Robin Yu on 9/9/2025 at 03:41
Hello taffers,
I just beat Caves of Qud and feel like prosyletizing, as I think fans of our more colorfully-written fan missions (or oddball science fantasy in the dying earth taxon) deserve to know about it. "Baroque" is no misappellation. If ornate, technical, and unabashedly weird paeans to half-ruined technopolies and their mutating inhabitants are in any way your thing, CoQ has much to feast your lobes on.
Of particular interest to sworn taffers may be its commonalities with Thief, including the central dilemma of order and chaos, though unlike Thief it lacks much POV at either end (narrowing its scope despite some effective cosmicism), and instead joins you to a richly characterized tribe. Occasional dialects/idiolects are employed, variously scrutable, and convey personality well. There is also a faction called the Mechanimists who revere technology (one has to wonder...), here a small part of an intertwining preoccupation with the organic, technologic, and spiritual.
Quote Posted by Mechanimist preacher
Enchantment! It knows no other name!
The music is the perfect accompaniment to this strange poetry, and largely responsible for determining the mood. Its transformative powers are most apparent when other variables remain the same, e.g. in certain areas at certain plot points. It far exceeded the expressive range I have come to expect from games of this graphical simplicity.
Like other roguelikes, I find the controls ungainly mainly when forced to switch between keyboard and mouse, either of which is situationally useless by itself. This offended less after I discovered autoexplore and bound it conveniently, though I felt less autonomous henceforth. I also had to rebind the directional examine, which is far too commonly used to be a key combo. Some UI bafflement remains, but as a Dwarf Fortress veteran I have put up with worse. Likewise, the fundamental Cartesian gridlock, while thematically incongruous, did not undermine my immersion, though the permadeath mechanic did slightly. I am not sure what (if any) type of game would have been a better "host" for this world, but no writing is so extraordinary that it can't depreciate when one is overexposed to it, e.g. in successive runs of a difficult permadeath roguelike, though in retrospect this did not affect much.
The procedural generation became mostly white noise as time went on, and I couldn't help feeling the devs were were trying to have their beautifully written cake and also make it infinitely eatable. Handcrafted ruins with random enemies/loot would have had more character, better evoked human constructions, and allowed more deliberate pacing. Nor did the procgen books amuse me with their anarchic grammer, but maybe there is an audience for such things. On the other hand, the overworld seems too static: a little bit of procgen a la DF continents would have aided replayability there.
I am not a big roguelike fan, but I found the gameplay compelling and the permadeath loop deeperly addicting, especially before I got to the end of the book. Playstyle diversity is probably lower than Tales of Maj Eyal (the other roguelike I've beaten; otherwise a blandfest), but more flexible and full of emergent possibilities. It is one of those games that allows you to become OP in roundabout ways, or do weird out of caprice. My first character to beat the game (probably my hundredth overall) ended up with 2 legs, 2 tails, 3 heads, 10 faces, 7 arms, and a fungus stump, all bearing powerful equipment that could stunlock it-ness itself, though the final boss was still a challenge because I accidentally cloned it.
If this seems heavy on complaints, it is not proportionate to my experience. The writing is the main attraction and my criticisms there are hardly show-stoppers. CoQ gave me that rare feeling I get when I discover new favorite authors, which always exceeds game-excitement. I am still digesting it, and will be for a while.
I leave you with CoQ's description of a plastic tree:
Quote:
Fronds are splayed out in a waxy imitation of life. It looks hard and greasy up close, but as you back away its edges burn into softness and it performs the tree function.
demagogue on 9/9/2025 at 06:16
I love this game. I've gotten to the end game neighborhood, so feel pretty confident I can speak about the whole experience. The storytelling and vibe are pretty great. I think the trailers capture the mystical vibe it has going pretty well.
[video=youtube;4nG-N_jtpZI]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4nG-N_jtpZI[/video]
Edit: The (
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZHUEtjClps) original trailer captures the mystical vibe even better. The (
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v8SbeAYMp5Q) Switch trailer is probably better in terms of showing what you can actually expect from the game though.
What I like about it as a Roguelike, similar to what I like about the other Roguelike I like Shattered Pixel, is how intense it gets, where in a lot of situations you're plotting individual moves very carefully, where literally every single move is a life or death decision, and you're carefully picking your way out of these epic battles... Also just the process of discovery, since as you move out, you don't know what kinds of surprises enemies will have for you when you first encounter them. Oh, and along with that, the dynamism of it. You never know what collection of enemies are going to team up, and in what environment, because it changes every game. As does your character's traits and equipment, so you have different assets to bring against the bad guys. And as you get experience playing it, you know how to make the best of whatever hand you're dealt.
The balance between periodic hyper intense situations and really chill parts where you can just explore and talk to characters at ease is a really nice balance for gaming. And of course it's great for role playing, building your character, getting to know this world, taking in the vibe and other worldliness of it all.
Anyway I'm a big fan too. It's on par with Dwarf Fortress. If you love one you're sure to love the other, but each does the thing they're doing in their own way.
Malf on 9/9/2025 at 08:51
Quote Posted by demagogue
Anyway I'm a big fan too. It's on par with Dwarf Fortress. If you love one you're sure to love the other, but each does the thing they're doing in their own way.
I've always been tempted to pick this up because of recommendations like this, but at the same time, these recommendations kinda scare me off too.
I fear I only have room in my life for one incredibly complex fantasy world simulator.
For clarity dema, I take it you mean it's comparible to DF's Adventure mode, not Fortress mode?
Again, that's something I've never really delved into, despite having thousands of hours in fortress mode.
demagogue on 9/9/2025 at 15:49
It's comparable in the sense that you have complex systems that interact creating these cascading interesting emergent situations.
There's a podcast where they're talking with each other about some of the funniest unexpected emergent situations or bugs they had. I remember Dwarf Fortress's was dwarfs getting drunk and spilling beer on the ground which the cats then drank as they wandered by, got sick, vomited, and then they had this problem of cat vomit piling up in the bars that wasn't getting cleaned up. And now I can't remember what COQ's story was, but it was something like that. (I think (
https://www.bay12games.com/media/Dwarf_Fortress_Talk_26.mp3) this is the podcast, but I don't have time to double check it & find where that exchange is. There are some (
https://open.spotify.com/episode/0ktsHVb1RqMgVfTgfBkihs) others where they talk together.)
I never played Adventure Mode in DF either, just Fortress mode, so I don't know how they compare. But that's the kind of thing I meant, at that really general level of emergent systems DF and CoQ compare, where ascii characters are interacting and fighting while ascii systems are doing their thing around them, and emergent things are happening that you could tell a story about. But that's a pretty general level. At the more specific level of gameplay they're still different games of course.
COQ is different in the sense that you're building your character and whatever unique combination of their abilities and equipment, and taking that out into dungeons that have different surprises as you go deeper. In a way it's like the reverse of DF fortress mode, since you're the one invading the fortresses/dungeons with special powers, combining all these mutations and skills and powers and equipment in crazy ways to take on stock monsters in dungeons in unique and interesting ways, as opposed to DF where you train dwarfs and combine their skills with crazy gizmos to take on stock monsters invading you in unique and interesting ways. And in CoQ you're visiting existing villages and communities that you can interact with, so there's a social interaction side, and in DF of course you build your own community with probably more complex social dynamics.
I think it's understandable and fine to have a favorite and give your time to it, since I agree people can't give in to every time sink. I think it might worth playing a little of CoQ just to see how they compare, because that's interesting to think and talk about, and then going back to DF as your home game. But to each their own.
Malf on 9/9/2025 at 22:16
Cheers dema, that's good info. It does sound a lot like DF's Adventure mode, but a bit more refined. I've played a teeny-tiny bit of Adventure mode, but not enough to say I've got a handle on it.
I do love the idea of visitng fortresses I've made in Adventure mode mind you, and maybe one day I'll get around to it. But I've got that above-ground city to build first...
