Cube World finally has a release window, six years after alpha

Surprise! Six years after it released as a paid alpha in 2013, Cube World – the voxel-based, procedually-generated action-RPG that's a little like a mash-up of World of Warcraft and Minecraft – has finally secured a release date.

In its first official update in years, Picroma announced it will launch on Steam “hopefully around the end of September/October 2019”,  four years after the game was removed from sale from the digital platform.

If you're wondering why it's taken so long, you're not alone. In a candid blog update (thanks, Polygon) developer Wolfram von Funck described "why everything took [...] so long" and "why there were no updates", detailing how an early DDoS attack left the developer traumatised and hesitant to press on.

"When I released Cube World back in 2013 on our homepage, I was enthusiastic to finally share my game with you. It was a dream come true for me, I wanted to be a game developer since I was a kid," they wrote.

"As some of you might remember, we got DDoS'ed as soon as we opened the shop. It might sound silly, but this event traumatized me and kind of broke something inside me. I never told anyone about it, and I don't want to go into the details, but I'm dealing with anxiety and depression ever since. Social media didn't improve it, as you might imagine. I'm still not sure if it's a good idea to tell the world about it, but I wanted to give the fans an explanation."

Von Funck went on to detail how, at "several points in the past years", they considered releasing an update, "but every time I was afraid it wasn't good enough" and perfectionist tendencies made them "rework everything from scratch several times". 

Looking ahead, the imminent release sees a number of improvements on its alpha predecessor. Von Funck says the planned new release "is basically Cube World 2.0" and while there are "still many things [they'd] like to add in the future", the version finally slated for release "is already fun".

According to the new listing on Steam, Cube World 2.0 offers the usual four RPG classes and includes co-operative online multiplayer, "procedurally generated lore", "non-linear, open world gameplay", and "action-based combat". Of course, early adopters will get the new, updated game without forking out any more money.

While you wait for Cube World to drop, why not check out our list of the best PC games?