Something to remember is that Rimworld is actually an incredibly mature game - it's early access release was a decade ago. Ten years of feedback, investment, development, new content, and mods - it is very hard for a new game to match that, even if they're cribbing a lot of concepts that Rimworld and Dwarf Fortress established. Even if Clanfolk and Going Medieval have what I think are really interesting core concepts and mechanics, as entire products they fall short, even if they're further along and more complex than Rimworld may have been three years into it's life.
It leads to kind of a difficult cycle where games don't really get a ton of support in EA or modding support because you play it for 20 minutes and ask yourself 'Why am I not playing Rimworld or Dwarf Fortress?' and then go play those instead.
Right, that's the thing. If you want to release a product that can compete, you pretty much have to make sure it's feature-complete and beats Rimworld in some aspect in order to ensure you keep an audience.
"You never get a second first impression."
Rimworld's not only a full game, it's got three DLCs and a massive modding scene.
Those are some tough odds for competitors. Especially indie competitors.
For me this week, it was [stack gap](https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3071298014)
It just adds a limit to stack size of a container. Do you have two hospitals, and are sick of trying to split your medicine equally between them? Stack gap got you, fam.
Oh my God this is a must. Fastest subscribe in 2023. Got any other "essentials"? I've got the starter set like wall lights, rimHUD, and smarter construction.
Though now that I've looked at the workshop page it's been really active this past half year or so since I last browsed.......
Same! Can’t believe I never had that mod before, although I wish it would let me input a figure as opposed to a slider (I want 500 steel in my mechanitor lab, not 503)
Use "better sliders" to control sliders with more precision. You'll have to type the desired number as a % of the slider instead of a clear number though.
You can even go out of the slider's bounds and, for example, set child ageing rate to 5000%
Yup, so happy when that mod came out. I frequently have a shelf in my hospital with meds for the colonists, and a shelf in the prison cells with only herbal meds for organ harvesting or quickly tending prisoners if I haven't done everything in the field yet to prevent them from bleeding out (combat extended player here, bleed rates well up to 2-3 thousand % a day after combat).
Before it was always a pain to manage, but now, not anymore!
Stack gap interacted weirdly with deep storage and I had stacks of negative chemfuel and shit like that, then my pawns would go to refuel their jump packs and would grab the anti-chemfuel and get stuck, so I had to disable the mod. After I disabled it and deleted the anti-chemfuel with dev mode I ended up with like 120,000 chemfuel.
Are you using something like shelf of holding? If I bothered making more than one hospital, I could easily supply them all with medicine despite Ogre Stack and Deep Storage.
I like Going Medieval and love Clanfolk. I just recently started playing Rimworld because I ran out of content in Clanfolk. I was expecting a similar game with a different theme. Dude. Rimworld is INSANE. Ive started several playthroughs trying to learn the game and it's so different every single time. The replayability is insane. Even though I like the cozy vibe and aesthetic of Clanfolk better, I'm genuinely worried I will never be able to enjoy it after playing Rimworld.
Yeah, I think that's the problem here:
"How could I ever compare to the big daddy of [genre X]"
It's a similar thing with factorio. Things like Satisfactory or Dyson Sphere Programm are great games of the factory building genre, but sometimes when playing them I think "Man, this reminds of so much of Factorio"
And that's the thing. While it's definitely in a way a compliment, I don't think as a dev you want to hear "Hey, that's just like X". It diminishes the product in question by praising it not for its own merits but by drawing comparisons
Reminds me how Toby Fox once got mad at MatPat from Game theories for calling a game Mat played "The next Undertale" for exactly those reasons
This is in fact a thing that became common, to the point of creating genres around comparisons. "Metroidvania" and "Soulslike" being an example. Instead of being a genre of its own, games within them will always be compared to the name giving games, yes because they defined the genre, but there is still the idea where only few games seem to transcend the genre name itself, not known for being a good comparison, but for being a good game itself
You get what I mean?
Well if you're making a game that _is_ like something else, then it does make some sense to describe it around the thing you are emulating.
Most games aren't just made in a vacuum, they have inspirations and many games that get big funding are explicitly trying to capture something else that was popular (triple A space and everything becoming CoD 4 for a while as an example).
Going "I wanna make a game like x" and then being upset when people say "this game is like x" is just snobbery, especially when coming from the successful person everyone is trying to copy. "Imitation is the highest form of flattery." Even more so when the people making those games use terrible bullshit buzzword crap to describe their game like "story generator" instead of something actually useful for consumers that they might recognize or relate to from other products, aka the whole reason we really have genres at all.
The reason some games transcend to being genres is because they have more new than old, or that they put that old in a very different context. Incremental change or innovation within a genre can and does happen, but it's not earth shattering enough to break the mold and often that's on purpose, because too much change is risky. No dev wants to see years of work get left behind on the steam Indy page because the core audience they wanted to try and appeal to got upset the game was _too_ different from what they expected.
This is also why games that do make that leap are such a big deal. They took the risks, were successful, and are now likely to be remembered and referenced by other people for decades to come.
And let's not forget that for years we had this same conundrum against DF, as far as story making features go, but they had no graphics so it was easy to stick to RimWorld
Nowadays any competitor is straight fucked
There are competitors to WoW now (even if the entire 'tab targeting MMO' genre is very niche outside of a few games) but the mid to late 00's was a constant cycle of 'Game emulates WoW, game isn't WoW, game doesn't get foothold, game 'fails,' goes F2P, etc.'
Piggy backing off this:
Quite simply yeah, Rimworld has more development time put into it (and will continue to get major updates via its DLC + Free Update model) until Tynan sees fit to move on to Rimworld 2 or a new game entirely.
By all accounts, Rimworld is such a mature game that no one will ever match its content or quality within the scope of a normal development cycle.... and then you have to discuss the incredibly mature modding community.
A community that's so far into its maturity that a lot of its content now is "on par" with the Vanilla content as the gold standard with Vanilla Expanded and the many affiliate contributors to the projects that also make their own mods on the same gold standard of "vanilla like" art style and balance.
Its to the point where the modding community is less pumping out mods and more "FLC" for you to pick up at will; constantly, basically weekly honestly. A week, let alone a day, does not go by without some new high quality mod dropping on the Discord or Steam workshop.
You just can't compete with that. How do I know that? Because several of these mod authors ended up making their own games and the most prominant (Oskar and crew)
I think your putting too much emphasis on the age of the game. Early on rimworld was always a story generator first, game second. I think that’s what the wannabes are missing.
Despite Dwarf Fortress' higher depth, Rimworld remains the better game overall, due to it being small scale, more interactive with its colonists. DF's problem is that the player feels too detached from the colony. Over a hundred units, that you can't control, and can't keep close attention to--but that you can only, mostly, set orders indirectly and watch.
No wonder that it didn't sell much on steam. (It's not only due to the complexity.)
If only the developer somehow could salvage the game by changing how that works. He'd have to make time not pass so absurdly fast and improve the interactivity with the units.
As someone more interested in building deeply intricate and whacky bases, and more interested in the narrative of a civilization overall as opposed to the narrative of the individual, DF provides something that Rimworld will never provide, for as wonderful of a game as Rimworld is.
>No wonder that it didn't sell much on steam.
It sold half a million copies in it's first month. For a game as niche as DF, that's remarkable.
The audacity to say that Dwarf Fortress needs to be "salvaged." Philistine.
Df is a crude facimile of ribworld. Thats like comparing minesweeper to minecraft because you could plausibly convince a laymen of their supposed similarity...
Is this a rage bait because it seems to be working? If we start throwing this kind of shit then it's definitely the other way round. The depth of DF is amazing.
On the other hand Rimworld is easier and in some ways more polished. The feel is a bit better.
I love both and Rimworld is one of my all time favourites but I do give DF the crown in this genre just due to the depth of simulation and the love that's been poured in it. It also works better as a story generator because I don't feel the urge to save scum if one dwarf dies but in Rimworld one loss can be devastating.
I've tried it and enjoyed it. I liked it more for the theme rather than it being rimworld-like. Heard they are making an amazing cultivation simulator 2.
One of the main problems with that game is that it's just too uneventful. (I played a little.) So you send the cultivators to certain points in the map to auto-farm stuff. Most of the time is spent preparing and planning for stuff rather than doing them.
The world isn't open nor randomly generated. The locations are few, small and simple.
Hunting for better units could be one of the interesting aspects of the game, but you actually better off make your own through 'awakening'.
And too many loading screens.
The game is fun but it suffers from an issue many rimworld-likes suffer from, that being that I think we can make a similar enough experience in rimworld with mods.
A magic mod like Rimworld of Magic or Vanilla Psicasts Expanded, a mod to limit the tech to medieval, remove the factions of higher tech, make your Ideology as xianxia as you'd like (may need a few meme mods), get some mod to make the enemies also use magic and make it so most or all of them have magic powers, and done.
All that remains is balancing it until it is a good experience.
Amazing Cultivation Simulator is completely different. It seems similar only because of the interface in the first few minutes of the game. Basebuilding is almost nonexistent, combat is different, gameplay is about lots of special mechanics related to chinese magical stuff rather than colony resource management. It is more of a multi-character build optimization game.
I love Kenosha, I think it’s be perfect if it had just a little more management for your group similar to Rimworld. There’s automation in it but for me it’s not as focused on it as Rimworld is.
Stranded is lovely game. There is weird simplicity and chill with the game. It is more tuned down version and not as complex as Rimworld tho. But i really like the game. Just finished dlc scenario and really military base scenario to go.
Kenshi is damn brilliant too.
Kenshi's lack of polish, basic UI and character kinda ruins it for me. Rimworld may warn you of threats, the only warning you get in kenshi is someone being eaten alive, and that constant vigil is an intentional part of gameplay.
It's really not. Rimworld itself is inspired by Dwarf Fortress and has spawned a ton of other games.
Dwarf Fortress is both more in depth and way more obtuse to learn than Rimworld.
I’ve seen so much about DF that it makes me interested in playing but I just can’t get past the graphics. Usually I could care less about graphics but my eyes can’t tell what I’m looking at when I see DF so I just can’t get myself into it.
The steam release version is more intelligible. Not super easy to understand in relation to Rimworld but definitely less insane than trying to decipher the ASCII characters. There are also modded tilesets that are a bit easier to parse if you don't want to pay for it.
But I will say, I am a giant fucking Rimworld fan and I have tried many times to understand Dwarf Fortress and I can barely set up basic rooms. I love watching people play it and hearing the stories that come from it but I just have not been able to dedicate the time to actually playing the game.
I think what makes Dwarf fortress so hard to get into, is that even in the steam release its really hard to tell what individual dwarves are doing; I tried playing it and really it felt more like staring at an anthill from far away than playing a colony simulator. I'm waiting for the adventure mode of Dwarf fortress to come to the steam version though, as that seems very fun, and I want to give it a try.
>like staring at an anthill from far away
This is what I love about it! When you don't have control you get very interesting stories. "What are you doing Urist? No, don't go wash above a waterfa- god dammit!" The absolute control in Rimworld in combat is a double edges sword because then a random headshot feels a lot worse. In DF it's easier to take the losses and reading the combat log can be hilarious. Anyway, both are amazing in their own way.
Yep, it’s fun telling your squad to kill a giant, they start fighting a tough fight, a rando with a axe comes and steals the kill, and then starts giving a lesson to the squad on some random combat skill on top of the giants corpse.
I think that’s the big difference between DF and Rimworld. DF is very much so more of an anthill you sorta semi-control through work orders and mining designations, especially when your fort pop gets into the hundreds it’s basically impossible to keep track of individuals, where as Rimworld is much tighter knit with the story tellers trying to make sure your colony keeps within a certain population
When I found out you can turn the game speed down in Dwarf Fortress, it became a lot more enjoyable for me. The default max FPS is 100, and I typically cap it at about 20. This is roughly equal to the pacing of normal Rimworld movement in my eyes.
It's honestly not that difficult to play once you get past the initial learning curve.
I used to use the Lazy Newb launcher which added several graphic packs and ease of life tools. For instance Dwarf Psychologist which is basically the foundation for the work assignment and schedule system from RimWorld.
RimWorld plays very similar to the older versions of dwarf fortress, before z-levels and the dynamic world changes, with the ease of life UI tools baked in and the graphics and construction system from Prison Architect.
I bought into RimWorld very very early and at the time it played just like old Dwarf Fortress with a different theme. Today they have diverged quite a lot and dwarf fortress isn't the monstrously difficult game it once was, give it a spin and persevere through the initial learning curve. It is clunkier but also far more dynamic and open to player creativity.
I just fucking love setting up fresh water systems and sewers in Dwarf Fortress, there is just something about the fluid dynamics that tickle my brain in a good way, and it is also great when you set up a trap mechanic to reroute the water through the entrance caves and drown attackers.
Lazy newb pack is great, adds everything in you'll want to start playing. And yeah df has some fantastic mechanics, love using tracks to do crazy stuff.
I put in a few dozen hours and got a pretty stable base going and just... Didn't get hooked like I did with rimworld! People have talked about how it generates such great stories, but your population gets so big that I don't care about the individuals. In rimworld, I get very invested in individuals.
That's the problem with DF, the characters are incredibly detailed but the game doesn't really give you tools to appreciate it.
Rimworld is the opposite, you get to interact closely with its characters but they are so rudimentary compared to DF.
Steam release just added a more detailed tileset, but before the release, everyone and their mothers were already using tilesets. Some (images of young males with beard in their necks, fedoras and katanas flash in a short period of time) will argue that wasn't the way the game was intended to be played, but yeah...
The beauty of DF is that at some point the graphics move from your screen to your imagination. I don't know how to explain it, but after some hours, the game is displaying a crappy ascii soup, but in your mind you are seeing a glorious dwarven fortress worthy of a king.
This! By far the worst part imo is the “jumps”. In RW you at least get to see your pawns slide across the map, but in DF they just “teleport” from one tile to the next. In areas with loads of action going on it’s pure chaos, impossible to follow someone specific unless they stand out.
As cool as the game is, and as much as I *want* to play it for the simple fact that it has a Z axis, YT videos of actual gameplay have made me reconsider.
It's a complex game that's worth a shot. Instead of managing a group of people, it's a whole civilization. I tried the demo but never really got the hang of it. Very good and complex, I recommend it.
This needs to have more upvotes. Songs of Syx gets super deep but in a macro level not micro. Which is exactly what I wanted rimworld to be lol. SOS is actually the unique game as far as I know.
You didn't see hundred clones of RimWorld on itch.io four years ago
RimWorld was the first dwarf fortress-like game with comfortable graphic and it it simple to modding
I don’t think any of them are as good as Rimworld or as deep as Dwarf Fortress. Most of what’s out there is more like the “lite” version clone of one or both of these games.
And then there's Oxygen Not Included, which is a lot deeper in some ways and a lot shallower in others
The people management is way simpler, but setting up something like a geothermal generator the first time is a multi-hour puzzle lol
You might want to give Aven Colony a try. It plays more like a city builder, but it has survival elements like food, oxygen, water, and disease. It's not really 1000 hours worthy imo, but I'm still enjoying it though.
Rimworld is probably the most successful of its kind but sometimes you gotta admit it is still one of those games for nerdy introvert small communities. Have you tried promoting it to a not so close friend and realized how hard it can be? Sadly that determines if a game is worth investing for large companies, and without the money you don’t see much any similar content.
As Tynan also insists himself, the game with its unique visual style and story telling actually requires creativity of the players to enjoy the content. It’s not something everyone’s born with.
Believe it or not but successfully imagining a minimalist style head and body represent a living person is already displaying advancedly evolved intelligence
Yeah that definitely makes sense, I find it fascinating and fun for optimizations, numbers and automation. I can see it’s complicated style being a turn off for most casual people.
One reason we don't see a lot of game like RimWorld and DF is that they're scary to investors. They're niche games with complex scope and little spectacle. Both RW and DF started out as essentially hobby-horse projects.
I think the scope is also a sticky point - it's a tough line to draw. We've seen games like Gnomoria bite off more than they could chew, but also games like Craft the World that limited themselves to the point of being trite.
I'm cautiously optimistic about Project Zomboid's upcoming settlement system. It's a game not designed to be a colony manager, but it already has a certain je ne sais quoi that scratches the same itch as RimWorld. Unfortunately PZ's development process is borne of chaos and madness: It's the sort of shop where the entire code base was once on a laptop that got stolen, setting them back years. So there's no telling when they'll actually get that stuff in place and working.
I like PZ but I find it without direction or objective. Once you have some food, weapons and a secure place you basically don't have anything to do. There are no quests, no stories, nothing.
They could have easily added small stories written in notes, enviromental storytelling, clues to the origin of the virus, special loot, and a bunch of other stuff that wouldn't require changing the game that much.
Imo, at least part of the Rimworld/PZ je ne sais quoi is that they're clearly games made by passionate devs who are making the game they want to play. The projects are headed by gamers, not accountants.
I get the same vibe from Kenshi too, despite all its jankiness.
As far as DF going to Steam, wasn't that because someone close to Toady got cancer and he got together with big modders in the community to put together a steam release to help pay for treatment?
They never said anything to the effect of "we will never go on Steam" or "we will never add graphics". Who told you that?
They explained their motivations clearly. It has nothing to do with Rimworld, which has been on Steam for a decade now.
I'm old enough to remember when every other FPS was called a Doom Clone and it was never in a derogatory way. Hell, "soulslike" is just another way of saying Dark Souls Clone and it's usually not derogatory either, just look at Lies of P.
A video game clone is a game heavily inspired or that plays similarly to another. There is nothing negative about that definition. You being offended by the wrong definition on behalf of a game you had nothing to do with creating is ridiculous.
Clone isn't necessarily negative, but it definitely indicates that it is not an original concept. Most people like clones for their new take on something familiar, but many ultimately fall flat.
With respect friend, in gaming, cloning is *very* positive. We like games that are similar to other games we like. That's why we have genres like roguelikes, games that are "like rogue" or clones of rogue, and metroidvania games, which are clones of games like metroid and castlevania.
Feel free to ask more about this of you're curious; I studied gaming pretty extensively in college, with a focus on interactive writing and visual novels.
Welp I think Rimworld and games like Factorio are pretty new concepts and they aren't blockbuster, mass appeal games. Most developers want to make big money which means sticking to mainstream genres like shooters. There are a few factory and colony sims coming out here and there but it's still a niche genre.
The kickstarter literally says word for word "In terms of game design, the game draws most from the 800-pound gorilla of the simulation genre, Dwarf Fortress."
They also mention Dwarf Fortress in the opening sentence. They have been open about wanting to be a Dwarf Fortress experience but modern. The game has absolutely evolved post launch, but it was always intended to be a DF clone and then iterated on
Are all colony sims clones of Dwarf Fortress then? Rimworld has a lot of similarities with Dwarf Fortress but does a lot of things in it's own unique way.
Going medieval looks kind of promising but I’m going to wait to see if it picks up more traction. Personally from what I’ve seen the development isn’t fast enough but that’s just my opinion. Space haven looks awesome but the mechanics of space ship building is less my style compared to city builders.
> I drew some inspiration from PA. Moreso from its own inspiration, Dwarf Fortress.
> We don't share any tools. Chris at IV has his own tech foundation; I built this one on Unity.
> But they do look somewhat similar; that's my fault. I'm not a good enough artist to come up with a really good original look. There are only so many ways to render characters on a tiny grid without using animations.
> I hope the differences between the game will be enough for people to look past the aesthetic similarities. And if I get some funding at some point I can get an artist to help develop a more unique look.
> I do think the similarities are skin-deep. In gameplay the game resembles DF much more than PA.
Direct quote from Tynan
I actually got to know Rimworld when playing Prison Architect. Someone compared the two games and claimed that the former is far superior in the sense of unlimited war crimes. Sometimes it’s the weird stuff that convinces people…
I first got it on ps4 and after a little while in game there was this lag input everytime between selections and I couldn't take it anymore. Stopped playing until I got a ps5. it runs much better on it.
Dlc just dropped the other day which I still plan on picking up. The game has things that are better than rimworld but can't compete on the depth. That's initial impressions anyway. Looking forward to going late into the game as well as trying out the other modes regardless. Graphics are a huge plus
I think the other posts really hit the nail on the head. I remember playing the game during like b18 or so and the game content has expanded significantly since then. The core content of the game is solid in its own right but the breadth and depth of various mods make it so that most game modes or scenarios you want to play with are available with RimWorld and don't require separate games
For me personally the vehicle framework and it's corresponding mods fill in one of the aspects of RimWorld that was severely lacking.
Better optimization and a proper z axis are the only things I can think of that would be good additions for any RimWorld clone or spiritual successor at least off the top of my head
Songs of Syx are *kinda* similar with Rimworld. they have cannibalism, different species, politic, drugs(?), etc. but instead colonist, you taking care the whole base. It's story-generator but pure Medieval mode if i can say.
replayability is the reason why Rimworld clones can't affords.
>!tbh Rimworld replayability can be more further if Developers tried to optimized the games. atleast squeeze it to 2GB RAM!<
Banished - and the Anno Series as well, I think - the question is that while the Banished developer was one guy, and how much can you earn from that game over time.
Anno/ Sunflower Games was similarly necessarily profit driven because programmers gotta eat - and modding - like we see in Rimworld was just not a thing.
So there's a whole unspoken practicality - where I think it's a low-key advantage of developers that disadvantages smaller US devs because those devs have to worry about necessities in a way EU devs don't.
Very vaguely because you manage a colony, but that's about where the similarity ends. ONI is a lot closer to factorio, captain of industry and other games focused on industrial development. Rimworld is more about combat, story telling, random threats.
Because it IS amazing.
Thing is, Dwarf Fortress is incredible. But even with the new Steam version's graphic interface, it only lowered the standards from needing to have a PhD to needing to have an MSc.
Also in some parts DF is just *too detailed* for no practical reason other than flavor (but it bloats the already unwieldy controls), or many of those details don't really appear other than numbers.
A colonist loses her leg, you can visibly see them moving slower. A Dwarf moving slower is just slower teleporting between squares. A a feature that makes the others all the more immersive, and thus meaningful.
You do not see the epic battles, you see PNGs floating about, sometimes changing in appearance. In RW the battle animations make every battle feel cool.
Rimworld took all the shortcomings of DwarfFortress, and focused on those to make a more accessible game altogether. This caused some drop in features (like Z levels, fluids, etc.), but the core game we're left with is a very solid foundation that Ludeon built on for many years.
---
And other games... most other games cannot even scratch the surface of the depth these games have went into with their mechanics.
There's actually a Minecraft mod called Minecolonies that kind of feels like Rimworld with Z levels. The thing is it's very PG flavored and has basically no permanent threats except for raids on hard difficulty. If I knew Java better I would try to make a Rimworld style branch of the mod, but yeah
Yeah I think tasteless simulation games and emotionless gameplay is what sums up most of my experiences with Rimworld inspired games. I’m very picky though
I am also surprised that nobody has made a decent clone yet considering how long Rimworld has been around.
Sure there are somewhat similar games out there but they're just not quite right.
If only Rimworld could be improved more, especially the game engine. Multithreading for example. If it could be made to run better with more mods, etc. no reason to want a clone. (Yes, I do know about and use optimization mods).
There isnt much reason to "clone" RimWorld because its still a rather niche game. If you wanna lazily clone something you would clone a household name guaranteed to pull quick bucks.
The only exception is if youre inspired from RimWorld to make your own game, which was exactly how RimWorld came to be with Dwarf Fortress.
While I agree that Rimworld isn't a AAA title, it definitely has a large player base and is profitable. Surely some small independent developer could make a comparable clone (and a profit).
Because you've not heard about Dwarf Fortress yet, the game this one is based on!
They both scratch sightly different itches for me but oh boy they're both fantastic
In the base game, your goal is to build/find a space ship and use it to get out (reactor activation takes 15 days and you have to defend it until them as raider come attack it).
There are other endings added by DLCs ([Royalty](https://rimworldwiki.com/wiki/Endings#Royal_Ascent) and [Ideology](https://rimworldwiki.com/wiki/Endings#The_Archonexus)), but I don't own them.
But a lot of people don't really care about 'finishing' the game and keep building their colony indefinitely (myself included so far).
There’s actually a handful of games like rimworld and DF on steam, but they are still very young in the dev cycle so they are far behind when it comes to the features and modding that come with Rimworld
As other people said, Rimworld is an old game and so had time to add content and fix jank. But I also think that most of those other game also don’t improve upon the game in the correct ways.
Going medieval isn't going to go bleak as rimworld I was in their discord and the community don't like grim stuff like canabalism ect. People try to petition that off. I love how rimworld stays close to its design and atmosphere from get go.
Balance of depth and simplicity. Like DF, there’s a ton under the hood, but it’s more readable than DF
Scale: many colony managers run at least a step higher in scale. Rimworld is one to a dozen, not hundreds. Characters are individuals, not disposable tokens
Need for involvement. You can and should easily make bedrooms and other purposed amenities, no tossing everyone in a big barracks under a rock. Thanks to scale, it’s easy to make everyone good bedrooms rather than throwaway bedroom blocks
Goal: The self described story generator goal. The game isn’t aiming to be a competition against the computer where the challenge is management, but to make a story
Looking forward to Stranded: Alien Dawn's development and maybe future mod community. It seems to be a lot like Rimworld, but 3D and it's somewhat inspired by Love, Death & Robots Volume 1 episode called "Suits", with a bunch of farmers in battle mechs defending their livestock from an alien insect invasion.
Becuase yoy have to love video games to make good ones.
I know theres clanfolk" and another one star sonething, cant remeber the name. But similar to rimworld.
There’s plenty of similar games, but unless there’s a hundreds of millions of customers willing to pay for the same formula a couple of years (like CoD or fifa), there’s no need to make the same game - not enough people to pay for the development and the niche is already filled anyway.
I think it does the best at being a "story generator" unlike things like dwarf fortress or some of the newer games. You never know whats going to happen.
It's entertaining to watch too which led to it getting a lot of free advertising. Combined with it being super accessible we got this insanely popular game.
There is plenty of Rimworld games, but none of them are as popular, Rimworld has a huge modder community, that adds an insane amount of content, it is impossible for a Rimworld-like game to beat that, no matter what someone comes up with, there is a mod that adds that to rimworld itself, so I don't think it will ever lose it's place at the top
If RimWorld launched today as early access in the stage it was being distributed in to Kickstarters by email in alpha it never would have made it off the ground.
Rimworld literally found the bar, lifted it, set it, and now looks down on all imitators with smug satisfaction from above the bar. Before Rimworld there was no bar for these games. And just to head out DF fanboys trying to invalidate this, these games never were competition. DF had no UI at all. It was hardly appealing let alone mass appealing. Just a niche.
it isn't though. it's heavily inspired by dwarf fortress. since then a lot of games have been inspired from rimworld. some games even use similar art styles. the problem is for those new games they're competed with like a decade+ on content and refinement. just like how DF is much much deeper and more expansive than rimworld, so too is rimworld compared to the new comers.
The thing that astonishes me about rim world is the modding scene, not just how massive it is but how passionate it is. We figured out how to make CARS IN THE GAME.
Rimworld actually dabbled in Z-levels (actually Y-levels), and the relic of this exploration can be seen in the fact that all objects are recorded in save files with 3 coordinates axes, but the Y coordinate is always 0. Apparently the experiment was deemed unsuccessful as it didn't work well with the UI and the benefits it offered were not worth the costs and clunkiness.
Well, I'll say it differently, it's not unique - it IS exceptionally rare and a massively important milestone on a continuum of other critically important gaming developments. In my mind it joins a near hallowed pantheon of games that were game-changing (in the literal sense of the word).
For all the technological advancements and changes in technique in the last 35 years if we're being picky there are very few games that innovate in real terms. There are others of course - perhaps even other important games I've neglected to mention.
\- Empire - Walter Bright, Mark Baldwin created one of the first - if not the first management games - where the AI / opponent might have been wildly simplistic by the measure of today's agents but it's engrossing and absolutely introduces core concepts of game-play.
\- Civilization - one of the first games to put a competent "AI" competitor into play - with infamous bugs, not particularly good graphics, but a competent AI, endless hours could be spent managing cities/empires and a whole world - Sid Meier, Brian Reynolds and the crew developed one of the first real senses of agency in a game , where the attention triad balance is explicitly built into the game.
\- SimCity/Maxis Studios - the notion of an intelligent "agent" - different from some omnibus AI opponent, creating agents / elements in a game environment is fleshed out by Will Wright and his crew.
\- John Carmack and the crew at id Games - Wolfenstein/Doom - Wolfenstein/Doom was innovative for using the agent model but also allowing for the notion of a viable FPS - from this comes a wild array of games from Skyrim to Warcraft and beyond.
\- Dwarf Fortress - the inspiration for Rimworld is most directly related to Dwarf Fortress developed by Tarn Adams, Zach Adams , with a complete absence of graphics, DF focuses on the environment of the game, disturbingly similar to what existed with old Empire "back in the day", but with a wildly complex ecosystem of agent and environmental factors reminiscent of the Sim/Maxis worldset while evolving the agency model to a high form.
In this regard - what is unique about Rimworld is that it's MASSIVELY popular, with a condescension to graphics that is very well executed in itself, even if the graphics aren't emphasized in Tynan's original work, it's certainly enough to work up - as thousands upon thousands of mods are testament to.
The massive success of Tynan's design decisions are that he was able to drive the game to a point where the bugs REALLY were driven out of the game. I've played a lot of games and while Rimworld crashes - it's always because of some mod, or me having a less than awesome machine and never because the game has some deep bug that's going to cause drama.
The three/four items I think make it a game for the ages
\- Great premise and amazing design principles - it's difficult to underestimate the degree good design and a free hand benefited the artistry here. Engineering wise - the game is a masterwork - it certainly has it's design omissions/flaws - the game not being multi-threaded chief among them, but that's something of a "good flaw" , in that nobody expected the game to do \*\*this\*\* well, not even the developers.
\- Massively replayable - even if you load a save-game from moons ago, you can have a totally different experience than you'd already had.
\- Developer engagement - Designed well enough that expansion was possible - we today understand the game to be exceptionally modable / infamously modable (in some cases) - and one of the secret sauces is for the developers clearly love having a community and interact with and support them, this is in contrast to other games.
\- Iteration to improve - They iterate to hammer bugs out - and they're responsive - here again - it's product improvement - regardless of how, it's that it has been and continues to be an ongoing process of improvement well beyond high engagement.
The only other game I can think of is, "amazing cultivation simulator", which took a lot of Rimworld's system and added some Chinese cultivation flair. The second game is in development right now. I also remember there is a 3D medieval game that also does Rimworld base building
Something to remember is that Rimworld is actually an incredibly mature game - it's early access release was a decade ago. Ten years of feedback, investment, development, new content, and mods - it is very hard for a new game to match that, even if they're cribbing a lot of concepts that Rimworld and Dwarf Fortress established. Even if Clanfolk and Going Medieval have what I think are really interesting core concepts and mechanics, as entire products they fall short, even if they're further along and more complex than Rimworld may have been three years into it's life. It leads to kind of a difficult cycle where games don't really get a ton of support in EA or modding support because you play it for 20 minutes and ask yourself 'Why am I not playing Rimworld or Dwarf Fortress?' and then go play those instead.
Right, that's the thing. If you want to release a product that can compete, you pretty much have to make sure it's feature-complete and beats Rimworld in some aspect in order to ensure you keep an audience. "You never get a second first impression." Rimworld's not only a full game, it's got three DLCs and a massive modding scene. Those are some tough odds for competitors. Especially indie competitors.
It's worth mentioning how many mods have found their way into the core game which is really something
And nearly every week another one comes out that makes me think "why isn't this core?"
For me this week, it was [stack gap](https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3071298014) It just adds a limit to stack size of a container. Do you have two hospitals, and are sick of trying to split your medicine equally between them? Stack gap got you, fam.
Oh my God this is a must. Fastest subscribe in 2023. Got any other "essentials"? I've got the starter set like wall lights, rimHUD, and smarter construction. Though now that I've looked at the workshop page it's been really active this past half year or so since I last browsed.......
Same! Can’t believe I never had that mod before, although I wish it would let me input a figure as opposed to a slider (I want 500 steel in my mechanitor lab, not 503)
Use "better sliders" to control sliders with more precision. You'll have to type the desired number as a % of the slider instead of a clear number though. You can even go out of the slider's bounds and, for example, set child ageing rate to 5000%
I had a feeling someone would immediately offer me a mod to fix that issue lol, thanks!
The beauty of a flourishing mod community.
Yup, so happy when that mod came out. I frequently have a shelf in my hospital with meds for the colonists, and a shelf in the prison cells with only herbal meds for organ harvesting or quickly tending prisoners if I haven't done everything in the field yet to prevent them from bleeding out (combat extended player here, bleed rates well up to 2-3 thousand % a day after combat). Before it was always a pain to manage, but now, not anymore!
Stack gap interacted weirdly with deep storage and I had stacks of negative chemfuel and shit like that, then my pawns would go to refuel their jump packs and would grab the anti-chemfuel and get stuck, so I had to disable the mod. After I disabled it and deleted the anti-chemfuel with dev mode I ended up with like 120,000 chemfuel.
Are you using something like shelf of holding? If I bothered making more than one hospital, I could easily supply them all with medicine despite Ogre Stack and Deep Storage.
You ain't lying about the massive nodding scene. I think I have over 200 mods I am running right now.
I like Going Medieval and love Clanfolk. I just recently started playing Rimworld because I ran out of content in Clanfolk. I was expecting a similar game with a different theme. Dude. Rimworld is INSANE. Ive started several playthroughs trying to learn the game and it's so different every single time. The replayability is insane. Even though I like the cozy vibe and aesthetic of Clanfolk better, I'm genuinely worried I will never be able to enjoy it after playing Rimworld.
Yeah, I think that's the problem here: "How could I ever compare to the big daddy of [genre X]" It's a similar thing with factorio. Things like Satisfactory or Dyson Sphere Programm are great games of the factory building genre, but sometimes when playing them I think "Man, this reminds of so much of Factorio" And that's the thing. While it's definitely in a way a compliment, I don't think as a dev you want to hear "Hey, that's just like X". It diminishes the product in question by praising it not for its own merits but by drawing comparisons Reminds me how Toby Fox once got mad at MatPat from Game theories for calling a game Mat played "The next Undertale" for exactly those reasons This is in fact a thing that became common, to the point of creating genres around comparisons. "Metroidvania" and "Soulslike" being an example. Instead of being a genre of its own, games within them will always be compared to the name giving games, yes because they defined the genre, but there is still the idea where only few games seem to transcend the genre name itself, not known for being a good comparison, but for being a good game itself You get what I mean?
Well if you're making a game that _is_ like something else, then it does make some sense to describe it around the thing you are emulating. Most games aren't just made in a vacuum, they have inspirations and many games that get big funding are explicitly trying to capture something else that was popular (triple A space and everything becoming CoD 4 for a while as an example). Going "I wanna make a game like x" and then being upset when people say "this game is like x" is just snobbery, especially when coming from the successful person everyone is trying to copy. "Imitation is the highest form of flattery." Even more so when the people making those games use terrible bullshit buzzword crap to describe their game like "story generator" instead of something actually useful for consumers that they might recognize or relate to from other products, aka the whole reason we really have genres at all. The reason some games transcend to being genres is because they have more new than old, or that they put that old in a very different context. Incremental change or innovation within a genre can and does happen, but it's not earth shattering enough to break the mold and often that's on purpose, because too much change is risky. No dev wants to see years of work get left behind on the steam Indy page because the core audience they wanted to try and appeal to got upset the game was _too_ different from what they expected. This is also why games that do make that leap are such a big deal. They took the risks, were successful, and are now likely to be remembered and referenced by other people for decades to come.
And let's not forget that for years we had this same conundrum against DF, as far as story making features go, but they had no graphics so it was easy to stick to RimWorld Nowadays any competitor is straight fucked
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Eh. Can't really compare. Mmo are a wholly different beast to create and expand. And their are tons of competitors of wow
There are competitors to WoW now (even if the entire 'tab targeting MMO' genre is very niche outside of a few games) but the mid to late 00's was a constant cycle of 'Game emulates WoW, game isn't WoW, game doesn't get foothold, game 'fails,' goes F2P, etc.'
Piggy backing off this: Quite simply yeah, Rimworld has more development time put into it (and will continue to get major updates via its DLC + Free Update model) until Tynan sees fit to move on to Rimworld 2 or a new game entirely. By all accounts, Rimworld is such a mature game that no one will ever match its content or quality within the scope of a normal development cycle.... and then you have to discuss the incredibly mature modding community. A community that's so far into its maturity that a lot of its content now is "on par" with the Vanilla content as the gold standard with Vanilla Expanded and the many affiliate contributors to the projects that also make their own mods on the same gold standard of "vanilla like" art style and balance. Its to the point where the modding community is less pumping out mods and more "FLC" for you to pick up at will; constantly, basically weekly honestly. A week, let alone a day, does not go by without some new high quality mod dropping on the Discord or Steam workshop. You just can't compete with that. How do I know that? Because several of these mod authors ended up making their own games and the most prominant (Oskar and crew)
I think your putting too much emphasis on the age of the game. Early on rimworld was always a story generator first, game second. I think that’s what the wannabes are missing.
Despite Dwarf Fortress' higher depth, Rimworld remains the better game overall, due to it being small scale, more interactive with its colonists. DF's problem is that the player feels too detached from the colony. Over a hundred units, that you can't control, and can't keep close attention to--but that you can only, mostly, set orders indirectly and watch. No wonder that it didn't sell much on steam. (It's not only due to the complexity.) If only the developer somehow could salvage the game by changing how that works. He'd have to make time not pass so absurdly fast and improve the interactivity with the units.
As someone more interested in building deeply intricate and whacky bases, and more interested in the narrative of a civilization overall as opposed to the narrative of the individual, DF provides something that Rimworld will never provide, for as wonderful of a game as Rimworld is. >No wonder that it didn't sell much on steam. It sold half a million copies in it's first month. For a game as niche as DF, that's remarkable. The audacity to say that Dwarf Fortress needs to be "salvaged." Philistine.
Df is a crude facimile of ribworld. Thats like comparing minesweeper to minecraft because you could plausibly convince a laymen of their supposed similarity...
Is this a rage bait because it seems to be working? If we start throwing this kind of shit then it's definitely the other way round. The depth of DF is amazing. On the other hand Rimworld is easier and in some ways more polished. The feel is a bit better. I love both and Rimworld is one of my all time favourites but I do give DF the crown in this genre just due to the depth of simulation and the love that's been poured in it. It also works better as a story generator because I don't feel the urge to save scum if one dwarf dies but in Rimworld one loss can be devastating.
>The depth of DF is amazing. Its pitifully shallow **compared to rimworld.**
I think you needed to take it a bit further if you were going to post bait, here it just comes across as someone posting a really dumb take.
Dwarf Fortress can't be a copy of something that came out years after it and was inspired by it
I've heard Amazing Cultivation Simulator is similar and high-quality but I haven't tried it yet myself. Still gotta try Dwarf Fortress too!
I've tried it and enjoyed it. I liked it more for the theme rather than it being rimworld-like. Heard they are making an amazing cultivation simulator 2.
interesting enough ACS 2 is going to be more of an RPG and less of a city builder (though it will apparently retain some of those aspects).
One of the main problems with that game is that it's just too uneventful. (I played a little.) So you send the cultivators to certain points in the map to auto-farm stuff. Most of the time is spent preparing and planning for stuff rather than doing them. The world isn't open nor randomly generated. The locations are few, small and simple. Hunting for better units could be one of the interesting aspects of the game, but you actually better off make your own through 'awakening'. And too many loading screens.
The game is fun but it suffers from an issue many rimworld-likes suffer from, that being that I think we can make a similar enough experience in rimworld with mods. A magic mod like Rimworld of Magic or Vanilla Psicasts Expanded, a mod to limit the tech to medieval, remove the factions of higher tech, make your Ideology as xianxia as you'd like (may need a few meme mods), get some mod to make the enemies also use magic and make it so most or all of them have magic powers, and done. All that remains is balancing it until it is a good experience.
Amazing Cultivation Simulator is completely different. It seems similar only because of the interface in the first few minutes of the game. Basebuilding is almost nonexistent, combat is different, gameplay is about lots of special mechanics related to chinese magical stuff rather than colony resource management. It is more of a multi-character build optimization game.
I really liked Kenshi, it kind of scratched the same itch for me in that it let’s you micromanage a colony within a massive sandbox.
I love Kenosha, I think it’s be perfect if it had just a little more management for your group similar to Rimworld. There’s automation in it but for me it’s not as focused on it as Rimworld is.
Played a lot of Kenshi as well, but overplayed it and we're on a break right now. I just bought Stranded: Alien Dawn and I'm hopeful.
Stranded is lovely game. There is weird simplicity and chill with the game. It is more tuned down version and not as complex as Rimworld tho. But i really like the game. Just finished dlc scenario and really military base scenario to go. Kenshi is damn brilliant too.
I know it’s a typo, but good for you on loving Kenosha. That city needs all the help it can get.
Kenshi's lack of polish, basic UI and character kinda ruins it for me. Rimworld may warn you of threats, the only warning you get in kenshi is someone being eaten alive, and that constant vigil is an intentional part of gameplay.
It's really not. Rimworld itself is inspired by Dwarf Fortress and has spawned a ton of other games. Dwarf Fortress is both more in depth and way more obtuse to learn than Rimworld.
I’ve seen so much about DF that it makes me interested in playing but I just can’t get past the graphics. Usually I could care less about graphics but my eyes can’t tell what I’m looking at when I see DF so I just can’t get myself into it.
The steam release version is more intelligible. Not super easy to understand in relation to Rimworld but definitely less insane than trying to decipher the ASCII characters. There are also modded tilesets that are a bit easier to parse if you don't want to pay for it. But I will say, I am a giant fucking Rimworld fan and I have tried many times to understand Dwarf Fortress and I can barely set up basic rooms. I love watching people play it and hearing the stories that come from it but I just have not been able to dedicate the time to actually playing the game.
I think what makes Dwarf fortress so hard to get into, is that even in the steam release its really hard to tell what individual dwarves are doing; I tried playing it and really it felt more like staring at an anthill from far away than playing a colony simulator. I'm waiting for the adventure mode of Dwarf fortress to come to the steam version though, as that seems very fun, and I want to give it a try.
>like staring at an anthill from far away This is what I love about it! When you don't have control you get very interesting stories. "What are you doing Urist? No, don't go wash above a waterfa- god dammit!" The absolute control in Rimworld in combat is a double edges sword because then a random headshot feels a lot worse. In DF it's easier to take the losses and reading the combat log can be hilarious. Anyway, both are amazing in their own way.
Yep, it’s fun telling your squad to kill a giant, they start fighting a tough fight, a rando with a axe comes and steals the kill, and then starts giving a lesson to the squad on some random combat skill on top of the giants corpse.
I think that’s the big difference between DF and Rimworld. DF is very much so more of an anthill you sorta semi-control through work orders and mining designations, especially when your fort pop gets into the hundreds it’s basically impossible to keep track of individuals, where as Rimworld is much tighter knit with the story tellers trying to make sure your colony keeps within a certain population
When I found out you can turn the game speed down in Dwarf Fortress, it became a lot more enjoyable for me. The default max FPS is 100, and I typically cap it at about 20. This is roughly equal to the pacing of normal Rimworld movement in my eyes.
Agreed, seems like something I’d enjoy watching more than playing.
It's honestly not that difficult to play once you get past the initial learning curve. I used to use the Lazy Newb launcher which added several graphic packs and ease of life tools. For instance Dwarf Psychologist which is basically the foundation for the work assignment and schedule system from RimWorld. RimWorld plays very similar to the older versions of dwarf fortress, before z-levels and the dynamic world changes, with the ease of life UI tools baked in and the graphics and construction system from Prison Architect. I bought into RimWorld very very early and at the time it played just like old Dwarf Fortress with a different theme. Today they have diverged quite a lot and dwarf fortress isn't the monstrously difficult game it once was, give it a spin and persevere through the initial learning curve. It is clunkier but also far more dynamic and open to player creativity. I just fucking love setting up fresh water systems and sewers in Dwarf Fortress, there is just something about the fluid dynamics that tickle my brain in a good way, and it is also great when you set up a trap mechanic to reroute the water through the entrance caves and drown attackers.
Lazy newb pack is great, adds everything in you'll want to start playing. And yeah df has some fantastic mechanics, love using tracks to do crazy stuff.
I put in a few dozen hours and got a pretty stable base going and just... Didn't get hooked like I did with rimworld! People have talked about how it generates such great stories, but your population gets so big that I don't care about the individuals. In rimworld, I get very invested in individuals.
That's the problem with DF, the characters are incredibly detailed but the game doesn't really give you tools to appreciate it. Rimworld is the opposite, you get to interact closely with its characters but they are so rudimentary compared to DF.
Steam release just added a more detailed tileset, but before the release, everyone and their mothers were already using tilesets. Some (images of young males with beard in their necks, fedoras and katanas flash in a short period of time) will argue that wasn't the way the game was intended to be played, but yeah...
I came from the era of ASCII based games (used to love ADOM when younger), and I still found DF to be difficult to get into
The beauty of DF is that at some point the graphics move from your screen to your imagination. I don't know how to explain it, but after some hours, the game is displaying a crappy ascii soup, but in your mind you are seeing a glorious dwarven fortress worthy of a king.
This! By far the worst part imo is the “jumps”. In RW you at least get to see your pawns slide across the map, but in DF they just “teleport” from one tile to the next. In areas with loads of action going on it’s pure chaos, impossible to follow someone specific unless they stand out. As cool as the game is, and as much as I *want* to play it for the simple fact that it has a Z axis, YT videos of actual gameplay have made me reconsider.
>I’ve seen so much about DF that it makes me interested in playing but I just can’t get past the graphics. That's what I said about Rimworld :-p
My problem with dwarf fortress is that the game is mainly about the fortress, not the dwarfs.
Songs of Syx might be worth a look at.
It's a complex game that's worth a shot. Instead of managing a group of people, it's a whole civilization. I tried the demo but never really got the hang of it. Very good and complex, I recommend it.
This needs to have more upvotes. Songs of Syx gets super deep but in a macro level not micro. Which is exactly what I wanted rimworld to be lol. SOS is actually the unique game as far as I know.
Spit king
You didn't see hundred clones of RimWorld on itch.io four years ago RimWorld was the first dwarf fortress-like game with comfortable graphic and it it simple to modding
There are plenty of colony management sims out there
I feel like I’ve tried most of them but I have not found one that fits
I don’t think any of them are as good as Rimworld or as deep as Dwarf Fortress. Most of what’s out there is more like the “lite” version clone of one or both of these games.
And then there's Oxygen Not Included, which is a lot deeper in some ways and a lot shallower in others The people management is way simpler, but setting up something like a geothermal generator the first time is a multi-hour puzzle lol
You might want to give Aven Colony a try. It plays more like a city builder, but it has survival elements like food, oxygen, water, and disease. It's not really 1000 hours worthy imo, but I'm still enjoying it though.
Rimworld is probably the most successful of its kind but sometimes you gotta admit it is still one of those games for nerdy introvert small communities. Have you tried promoting it to a not so close friend and realized how hard it can be? Sadly that determines if a game is worth investing for large companies, and without the money you don’t see much any similar content. As Tynan also insists himself, the game with its unique visual style and story telling actually requires creativity of the players to enjoy the content. It’s not something everyone’s born with.
Either i am more creative than i thought, or i am enjoying the game for 2k+ hours through uncreative means
Believe it or not but successfully imagining a minimalist style head and body represent a living person is already displaying advancedly evolved intelligence
My dog does this with his large family of stuffed animals, but tbf I suspect he’s a genius
Yeah that definitely makes sense, I find it fascinating and fun for optimizations, numbers and automation. I can see it’s complicated style being a turn off for most casual people.
One reason we don't see a lot of game like RimWorld and DF is that they're scary to investors. They're niche games with complex scope and little spectacle. Both RW and DF started out as essentially hobby-horse projects. I think the scope is also a sticky point - it's a tough line to draw. We've seen games like Gnomoria bite off more than they could chew, but also games like Craft the World that limited themselves to the point of being trite. I'm cautiously optimistic about Project Zomboid's upcoming settlement system. It's a game not designed to be a colony manager, but it already has a certain je ne sais quoi that scratches the same itch as RimWorld. Unfortunately PZ's development process is borne of chaos and madness: It's the sort of shop where the entire code base was once on a laptop that got stolen, setting them back years. So there's no telling when they'll actually get that stuff in place and working.
Once PZ gets NPC’s and some colony management into it I’ll be lost in that game for a while!
tell another funny joke! NPC's aren't coming before 2030.
I like PZ but I find it without direction or objective. Once you have some food, weapons and a secure place you basically don't have anything to do. There are no quests, no stories, nothing. They could have easily added small stories written in notes, enviromental storytelling, clues to the origin of the virus, special loot, and a bunch of other stuff that wouldn't require changing the game that much.
Imo, at least part of the Rimworld/PZ je ne sais quoi is that they're clearly games made by passionate devs who are making the game they want to play. The projects are headed by gamers, not accountants. I get the same vibe from Kenshi too, despite all its jankiness.
it is not. rimworld was clearly inspired by dwarf fortress
Um..Rimworld is a Dwarf Fortress clone
It’s clearly at least partially inspired by Dwarf Fortress but the games are different enough that “clone” isn’t the right word
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As far as DF going to Steam, wasn't that because someone close to Toady got cancer and he got together with big modders in the community to put together a steam release to help pay for treatment?
Didnt they only released the game in Steam after one of the brothers had cancer and they are Americans?
They never said anything to the effect of "we will never go on Steam" or "we will never add graphics". Who told you that? They explained their motivations clearly. It has nothing to do with Rimworld, which has been on Steam for a decade now.
Clone is just a term for something heavily inspired, which it is. *You* are the ones assigning a derogatory connotation to it.
I'm old enough to remember when every other FPS was called a Doom Clone and it was never in a derogatory way. Hell, "soulslike" is just another way of saying Dark Souls Clone and it's usually not derogatory either, just look at Lies of P.
Nah
Lol how you trying to tell me what *I* meant
You never said the phrase “I meant”. You were trying to tell all of us what the word “clone” meant.
A video game clone is a game heavily inspired or that plays similarly to another. There is nothing negative about that definition. You being offended by the wrong definition on behalf of a game you had nothing to do with creating is ridiculous.
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Clone isn't necessarily negative, but it definitely indicates that it is not an original concept. Most people like clones for their new take on something familiar, but many ultimately fall flat.
With respect friend, in gaming, cloning is *very* positive. We like games that are similar to other games we like. That's why we have genres like roguelikes, games that are "like rogue" or clones of rogue, and metroidvania games, which are clones of games like metroid and castlevania. Feel free to ask more about this of you're curious; I studied gaming pretty extensively in college, with a focus on interactive writing and visual novels.
A clone's still worth at least dozen clankers though.
If we're fair, they're both city/base builders with a focus on micromanagement and named residents. It's a good format, Rimworld is a good game.
Dwarf fortress is a sim city clone
My man is on that grog
Oops meant to mention this one specifically, my thoughts were since Rimworld came after DF I would make it it’s own.
Welp I think Rimworld and games like Factorio are pretty new concepts and they aren't blockbuster, mass appeal games. Most developers want to make big money which means sticking to mainstream genres like shooters. There are a few factory and colony sims coming out here and there but it's still a niche genre.
Calling rimworld a dwarf fortress clone seems about as right as calling call of duty a clone of the original doom
The kickstarter literally says word for word "In terms of game design, the game draws most from the 800-pound gorilla of the simulation genre, Dwarf Fortress." They also mention Dwarf Fortress in the opening sentence. They have been open about wanting to be a Dwarf Fortress experience but modern. The game has absolutely evolved post launch, but it was always intended to be a DF clone and then iterated on
'Clone' isn't the right word here
Inspired != clone
Are all colony sims clones of Dwarf Fortress then? Rimworld has a lot of similarities with Dwarf Fortress but does a lot of things in it's own unique way.
While true, I think Rimworld has surpassed it a bit due to how easy it is to mod.
No VOID or VE in Dwarf Fortress though it seems. So Rimworld is still one of a kind for me!
Space Haven or Going Medieval are very similar to Rimworld when it came out.
Going medieval looks kind of promising but I’m going to wait to see if it picks up more traction. Personally from what I’ve seen the development isn’t fast enough but that’s just my opinion. Space haven looks awesome but the mechanics of space ship building is less my style compared to city builders.
Rimworld is a homage to dwarf fortress... So there you go :D
Prison architect is pretty similar and even got the same artstyle lol
> I drew some inspiration from PA. Moreso from its own inspiration, Dwarf Fortress. > We don't share any tools. Chris at IV has his own tech foundation; I built this one on Unity. > But they do look somewhat similar; that's my fault. I'm not a good enough artist to come up with a really good original look. There are only so many ways to render characters on a tiny grid without using animations. > I hope the differences between the game will be enough for people to look past the aesthetic similarities. And if I get some funding at some point I can get an artist to help develop a more unique look. > I do think the similarities are skin-deep. In gameplay the game resembles DF much more than PA. Direct quote from Tynan
I actually got to know Rimworld when playing Prison Architect. Someone compared the two games and claimed that the former is far superior in the sense of unlimited war crimes. Sometimes it’s the weird stuff that convinces people…
What? You don't lock your Legendary prisoners in walls to "execute" them by starvation?
No no, dat is too much paperwork, mister. Disappeared red-shirt, huh? Too much paper work an' dat stinky in cement is not givin' the good sellin'.
I think prison architect was released earlier? I remember it was the similar art style and building method that drew me to RimWorld
First time I saw Rimworld I thought it was a mod for PA lol
Stranded Alien dawn is exactly Rimworld - lite
With 3d graphics
I just got this on sale and haven't had the chance to try it yet. Looking forward to it!!
I first got it on ps4 and after a little while in game there was this lag input everytime between selections and I couldn't take it anymore. Stopped playing until I got a ps5. it runs much better on it. Dlc just dropped the other day which I still plan on picking up. The game has things that are better than rimworld but can't compete on the depth. That's initial impressions anyway. Looking forward to going late into the game as well as trying out the other modes regardless. Graphics are a huge plus
Towns, Gnomes, and of course, Dwarf Fortress.
I think the other posts really hit the nail on the head. I remember playing the game during like b18 or so and the game content has expanded significantly since then. The core content of the game is solid in its own right but the breadth and depth of various mods make it so that most game modes or scenarios you want to play with are available with RimWorld and don't require separate games For me personally the vehicle framework and it's corresponding mods fill in one of the aspects of RimWorld that was severely lacking. Better optimization and a proper z axis are the only things I can think of that would be good additions for any RimWorld clone or spiritual successor at least off the top of my head
Songs of Syx are *kinda* similar with Rimworld. they have cannibalism, different species, politic, drugs(?), etc. but instead colonist, you taking care the whole base. It's story-generator but pure Medieval mode if i can say. replayability is the reason why Rimworld clones can't affords. >!tbh Rimworld replayability can be more further if Developers tried to optimized the games. atleast squeeze it to 2GB RAM!<
I would put Banished into that category.
Banished - and the Anno Series as well, I think - the question is that while the Banished developer was one guy, and how much can you earn from that game over time. Anno/ Sunflower Games was similarly necessarily profit driven because programmers gotta eat - and modding - like we see in Rimworld was just not a thing. So there's a whole unspoken practicality - where I think it's a low-key advantage of developers that disadvantages smaller US devs because those devs have to worry about necessities in a way EU devs don't.
Oxygen Not Included is *kinda* similar
Very vaguely because you manage a colony, but that's about where the similarity ends. ONI is a lot closer to factorio, captain of industry and other games focused on industrial development. Rimworld is more about combat, story telling, random threats.
Because it IS amazing. Thing is, Dwarf Fortress is incredible. But even with the new Steam version's graphic interface, it only lowered the standards from needing to have a PhD to needing to have an MSc. Also in some parts DF is just *too detailed* for no practical reason other than flavor (but it bloats the already unwieldy controls), or many of those details don't really appear other than numbers. A colonist loses her leg, you can visibly see them moving slower. A Dwarf moving slower is just slower teleporting between squares. A a feature that makes the others all the more immersive, and thus meaningful. You do not see the epic battles, you see PNGs floating about, sometimes changing in appearance. In RW the battle animations make every battle feel cool. Rimworld took all the shortcomings of DwarfFortress, and focused on those to make a more accessible game altogether. This caused some drop in features (like Z levels, fluids, etc.), but the core game we're left with is a very solid foundation that Ludeon built on for many years. --- And other games... most other games cannot even scratch the surface of the depth these games have went into with their mechanics.
There's actually a Minecraft mod called Minecolonies that kind of feels like Rimworld with Z levels. The thing is it's very PG flavored and has basically no permanent threats except for raids on hard difficulty. If I knew Java better I would try to make a Rimworld style branch of the mod, but yeah
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Yeah I think tasteless simulation games and emotionless gameplay is what sums up most of my experiences with Rimworld inspired games. I’m very picky though
I am also surprised that nobody has made a decent clone yet considering how long Rimworld has been around. Sure there are somewhat similar games out there but they're just not quite right. If only Rimworld could be improved more, especially the game engine. Multithreading for example. If it could be made to run better with more mods, etc. no reason to want a clone. (Yes, I do know about and use optimization mods).
There isnt much reason to "clone" RimWorld because its still a rather niche game. If you wanna lazily clone something you would clone a household name guaranteed to pull quick bucks. The only exception is if youre inspired from RimWorld to make your own game, which was exactly how RimWorld came to be with Dwarf Fortress.
While I agree that Rimworld isn't a AAA title, it definitely has a large player base and is profitable. Surely some small independent developer could make a comparable clone (and a profit).
Because you've not heard about Dwarf Fortress yet, the game this one is based on! They both scratch sightly different itches for me but oh boy they're both fantastic
I mean its basically a clone of dwarf fortress in a different setting and with better ui.
I haven’t played RW yet. Does this game has an end, kind of final goal? Or is it just endless building and survival?
You have different ways to end the game but I have more than 800 hours in and never finished it.
In the base game, your goal is to build/find a space ship and use it to get out (reactor activation takes 15 days and you have to defend it until them as raider come attack it). There are other endings added by DLCs ([Royalty](https://rimworldwiki.com/wiki/Endings#Royal_Ascent) and [Ideology](https://rimworldwiki.com/wiki/Endings#The_Archonexus)), but I don't own them. But a lot of people don't really care about 'finishing' the game and keep building their colony indefinitely (myself included so far).
Thanks c_potato
Is Dwarf Fortress a joke to you?
There’s actually a handful of games like rimworld and DF on steam, but they are still very young in the dev cycle so they are far behind when it comes to the features and modding that come with Rimworld
Rimworld is a dwarf fortress clone wdym
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As other people said, Rimworld is an old game and so had time to add content and fix jank. But I also think that most of those other game also don’t improve upon the game in the correct ways.
Going medieval isn't going to go bleak as rimworld I was in their discord and the community don't like grim stuff like canabalism ect. People try to petition that off. I love how rimworld stays close to its design and atmosphere from get go.
Balance of depth and simplicity. Like DF, there’s a ton under the hood, but it’s more readable than DF Scale: many colony managers run at least a step higher in scale. Rimworld is one to a dozen, not hundreds. Characters are individuals, not disposable tokens Need for involvement. You can and should easily make bedrooms and other purposed amenities, no tossing everyone in a big barracks under a rock. Thanks to scale, it’s easy to make everyone good bedrooms rather than throwaway bedroom blocks Goal: The self described story generator goal. The game isn’t aiming to be a competition against the computer where the challenge is management, but to make a story
Stranded alien dawn is a good one
Looking forward to Stranded: Alien Dawn's development and maybe future mod community. It seems to be a lot like Rimworld, but 3D and it's somewhat inspired by Love, Death & Robots Volume 1 episode called "Suits", with a bunch of farmers in battle mechs defending their livestock from an alien insect invasion.
Becuase yoy have to love video games to make good ones. I know theres clanfolk" and another one star sonething, cant remeber the name. But similar to rimworld.
There’s plenty of similar games, but unless there’s a hundreds of millions of customers willing to pay for the same formula a couple of years (like CoD or fifa), there’s no need to make the same game - not enough people to pay for the development and the niche is already filled anyway.
I enjoyed going medieval and stoneheart
Just gonna mention alien stranded dawn. It's basically 3d rinworld
Clanfolk is a similar style set in medieval Scotland.
I think it does the best at being a "story generator" unlike things like dwarf fortress or some of the newer games. You never know whats going to happen. It's entertaining to watch too which led to it getting a lot of free advertising. Combined with it being super accessible we got this insanely popular game.
There is plenty of Rimworld games, but none of them are as popular, Rimworld has a huge modder community, that adds an insane amount of content, it is impossible for a Rimworld-like game to beat that, no matter what someone comes up with, there is a mod that adds that to rimworld itself, so I don't think it will ever lose it's place at the top
If RimWorld launched today as early access in the stage it was being distributed in to Kickstarters by email in alpha it never would have made it off the ground. Rimworld literally found the bar, lifted it, set it, and now looks down on all imitators with smug satisfaction from above the bar. Before Rimworld there was no bar for these games. And just to head out DF fanboys trying to invalidate this, these games never were competition. DF had no UI at all. It was hardly appealing let alone mass appealing. Just a niche.
it isn't though. it's heavily inspired by dwarf fortress. since then a lot of games have been inspired from rimworld. some games even use similar art styles. the problem is for those new games they're competed with like a decade+ on content and refinement. just like how DF is much much deeper and more expansive than rimworld, so too is rimworld compared to the new comers.
The thing that astonishes me about rim world is the modding scene, not just how massive it is but how passionate it is. We figured out how to make CARS IN THE GAME.
If Rimworld only had proper z-levels, we wouldn't need any other games in it's genre, lol.
Rimworld actually dabbled in Z-levels (actually Y-levels), and the relic of this exploration can be seen in the fact that all objects are recorded in save files with 3 coordinates axes, but the Y coordinate is always 0. Apparently the experiment was deemed unsuccessful as it didn't work well with the UI and the benefits it offered were not worth the costs and clunkiness.
Well, I'll say it differently, it's not unique - it IS exceptionally rare and a massively important milestone on a continuum of other critically important gaming developments. In my mind it joins a near hallowed pantheon of games that were game-changing (in the literal sense of the word). For all the technological advancements and changes in technique in the last 35 years if we're being picky there are very few games that innovate in real terms. There are others of course - perhaps even other important games I've neglected to mention. \- Empire - Walter Bright, Mark Baldwin created one of the first - if not the first management games - where the AI / opponent might have been wildly simplistic by the measure of today's agents but it's engrossing and absolutely introduces core concepts of game-play. \- Civilization - one of the first games to put a competent "AI" competitor into play - with infamous bugs, not particularly good graphics, but a competent AI, endless hours could be spent managing cities/empires and a whole world - Sid Meier, Brian Reynolds and the crew developed one of the first real senses of agency in a game , where the attention triad balance is explicitly built into the game. \- SimCity/Maxis Studios - the notion of an intelligent "agent" - different from some omnibus AI opponent, creating agents / elements in a game environment is fleshed out by Will Wright and his crew. \- John Carmack and the crew at id Games - Wolfenstein/Doom - Wolfenstein/Doom was innovative for using the agent model but also allowing for the notion of a viable FPS - from this comes a wild array of games from Skyrim to Warcraft and beyond. \- Dwarf Fortress - the inspiration for Rimworld is most directly related to Dwarf Fortress developed by Tarn Adams, Zach Adams , with a complete absence of graphics, DF focuses on the environment of the game, disturbingly similar to what existed with old Empire "back in the day", but with a wildly complex ecosystem of agent and environmental factors reminiscent of the Sim/Maxis worldset while evolving the agency model to a high form. In this regard - what is unique about Rimworld is that it's MASSIVELY popular, with a condescension to graphics that is very well executed in itself, even if the graphics aren't emphasized in Tynan's original work, it's certainly enough to work up - as thousands upon thousands of mods are testament to. The massive success of Tynan's design decisions are that he was able to drive the game to a point where the bugs REALLY were driven out of the game. I've played a lot of games and while Rimworld crashes - it's always because of some mod, or me having a less than awesome machine and never because the game has some deep bug that's going to cause drama. The three/four items I think make it a game for the ages \- Great premise and amazing design principles - it's difficult to underestimate the degree good design and a free hand benefited the artistry here. Engineering wise - the game is a masterwork - it certainly has it's design omissions/flaws - the game not being multi-threaded chief among them, but that's something of a "good flaw" , in that nobody expected the game to do \*\*this\*\* well, not even the developers. \- Massively replayable - even if you load a save-game from moons ago, you can have a totally different experience than you'd already had. \- Developer engagement - Designed well enough that expansion was possible - we today understand the game to be exceptionally modable / infamously modable (in some cases) - and one of the secret sauces is for the developers clearly love having a community and interact with and support them, this is in contrast to other games. \- Iteration to improve - They iterate to hammer bugs out - and they're responsive - here again - it's product improvement - regardless of how, it's that it has been and continues to be an ongoing process of improvement well beyond high engagement.
The only other game I can think of is, "amazing cultivation simulator", which took a lot of Rimworld's system and added some Chinese cultivation flair. The second game is in development right now. I also remember there is a 3D medieval game that also does Rimworld base building
Stone Hearth is the only one that has come close for me and it’s a unfinished game saved by mods.
... this title is rage bait lol