When comparing Ziggurat vs Caves of Qud, the Slant community recommends Caves of Qud for most people. In the question“What are the best roguelikes/roguelites on PC?” Caves of Qud is ranked 11th while Ziggurat is ranked 53rd. The most important reason people chose Caves of Qud is:
Mutations are one of the biggest parts of Caves of Qud. Want to be a two-headed beguiling spider-thing? A four-armed flying plant-man? You can. There's also lots of armor, weapons, and equipment, which can be found enchanted, as well as a bunch of "spells" (mental mutations) and skills.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Assortment of enemies that have varied designs
There is a large assortment of enemies to battle in game that all have varied designs.
Pro Procedurally generated levels and random weapons upon start
Ziggurat has large procedurally generated levels where the player start out with a different weapon each time, making for fresh and different experience every time a game is played.
Pro Inspired by Hexen and Doom
Ziggurat is heavily inspired by the classic PC games Hexen and Doom, making for a current gen refresh.
Pro Tons of customization
Mutations are one of the biggest parts of Caves of Qud. Want to be a two-headed beguiling spider-thing? A four-armed flying plant-man? You can. There's also lots of armor, weapons, and equipment, which can be found enchanted, as well as a bunch of "spells" (mental mutations) and skills.
Pro Fantastic User Interface
The UI in Qud is very well designed, which helps to make it easy to get into.
Pro Interesting and original setting
The game is set in a post-apocalyptic world that feels truly unique. Caves of Qud's world is like no other, and everything from the creatures/characters you'll encounter, to the items you'll find, and the locations you'll discover is different from what you would find in most rogue-likes.
Pro Over 60 factions
Befriend or become enemies with dozens of different factions—crabs, turtles, robots and even trees to name a few.
Pro Unique idea
Unique content and idea of "retro-future" make this "not another rogue-like", in a way.
Pro Unique and evocative prose, art and music
Extremely well written, with highly evocative prose which brings this unique world to life. The fantastic writing is supplemented by a unique art style and sublime otherworldly music.
Pro Huge, procedurally-generated world
Cons
Con Short
The title is pretty short, with only five levels the game could potentially be beaten in under an hour.
Con Death is inevitable and happens often
Being that Ziggurat is a roguelite game, death will happen and it will happen often. While it is by design it can get infuriating at times.
Con Can be difficult to get started
The beginning of the game explains little, depending on what attributes you put points into in character creation will have a high level of impact at the start of the game. This is not explained to the player, so if you do not put 18 points into "toughness" without having a very particular build in mind that will have some way of dodging or avoiding attacks, the result will just be plenty of death with little advancement.
Con Cooldown simulator
Con UI is in the way
UI is in the way, literally. Even with the overlay mod you'll have issues. The original overlay is too bulky and hard to read.