# Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead — user reviews > 242 indexed App Store user reviews of Cataclysm by Dancing Bottle, rated 3.90/5 from 323 ratings. - Source: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/cataclysm-dark-days-ahead/id1017236109/reviews - App overview in markdown: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/cataclysm-dark-days-ahead/id1017236109.md - Rating breakdown: 5★ 191 · 4★ 43 · 3★ 15 · 2★ 18 · 1★ 56 ## What do users think of Cataclysm? Overall sentiment: positive **Pros** - 👍 Great game - 🚀 Highly customizable - 💡 Endless possibilities - 👍 Fantastic hardcore roguelike - 👍 Addictive - 👍 Impressive depth and complexity **Cons** - 🐛 Controls are clunky and unresponsive - 🐛 Language issues (game in Russian/other languages) - 🐛 Screen size issues (too small) - 🐛 Crashes and bugs - 🐛 Outdated version, needs updates **Commonly reported bugs** - Keyboard issues (gets stuck, doesn't work properly) - Compatibility issues with newer devices/iOS versions - Crashes and freezes **Most requested features** - Update the game to latest stable version - Improve touch controls and UI for mobile - Add screen zooming/magnification options - Provide better language support and options ## Newest reviews (10 of 242) ### 3/5 — I really like the game but this port isn’t updated *2026-08-14, version 1.12.3* You should just download the game and play it on pc, this port is outdated and the others people made for iOS straight up cost money, the game is REALLY good though! ### 2/5 — 9 years since last update *2025-10-11, version 1.12.3* It’s a great, free, open source game. Please update it to the latest stable version ### 3/5 — Wish I could play it *2023-09-20, version 1.12.3* For some reason stuck in Russian texts. I wish I could read Cyrillic ### 3/5 — Классный порт *2023-05-28, version 1.12.3* Но очень устаревший. Стоит играть, только как ознакомительный вариант ### 2/5 — Possibly broken *2023-03-10, version 1.12.3* After going through the instructions upon the app booting up, I see a black screen with Russian words I don’t understand come up. Nothing I press can get me past this black screen despite the D Pad and other buttons clearly not frozen by lighting up when I press them. Also the keyboard key that comes up when swiping with two fingers is in Chinese. Something seems wrong ### 2/5 — Great game, but needs an update. *2023-01-25, version 1.12.3* CataclysmDDA is a fantastic game. It definitely has a learning curve, and you really need the wiki to learn to play it. You can construct a ton of stuff, and do a ton of stuff. The negative things about this game is that 1. This port is years out of date compared to the far superior PC version. 2. The game is intended to be played with a PC. keyboard. Because of this, the touch controls are klunky. I can’t think of a way to improve or change this though. 3. The font and tilesets are EXTREMELY small on an iPhone. If you have poor eyesight, the game is near unreadable. Everything is way too tiny. I would say that unless you have great eyesight, or don’t mind squinting to read text, or see the graphics, I probably wouldn’t recommend this game on a smaller iPhone. This game would benefit from having some type of screen zooming or magnifying feature. But since this game hasn’t been updated in years, I doubt that anything like this will ever come. This game would obviously look much better on a larger screen, like an iPad. On my iPhone 6s, everything is really too small for me to see. Another problem that I’m constantly running into is that for some reason, the game keeps saying, “External keyboard detected” and it pops up the iphone, on screen, keyboard. And then the keyboard gets stuck on the screen. I can’t get it to go away when this happens. It’s happening so much that it’s making the game unplayable. I’m wondering if this might be the result of an iOS update or something that created some kind of incompatibility with this game. Since the game is abandoned and hasn’t been updated in years, there is a good chance that this is the case. I don’t recall this ever happening before. Six years with no update is a very long time for an app that’s on a system that gets an updated OS every other month. ### 3/5 — Pretty meh *2022-11-21, version 1.12.3* It's a ok alternative for mac play, since you cant normal play on it. But the quality is poor and some proffesions are missing. But its playable, there is also a bug with naming words where you cant delete text and can type over several lines. At least you dont make people pay for a free game. ### 1/5 — It’s in japanese *2022-08-04, version 1.12.3* I can’t change the language. Don’t know how to get to options menu. The interface is a joke. Maybe if you had an external keyboard it might be playable if you could change the language. ### 1/5 — Is this supposed to be in russian? *2022-04-04, version 1.12.3* Cause i cant read russian and i cant tell where the start button is ### 1/5 — Il y a une limite au vintage *2022-01-29, version 1.12.3* C’est juste injouable. Je recherchais un truc basique, mais là. On arrive à bouger, mais rien d’autre. Les jeux où faut lire 20 pages pdf pour comprendre quoi faire ou comment actionner le personnage, perso, ça me branche pas. ## Most critical reviews (10 lowest-rated) ### 1/5 — Well *2026-05-04, version 1.12.3* Doesn’t work for iPhones says screen is too small with no fix ### 1/5 — Font size too big, can't play *2026-05-02, version 1.12.3* I'm playing on an iPhone 11, and the game says "Woah! Your terminal is tiny! This game requires a minimum terminal size of 80X24 to work properly. 66X18 just won't do. Maybe a smaller font would help?" I don't see a way to make the font smaller. Maybe this is a feature that could be added? ### 1/5 — Can't open the game *2026-04-14, version 1.12.3* Downloaded the game couldn't get past the home screen ### 1/5 — Not in english *2026-01-18, version 1.12.3* The game appears to be in russian though i dont know flr certian, with seemingly no way to change the language. i do not speak russian or whatever language this is. thank god it was free as it is unplayable if you do not already speak the language ### 1/5 — Controls *2025-06-17, version 1.12.3* Unbelievably bad controls with KEYBOARD keys. Horrific and outdated even for PC, absolutely unplayable on iOS. ### 1/5 — Couldn’t get past the controls *2023-10-02, version 1.12.3* Too complicated trying to figure out the controls. I didn’t even get past the setup screens before I got frustrated and uninstalled it. ### 1/5 — The controls are really bad *2023-09-14, version 1.12.3* I don’t know how to play ### 1/5 — …? *2023-07-21, version 1.12.3* Some how my screen isn’t big enough or something? Said 80x something and mine is only like 60xsomething but I’m on a iPhone XR…? ### 1/5 — it's in russian *2023-01-15, version 1.12.3* WHY IS IT IN RUSSIAN ### 1/5 — Waste of time *2022-09-12, version 1.12.3* Don’t say the game works on my phone only for the game to say my screen size is too small. Downloaded it on an iPad and the same message comes up!!!! How big do you expect my screen to be? I will not be downloading from this developer again as they don’t reply to messages ## Most praised reviews (10 highest-rated) ### 5/5 — GREAT *2025-10-27, version 1.12.3* I LIKE IT ### 5/5 — iOS 26 *2025-09-16, version 1.12.3* New update made the in game keyboard stop working ### 5/5 — Одна из лучших игр на телефон *2025-07-16, version 1.12.3* Даже несмотря на то, что версия устарела, эта игра продолжает быть одной из лучших игр которые я видел на телефон (хотя обновления все таки хотелось бы). ### 5/5 — HERO *2023-12-14, version 1.12.3* YOU ARE THE REAL HERO ### 5/5 — ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ *2023-08-01, version 1.12.3* Неймовірна гра, шкода що не оновлюється. ### 5/5 — very good, despite outdated version *2023-02-03, version 1.12.3* this version is nowhere near the most recent release of CDDA, and plays fairly differently from the modern PC release, but this is an absolutely fun app despite this seeing as the alternative is a paid version (which i recommend for its price tag). i've had no issues regarding the commonly stated "screen is too small" bug and i use an iphone SE gen 2, the commonly stated language bug does exist, but the fix is as easy as going into the settings menu and turning the option which says it's in russian, to english (look for "Опции", then tab along to "Внешний вид", then look for "Язык: Русский" and change it to english). overall an enjoyable game regardless of the language issue which is easily fixable, good game ### 5/5 — Great port *2022-10-17, version 1.12.3* I have put many hours into this app, and it's been a total blast. It's so nice to be able to play DDA while on the go. Thanks for making this! ### 5/5 — The most detailed game available on phones *2022-05-19, version 1.12.3* I’ve never played it on my phone more than a few minutes, but I’m giving 5 stars just for somehow porting this masterpiece on here and making it somewhat usable. But if you have a PC, use that instead. ### 5/5 — ВНИМАНИЕ! *2022-04-06, version 1.12.3* порт крайне добротный, но старый. настолько, что запаздывает на шесть лет с половиной лет. ### 5/5 — Thanks sseth for god tier game *2022-01-16, version 1.12.3* Hey hey people, sseth here --- *Data collected daily from the US App Store and indexed by [AppsHunter](https://appshunter.io/). User reviews are verbatim App Store reviews. Ratings, prices and chart positions refresh continuously; this snapshot is from 2026-09-05.*