this game is a very good game.
I bought this through Itch, but I like it enough to want to speak fondly of it here! But then saw a few reviews focusing on a controversy with the developers specifically, and I wanted to provide a summary for others who're considering the game but don't wanna give money to awful people. So here's the controversy: The controversy surrounding the developers of Caves of Qud, Freehold Games, primarily stems from a combination of community management decisions and a specific incident involving a popular YouTuber. In October 2020, YouTuber SsethTzeentach released a review of Caves of Qud, which was largely positive but included a brief segment criticizing the game's Discord community for banning him after he made a sexist and homophobic joke. He then jokingly challenged his viewers to get banned from the Discord as quickly as possible. This led to a wave of his fans attempting to disrupt the Caves of Qud Discord, prompting the developers to make the server private and vet new members individually. This decision was met with criticism from some who viewed it as an infringement on their free speech, while others supported the developers' right to manage their community and maintain a certain standard of behavior. That's it. That's the controversy. There were other rumours flung at the developers, but none of it was proven or substantiated in any way. Get the game, it's great.
Fantastic game. There's a high bar to entry, though. There's no hand-holding, and so if you're not the type to enjoy fiddling with things to learn how they work— often to your people's failure— then this may not be a good entry for you. Imagine games from the 90s where all you had was an icon and some toggles, and you gotta use your brain to figure it out. The game is fantastic once you figure it out, though. I enjoy it more than Dwarf Fortress much of the time, which is blasphemous. The dev's just one dude, so updates come like you'd expect, but the game is very playable as-is. He's incredibly passionate about this project though, and it shows through all his updates and expanded content. The music is also great.
It's not perfect by any stretch, but it's one of my first memories of a proper grand-scale Civilization-like game. It has a reasonable amount of depth, and the setup > live overview of real-time battles was always fun. If you get yourself comfortable with the sometimes limiting UI, the charm of the game really opens up. It'll take a few runs to get the hang of it.
