Home / Games / Caves of Qud
Caves of Qud
Inhabit a deeply-simulated science fantasy world and chisel through layers of thousand-year-old civilizations. Build a character from over a hundred mutations and cybernetics. The award-winning sandbox roguelike & RPG full of robots, deep lore, and sentient plants.
What players say
Steam review score and the most-helpful voices, which may include critical ones. Score via Steam as of 2026-08-31 · quoted reviews as of 2026-05-12.
What reviewers agree on
42 of the 103 reviews raise this.
“Such a unique game full of charm. I find the "Dead Earth" setting evocative, even with retro graphics. The music is great, and the visual effects of everything from water and fire to the reality-bending powers provide…”
“I was hesitant to buy the game at first, but I'm so glad I did. Caves of Qud is one of, if not the best, roguelike out there, and I've played a lot of roguelikes/roguelites. It's a "true" roguelike, full of charm,…”
“30 hours and I still don't think I know exactly what I'm doing or even scratched the surface of the game itself. It's easy to get lost just exploring. And its incredible, don't let the graphics fool you there's a lot…”
19 of the 103 reviews raise this.
“Such a unique game full of charm. I find the "Dead Earth" setting evocative, even with retro graphics. The music is great, and the visual effects of everything from water and fire to the reality-bending powers provide…”
“I think this game is a masterpiece. Firstly, everytime you start a new game the whole world is simulated, including its history, historical figures and deities. Its such a technological marvel. Just like dwarf fortress;…”
“Amazing rogue like, very unique theme and mechanics, lots of interesting things to discover.”
15 of the 103 reviews raise this.
“Such a unique game full of charm. I find the "Dead Earth" setting evocative, even with retro graphics. The music is great, and the visual effects of everything from water and fire to the reality-bending powers provide…”
“I think this game is a masterpiece. Firstly, everytime you start a new game the whole world is simulated, including its history, historical figures and deities. Its such a technological marvel. Just like dwarf fortress;…”
“Move slowly. Immerse yourself in the world. Look at everything. Read everything. Where there is one enemy, there is likely 37 more just around that dark corner. Your base is wherever you decide to plop down a chest you…”
13 of the 103 reviews raise this.
“Such a unique game full of charm. I find the "Dead Earth" setting evocative, even with retro graphics. The music is great, and the visual effects of everything from water and fire to the reality-bending powers provide…”
“30 hours and I still don't think I know exactly what I'm doing or even scratched the surface of the game itself. It's easy to get lost just exploring. And its incredible, don't let the graphics fool you there's a lot…”
“Honestly one of the best works of art ever made. Its goated with goated devs.”
8 of the 103 reviews raise this.
“I was hesitant to buy the game at first, but I'm so glad I did. Caves of Qud is one of, if not the best, roguelike out there, and I've played a lot of roguelikes/roguelites. It's a "true" roguelike, full of charm,…”
“There's so much poetry to this game. I'm not talking about the prose which sure is nice. Rather, the vibe and the setting is just beautiful. It's true Fantasy. The game is very polished (especially for a true rogue…”
“Qud is one of my favorite games of all time. And I haven't even beaten it (gotten pretty damn close though). Such an immersive world, so many different builds, so many things you can do. I have never played a game with…”
6 of the 103 reviews raise this · 2 of them still recommend the game.
“I thought I didn’t “get it.” I assumed there was something deep in Caves of Qud that I just wasn’t reaching yet. I value complexity, systems that interact, worlds that push back, where your actions ripple out in…”
“WAY too expensive for what it is! The world and the possibilities, which the game seems to pride itself on, are way more shallow than you would expect... Sure, i can find a village full of talking crocodiles, spend some…”
“I would not call this a role playing game. The game has nonsensical proc-gen texted outside the story quests, which itself are quite obtuse. NPCs are bland and only serve as quest or trade vendors for the most part. The…”
3 of the 103 reviews raise this · 3 of them still recommend the game.
“It's definitely worth a try, but I am a bit mixed on it. The game is at its best when you're exploring. Trying out new builds. Learning about the creatures and the history. However, if you're not prepared you will…”
“It certainly was one of the games of all time. If you like this kind of game you will love it. If you dont... well... its not really something thats going to spur your love of the genre into action by any means. Its…”
“Ten minutes on Character creation screen browsing options. Sounds interesting. Immediate region options. Awesome. Choose the desert. Walk down two squares. Killed in one strike by scorpion. 8/8 This is Art. This is why…”
3 of the 103 reviews raise this · 1 of them still recommend the game.
“The world and characters are a joy to explore and meet. The game's writing tries too hard to be a different flavor of English, but despite that its still very charming if not hard to parse sometimes. I think the game's…”
“I really really wanted to like this and its not like its a bad game but this should only be priced at 6$ if that. The gameplay gets stale fast. The HUD and the UI is a nightmare. I tried to refund way before my 3 hours…”
Counted across 103 English reviews, sampled to match this game's 95.0% positive rating · as of 2026-05-12
“i'm not much for writing reviews -- i'm not very good at them. but this game is spectacular. i'm old. so i played rogue. and angband, and zangband. most importantly, i played mission: thunderbolt. which, i suspect, few people have. this is the perfect successor. it's difficult.…”
— a player, Steam review · 143 hrs played“This is the game that when youre playing it, your buddies will ask "what game are you always playing". Then you show them, and they have zero idea what on earth is going on. But its the greatest game to sink infinite hours into and they have no idea. Qud is my guilty pleasure,…”
— a player, Steam review · 158 hrs played“I wish I could give this a mixed rating. Positives: The setting- The world is very unique and creative, and it truly gives you a 'stranger in a strange land' type feeling. Exploring and finding weird creatures or environments is very satisfying because there's so much and it's…”
— a player, Steam review · 57 hrs playedPlayer activity
Monthly average concurrent players. Live data self-collected from the Steam API · history through 2026-06 via SteamCharts.
Achievement stats
Global completion rates across all Steam players — a data view of how far people actually get. Source: Steam official stats · as of 2026-09-05.
Price tracking
US-region pricing (USD), sampled twice daily by our own tracker since 2026-07-11. Steam prices vary by region — always confirm your local price on Steam.
Regional prices at last sample, in local currency — Steam sets each region's price independently.
Cheapest → most expensive, converted to USD at ECB reference rates (2026-09-10). Relative comparison only.
Latest official news
Developer announcements via the Steam news API — links go to the original posts. More across all games on the news hub.
Autoexplore Beta
This is a beta test of a new autoexplore algorithm! Let us know if you spot any bugs or issues. 211.52 - 'beta' branch *Added a new 'classic' autoexplore mode which is a more performant version of the
Maintenence Patch - August 8, 2026
211.51 Effects that increase the size of damage dice now apply to arc winders. Irisdual beam now interrupts auto-actions. Gigantic creatures are now transmuted into gigantic gems. You can no longer be
Maintenance Patch - July 4, 2026
211.50 Autoexplore will now only dig in order to reach revealed objects of interest. Autoexplore is now less prone to discard its last target if interrupted. Fixed a bug that caused saves to load with
Burgeoning Summer Growth
Hey folks,We have some nice updates to share. First, after several weeks on the beta branch, our performance patch is now ready for everyone. It includes lots of little fixes and some deep rewrites th
Beta Patch - April 24, 2026
211.38 - 'beta' branch Greatly improved performance on wet maps.
Games like Caves of Qud
From our knowledge graph — ranked by shared traits, not a black box. Each card says why it's here.
The Doors of Trithius
94.5% · 656 reviews
shares Traditional Roguelike, CRPG, Turn Based, Replay Value
Tales of Maj'Eyal
94.5% · 4,927 reviews
shares Traditional Roguelike, Moddable, Turn Based, Replay Value
Cogmind
96.2% · 1,758 reviews
shares Traditional Roguelike, Turn Based, Replay Value, Procedural Generation
ATOM RPG Trudograd
86.0% · 1,146 reviews
shares CRPG, Turn Based, Replay Value, Turn Based Combat
Stoneshard
74.1% · 11,588 reviews
shares Turn Based, Replay Value, Turn Based Combat, Procedural Generation
Encased: A Sci-Fi Post-Apocalyptic RPG
74.3% · 2,397 reviews
shares CRPG, Turn Based, Turn Based Combat, Choices Matter
Shattered Pixel Dungeon
93.1% · 821 reviews
shares Traditional Roguelike, Turn Based, Replay Value, Turn Based Combat
Rogue Fable III
92.8% · 594 reviews
shares Traditional Roguelike, Turn Based, Replay Value, Procedural Generation
Screenshots
Official Steam store screenshots — click any shot to enlarge.
Facts & details
From the Steam store record, snapshot 2026-05-12.
| Genres | Adventure, Indie, RPG, Strategy |
| Player tags | Procedural Generation · Turn-Based Combat · Open World · Turn-Based · Transhumanism · Sci-fi · Replay Value · Traditional Roguelike · Rogue-like · Story Rich · RPG · Character Customization (SteamSpy community voting) |
| Features | Single-player · Steam Achievements · Full controller support · Steam Workshop · Steam Cloud · Steam Leaderboards · Includes level editor · Family Sharing |
| Languages | English |
| Controller | Full support |
| Achievements | 150 |
| Official site | http://www.cavesofqud.com |
Minimum system requirements (PC)
Minimum: OS: Windows 10 21H1, Windows 11 21H2 Processor: 1GHz or faster. SSE2 instruction set support. Memory: 4 GB RAM Graphics: Graphics card: DX10, DX11, DX12 capable Storage: 2 GB available space