There are many possible approaches to this. One is to quotemeta() only inside the pattern:

$version = "3.5.2+tcl-tk-8.5.18+sqlite-3.10.0";
$path =~ s/\Q$version\E.*/$version/s;
[download]

Another is to replace with what the pattern actually matched:

$version = quotemeta("3.5.2+tcl-tk-8.5.18+sqlite-3.10.0");
$path =~ s/($version).*/$1/s;
[download]

Another is to use index() to search for a fixed string, rather than a regexp:

$version = "3.5.2+tcl-tk-8.5.18+sqlite-3.10.0";
my $pos = index($path, $version);
# cut everything beyond the match, if there was a match
substr($path, $pos + length($version)) = '' if $pos >= 0;
[download]

My guess is that tybalt89's solution with \K will be the fastest, but not necessarily the easiest to understand and maintain.

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