ferret in Caves of Qud.

That is no surprise to fans of the traditional roguelike’s deep details and convoluted systems and surprising random events. For others it will be unpleasant at first. Caves of Qud has what is likely the best, most modern interface and controls in a game of its kind, but the experience is still at times frustrating as you try to unravel just what happened in the last combat round that caused you to die. For some who have not played games like this before, simply the act of learning to control and maneuver your character will be frustrating. Despite this I cannot recommend Caves of Qud enough for its innovations in mechanics and storytelling, however anachronistic it may look.

Besides, on top of it all? You can easily mod this game.

Caves of Qud: Price Comparison

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The Verdict94Read our review policyCaves of QudCaves of Qud is a genre-defining achievement in play, story, and roleplaying freedom.

The Verdict

94Read our review policyCaves of QudCaves of Qud is a genre-defining achievement in play, story, and roleplaying freedom.

94Read our review policy

Caves of QudCaves of Qud is a genre-defining achievement in play, story, and roleplaying freedom.

Caves of Qud

Caves of Qud is a genre-defining achievement in play, story, and roleplaying freedom.

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Our Verdict#

Layer qake#

Rich storytelling#

Get weird#

Stay weird#

Our Verdict

Layer qake

Rich storytelling

Get weird

Stay weird