Cube World is an amazing work of art with a very intriguing implementation. The game looks good, performs good, plays good and sounds (almost) good. Multiplayer just works. In my (and friends) experience, bugs are rarely found. It's truly amazing that a team of 1 developer and 1 artist could achieve.
Objectively speaking, the game makes a tough case for your money - its price point is very good for the amount of work put into it.
However, all of this is very nice and dandy, until we get to the issues with Game Design. Those, along with project history, is what caused (and is causing) the fallout inside and around the game's community.
With all of the above taken into consideration, I can only recommend Cube World on a very specific set of conditions:


1) Will you play Co-Op? You should.
Reason: Playing solo is pretty bad, playing Co-op can be pretty fun.


2) Do you expect a sandbox open-world experience similar to Minecraft or Terraria? You should not.
Reason: Cube World punishes you severely for freely exploring. The game is about specific, near-linear progression, rather than open-ended and emergent gameplay. There's no building or property mechanics.


3) Would you voluntarily go to Hell? You should not. But by playing it, you are voluntarily experiencing it.
Reason: Cube World is a videogame representation of a type of Hell (symbolic meaning), and you shouldn't buy it unless you are aware of it.


If you do not meet above conditions, I can't recommend the game. Further explanations below.

Quickly exploring the second and third points will compress all I have to say about the bad parts of the game.
Imagine Garfield (yes, the cartoon cat) dies and goes to hell. The Devil tells him he's free to eat all lasagna he wants, for all eternity.
Garfield becomes excited and thinks the hell is an awesome place. What the Devil doesn't tell him is that he will always be hungry, which means he will always be eating, which means lasagna will eventually lose its flavor and joy. Likewise, it also means he is not free to go anywhere, unless it has lasagna.


Stuck in a loop with no end in-sight, set free in a wide landscape yet bound by artificial and arbitrary rules. That is Cube World.


You get in CW's world, and you want loot, special items and artifacts. You get those, near linearly, and do all the quests in your Region.
You move on elsewhere, and when you cross a border (to a different map Region), all your progress is erased (gear is region-locked: a region's gear is worthless in another except for Artifacts*). You start over, with no end in sight - the game has no End-game, no Final Boss, no Difficult Goal to grow towards - and by this point you will likely be asking yourself why you are not playing something else instead - such as Trove, Minecraft, Terraria or Starbound.


(*) Artifacts are character-bound items that give you percentage increases on secondary parameters, such as Swimming Speed, or Gliding Speed. Primary parameters such as damage, move speed, health/mana/stamina regeneration are never affected.


Although the game is a heavy hitter in multiple regards - I'm specifically fond at how it makes a cute block game have a rather hard, souls-like combat system - it magnificently manages to shoot itself in the foot with a bazooka due to its progression system.
I'm particularly fascinated how one managed to design and implement a type of a symbolic Hell in a videogame - I don't think many people could do it (requires creating a special kind of illusion), and I doubt anyone would do it (causes an obscene amount of negative reactions). This makes me think it was intentional and deliberate, but I really hope it was not.


Regarding future patches and changes: around CW, there's a lot of "could"s. The developer could fix the game by fixing the progression system. There could be faster ways to travel the land. Could add a storage system. Could this, and could that. We could only hope.


If after reading through all of this, you still think you could have fun with the game, by all means, try it. I had good fun with Co-op (2 and 3-player co-op). But do so knowing that you already took the red pill - I already showed you where the rabbit hole goes.


Thanks for reading!
Special thanks to my wife Mariana, who laughed at my comparison of CW's design to that of Hell during dinner, making me believe maybe noting itdown would make it funnier.


---
In 3 hours of gameplay I managed to achieve: nothing. Well, except for a single piece of equipment better than mine. Which still makes my character have a hard time killing a cow.
Walking simulator 2019.


Note: I'll be giving the game a fair chance, but I already gave it 2 fair chances and it failed to entice me beyond the 2 hour walking session. I know exactly what I should do to progress in the game, but it's just not fun.
There's a rare chance it'll be a bit more fun after the initial horrid hours-long walking sessions. If I can make myself get there, I can update this to give it a more fair review, given that clearly a lot of work went into it. The game design however, feels very misguided.

[h1][b]UPDATE [/b]after 20+ hours of gameplay[/h1] [h1]Summary[/h1] Cube World is an amazing work of art with a very intriguing implementation. The game looks good, performs good, plays good and sounds (almost) good. Multiplayer [i]just works. [/i]In my (and friends) experience, bugs are rarely found. It's truly amazing that a team of 1 developer and 1 artist could achieve. Objectively speaking, the game makes a tough case for your money - its price point is very good for the amount of work put into it. However, all of this is very nice and dandy, until we get to the issues with Game Design. Those, along with project history, is what caused (and is causing) the fallout inside and around the game's community. With all of the above taken into consideration, I can only recommend Cube World on a [i]very[/i] specific set of conditions: [b]1) Will you play Co-Op? [i]You should.[/i][/b] [b]Reason[/b]: Playing solo is pretty bad, playing Co-op can be pretty fun. [b]2) Do you expect a sandbox open-world experience similar to Minecraft or Terraria? [i]You should not.[/i][/b] [b]Reason:[/b] Cube World punishes you severely for freely exploring. The game is about specific, near-linear progression, rather than open-ended and emergent gameplay. There's no building or property mechanics. [b]3) Would you voluntarily go to Hell? [i]You should not. But by playing it, you are voluntarily experiencing it.[/i][/b] [b]Reason: [/b]Cube World is a videogame representation of a type of Hell ([i]symbolic meaning[/i]), and you shouldn't buy it unless you are aware of it. If you do not meet above conditions, I can't recommend the game. Further explanations below. [h1] [/h1] [h1]Garfield in Hell - The Core Gameplay Issue[/h1] Quickly exploring the second and third points will compress all I have to say about the bad parts of the game. Imagine Garfield (yes, the cartoon cat) dies and goes to hell. The Devil tells him he's free to eat all lasagna he wants, for all eternity. Garfield becomes excited and thinks the hell is an awesome place. What the Devil doesn't tell him is that he will always be hungry, which means he will always be eating, which means lasagna will eventually lose its flavor and joy. Likewise, it also means he is not free to go anywhere, unless it has lasagna. Stuck in a loop with no end in-sight, set free in a wide landscape yet bound by artificial and arbitrary rules. That is Cube World. [h1]Explanation[/h1] You get in CW's world, and you want loot, special items and artifacts. You get those, near linearly, and do all the quests in your Region. You move on elsewhere, and when you cross a border (to a different map Region), all your progress is erased (gear is region-locked: a region's gear is worthless in another except for Artifacts*). You start over, with no end in sight - the game has no End-game, no Final Boss, no [i]Difficult Goal[/i] to grow towards - and by this point you will likely be asking yourself why you are not playing something else instead - such as Trove, Minecraft, Terraria or Starbound. [b](*) Artifacts [/b]are character-bound items that give you percentage increases on secondary parameters, such as Swimming Speed, or Gliding Speed. Primary parameters such as damage, move speed, health/mana/stamina regeneration are [b]never [/b]affected. [h1]Conclusion[/h1] Although the game is a heavy hitter in multiple regards - I'm specifically fond at how it makes a cute block game have a rather hard, souls-like combat system - it magnificently manages to shoot itself in the foot with a bazooka due to its progression system. I'm particularly fascinated how one managed to design and implement a type of a symbolic Hell in a videogame - I don't think many people [i]could [/i]do it (requires creating a special kind of illusion), and I doubt anyone [i]would[/i] do it (causes an obscene amount of negative reactions). This makes me think it was intentional and deliberate, but I really hope it was not. Regarding [b]future patches[/b] and [b]changes[/b]: around CW, there's a lot of "[i]could[/i]"s. The developer [i]could[/i] fix the game by fixing the progression system. There [i]could [/i]be faster ways to travel the land. Could add a [i]storage system. [/i]Could this, and could that. We [i]could [/i]only hope. If after reading through all of this, you still think you [i]could [/i]have fun with the game, by all means, try it. I had good fun with Co-op (2 and 3-player co-op). But do so knowing that you already took the red pill - I already showed you where the rabbit hole goes. Thanks for reading! [b][i]Special thanks[/i][/b][i] to my wife [/i][b][i]Mariana[/i][/b][i], who laughed at my comparison of CW's design to that of Hell during dinner, making me believe maybe noting itdown would make it funnier.[/i] --- [h1][b]Original 4h Playtime Review:[/b][/h1] In 3 hours of gameplay I managed to achieve: nothing. Well, except for a single piece of equipment better than mine. Which still makes my character have a hard time killing a cow. Walking simulator 2019. Note: I'll be giving the game a fair chance, but I already gave it 2 fair chances and it failed to entice me beyond the 2 hour walking session. I know exactly what I should do to progress in the game, but it's just not fun. There's a rare chance it'll be a bit more fun after the initial horrid hours-long walking sessions. If I can make myself get there, I can update this to give it a more fair review, given that clearly a lot of work went into it. The game design however, feels very misguided.