I played this game in the Alpha version a pretty long tome ago, so I have nostalgic memories of Cube World. I played it recently and bought the steam version and here's what I have to say about Cube World in general:
I truly believe this game likely would have been a titan in the "block game" category if the creator didn't take a hard left turn when updating it past alpha to put on steam. Alpha world generation is peak world generation, the game was simple and had an addictive gameplay loop. Improving skill trees, adding human companions, improving village generation (or making a quest based generation) could have been implemented to make the game perfect.
Cube World Steam Version changes the main gameplay loop entirely. crafting materials are rarer and loot drops are better, and there is no level restriction on equipment. The new gameplay loop is kill bosses, loot better gear, kill more bosses. The objective of Steam Version is to collect "Artifacts" around the biomes which give random improvements to abilities. Leaving a biome removes all the items collected and "resets" your character. This is a literal gameplay "Loop." Once you complete the first area, you have to do the exact same thing again from the bottom. Dying in steam version also sucks. Even with gear equal to the boss, you are still extremely likely to die if you don't cheese the boss. respawn areas are 1-3 entire minutes away from boss locations, so you are stuck holding W and maybe scrolling on your phone for 3 minutes just to die immediately and do it again. This is where I stopped playing Steam Version, fighting the highest level enemy with the highest level equipment and losing multiple times.
The alpha version is a craft/loot combination exploration game. You start out extremely weak, dying to every wild animal. Finding crafting materials and fighting the few enemies you can defeat lets you get better armor and use the very limited skill tree. Killing the bosses scattered around the map provides you with special crafting materials for weapons and a bunch of exp. As you level up, you can craft better gear and equip better gear. That is the gameplay loop of alpha Cube World. Craft and equip gear to kill difficult bosses, level up, craft more gear and fight more bosses. The distance between bosses in alpha is still obscene, but there are respawn points 15 seconds away from every boss, and the areas in between are filled out better with ore, crafting materials, and radiant bosses.
I really wish this game was moddable. Sadly, it seems that the developer made a lot of the code and programs very unfriendly to modders. The 4-5 mods for this game are not true scripted mods, but are instead mods that change 1 or 2 numbers of a variable.
Heres how I suggest enjoying cube world:
1. Buy the steam version and play it for a few hours. Don't hurt the developer because you don't like how they manage their game, they still deserve support for creating the game you are playing.
2. Look for the alpha version download online. Download that version and play it for a few hours as well. The game is very hard in the start because everything can kill you, so don't get discouraged right off the bat. There is little skill mechanics in the game, enemies auto lock attacks, have super far reach and attack faster than you can dodge. You are required to get better equipment to defeat enemies.
