Steam Community :: Caves of Qud

Caves of Qud 1.0 OUT NOW!

5 Dec

We are proud to announce that after 17 years of development, Caves of Qud launches into 1.0 today. A new trailer celebrating the launch will also be debuting today at PC Gamer’s Most Wanted showcase. Make sure you tune in starting at 12pm PST/3pm EST/8pm GMT/9pm CEST.

EDIT: The 1.0 launch trailer is now live!

The Caves of Qud 1.0 update includes:

The conclusion of the main quest, with multiple endings
Lots of new music, sound effects, items, and final UI polish
Tons of bugfixes and small feature improvements

Launching alongside 1.0 is the Dromad Deluxe edition, which includes:

The base game
The finished original soundtrack, now with over 2 hours of music
The Pets of Harvest Dawn DLC, with your choice of 13 unique companions to start the game with
And most importantly, the Dromad Deluxe seal stamped on your main menu!

https://gtm.you1.cn/storesteam/bundle/46891/Dromad_Deluxe_Edition/

If you already purchased the base game, you can complete the Dromad Deluxe collection (and get your seal) by buying the rest of the items in the bundle.

What’s Next?

What comes after 1.0 for Caves of Qud? First and foremost, the team will be taking a well-deserved break. Putting the capstone on a game as complex as Qud took a whole lot of work. After that, we plan to continue updating the game, with two big feature arcs already in mind. Whether those are free updates or paid DLC has yet to be determined.

And while we might push updates to the live branch, we’ll be keeping save game compatibility stable between big feature arcs. This should allow modders to feel comfortable getting to work on new mods. Compatibility might break when a big feature arc does drop (whether it’s free or DLC), but we’ll give plenty of lead time in the run up to those releases.

Other than that, we’ll be working on supporting other platforms. More news on that later.

Beginner Tutorial

We’ve collaborated with SBPlaysGames to create a beginner tutorial designed for first time players who want to jump in quickly. If you have been hesitant to start playing, this guide is a great companion to stat your journey. And if you have any friends who are Qud-curious, send them this video!

Reddit AMA

We are hosting an AMA on r/Games with the Caves of Qud team on Monday December 9th 2024 starting at 10am PST/1pm EST. Bring your questions about Caves of Qud development, what it’s like working on an Early Access title for over 15 years, or something dank such as their favourite Dune memes!

Merch is Live!

The first wave of official Caves of Qud merch by Mighty Merch is now available for pre-order![mightymerch.store] Show off your love for our esoteric indie roguelike with a Live and Drink t-shirt. Hang up a print of a fictitious sci-fi novel featuring a strange and wondrous vista from the world of Qud. The first wave will contain t-shirts, stickers, posters, and pins, with more designs and items coming in future waves.

Speedrun Contest for Content Creators - Update to Rules!

Attention Qud experts, speedrunners, and streamers alike! We are holding a special contest to celebrate the 1.0 update and the end of the game. Choose your run difficulty and beat the game as quickly as possible in front of an audience to win fabulous Caves of Qud prize packs. This is a contest designed to be streamed and shared with your community. PLEASE NOTE: Rules have been refined and updated since last week’s post so please review all the details again. Full details and rules can be found here.[docs.google.com]

A Thank You…

It feels like a fever dream to be releasing 1.0. Seventeen years of development, nine and a half years of Steam Early Access. The only constant has been that whenever we’ve shown the game to a wider audience, there are more and more weirdos just like us who are ready to connect with it. Thank you so much for supporting us through the years — some of you since the very beginning — and helping us bring something original and heartfelt into the world.

Full Patch Notes for Caves of Qud 1.0

END OF THE GAME

We added the end of the game, including the conclusion of the main quest and the ability to beat the game, with multiple endings.

In support of this we added many, many things that are too numerous to list and would need to be redacted anyway. Enjoy!

SOUND & MUSIC

Added several new music tracks, mostly for the endgame but one for overland maps in the salt marshes, desert canyons, hills, and flower fields.
Added several remasters of existing tracks.
Added many, many new sound effects.

UI

Added a new main menu with animation.
Refactored the main menu and secondary menu options.
Polished the frames of several submenus, like the Mods menu and Modding Toolkit.
Renamed the Skills & Powers screen to Skills, the Attributes screen to Attributes & Powers, and the Inventory & Equipment screen to Equipment.
We made several functionality improvements to the Equipment screen.
- Added a new option that allows pagination binds to move between inventory and equipment panes and arrow keys to collapse / expand categories. (Options > UI > "Navigate inventory and equipment panes with left/right pagination instead of movement binds"; must have advanced options enabled)
- The option "Equip/unequip highlighted item when pressing right or left" now functions in modern UI when using pagination navigation on the Equipment screen.
- Added a new option to expand whichever of the inventory or equipment panes is currently focused. (Options > UI > "Expand the equipment or inventory pane when focused"; must have advanced options enabled)
- The proper pane on the Equipment screen is now selected based on how you enter the screen (ie, hitting 'i' will enter the screen with the inventory pane in focus).
- Added a selection highlight to the inventory and equipment lists.
- Added hotkeys to the equipment pane in list mode.
- Dragging an item onto the paper doll background now autoequips it to an appropriate slot.
- Right-clicking a piece of default equipment on the paperdoll now inspects it.
- The inventory search filter now prefers exact substring matches instead of fuzzy searching by default. The search mode can be changed in the toggle options on the Equipment screen.
- Added tooltips for the filter categories.
Added compute power to the secondary attributes pane of Attributes & Powers screen. It only appears if you have compute power greater than the default of zero.
Added a new option that allows the character sheet to expand to full height or full screen on large monitors. (Options > UI > Character sheet size)
Buy Mutations and Show Effects are now navigable options on the Attributes & Powers screen.
The Quests screen now supports expand and collapse-all binds.
Left and right now expand and collapse categories correctly on the Tinkering, Journal and Quests screens.
Collapsing a category on the Skills screen now selects the proper parent category.
Using search on the Skills screen now searches all skills, including unexpanded categories.
Added a sort menu to the Reputation screen.
Added tooltips for the Journal tabs.
Removed the unused "general" category from the chronology.
The stage dock width is now saved between sessions.
Improved the character creation UI on small screens.
Improved the formatting of the Skills screen.
Improved the formatting of the Tinkering screen on small screens.
Improved the formatting of the Quests screen on small screens.
Right-clicking on the worldmap now defaults to look instead of the interact menu.
Becoming nook terminal lines can now be clicked.
You can now right-click the background to exit the becoming nook terminal.
The modern UI now properly shows robot modules.
Opening the abilities menu when you have no abilites no longer shows placeholder text.

OPTIONS

We did a big refactor of the options menu.
- Massively simplified and reduced the number of default "simple" options.
- There's now a "Show advanced options" checkbox next to the options search bar (and in the Legacy UI, an App Settings option). Enabling this reveals all options.
- Did an edit & cleanup pass on option categories and text.
- Deleted some deprecated options.
- Added a volume slider for combat sounds.
- Added a volume slider for interface sounds.
We did a refactor of the control bindings menu.
- Did an edit & cleanup pass on binding categories and text.
- Deleted some deprecated binds.
- Changed all references from 'keybindings' to 'control bindings'.
Search text is now cleared when reopening the options menu or control bindings.

TUTORIAL

The tutorial pumping station no longer stocks hundreds of drams of free freshwater.
Sprint and Freezing Ray are taken off cooldown if you need to use them.
Fixed a bug that allowed you to take the starting chest.
Fixed a bug that allowed you to miss with Freezing Ray.
Fixed a softlock in the tutorial if you failed to equip the torch.
Fixed a bug that allowed you to reset the starting location to Joppa.
Fixed a bug that prevented you from getting the battle axe.

GAMEPLAY

We reduced the point cost of some mutations.
- Quills now costs 3 instead of 4.
- Psychometry now costs 3 instead of 4.
- Stunning Force now costs 3 instead of 4.
- Pyrokinesis now costs 4 instead of 5.
- Cryokinesis now costs 4 instead of 5.
- The Star-Eye Esper preset now has Sense Psychic.
Stunning Force now deals damage in up to 3 increments based on proximity to the center of the blast, as it's supposed to.
You may now seal yourself in [redacted] when you are gigantic.
Pools of liquid indirectly affected by warm static pouring now glitch into a safer subset of liquids.
Charge can now be used while standing next to plants without melee attacks.
Love tonic effects now more reliably expire when old zones are loaded.
Restocking merchants now more reliably trade away unimportant items sold to them.

MISCELLANEOUS

Added special time icons for Tzimtzlum and [redacted].
In addition to all the new objects, we added several new tiles for old objects.
- Added a new figurine tile.
- Added four new sultan statue tiles.
- Added a tile for portable wall.
- Added a tile for psychic glimmer.
- Added new tiles for all golems.
- Added new tiles for albino ape, ogre ape, cragmensch boulderer, cragmensch luminary, glittermensch boulderer, glittermensch luminary, several merchants, Mayor Nuntu, plated knollworm, worm of the earth, dromad caravan guard, juicing cannibal, bow turrets, yempuris phi, and the Pilgrim calling.
Proselytize now asks which creature to target when there are two+ targets in a square.
Bask is now disabled when not usable.
Plants summoned by Burgeoning are now considered trifling and, for example, won't generate messages for follower deaths.
Toggling the Trash Rifling ability now resets the autoexplore ignore list for trash in the zone.
Added an explanatory popup when a vendor identifies an item for you.
Improved the performance of power transmission elements.
[modding] Subtype tiles are now flipped to be right-facing programatically.
[debug] Added a new “resetauto” wish to reset the autoexplore ignore lists for the zone.

BUGFIXES

Fixed a bug that caused containers to rarely become filled with 'objects' and 'pooledobjects'.
Urchin cherubs are now properly mobile.
Fixed a memory leak on the Attributes & Powers screen.
Fixed a bug that caused creatures separated from their leader to sometimes ignore your attacks.
Fixed a bug that caused powered items to be drained rapidly if traveling on the world map in a vehicle.
Fixed a bug that caused sensing effects like Heightened Hearing to apply to yourself in darkness.
Fixed a bug that caused gigantic, two-handed equipment to use more slots than required, if any were available.
Fixed a bug that caused flame and frozen sound effects to rarely play at inappropriate times.
Fixed a bug that caused blank 'this rank' and 'next rank' entries in mutation descriptions.
Fixed a bug causing rapid mutations to not apply some changes to mutation effects.
Fixed a bug that caused the layout to jitter on the Skills screen when the scrollbar appeared and disappeared.
Fixed a bug that caused stacks to temporarily disappear from trade after recharging an item from the stack.
Fixed a bug that caused sultan statue names in the journal to not be properly highlighted.
Fixed a bug that caused extremely long names to break the layout on the Attributes & Powers screen.
Fixed a bug in the scrollbar positioning of wide popups.
Fixed inconsistencies in the direction the player tile faces.
Fixed a rare exception during object destruction.
Fixed an issue with right-trigger wait on Steam Deck.
Fixed an issue with click-to-explore pathing.
Fixed some responsiveness issues at 1.5x in 1080p.
Fixed some responsiveness issues with Skills lines.
Fixed some intermittent layout issues in the status screens.
Fixed some layout issues in character creation
Fix a rare exception during zone build.
Fixed the "mod with tinkering" item action in the classic UI.
Fixed a description error with ThermalAmp and hamsa selection.
Fixed problems with the disabled mouse input option.
Fixed a bug with display names of some quests involving dynamic items.
Fixed a bug that caused tooltips to get stuck open.
Fixed a bug that caused tinkering line items to be unclickable.
Fixed a rare bug in zone generation due to random baetyl rewards not generating properly.
Fixed a bug in the scroll position of the journal map when highlighting a new entry.
Fixed a bug that caused layout issues in the map editor when reopening after reloads.
Fixed a bug that caused the comparison tooltip to overflow on small screens.
Fixed a bug that caused the hover tooltips to sometimes flicker.
Fixed some layout issues on small screens on the Equipment screen.
[modding] Fixed an issue with AllowedMutationCategories on Genotypes during character creation.

Caves of Qud

2,205

228

Workshop Item

TW - Endless EXP

TrueWolves

Guide

big dave's surprisingly small guide on defects

This list is going to work a little differently from the others, since defects are supposed to suck. As per usual, these are my opinions and should not have too strong of an influence over how you like to play the game.

36 ratings

13

billy.checkers.19

Video

Don't do neutron flux, kids.

Blueflowers

Guide

A Detective's Guide to Qud.

An in-character journey to understand more about the world of Qud.

34 ratings

4

Chosen

6 people found this review helpful
1 person found this review funny

Recommended

127.1 hrs on record

Posted: 19 December

Sometimes I lose perspective on everything that exists beneath all the layers of Qud's procedural generation and mechanical intricacy and capital-g Gameplay—I gradually stop suspending my disbelief until I realize I've been autoexploring every screen from a bird's-eye view and instinctually hotkeying through all the main-quest dialogue trees I've seen a hundred times and passively watching the numbers roll up with little regard for narrative context. Once I have that realization, I crack open whichever of the rare in-game books with non-generated, lushly-written text I've acquired most recently—it's almost always one I've never found or read before—and within a paragraph (or stanza) or two I'm fully back in it. I'm back to reading the dialogue, the character descriptions, the item descriptions, the location descriptions. I zoom the camera back in and move my weird character around the environment with intention. Once I'm back in that mindset, paying attention to what Caves of Qud really is, the spaces left between the astonishingly beautiful, complex, mysterious worldbuilding and the dense game systems and the just-abstract-enough visuals and (of course!) the writing are bridged by my imagination and I remember that this is pretty much the best game world ever—and what a treat it is to get to explore it, a slice at a time, through the lens of some of the most compelling roguelike and RPG mechanics out there.

doppio

193 products in account

0

Guide

big dave's clinically overweight case study of various qud quests

Remember, everyone approaches quests differently in Qud, take my opinions with a fistful of salt. Also remember to brush your teeth every night to avoid tooth decay.

28 ratings

28

billy.checkers.19

10 people found this review helpful
2 people found this review funny

Not Recommended

11.5 hrs on record

Posted: 22 December

I'm surprised to find myself writing a negative review. I thought this game would be right up my alley.

I picked this game up after playing a lot of Tales of Maj'Eyal. A friend recommended it as a similar game that they thought was better than ToME.

I enjoyed my first few hours of Caves of Qud, trying different characters and learning how to survive the first two quests in Classic Roguelike mode.

However, once I figured out my strategy and consistently made it past the starting area I found the rest of the world to be... more of the same. My overall impression is that this is a game with lots of breadth but, ironically for a game called Caves, very little depth.

The core gameplay loop is dull. You explore the World Map, descend into a procedurally generated cave, clear the cave of generic procedurally generated monsters, find some loot that's exactly the same as all the other loot you found in all the other procedurally generated caves, then move on to the next cave.

First, character progression is linear. The skill tree is exactly the same every run. You level up, and you add points to your Mutation powers, giving them a marginal increase in stats. This progression is the exact same, every run. There is no exciting or interest variance to this progression. You increase your stat points marginally with every level up, which marginally increases your combat abilities. Which leads to my next point:

This game lacks core elements that make Roguelikes engaging. There are no cool unique items or artifacts. Every run, you'll find the exact same bronze->iron->steel weapons with marginal stat improvements on the previous tier. Maybe one of them will be "painted" and give you +50 reputation with one faction or another.

There are no interesting encounters. There are few types of random events. Primarily:

Stumbling upon procedurally generated ruins that contain procedurally generated books that are full of procedurally generated gibberish.

Stumbling upon a procedurally generated Lair that has a purple text NPC from a random faction who you can 'purchase' procedurally generated 'secrets', conscript into your service, or sells a 'unique' item(read: gives you +1 to a status point).

Conscripting the NPC will give you a bunch of +/- to various faction reputations and and they follow you around like a pet. That's it. No further interesting interactions. No quests. No unique dialogue.

My final major issue with the game is the procedurally generated lore. I was excited to get into the game's lore, but quickly lost enthusiasm after reading 9 pages of meeting minutes from the Wardens and realized that the 'lore' is all procedurally generated purple prose gibberish that reads like it was written by a lawyer. I continue to skim the books to see if there's anything new or interesting, but am disappointed each time.

tl;dr: A wide range of shallow features and poorly implemented procedural generation. Go play ToME, it does pretty much everything Caves of Qud tries to do, but better.

M☯NK

3

Video

Caves of Qud - Holy Crap This Is Insane

BrianRubin

Guide

Double headed ESPer, the ONE who rules the world of Qud!

How good and easy can a ESPrer build be? Tricks to earn as much frash water as you wanted? ESPer build starts with an Axe in your hand with only 18 Ego, does it works? We may find out.

5

rockyst2

1.0 pre-Launch Information

28 Nov

Hey friends,

Caves of Qud 1.0 comes out in just over a week, on December 5th! It’s been an emotional and exciting time and the team has been hard at work with all the finishing touches on the update. We wanted to share some info about what you can expect on launch day.

Dromad Deluxe Edition

The 1.0 version of Caves of Qud launches alongside the Dromad Deluxe edition, which includes Caves of Qud, the newly enhanced soundtrack now with over 2 hours of music, and the Pets of Harvest Dawn DLC pack with in-game companions to start the game with. And most importantly, if you purchase the Dromad Deluxe edition, you get a special, shiny, dromad badge on your main menu screen!

If you already own Caves of Qud, don’t worry; you can complete the Dromad Deluxe bundle by purchasing the OST and Harvest Dawn pet pack separately.

Merch!

We’ve been working very closely with Mighty Merch[mightymerch.store] to develop a line of Caves of Qud merch that both channels Qud’s esoteric vibes and features your favorite characters & quotes. The first wave will contain t-shirts, stickers, posters, and pins, with more designs coming in future waves. Please note that these are launching as pre-order items from the Mighty Merch Store.

Speedrun Contest for Streamers

Starting December 5th, we will be holding a special contest for streamers to celebrate the ending of the main quest in the 1.0 update. Choose your run difficulty and beat the game as quickly as possible in front of an audience to win fabulous Caves of Qud prize packs. This is a contest designed to be streamed and shared with your community. Full details and rules can be found here.[docs.google.com]

FAQ

Q: Will the 1.0 update make my old saves incompatible?

A: Yes. Due to the nature of 1.0 update, old saves will not be compatible with the new patch on launch day. BUT! You can always continue playing old saves by switching to one of our legacy branches. The currently live branch is 208.x; you can switch to this branch now to avoid updating when the patch drops on December 5th.

Q: What is the exact time of launch?

A: 9am PT// 12pm ET// 5pm GMT

Caves of Qud

1,000

94

Workshop Item

Playable Slime 1.0

Symbiode

Screenshot

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7

1

街の守護役ワーデンを挑発したら腕を落とされた...

gipsydog

the Psychological Horror tag

Workshop Item

Madpoles have gyrocopter backpacks now

Workshop Item

Cromagus' CYF Expansion

Cromagus

Workshop Item

Tessa's Ancient Weapons

Tcgirl8

Artwork

Award

6

0

Qud memes

flemingluiz

Video

A Victim Of My Own Hubris - Caves of Qud

FurtherReading

anyone else think 'light manipulation' is a bit over powered?

seriously, it seems like a necessity for mental mutation dependent builds. it never misses, it does quite a good chunk of single target damage, it can be used many times in a row without cooldown, AND it provides a lightsorce if used lightly (no pun intended). i personally think it could use a nerf... or at least a similar alternative....

13

Jason1527

18 minutes ago

General Discussions

Video

Caves of Qud - 22 - Down the Grit Gate [GER Let's Play]

ForceCommander

Screenshot

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4

0

Miromaho

Screenshot

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4

0

自分の腕を拾って逃げたけどしっかり装備欄から手に持てる項目が消えてる、火の鳥の我王みたいになってしまった。まあ高く付くけど腕を元に戻す方法はあるっちゃある

gipsydog

Artwork

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5

2

Qud

flemingluiz

Artwork

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3

0

Blue Jell

Thighs

Screenshot

Potential spoilers. Hover to reveal image.

Award

2

0

delight in the abundance of peace (spoilers 7th nephilim)

fleshpuppetry

Screenshot

Award

2

0

THIS IS WHERE I POST FROM

💀💀💀💀💀💀

Artwork

Award

2

1

Esper hell.

Nokka

Guide

zetachrome attainment and smoothing the power curve

there is nothing in all the worlds that glitters like zetachrome

2

pavelkaiddub

Artwork

Award

3

0

Amaranthine Prism

Vic Viper