Cults and Daggers

EDITED I'm going to be frank and say this game is not perfect. It's far from it, and it really should be labelled as Early Access. Putting this game on an arbitrary ten point scale, I'd score it around a 3. I originally gave this game a down vote, and I do strongly urge potential buyers to do their own research and know what you're getting in to. However, the concept alone is something fresh and is a breath of fresh air on Steam. The developer also keeps a close ear on the forums and is taking the criticism and suggestions offered to heart. As long as the developer keeps putting in the effort to fix things, they'll have my confidence.

The game is flawed but really original and clever. Not enough developers have a singular vision for a game and stick to it despite pressure from a vocal minority. Ignore the MIXED review rating. Most indie strategy games have 50-60% positive reviews because they are niche genres, have complex and new concepts and many people buy games on sale without reading the store info and just gather expectations by looking at images. 8/10 times that will result in a negative review. This is a slow and meticulous game where you will plan your strategy a dozen moves ahead. Still you won't feel overwhelmed at any point. The game's slower pace allows you to adjust to evolving scenarios with the opposition. The game is considered finished but the developer continues to occasionally update the game based on reasonable feedback. It was last updated in March and April(now June). I recommend the game to those who have an interest in historical secret societies, rising religious powers and intelligence(spies) warfare. Support original game designers or we will be playing the same old boring FPS Survival games or MOBAS. YUCK! Let's spend $20-40/month supporting clever developers, especially in the Strategy/Tycoon/Sim genre which is ignored by mainstream mostly(except for a few stragglers). It's up to us

This game has so much potential! It's a great game that will keep you playing for hours, until you realize that it's a strategic clicker, and I found that the depth that I thought was there evaporates after you get past winning the first couple of ages. I want there to be more about developing your cult as the ages progress, and elimination of the randomness of of the times inbetween the ages.

Although this game has a good concept, the Cluttered user interface and no tutorial or instructions make this difficult to learn and enjoy. Will come back to this in a couple of updates to see how it goes but for now its $30 that I wish I hadnt wasted.

I.. I have no idea what is going on. Been trying to for two days, slowly some patterns are emerging but I'm just confused. Followers suddenly disappear off the map. I win an age (how did I win?) and then the next the AI seems to overnight have 350+ faith to my 40 (the other two AIs have 5 between them). There are options and abilities but no clue what they do or why I should care. Faith seems important but no option seems to generate it. I want to like this game, the concept is awesome, but the UI is So cumbersome...

Seriously. A neutral button. Why can't we have that? There is only one reason for me not to recommend the game to most of you and that indeed is as even the dev has mentioned is that the game is made for a very niche audience. But for that niche audience, the game works and is ok to play. I still feel that friends of other grand strategy games like crusader kings 2 (F2P this week btw) won't get the same feeling from cults and daggers compared to them. Controlling you're disciples just doesn't have the same feel as in controlling royal family matters, armies and diplomatic relations I would imagine. The game works and I only ran into one bug that destroyed the world map entirely for some reason, but that's easily fixable by loading a save. In summary the game works and if you are a hardcore fan of grand strategy games, then you may want to buy it now, if you can't wait for a sale, but in any other case WAIT FOR A SALE. And even then, proceed with care. If you wan to see some gameplay take a look of my video below, where I talk about the game a bit more. http://youtu.be/VXMVhLgzmMU

Good stuff. Watch Agrippa's lets play to learn how to play is best. https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLfm9XNvwBFG_DNZZEO9kOEr2yPxRAMBf6

Breath of fresh air..... I've just run through my first age of Cults and Daggers and was happily surprised. From the screen shots I expected the Rome:Total War map segment - without the fighting bits, just moving pawns around a map of central Europe, but it is much much more than that. Im real time and turn based strategy all the way and this game adds some very interesting little quirks to genres that sadly can sometimes get a little repetative. The AI is nicely devious (even on easy) and you feel that your orders to your desciples can be a genuine gamble, I lost 3 cities in 2 turns to plague and murder, great stuff. This brings to the PC alot from those old board games i used to play. Watch the devs video for a quick 'in' to playing, it taught me alot. This was a brave concept to try and its paid off, reading the boards whilst downloading the dev also seems approachable with any problems which is refreshing. 10/10

Would I recommend this game? Yes How would I rate this game? 5-6/10 ... for now, I could see it being a 7-8/10 later Pros: This game has a wonderful premise. It is pretty easy to understand the basic mechanics and like many games doesnt try to be something that it is not. I have only played a few hours so far but I can see that there is a lot of potential replayability here. If you like history, theology, board games and turn based strategy you should pick this game up. Cons: There are map UI issues and playability issues that need to be worked out. Following what happens every turn can get tedious. The UI for the summary of a turn (scrolling is difficult) as well as the map UI, no high level view needs tweaking. Some scenarios need reworking, its too easy to kill off disciples with no consequences. Also, some more story depth needs to be added. I would love to see evils that take multiple events to defeat and more decisions that have to be made based on historical events of the time. To Sum Up: Overall this game has a lot of potential. As long as the game designer and developer(s) stick with the game and keep updating it, this game has the chance to be a huge winner. I am hoping this is the case because I have been waiting a long time for a game like this.

This is a great game! Cults and Daggers is a rare example of this sort of game being designed well, where it is actually engaging, fun to play, and true to the themes it involves. There are not many games of this genre of "Cult Simulation" around. I can only think of one other, called "Evil Cult" which is a free browser game that is also very fun and well designed, but much simpler than this. I highly recommend this game, especially if you ever wanted a good strategy game that simulates cult management and the religious, occult and supernatural themes involved. Along with this, the Classical Age setting and aesthetics, as well as the art design are marvellous. I really like this game and it has great potential to be expanded upon. I hope with future updates, the game mechanics are made more complex and fine-tuned. I also would love to see an expansion with a campaign setting in contemporary times. I finished the game recently. I saw from this that the game needs further development. Regardless, this programme is the kernel of a great game that needs more development for the game to properly flourish.