Islands of the Caliph

SOFTLOCK: I prayed at the mosque in Shifa and it softlocked the game. This was immediately after learning prayers, and after using the prayer rug twice. Also it was at night. No idea if any of these things factor in, but it wiped out a bunch of progress. This ocurred on 2/26/25.
Some other feedback: I do not think keyboard only is a valid design choice. It forces every interaction with the game to feel like you're operating a machine, rather than playing a character. It makes navigating the inventory feel so much worse than it needs to feel.
Outside of the keyboard only thing, I think Islands Of The Caliph will be super interesting to folks who like retro blobbers, but maybe not to players who like more modern Grimrock-y stuff. The pixel art is lovely, movement feels fluid, and there's a real funk to the game that I haven't seen anywhere else in a long time. A lot of its design just isn't optimal---including the keyboard only controls---and sometimes this produces little avenues of design that feel like they could be expanded upon.
For example, you're constantly getting poisoned or diseased or getting blisters on your fingeys, and medicine is bulky and expensive. You have to carry a lot of different types, otherwise your condition starts building up on its own until its swallows your health bar. Poison in Islands Of The Caliph is just about the harshest I've seen in any game, and it (and the fatigue system, and the hunger system) introduces some real softlock potential. You can save anywhere---but because tiredness deals damage and sleep is only possible in certain locations, you *really* shouldn't.
Quests are also not easy to track, and it feels lowkey miraculous that the game even has an automap.
So you're managing your unwieldy overstuffed inventory and trying to remember where you took quests and if you save in the wrong place your entire playtime might be down the drain due to the game's single save slot per file, and this creates the feeling that you're actually doing logistics for some kind of jungle expedition. Expand the sickness and injury system, and I think it would be really interesting having to do precise and technical medicine on yourself in what is otherwise a straightforward old school dungeon crawler.
So why am I recommending Islands Of The Caliph?
Well, I'm going to play a bit further and update after I do, but for the time being I appreciate the risks Caliph is taking. It's built different. Sometimes wrong. But it has a ton of heart in it, and I don't think I've seen any other rpgs include complex mechanics around learning Islam. You can have a million designers doing industry standards and best practices, and if you only play their games you'll miss out on the cool stuff that people make when they ditch those best practices, lean into the jank, and design with reckless enthusiasm.
Also the soundtrack is frequently a bop. Great ambiance overall, and lovely vocals on the town track. When you're just standing still, not touching the keyboard, this is a great game to immerse yourself in.
Edit: Oh. It autosaves when you die. After it deducts most of your money. The money you need for the expensive boats to travel between islands. The money you have to slowly farm off of random drops if it gets too low. The money you spend a lot on traveling because the game is one big interlaced fetch quest with an unhelpful questlog and a clunky interface. I don't mind the ramadan fasting, the 4x daily prayer, the optional clunk that you voluntarily take on to progress the religion questline, but being stuck in a grindlock when the rest of the game is already a massive test of your patience is a bit much of an ask. I hope we get a sequel, and I hope it picks one or two fewer things to be clunky about, but I ain't finishing this. Support it if you have a *lot* of fondness for old school blobbers, or if you want more indie designers to be able to take weird risks (you should.) Wait for a deep deep deep deep sale if you don't have the patience of a saint, however.
2nd Edit: Oh, you lose ITEMS when you die too. Really strongly recommend not doing saves and death the way you're doing them. Soulslike gameplay works because you don't really lose anything on death, just some univested exp, and you can usually recover it. You also don't have to constantly pay that exp to get on a boat. You don't lose vital equipment.
3rd Edit: It is beginning to seem plausible that the item I lost on death was the letter that I'm supposed to deliver to the other island leaders, which is why they're all refusing to meet with me. Stellar! I'm going to see if I can get it back by talking to the sultan again. I really like the islam mechanics, I haven't seen another rpg really make prayer and fasting and tithing part of its rhythm of play (apart from the solmenics in dragonlance I guess,) which is why I'm giving this thing third and fourth chances, but there's only so many times I can bang my head against a wall before something gives.
4th Edit: Unfortunately you have to go back to the sultan to get a new letter after every delivery, so my suffering is not ended yet. At this point I'd trade the automap for the ability to use map pins, since nothing is labeled and all the stuff that's behind doors does not show up unless you're currently on the other side of that door. "Thanks for delivering this recipe book. Come back and find me after I've finished reading it." No I won't. Your quest isn't even tracked anymore. You're gone into the aether. I will never remember your location. The map is a meaningless spill of runes and I am in hell.
5th Edit: Giving money to boatmen simulator.
6th Edit: Okay, so grinding out the loyalty quests for each island is immensely boring. Boat. Step. Boat. Step. Boat. Step. Sometimes a snake poisons you. Nothing is happening so prodigiously that you can read it on the richter scale. And if you do the lamp quest and free the jinn it's way worse, because for that you have to hit a perfect 360 no scoped SSS rank triple combo multiplier ultimate ramadan fast (you need to spam rest to advance the calendar until it is ramadan, then fast for seven days while maintaining correct daily prayers---basically, spam rest for like an hour if you started in the wrong part of the year) and then you have to find the kaba (an awful chore in its own right that seems to involve fishing in a specific pond under a crescent moon,) and we've fully hit the point of diminishing returns here. Some frustration and tedium in a game's design can force a player to lock in. This much frustration and tedium will cause them to lock out. I like some elements of Caliph, but I really hope the next game will try only doing good design instead of both good and bad design.

TL;DR: Recommended for fans of the genre, but with a few caveats that players should know going in.

The Good:
- Beautiful look and feel. Very immersive and evocative
- Emphasizes the most palatable and devotional aspects of Islam for very unique worldbuilding
- A reasonably believable "low fantasy" setting with lots of travel back and forth between islands
- An important, but not too challenging survival system (food, medicine to treat injuries, etc.)
- The world really feels open despite the confines of a "blobber". You can go many places before you're necessarily ready to progress, and the game will send you back to familiar locales later in the plotline
- Auto-mapping is old school friendly in that there is no note-taking. Many players (myself included...next time I play) would benefit from a notebook alongside the keyboard

The not-so-good:
- After about 6 hours, I realized that I'd made a couple of glaring mistakes that are making the game EXTREMELY tedious, requiring a lot of money grinding and sailing back and forth in order to proceed.
- Standard keyboard controls are not good. The combination of buttons necessary to interact with menus and objects is quite clumsy and results in a lot of mis-types
- The amount of description and flavor text for quests is problematically minimal. The journal is basically unhelpful beyond stating "look for this thing"
- The leveling up and character development system is not very important. I never found an area where combat was so challenging as to require spending any points on attributes

Things to know before purchasing:
- There is absolutely NO tutorial, and a fair number of large-impact decisions in the game. These have an impact not only on story, but on quality of life and convenience within the game world (LIKE FAST TRAVEL, OR LACK THEREOF) This is exciting and encouraging, but not for the casual gamer. If you make rash decisions, you may pay dearly!
- NO mouse whatsoever
- There is a lot of exploration required. One must either be EXTREMELY thorough or do some guesswork in order to find necessary keys
- A notebook is probably recommended for those serious dungeon crawlers out there
- There is very little available online for walkthrough/hint assistance. I have read and can understand people getting stuck and abandoning the game

Speaking of abandoning, that is what I have done after my handful of hours. However, this is good enough that I will come back to it...after re-reading my own notes above!

Finally! An Islamic-inspired lore game of a high quality. Deeply appreciated various references, the atmosphere, the respect towards Islamic culture and the mystery entailed through such a set up. Wishing strongly for another game in the series and it has been a very pleasant experience.

This is a tepid recommendation for most people. Calling this an old school dungeon crawler is a bit of a stretch: it's really more like a first-person NES Zelda-like with a strong Muslim flavoring. The main thing you do is fill out your map on new islands, explore ruins, find treasure, and complete some very basic quests. How basic? Well 90% of them are either fetching fruits or books from other islands. The main quest is more interesting, but you probably will be wandering around unsure of what to do at one point or another. Like choices and consequences? There are some pretty steep consequences for being a bad guy in this game, from killing important NPCs outright to paying a ludicrous sum to proceed the main quest that's what ended my playthrough lol
The best thing about the game is definitely the aesthetic. It's unique, colorful, beautiful, and retro in all the right ways. Some of the characters look like they were made in MS Paint, but it adds to the handmade charm in my book. The music is all stupendous and puts you right in the mood.
There's level ups, but they don't really do much. Purchasing gear is the #1 way to increase your character's damage and survivability. And the combat from beginning to end is attack when it's safe, block when it isn't. The whole game. It's basic bordering on ischemic. One thing I do like about the game is that some weapons have unique uses. Scimitars can cut down small shrubs! Hammers can smash rocks! Sometimes this opens up hidden paths to treasure! It's surprisingly satisfying, given how simple the game is at the core.
It unfortunately has to be said because there's always those kinds of people lurking in the corners of the internet, but this game isn't propaganda. Not unless A Christmas Carol is propaganda too. The game promotes monotheism, charity and helping those in need. A pretty basic "don't be an ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥" ethos. You get a minimal EXP bonus for praying five times a day and fasting during Ramadan. That's basically it. You can safely play this game as the world's ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ Muslim and just enjoy the aesthetic uninhibited. You can even help a murderous pirate escape prison or a Satan-worshiping sorcerer summon an evil Djinn. So once again: not propaganda, just flavoring from (probably) the dev's personal religious beliefs.

I learned more about Islam from playing this game than I did growing up in a Muslim family...
Kidding, but this game does delve into Islamic culture and mythology which you learn about through its story, gameplay, and world. The game does a great job making you feel like youre on an adventure as you explore these mystical islands filled with danger and secrets. Very fun and one of the most refreshing experience I've had in a while, in a fantastic setting thats not used very often (makes me wish more games explored Islamic mythology). Games likes this remind me why I love video games, would definitely recommend!
One issue I did have with the game though was that it auto saves on top of your maunual save file, which I wasn't a big fan of but it ended up not being a big deal. But dont let that stop you from your fantastic journey through the Islands of the Caliph!

This is a really great game! It stuck in my mind after playing the demo, but it wasn't until I learned the mechanics related to the pillars of faith that I trurly fell in love.
In this game you can learn a lot about Islam and that's wonderful because as a white woman from Europe I could never do this in my entire life so that's really interesting for me.
The game has also beautiful retro design.
I have a little request tho. Could you upload OST on youtube or spotify? Because music is really great and I wanted to share it with friends which I already told about the game.
I keep my fingers crossed for your future projects!

I would recommend this with the caveat that you go in knowing:
- Keyboard only controls
- Cryptic quest objectives
- You have to thorougly explore
- Note taking really helps
Unfortunately I got motion sickness when playing this game so I was unable to complete it.