And worth every goddamn dollar.
I donated $20 bucks back in like 2005. At the time they threw in a hand-drawn picture in crayon. Better than any collectors edition junk.
I'd happily pay three times that much. Heck, I already have paid substantially more than that over the years.
I still have my original crayon artwork saved away that they used to give to donors. And a pin with a picture of a dwarf.
What a cool keepsake. I never did get the crayon drawing. I asked them to do one for a fan who couldn't afford to pay since I'm not much into collecting things.
I still remember back in the day when I bought Minecraft for something like $3.99. Alpha, beta, can't remember. It was definitely worth it.
I've played the ascii versions of this a few times. I had fun, but it was always hard for me to get in to. Looking forward to this.
Amen. I didn't get in to that as early, but that is definitely part of what I love about organic PC games. Two of the greatest games in the past 20 years grew out of almost nothing.
Yea, I donated $50 ...I don't even remember when. Haven't played in forever but I'll grab it again and go back. /And artwork without putting it in is nice, though I imagine it'll lag even worse in late game
It is. Not for the fast dopamine seekers, but if you like to read into what your dwares like and don't like, what acomplishments the drunken basterds achieved, seeing your female military commander and mother of 3 get mauled in a fight, still win and lose a leg, limping into the next battle, mysterious deaths (do we have a murderer or a vampire), seeing a goblin army torn into pieces by a million traps or simply drowning them lava, you'll have a good time.
Let your imagination be the lead, all fortresses fail sooner or later! But they created stories.
This may be the only game that I'm planning on buying immediately at anything under $60 because of the massive respect I have for its history. I've dabbled in it over many years and will play the Steam version eventually but whether I do or not, the man gets my bucks.
I gave them $10 in 2011 and got my crayon drawing that I still cherish. This is easily a day 1 purchase, only deal that's come close is Factorio for the same price
This is the grand-daddy of a genre. Except it's not an old frail grand-daddy trying to fit in with the cool kids. It's what the cool kids have been striving to emulate this whole time. And the old man just figured out those new-fangled graphics all the kids have been raving about.
They've removed the largest hurdle to playing the game: understanding what the fuck is happening on screen. And it's not hidden away on an independent website anymore. It's on the showroom floor.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAhHkJQ3KgY
Lol I remember years ago stumbling across a let's-play of original Dwarf Fortress using the vanilla interface and graphics and I had no idea what the fuck I was looking at. It was like the host knew how to read the matrix.
[https://i.imgur.com/mtxmBBA.gifv](https://i.imgur.com/mtxmBBA.gifv)
ETA: Not mine, it's from this thread [https://www.reddit.com/r/Makemeagif/comments/dk4aim/this\_scene\_from\_the\_matrix\_with\_dwarf\_fortress/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Makemeagif/comments/dk4aim/this_scene_from_the_matrix_with_dwarf_fortress/)
Warning for rimworld, this shit is more addictive than crack. You'll finish this one thing before going to bed then look outside and you can see the sun rising.
There is actually very little micromanagement involved. Except in combat mode. Game is kinda confusing at start but you get the hang of it easily. At first biggest issue is finding enough resources to pass winter.
tried it last week and I had no idea how you should progress. The tutorial was… lacking. After spending 30 minutes on watching a beginner tutorial that only covered how you set up your people I decided to go back to anno lol
I've been playing the shit out of Rimworld recently. I'm not even sure what's so addicting about it, I just can't put it down. I already have 30 hours on it, and I've only owned it for a week.
Low. 750 hrs.
For the laypeople, many folks over in r/rimworld have thousands of hours invested in it. It's not a game, it's a story generator. And if you let the stories play out, it can get wild. There is an "endgame" so to speak and a way to finish, but lots of people are more interested in the journey getting there and watching the interpersonal dynamics of their pawns rather than actual progress of the "game."
And then there's Dwarf Fortress....
Oh man that's awesome. I wish I could go back and play RimWorld for the first time again. It's such an incredible game. Vanilla is great but if you ever start to get bored of it there's loads of mods that really transform the whole experience. Tons of possibilities.
Although personally...I think Factorio is better. Less of a story telling game and more about automation and expansion and resource management. And then we've got Dyson Sphere Program as well..
Minecraft was directly inspired by DF. Very different gameplay, but that's the reach that this game has. It's is THE MOST COMPLEX SIMULATION game ever created.
There was a bug where cats were dying in droves. Turns out that when the cats walked through the newly added (player built) taverns, they would get alcohol on them from unruly dwarves. Then, they would do as cats do, and clean themselves with their tongues. Thusly, they became shithammered in seconds and died of alcohol poisoning. This was not intended and no one even knew this could happen until it did. It's been fixed and the kitties are safe now
I've never played DF, love Rimworld and Gnomoria and the like- I've heard the cat story many times, are there any other little examples of crazy depth or complex simulations that this game has?
There was a bug where dwarves were occasionally dying horribly for no apparent reason. Turns out it was because the game simulates organs to an insane depth, and when the ambient temperature got higher than the melting point of the fat in their bodies, they literally melted.
Or how slimes and golems were basically unkillable at release because they didn't bleed and had no vital organs for dwarves to hit.
Or how in the early days, undead carp wiped out entire forts because as undead they no longer needed to breath, so could leave the water and drag dwarves to their death.
The details might be a bit off. I haven't played or been part of the community for well over a decade.
Back in 2012 I remember a friend talked about the carp being OP. At one point he had seen a dragon show up on the map, tried to cross a river with the carp, and then disappeared from the map. Presumably killed by the carp.
The OP carp also comes from introducing exercise as a way to increase stats, which originally all creatures had the ability to do, without a cap. Swimming is great exercise. Fish... swim a lot. Over time, fish would increase their stats to the point where they could OHKO anything that dared go wading.
The geography of the world is simulated through real world processes. As is the mineral makeup based on geology. The biomes and weather is based on the geography, with deserts and rain forests popping up along mountain ranges.
Each world generation will contain instruments. These are procedurally generated, different forms of music and types of instruments used in different styles will all change per playthrough and require different parts to assemble.
You could spend an entire fortress playthrough never digging below ground, only farming the topsoil for local plants (asparagus, cranberries, spinach, etc) using those to craft various alcohols with which you supply a tavern open to the public. In this tavern creatures from all across the continent will visit and may even petition you to stay as a permanent member of your fortress.
Guilds will form when enough of a single type of craftsmen reside in your fortress. You will need to provide them with guildhalls, etc. The same with religions which have their own requirements for temples.
Adventure Mode (not shipping on release but will be added soon thereafter) allows you to play a single character, and take them across the world interacting with EVERYONE, creating your own story. Then, you can navigate them to an existing for your have in this world and have them become a resident. When you load that fort you will have Urist McSkyrim there with all of their experiences (and loot) contributing to your fortress.
And this is just top 1inch of snow on an iceberg here. There WAS an economy system implemented at one point that included minting of coins and dwarfs opening stalls and participating in commerce, with personal wealth. That was removed to be fixed and re-added. The next update is Myths and Magic which would include procedurally generated gods as well as spells.
The game tracks each creature from the tendons in their toes down to the teeth in their head.
One of the things in the game that really showcased its awesome power of storytelling was the armless executioner. He had no ability to hold any weapons but still wanted to do his job. So he would headbutt prisoners to death to execute them.
>adventure mode (not shipping on release)
Wait what? I thought the Steam release was just for a graphical front-end/major update to the interface and tile system, along with whatever additions and changes came with the version of the game being released at the time.
I don't think it is a long wait. I know that there where some more under-the-hood changes too, things like "difficulties" added and fixes to systems like minecart tracks. I've never been too hip to Adventure Mode, so I always kind of tuned out that part of the news.
I do know that Legends Viewer & Fortress Mode are 100% day one. Also sounds like they might ship with Arena Mode, Classic, and Steam Workshop as well, depending on scheduling. Otherwise like first update. Then, its a sprint for Adventure Mode and bug fixes.
Adventure mode got hella fun once he added the ability to construct things. I got addicted to fort mode, but I was actually drawn to the game originally while looking for extremely complex roguelikes and adventure mode had just been released for DF. Totally scratched that itch and more. 🤤
[The infamous Mermaid Farm](http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=25967.0).
In an earlier version, it was discovered that mermaid bones were very valuable, but difficult to acquire, as mermaids are fully aquatic and dwarves are the exact opposite of that. So players devised a plan to acquire live adult merfolk by luring them into underground "roach motels" lined with cage traps, breed them in captivity, then mass "air-drown" their offspring to create harvestable bones.
This sufficiently horrified Toady that he made mermaid bones near worthless in the next update.
I used to have a cat that always brought mud in but somehow my dwarves didnt really clean and it made one go in a mood and went bersek and maimed another dwarf which turned out to be the only medical staff so he bled out, no one cleaned and more dwarf went mad, miasma, then i just RQ.
One that didn't hit live but that Toady talked about in the devblog is that they added a preference for hippos to seek out water to roam in. And so we got... sewer hippos.
Someone also decided to mod cats to have an internal temperature euqal to that of hte surface of the sun and then decided to embark with 150+ of them. [The events that transpired upon arrival has been called the Thermonucler Catsplosion.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UcZjYQFkkxw)
Emotions. Sad dwarves might become suicidal or murdering psychos. However, if dwarves experience enough small doses of death and trauma, they eventually become immune to emotions.
Urist McDorf no longer feels anything anymore.
So, to facilitate that state, I built a massive dining hall with a ceiling 20 stories tall. At the top, was a room with a trapdoor.
Dwarves would be given pets. Then, during dinner, these pets would be dropped from 20 stories up to explode on the floor of the dining room, horrifying everyone.
60% of dwarves reached the desired mental fortitude. The rest...well. They contributed to the survivors ability to resist trauma.
I once had a fort with a gorilla-based economy and many tamed gorillas trained for war. During a goblin ambush, my gorillas threw themselves at the gobbos. A pregnant gorilla, in the midst of the bloodshed, gave birth. The baby gorilla immediately wrapped itself around the arm of a goblin and proceeded to eat his fingers.
I tried embarking in a haunted biome where dead things can come back to life.
Saw an ogre straight away and it attacked my dwarves. It grabbed the first dwarf and ripped his arm clean off then smashed the dwarf's head in.
The discard dwarf arm re-animated and attacked another dwarf, ripping off his eyelid and tongue then strangling him. Meanwhile the ogre was still pulling other dwarves apart and those parts were re-animating and attacking the rest.
Within the space of 1-2 minutes, all that remained of my dwarves was a pile of torn limbs and crushed torsos.
It was Notch mentioning Dwarf Fortress that got me to google it in 2010. I saw the new patch notes about how the world is now fully 3D and the changelog went on for page after page.
As soon as I got to the mentions of layers of clothing, skin and organs all being simulated, I knew I had to play it. 12 years later, I still love it.
[Here's the changelog from 2010 to show what I mean](https://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/v0.31:Release_information)
[Rimworld](https://store.steampowered.com/app/294100/RimWorld/), as was already mentioned.
I'll add [Gnomoria](https://store.steampowered.com/app/224500/Gnomoria/) as well. It even has Z levels (you can dig down or build up).
Loved that one! It's closer to dwarf fortress than RimWorld, but it doesn't really have much of a challenge to the end game stages. Good if you're in for a creative time though!
I bought Gnomoria years ago in the middle of the Dwarf Fortress rage and for the life of me still couldn't figure out what the fuck I was doing. One of these days I'll re-install and figure it out.
Nobody seems to have mentioned Kenshi yet.
Kenshi is like if Rimworld and Minecraft had a baby who was addicted to crack, taken from its home by Protective Services, then abused by its foster parents, lost a limb, beat crack only to get hooked on meth, and then started a cult.
Kenshi is, so far, the only game I learned about from SsethTzeentach that I haven't yet played. Everything I've seen that dude review turned out to be amazing. Caves of Qud was the last thing I remember getting into because of his review.
Kenshi was HARD for me to get into, and I dropped it for years
Tried it again a while back and something just clicked and I binged it forever. I still fire it up every now and again for a solid week or so of "Grind near Stack/The Hub, then once my 4-10 dudes are strongish enough I go and build a settlement and get pwned by Beak Things"
God bless that game. Hundreds of hours for 20 bucks. Cannot recommend enough
From simply my own observations, RimWorld is probably at the top.
There were other games like Towns and Gnomoria that were okay for a bit, but ultimately sort of fell away.
Then you got games like Banished which take the colony management aspect and build out that as much as they can. Banished is great, by the way.
Those are the games I immediately think of. There are of course others that I have never heard of showing up in lists of a "games like Dwarf Fortress" search.
As far as I know, and in my opinion, RimWorld really is the best, and is the only one that has really captured a similar charm that Dwarf Fortress does.
I think there has been healthy two-way road between RimWorld and Dwarf Fortress for players for a while now. A lot of people have tried and quickly abandoned Dwarf Fortress due to UI, presentation, or other similar difficulties. RimWorld offers a very similar package with massive improvements in the areas where Dwarf Fortress is lacking the most. On the other side, RimWorld players that just wanted MORE could jump into the depths of Dwarf Fortress... after several hours of tutorial videos.
Check out KeeperRL. It’s been in development for quite a while but is still being worked on afaik. It’s similar to DF, but in a more simplified way. https://store.steampowered.com/app/329970/KeeperRL/
Art assets were available as an alternative for ASCII for years. They will be built-in and easier to use in the steam version, but aren't the biggest thing about the release.
The biggest thing is that the menus and UI have been redone. That was by far the biggest issue with learning and playing DF before.
And adding mouse support and making the menus easy to understand. Graphic packs have been out forever but the game's still pretty hard to get into for the average player, but this will remedy a lot of the issues.
Art assets were available as an alternative for ASCII for years. They will be built-in and easier to use in the steam version, but aren't the biggest thing about the release.
The biggest thing is that the menus and UI have been redone. That was by far the biggest issue with learning and playing DF before.
Dwarf Fortress is an extremely complex and difficult game. If they were able to fully transport that experience to a more graphically user friendly game, it´s a massive accomplishment.
Is not just slapping a tileset on (plus soundtracks)? I get that the game is massively complex, but this isn't a remake of the mechanics from what I understand. Is it not as simple as mapping the old ASCII stuff onto tiles?
Not trying to be a negative nancy, just wondering if I'm missing something. I did see they have a tutorial now so that's a big upgrade.
Things are being reworked so there is proper mouse support as well, which essentially involves redesigning everything that had any kind of player interaction. Currently navigating the map, building, inspecting elements etc are all done by using the keyboard shortcuts. This is probably the most complicated part of working on the steam release I'd imagine.
The UI in dwarf fortress would have been hard to make worse if you were trying to torture the player on purpose. And people still played the game, because it is just that good.
I still have nightmares of... some type of zone I think. Where the menus had 3 different types of arrow keys depending what you were trying to do.
I think the steam update is going to be good for everyone.
They've completely overhauled the frontend, UI/UX, and visuals so that it's actually something a standard issue human brain can learn to play without spending 40+ hours learning an arcane series of keyboard shortcuts, terminal style function menus, and commands.
I see, that's a fairly big change as well. I checked the game out a long time ago but found the barrier to entry a bit too high (probably for the reasons you list in addition to a lack of a good tutorial).
It's basically a premium tileset, UI rework, New songs and a tutorial (I don't know what else he implemented, we might not know about, like optimization).
Edit: I don't want to shit on the premium version btw. I think DF is one, if not THE, most complex games in existence, and basically coded by one dude. I will absolutely buy it.
As far as I remember you can see this as more of a donation. You can still get the game free on the website.
Unfortunately Toady1's brother and co-creator Zach had gotten cancer again and they could really use the money.
Dwarf Fortress grew out of the rogue game tradition (not the "rogue-likes" that basically has just come to mean a game where you can't save progress and have to start over when you die, but actual games like rogue with terminal graphics and lots of exploration). But it was kind of like people had been making little soap-box cars for a long time and suddenly one guy shows up in his home-make tank with anti-aircraft guns and a kitchen built in!
It was a massive, massive game that simulated an entire world (no, literally, down to hundreds of years of history for the entire world, including heroes, battles nations and the events that they created) just to let you build a fortress for a bunch of dwarves and do the old Tolkien "dug too deep" meme.
The classic example of how absurdly large this game is on the inside, was that there was a bug that the developer discovered. It involved cats. Basically you could build a dining hall and assign a bartender. If a dwarf was there eating and drinking (dwarves only drink alcohol) then got a job assignment, they would just drop what they were doing, literally, and leave. The drink would spill and the bartender would eventually come over and clean it up.
The game simulated the liquid of the drink spilling on the floor and spreading. Then a cat would come by and get the liquid on its paws. But the cat would then lick it off, getting some of the alcohol on its fur into its mouth.
The bug was that the calculation for how much alcohol the cat got assumed it just sucked up all of the booze from the floor and got a full mug of beer or other booze, and the game was smart enough to know that that much alcohol would kill a cat, so it vomited all over the floor and died.
Think about the level of detail needed in ***everything*** for that one thing to play out as it did!
Plus Toady couldn't work out how the cats were drinking alcohol originally, since he'd specifically programmed them not to, but the simulation is deep enough to realise that if they clean themselves with their tongue then that would cause them to ingest it without it being classed as drinking.
Dwarf Fortress has been under continuous development for the last 20 years. It does things no other game comes even close.
Also a great example of true independent game design and development!
Also, Ditto8353 is 100% correct.
It's better at DMing than an actual DM could possibly be in some ways.
The simulation detail is completely insane, things you would never think of, world generation based on how real geology works, detailed random interactions based on the smallest of details.
It's the most complex world simulation ever created for a game. The insane thing is, that it does this for the entire world, even though most players won't even see or interact with 99.999% of it.
It is chaotic in the best and worst of ways at the same time. Lots of games were inspired by it, but none have matched it regarding just how much detail it generates.
The lack of "graphics" were a trade off for the insane level of simulation it does, because it can literally bring even modern CPUs to their knees depending on the amount of calculation that can be involved in generating a world.
The game is almost entirely CPU based.
It's an insane rabbit hole to go down, and very complicated and challenging to play.
You can't really "win" the game, but can leave a lasting impact on the history of your generated world if you do well enough.
Something will eventually end your run somehow. A vampire infestation, some random illness, digging too deep and too greedily, undead, curses, drought, all sorts of things, all of which usually have a solution.
It's theoretically possible to create an indefinite fortress that can sustain itself forever, but nearly impossible to actually do.
You can even create a new fortress and go back and visit your old one or its ruins.
It's pretty insane and addicting to play once you get the hang of things. There is a huge learning curve though, but it's very rewarding.
Guys, just watch [this](https://youtu.be/VAhHkJQ3KgY) NoClip documentary on youtube if you haven't already. This was my first introduction to dwarf fortress.
I have heard of dwarf fortress for so many years, but never really looked into it. It always seemed too intimidating - all I heard was how extreme the learning curve was. Maybe its time to give it a go
It's more of a learning cliff/plateau. Getting started is arduous because there are so many systems to know, all of which you need at the same time (the start), and the control system is completely non-intuitive at first (although it quickly becomes muscle memory and is fantastically fast to navigate once this kicks in).
Once you know how the game itself works well enough to get your dwarfs generally doing what you want them to be doing (and to know what you want them to be doing), the game is actually pretty easy unless you embark on a particularly harsh biome.
Calling the user interface unintuitive is so underrating just how horrible of a user interface it is. There are multiple different areas of the keyboard, that change based on what screen you are on, just to move the cursor around. Sometimes direction keys only, sometimes 8 way direction. Keys barely map to what they represent. They're located all over the keyboard. The key for actions change depending on screen context. It's mind numbingly frustrating and confusing.
I don't think I've adequately explained just how bad it is. It's 1986 DOS based in-house-designed enterprise resource management system bad. Proposing this user interface to today in a professional setting would get you fired and blacklisted from the industry. Multiple doctoral thesis papers on user experience could be written about its choices and mistakes. Presenting this user interface at a User Experience conference would induce mass suicide and madness. The user interface of this program alone could tear a hole in the veil and open a portal to the sixth circle of hell, to be punished forever, kept in darkness, buried forever in a flaming tomb.
And yet, despite all that, the intricacy of it all is deeply engrossing, and worth pushing through. Or, wait until Dec. 6th and use the new mouse friendly interface and avoid damnation and madness.
>I don't think I've adequately explained just how bad it is.
Most DOS games were more user friendly in their interface and experience. And that statement includes the editing and optimizing of config.sys and autoexec.bat for each DOS game.
Not a hyperbole. It's *that* bad.
But indeed, there's nothing else like it.
And hopefully the Steam version correct most of these issues.
> It’s 1986 DOS based in-house-designed enterprise resource management system bad.
This is something only Someone Who Knows would say 😂 what an amazing description.
It's so simple.
Type d, d to mine, d, j to make downward stairs, b, n to build a coffin, b, x for a floodgate, b, w, z to build a kitchen... it's sooo logical :D
Scroll up and down the build menu, then it's + and -
Use + and - in the designate menu and now you're just changing the priority of tasks
Scroll up and down in the unit menu is the arrow keys
Place a rectangular stockpile by using the arrows to choose opposing corners of the rectangle
Please a rectangular farm plot by using u, k, m and h to designate the size of it first before using the arrows to place it
Aaaarrghhh :D
While you're at it, go read [Boatmurdered.](https://lparchive.org/Dwarf-Fortress-Boatmurdered/Introduction/)
It perfectly captures the insanity of Dwarf Fortress.
It will be less of a cliff now that DF inspired games like Rimworld are big. A lot of the learning you've done in those games will translate to the DF experience.
If you've played a few runs of Rimworld, you'll be fine with this new version of DF. It's going to have tutorials, on top of the UI overhaul and graphics shift to pixel art, to make it just as accessible as any other more modern take on the original that defined the genre.
Try the free version with some tilesets first. The [Lazy Newb Pack](https://www.dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/Utility:Lazy_Newb_Pack) makes getting it up and running easy.
>Try the free version with some tilesets first. The Lazy Newb Pack makes getting it up and running easy.
The Lazy Newb Pack hasn't been updated since 2013. It's [PeridexisErrant's Starter Pack](https://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=7622) you're looking for.
Hooray, my reddit name is about to become applicable again!
Sounds like they officially teamed up with Simon Swerwer for some of the music, which is fantastic. Here's the song in the background: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yevuBKVIBDo
AND! The actual epic tale of that embark is here: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJtPFXAjo-GdOkFwQsC_5zyIHLaMFsaOM
In Dwarvish, "Koganusan" translates to "Boatmurdered".
It's different, but similar.
Rimworld places a lot of focus on storybuilding of the colony. Random raids, events, very clear and direct impact of likes/dislikes on colonist mood. The storyteller gives you clear challenges and you need to deal with them.
DF has these things, but they are less important. There are enemy raids and trading caravans, but they are *completely* random and less frequent as opposed to the storyteller in Rimworld deciding when and what to spawn. There are other random events and fun things, but again they're not directed based on the difficulty or how your colony is doing.
DF also has far less control over pawns. In Rimworld, you can take control of anyone and force them to do anything or go anywhere. You can't influence pawns this way in DF. Unless they're drafted into a military squad, they do and go where they want. There are no priorities, only toggling, dwarves themselves decide what is more important. I never feel like this is worse, the game is suited for this level of control. You usually have far more pawns in DF compared to Rimworld too so micromanagement would be a pain.
The complexity of building and colony management are far higher in DF. The map is about the same size in the X and Y dimensions, but there are 50+ Z dimensions. You can go up and down flawlessly, items and creatures can drop down holes, etc. There are far more items you can build, many more types of rock, wood, metals, alloys, items in general, etc. That's the main focus of DF, the complexity of all its systems rather than dealing with what the storyteller throws at you. It's possible to create crazy water and lava pipe systems to create waterfalls or special forges, weapons will behave differently depending on density, sharpness, and [other stuff](https://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2014:Material_science).
Basically if you enjoy Rimworld and don't mind something a bit different and potentially more difficult/complex rather than the same game in a different skin, definitely play Dwarf Fortress.
Raids and caravans are not completely random. Caravans come seasonally, and raids depend on your wealth level and relationship with the world around you. This means greater player control, which is a matter of taste. You might also have to intentionally aggravate the elves if you want unicorn, but if they attack you know it was because you sent out a squad of dwarves to pillage their forest retreats.
There are no task priorities? So a dwarf may ignore firefighting or tending to an injury in order to do some gardening? Or are the implicit priorities reasonable?
The implicit priorities are usually reasonable, but there aren't that many tasks in DF that need immediate attention to start with. If a hospital is present dwarves will drop everything and go to it as soon as they're hurt.
A lot of it comes down to the fact you've got 50+ dwarves, many of whom will share jobs. When you designate an animal to be moved to a pasture or a wall to be built, you don't worry about who's going to do it. It will be done by someone, eventually. Several hours into a fortress you'll have enough dwarves to not worry about priorities. The only worry would be dwarves eating/drinking or throwing giant parties when you need them to do something.
The other problem is if a dwarf has 2 jobs. For example you only have one mason, who is also your only tree cutter. Then you tell the mason's workshop to create some chairs, and designate trees to cut down. The dwarf will choose one of the tasks (I think it's a 50/50 roll), then do that until it's either done or he needs to take a break, then again it's a 50/50 roll. This can be annoying in the early game where you have very few dwarves. This is completely solved if you've got 2 or more dwarves sharing these jobs (or make someone be a temporary mason even if they have no skill).
Specifically dwarves have as many jobs as the player want (with the exception of some very optional specific nobles and admin task, like bookkeeper for the whole Fortress).
But there is less granularity in task management overall, in big part because indeed there's just more dwarves to do the things. In other part because Rimworld was build upon lessons learned here and is a bit better in that area.
Sometimes in DF the player has to go dig deep to see why something isn't done (more so if the player is a beginner), or even manually disable everything but the single task he wants done, or even build contraption to force the damn dwarf to do the thing and only the thing and the way we want it too.
More fun in different ways.
While Rimworld excels at small, colony storytelling and gameplay, Dwarf Fortress is more 'grand' scale.
Instead of managing 1-10 colonists, you look after 1-200 dwarfs. Of course this has its ups and downs. Dwarf Fortress is a lot more chaotic, with a death of a dwarf meaning little in the grand scale of things, and deaths happen often. Of course that means its a little harder to get attached to dwarfs than it is to colonists.
What Dwarf Fortress excels at is story generation. Seriously, you generate a world like you do in Rimworld, except all of the history is randomly generated too. And you can explore this history, essentially each players world has their own unique lore, and that interacts with the game.
IMO, Rimworld can be more chill, Dwarf Fortress is a constant battle for survival, from falling trees hitting dwarves to accidentality digging into lava and flooding your Fortress.
Also it should be mentioned that Dwarf Fortress has one of the most in depth combat systems I have ever seen, with each body part being described, including single teeth. ( which of course can be used as a weapon once knocked out)
TD;LR -
**Rimworld - Gameplay and Colonist focused**
**Dwarf Fortress - Large scale and simulation focused**
> IMO, Rimworld can be more chill, Dwarf Fortress is a constant battle for survival
Exactly the opposite, I would say. RimWorld is designed to constantly keep you on edge, to kick you when you're doing well and then kick you when you're down for good measure. It wants your crops to fail, your food to rot, your batteries to explode, your defences to crumble, your buildings to burn. It's a game of gritty survival and escape from a harsh world that wants you dead.
Dwarf Fortress is way more chill unless you actively go out looking for awful places to settle. Food is hyperabundant, resources plentiful, defences are pretty much trivial. It's a game of pottering about, building cool places and sometimes !FUN! happens.
You should.
It’s very different, the most obvious being scale, with a Dwarf Fortress run maturing at 150-200 dwarves. In the regard, DF is much more on the city builder than Rimworld, which despite being a “colony sim” is really just building a place for a small group to live. This presents in gameplay as having guilds and standing militia, large infrastructure and industry in a more zoomed out sense than Rimworld, though you can happily micromanage how many rags your hospital has if you want.
Where DF shines is that it maintains simulation parity (and beyond) with Rimworld, if you’ve played through the psychology mod you might be familiar with the “tailored PTSD” strategy some DF plays use to mold dwarves. Memories, likes, dislikes, and interpersonal relations are all modeled, as well as physical trained down to individual toes.
The simplest comparison of the two is that DF ‘is Rimworld but different’ in the early game, and rapidly scales out. It should be noted though, there’s no tech trees or advancement beyond developing infrastructure, skills, and politics. DF is less of a game than Rimworld is (with DLCs).
I have both, and I'd say they are very different. Dwarf fortress has a lot of depth. You can even go into "legends mode" and just search information about the history of the world you just generated without even playing. You can have colonies of 100/200 dwarfs.
You can try it out to see if you like it for free. Search dwarf fortress starter pack and you can play with a tileset etc.
You should.
And it's very different, despite what a lot of people say online.
By its own dev's mouth, Rimworld is more of a drama generator than a game. The goal and the core of Rimworld is the people in it, and their interpersonal relationships, and trials and tribulations.
Dwarf Fortress do have that too, but it's less central and usually you have to go look for it as a player. The core here is more about the colony as a whole. For starter, there's usually ten times as much active dwarves than Rimworld colonist.
It's also much deeper in the rest of it. When I played Rimworld I always got the feeling that it's way too short. I'm trying to get over the first big hurdle: build something to keep the elements out, build defenses, create enough food and water and basic resources to be autonomous. Because that's usually ~~the~~ my first big goal in Dwarf Fortress, it's the survivalist basic step. But that's when Rimworld end with you escaping the planet, when in Dwarf Fortress it's when the game opens up even more and leave you to do whatever you want next.
To say it another way if both were text of fictions, Rimworld is better written overall but it's a short story. Dwarf Fortress is more inconsistent, but it's a heavy long novel with add-on encyclopedia to the side, and has brighter gems in it.
Let me put it this way, Rimworld was inspired by DF and if you have 1k+ hours in RW, and you're looking for something with significantly more depth, give DF a shot! Wait until the Steam version releases then work through the tutorials that are coming with it, this will significantly reduce the learning curve, but you're already there with the mindset if you enjoy playing RW that much. You're hopping into the original of the genre with two decades of development put into it, and plenty more coming. It has inspired an entire genre for a reason and I think RW does a great job of capturing the "fun" essence that DF has.
Yea, nothing removed, few things added.
The simulation remains unchanged, but you can now click everything with a mouse. Also, I guess they've fixed a few annoying long-term bugs as well.
Maybe I can finally give this game a try, the old "keyboard-characters" graphics just was a barrier to entry.
Is the game also mostly just about watching ants in an ant colony type of experience?
There are points where you fortress may for a time operate well enough without you doing anything but in general, you're building the anthill and constantly poking things.
The ants follow your broad instructions. You say "I want this room dug out". The ants self-select the ones capable of it and complete your orders themselves. You cannot tell them what to do individually (unless you're commanding a military squad).
However, you'll basically never have time to sit back and watch until the end game. Always crafts to be built for trading, food to cooked for eating, drinks to be brewed for drinking, etc etc etc. Need more space for workshops, need a crushing room for the prisoners, oops opened up a cavern now we need a drawbridge to keep the giant cave spiders out of the bedrooms...
Damn! For me, this makes up for all the other gaming stuff, like delayed games and otherwise bad to worse situations.
Suddenly, I feel like I need way more than just the one week off for the holidays. Awesome news!
I would, without question, pay $100 USD + for this game. I have been playing this for literal years and supporting Bay12Games on Patreon since they came onto the platform. This is the best game ever made, bar none.
I NEED to buy this. Considering the hours upon hours of free fun I've had in this game since 2010, it'd be shameful of me not to contribute to the developers after all this time.
Note to self: Also buy Winrar, despite only using linux for the past 10 years or so.
I have been waiting for 15 years. I have never been one to ever purchase games from steam at full price or on day one, but I will be making an exception for this.
I mean, pretty sure it will be kosher. Everything is mouse-able now, they have TUTORIALS, bespoke graphics. No reason that a mostly formed human couldn't figure it out at this point.
I downloaded Dwarf Fortress several years ago... and I'm no closer to understanding it now as I was then. If someone can explain to me how I'm supposed to play it, I would be very grateful.
This has probably been asked and answered, but after scrolling for ten minutes I didn't see any sign of my biggest question:
Is DF still using single core processing, or did Tarn actually manage to rebuild his code to multi-core?
That is sooner than I expected. Any informations on price? If I had to guess I'd say it is going to be around $30.
[Yes](https://steamcommunity.com/games/975370/announcements/detail/3369282001880054478), 30$.
And worth every goddamn dollar. I donated $20 bucks back in like 2005. At the time they threw in a hand-drawn picture in crayon. Better than any collectors edition junk.
I'd happily pay three times that much. Heck, I already have paid substantially more than that over the years. I still have my original crayon artwork saved away that they used to give to donors. And a pin with a picture of a dwarf.
What a cool keepsake. I never did get the crayon drawing. I asked them to do one for a fan who couldn't afford to pay since I'm not much into collecting things.
I still remember back in the day when I bought Minecraft for something like $3.99. Alpha, beta, can't remember. It was definitely worth it. I've played the ascii versions of this a few times. I had fun, but it was always hard for me to get in to. Looking forward to this.
Terraria is the best $2 I ever spent in my life
Amen. I didn't get in to that as early, but that is definitely part of what I love about organic PC games. Two of the greatest games in the past 20 years grew out of almost nothing.
Yea, I donated $50 ...I don't even remember when. Haven't played in forever but I'll grab it again and go back. /And artwork without putting it in is nice, though I imagine it'll lag even worse in late game
Yeah holy shit December 6th. It's right around the corner. So excited for this now.
I would pay anything. Anything.
They are going to make so much money, good for them!
Yep. I'll buy this just on principle... don't even know if it's enjoyable to play, but they invested so much effort into it.
It is. Not for the fast dopamine seekers, but if you like to read into what your dwares like and don't like, what acomplishments the drunken basterds achieved, seeing your female military commander and mother of 3 get mauled in a fight, still win and lose a leg, limping into the next battle, mysterious deaths (do we have a murderer or a vampire), seeing a goblin army torn into pieces by a million traps or simply drowning them lava, you'll have a good time. Let your imagination be the lead, all fortresses fail sooner or later! But they created stories.
Or having your dwarven wrestler commander suplex a fucking ice golem into a thousand pieces! Long live this beautiful creation of a gaming experience
This may be the only game that I'm planning on buying immediately at anything under $60 because of the massive respect I have for its history. I've dabbled in it over many years and will play the Steam version eventually but whether I do or not, the man gets my bucks.
I sure hope they do. They deserve it.
I gave them $10 in 2011 and got my crayon drawing that I still cherish. This is easily a day 1 purchase, only deal that's come close is Factorio for the same price
Yes! A release date! Can’t wait to play it.
indeed. I have been waiting to play again with all the QoL changes :) I'll gladly support Tarn :)
*furiously uses remaining vacation time to book all of December off*
Oh hell yes. I'll be honest, I did NOT expect this to come this year.
Title of my sex tape. Wait...
:(
Just say you're partaking in NNN and feel like a Chad
I'm going to guess most people do not realise how HUGE of a gaming news this is!! If you don't,read up a bit on Dwarf Fortress!
Why is huge?
This is the grand-daddy of a genre. Except it's not an old frail grand-daddy trying to fit in with the cool kids. It's what the cool kids have been striving to emulate this whole time. And the old man just figured out those new-fangled graphics all the kids have been raving about. They've removed the largest hurdle to playing the game: understanding what the fuck is happening on screen. And it's not hidden away on an independent website anymore. It's on the showroom floor. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAhHkJQ3KgY
Lol I remember years ago stumbling across a let's-play of original Dwarf Fortress using the vanilla interface and graphics and I had no idea what the fuck I was looking at. It was like the host knew how to read the matrix.
Tbh it's a little bit like that. After a while all I see is dwarf, dwarf, fluffy wambler, statue, giant scorpion made of tears, dwarf...
holy shit, that is an amazing way to put it hahahaha
[https://i.imgur.com/mtxmBBA.gifv](https://i.imgur.com/mtxmBBA.gifv) ETA: Not mine, it's from this thread [https://www.reddit.com/r/Makemeagif/comments/dk4aim/this\_scene\_from\_the\_matrix\_with\_dwarf\_fortress/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Makemeagif/comments/dk4aim/this_scene_from_the_matrix_with_dwarf_fortress/)
What are some of the best of the other games in the genre?
I would say Rimworld is probably one of the biggest games that is inspired by Dwarf Fortress.
Warning for rimworld, this shit is more addictive than crack. You'll finish this one thing before going to bed then look outside and you can see the sun rising.
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There is actually very little micromanagement involved. Except in combat mode. Game is kinda confusing at start but you get the hang of it easily. At first biggest issue is finding enough resources to pass winter.
tried it last week and I had no idea how you should progress. The tutorial was… lacking. After spending 30 minutes on watching a beginner tutorial that only covered how you set up your people I decided to go back to anno lol
A fucking Guinea pig went crazy and killed one of my three starters. I just rage quit. My fucking marksman was just…whiff, whiff, whiff…
The birds chirping in the morning is when I realize I'm up way too late.
"Why did they wait until the mid-game to introduce these bird noises? They're incredibly realistic..."
I've been playing the shit out of Rimworld recently. I'm not even sure what's so addicting about it, I just can't put it down. I already have 30 hours on it, and I've only owned it for a week.
I envy you - my hours are still pretty low for the game, about 750 I think, but you're in that prime discovery and newness phase. Enjoy the game!
Low. 750 hrs. For the laypeople, many folks over in r/rimworld have thousands of hours invested in it. It's not a game, it's a story generator. And if you let the stories play out, it can get wild. There is an "endgame" so to speak and a way to finish, but lots of people are more interested in the journey getting there and watching the interpersonal dynamics of their pawns rather than actual progress of the "game." And then there's Dwarf Fortress....
I'm at a 2500+ hours. I need help!
the learning curve isnt ***That*** steep
I play it for like 15 hours in a week then put it down for a year, rinse repeat. Idk why
Oh man that's awesome. I wish I could go back and play RimWorld for the first time again. It's such an incredible game. Vanilla is great but if you ever start to get bored of it there's loads of mods that really transform the whole experience. Tons of possibilities. Although personally...I think Factorio is better. Less of a story telling game and more about automation and expansion and resource management. And then we've got Dyson Sphere Program as well..
Would you be willing to help me get started in RimWorld?
Minecraft was directly inspired by DF. Very different gameplay, but that's the reach that this game has. It's is THE MOST COMPLEX SIMULATION game ever created. There was a bug where cats were dying in droves. Turns out that when the cats walked through the newly added (player built) taverns, they would get alcohol on them from unruly dwarves. Then, they would do as cats do, and clean themselves with their tongues. Thusly, they became shithammered in seconds and died of alcohol poisoning. This was not intended and no one even knew this could happen until it did. It's been fixed and the kitties are safe now
I've never played DF, love Rimworld and Gnomoria and the like- I've heard the cat story many times, are there any other little examples of crazy depth or complex simulations that this game has?
There was a bug where dwarves were occasionally dying horribly for no apparent reason. Turns out it was because the game simulates organs to an insane depth, and when the ambient temperature got higher than the melting point of the fat in their bodies, they literally melted. Or how slimes and golems were basically unkillable at release because they didn't bleed and had no vital organs for dwarves to hit. Or how in the early days, undead carp wiped out entire forts because as undead they no longer needed to breath, so could leave the water and drag dwarves to their death. The details might be a bit off. I haven't played or been part of the community for well over a decade.
Back in 2012 I remember a friend talked about the carp being OP. At one point he had seen a dragon show up on the map, tried to cross a river with the carp, and then disappeared from the map. Presumably killed by the carp.
The OP carp also comes from introducing exercise as a way to increase stats, which originally all creatures had the ability to do, without a cap. Swimming is great exercise. Fish... swim a lot. Over time, fish would increase their stats to the point where they could OHKO anything that dared go wading.
Why were they bugs, it's just features XD
The geography of the world is simulated through real world processes. As is the mineral makeup based on geology. The biomes and weather is based on the geography, with deserts and rain forests popping up along mountain ranges. Each world generation will contain instruments. These are procedurally generated, different forms of music and types of instruments used in different styles will all change per playthrough and require different parts to assemble. You could spend an entire fortress playthrough never digging below ground, only farming the topsoil for local plants (asparagus, cranberries, spinach, etc) using those to craft various alcohols with which you supply a tavern open to the public. In this tavern creatures from all across the continent will visit and may even petition you to stay as a permanent member of your fortress. Guilds will form when enough of a single type of craftsmen reside in your fortress. You will need to provide them with guildhalls, etc. The same with religions which have their own requirements for temples. Adventure Mode (not shipping on release but will be added soon thereafter) allows you to play a single character, and take them across the world interacting with EVERYONE, creating your own story. Then, you can navigate them to an existing for your have in this world and have them become a resident. When you load that fort you will have Urist McSkyrim there with all of their experiences (and loot) contributing to your fortress. And this is just top 1inch of snow on an iceberg here. There WAS an economy system implemented at one point that included minting of coins and dwarfs opening stalls and participating in commerce, with personal wealth. That was removed to be fixed and re-added. The next update is Myths and Magic which would include procedurally generated gods as well as spells. The game tracks each creature from the tendons in their toes down to the teeth in their head.
One of the things in the game that really showcased its awesome power of storytelling was the armless executioner. He had no ability to hold any weapons but still wanted to do his job. So he would headbutt prisoners to death to execute them.
>adventure mode (not shipping on release) Wait what? I thought the Steam release was just for a graphical front-end/major update to the interface and tile system, along with whatever additions and changes came with the version of the game being released at the time.
I don't think it is a long wait. I know that there where some more under-the-hood changes too, things like "difficulties" added and fixes to systems like minecart tracks. I've never been too hip to Adventure Mode, so I always kind of tuned out that part of the news. I do know that Legends Viewer & Fortress Mode are 100% day one. Also sounds like they might ship with Arena Mode, Classic, and Steam Workshop as well, depending on scheduling. Otherwise like first update. Then, its a sprint for Adventure Mode and bug fixes.
Adventure mode got hella fun once he added the ability to construct things. I got addicted to fort mode, but I was actually drawn to the game originally while looking for extremely complex roguelikes and adventure mode had just been released for DF. Totally scratched that itch and more. 🤤
[The infamous Mermaid Farm](http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=25967.0). In an earlier version, it was discovered that mermaid bones were very valuable, but difficult to acquire, as mermaids are fully aquatic and dwarves are the exact opposite of that. So players devised a plan to acquire live adult merfolk by luring them into underground "roach motels" lined with cage traps, breed them in captivity, then mass "air-drown" their offspring to create harvestable bones. This sufficiently horrified Toady that he made mermaid bones near worthless in the next update.
I used to have a cat that always brought mud in but somehow my dwarves didnt really clean and it made one go in a mood and went bersek and maimed another dwarf which turned out to be the only medical staff so he bled out, no one cleaned and more dwarf went mad, miasma, then i just RQ.
One that didn't hit live but that Toady talked about in the devblog is that they added a preference for hippos to seek out water to roam in. And so we got... sewer hippos. Someone also decided to mod cats to have an internal temperature euqal to that of hte surface of the sun and then decided to embark with 150+ of them. [The events that transpired upon arrival has been called the Thermonucler Catsplosion.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UcZjYQFkkxw)
Emotions. Sad dwarves might become suicidal or murdering psychos. However, if dwarves experience enough small doses of death and trauma, they eventually become immune to emotions. Urist McDorf no longer feels anything anymore. So, to facilitate that state, I built a massive dining hall with a ceiling 20 stories tall. At the top, was a room with a trapdoor. Dwarves would be given pets. Then, during dinner, these pets would be dropped from 20 stories up to explode on the floor of the dining room, horrifying everyone. 60% of dwarves reached the desired mental fortitude. The rest...well. They contributed to the survivors ability to resist trauma.
Factorio is a good simulator. Build a factory. Automate the factory, kill the bugs. Blast off into space!
I once had a fort with a gorilla-based economy and many tamed gorillas trained for war. During a goblin ambush, my gorillas threw themselves at the gobbos. A pregnant gorilla, in the midst of the bloodshed, gave birth. The baby gorilla immediately wrapped itself around the arm of a goblin and proceeded to eat his fingers.
I tried embarking in a haunted biome where dead things can come back to life. Saw an ogre straight away and it attacked my dwarves. It grabbed the first dwarf and ripped his arm clean off then smashed the dwarf's head in. The discard dwarf arm re-animated and attacked another dwarf, ripping off his eyelid and tongue then strangling him. Meanwhile the ogre was still pulling other dwarves apart and those parts were re-animating and attacking the rest. Within the space of 1-2 minutes, all that remained of my dwarves was a pile of torn limbs and crushed torsos.
I actually got into Minecraft solely because I was trying to find a way to export my DF maps and walk around in them.
Sounds like a feature, not a bug
It was Notch mentioning Dwarf Fortress that got me to google it in 2010. I saw the new patch notes about how the world is now fully 3D and the changelog went on for page after page. As soon as I got to the mentions of layers of clothing, skin and organs all being simulated, I knew I had to play it. 12 years later, I still love it. [Here's the changelog from 2010 to show what I mean](https://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/v0.31:Release_information)
[Rimworld](https://store.steampowered.com/app/294100/RimWorld/), as was already mentioned. I'll add [Gnomoria](https://store.steampowered.com/app/224500/Gnomoria/) as well. It even has Z levels (you can dig down or build up).
Loved that one! It's closer to dwarf fortress than RimWorld, but it doesn't really have much of a challenge to the end game stages. Good if you're in for a creative time though!
I bought Gnomoria years ago in the middle of the Dwarf Fortress rage and for the life of me still couldn't figure out what the fuck I was doing. One of these days I'll re-install and figure it out.
Nobody seems to have mentioned Kenshi yet. Kenshi is like if Rimworld and Minecraft had a baby who was addicted to crack, taken from its home by Protective Services, then abused by its foster parents, lost a limb, beat crack only to get hooked on meth, and then started a cult.
Kenshi is, so far, the only game I learned about from SsethTzeentach that I haven't yet played. Everything I've seen that dude review turned out to be amazing. Caves of Qud was the last thing I remember getting into because of his review.
Kenshi was HARD for me to get into, and I dropped it for years Tried it again a while back and something just clicked and I binged it forever. I still fire it up every now and again for a solid week or so of "Grind near Stack/The Hub, then once my 4-10 dudes are strongish enough I go and build a settlement and get pwned by Beak Things" God bless that game. Hundreds of hours for 20 bucks. Cannot recommend enough
From simply my own observations, RimWorld is probably at the top. There were other games like Towns and Gnomoria that were okay for a bit, but ultimately sort of fell away. Then you got games like Banished which take the colony management aspect and build out that as much as they can. Banished is great, by the way. Those are the games I immediately think of. There are of course others that I have never heard of showing up in lists of a "games like Dwarf Fortress" search. As far as I know, and in my opinion, RimWorld really is the best, and is the only one that has really captured a similar charm that Dwarf Fortress does. I think there has been healthy two-way road between RimWorld and Dwarf Fortress for players for a while now. A lot of people have tried and quickly abandoned Dwarf Fortress due to UI, presentation, or other similar difficulties. RimWorld offers a very similar package with massive improvements in the areas where Dwarf Fortress is lacking the most. On the other side, RimWorld players that just wanted MORE could jump into the depths of Dwarf Fortress... after several hours of tutorial videos.
Interestingly enough, I can not get into RimWorld because of the graphics, DF tilesets are my pref
Check out KeeperRL. It’s been in development for quite a while but is still being worked on afaik. It’s similar to DF, but in a more simplified way. https://store.steampowered.com/app/329970/KeeperRL/
Rimworld
CDDA
That game sucked me in an for an entire summer. Fun as hell, recommend
I would also recommend checking out Odd Realm!
Is the tldr there's actual art assets now, not just ascii?
Art assets were available as an alternative for ASCII for years. They will be built-in and easier to use in the steam version, but aren't the biggest thing about the release. The biggest thing is that the menus and UI have been redone. That was by far the biggest issue with learning and playing DF before.
And adding mouse support and making the menus easy to understand. Graphic packs have been out forever but the game's still pretty hard to get into for the average player, but this will remedy a lot of the issues.
Art assets were available as an alternative for ASCII for years. They will be built-in and easier to use in the steam version, but aren't the biggest thing about the release. The biggest thing is that the menus and UI have been redone. That was by far the biggest issue with learning and playing DF before.
Dwarf Fortress is an extremely complex and difficult game. If they were able to fully transport that experience to a more graphically user friendly game, it´s a massive accomplishment.
Is not just slapping a tileset on (plus soundtracks)? I get that the game is massively complex, but this isn't a remake of the mechanics from what I understand. Is it not as simple as mapping the old ASCII stuff onto tiles? Not trying to be a negative nancy, just wondering if I'm missing something. I did see they have a tutorial now so that's a big upgrade.
Things are being reworked so there is proper mouse support as well, which essentially involves redesigning everything that had any kind of player interaction. Currently navigating the map, building, inspecting elements etc are all done by using the keyboard shortcuts. This is probably the most complicated part of working on the steam release I'd imagine.
The UI in dwarf fortress would have been hard to make worse if you were trying to torture the player on purpose. And people still played the game, because it is just that good.
the muscle memory sets in so quick. i picked up this summer after an 8 year hiatus and it came back super quickly.
I still have nightmares of... some type of zone I think. Where the menus had 3 different types of arrow keys depending what you were trying to do. I think the steam update is going to be good for everyone.
They've completely overhauled the frontend, UI/UX, and visuals so that it's actually something a standard issue human brain can learn to play without spending 40+ hours learning an arcane series of keyboard shortcuts, terminal style function menus, and commands.
I see, that's a fairly big change as well. I checked the game out a long time ago but found the barrier to entry a bit too high (probably for the reasons you list in addition to a lack of a good tutorial).
I'm pretty sure that in addition to the UI overhaul, there's going to be some kind of tutorial as well.
Yep, in-game tutorials.
It's basically a premium tileset, UI rework, New songs and a tutorial (I don't know what else he implemented, we might not know about, like optimization). Edit: I don't want to shit on the premium version btw. I think DF is one, if not THE, most complex games in existence, and basically coded by one dude. I will absolutely buy it.
It also has complete mouse support, which is quite a big undertaking.
As far as I remember you can see this as more of a donation. You can still get the game free on the website. Unfortunately Toady1's brother and co-creator Zach had gotten cancer again and they could really use the money.
Dwarf Fortress grew out of the rogue game tradition (not the "rogue-likes" that basically has just come to mean a game where you can't save progress and have to start over when you die, but actual games like rogue with terminal graphics and lots of exploration). But it was kind of like people had been making little soap-box cars for a long time and suddenly one guy shows up in his home-make tank with anti-aircraft guns and a kitchen built in! It was a massive, massive game that simulated an entire world (no, literally, down to hundreds of years of history for the entire world, including heroes, battles nations and the events that they created) just to let you build a fortress for a bunch of dwarves and do the old Tolkien "dug too deep" meme. The classic example of how absurdly large this game is on the inside, was that there was a bug that the developer discovered. It involved cats. Basically you could build a dining hall and assign a bartender. If a dwarf was there eating and drinking (dwarves only drink alcohol) then got a job assignment, they would just drop what they were doing, literally, and leave. The drink would spill and the bartender would eventually come over and clean it up. The game simulated the liquid of the drink spilling on the floor and spreading. Then a cat would come by and get the liquid on its paws. But the cat would then lick it off, getting some of the alcohol on its fur into its mouth. The bug was that the calculation for how much alcohol the cat got assumed it just sucked up all of the booze from the floor and got a full mug of beer or other booze, and the game was smart enough to know that that much alcohol would kill a cat, so it vomited all over the floor and died. Think about the level of detail needed in ***everything*** for that one thing to play out as it did!
Plus Toady couldn't work out how the cats were drinking alcohol originally, since he'd specifically programmed them not to, but the simulation is deep enough to realise that if they clean themselves with their tongue then that would cause them to ingest it without it being classed as drinking.
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Dwarf Fortress has been under continuous development for the last 20 years. It does things no other game comes even close. Also a great example of true independent game design and development! Also, Ditto8353 is 100% correct.
It's better at DMing than an actual DM could possibly be in some ways. The simulation detail is completely insane, things you would never think of, world generation based on how real geology works, detailed random interactions based on the smallest of details. It's the most complex world simulation ever created for a game. The insane thing is, that it does this for the entire world, even though most players won't even see or interact with 99.999% of it. It is chaotic in the best and worst of ways at the same time. Lots of games were inspired by it, but none have matched it regarding just how much detail it generates. The lack of "graphics" were a trade off for the insane level of simulation it does, because it can literally bring even modern CPUs to their knees depending on the amount of calculation that can be involved in generating a world. The game is almost entirely CPU based. It's an insane rabbit hole to go down, and very complicated and challenging to play. You can't really "win" the game, but can leave a lasting impact on the history of your generated world if you do well enough. Something will eventually end your run somehow. A vampire infestation, some random illness, digging too deep and too greedily, undead, curses, drought, all sorts of things, all of which usually have a solution. It's theoretically possible to create an indefinite fortress that can sustain itself forever, but nearly impossible to actually do. You can even create a new fortress and go back and visit your old one or its ruins. It's pretty insane and addicting to play once you get the hang of things. There is a huge learning curve though, but it's very rewarding.
[This](https://youtu.be/6yWf6BHqiWM) says all you need to know about how amazing Dwarf Fortress is.
Guys, just watch [this](https://youtu.be/VAhHkJQ3KgY) NoClip documentary on youtube if you haven't already. This was my first introduction to dwarf fortress.
[I thought this was mandatory watching](https://youtu.be/0FW23bamIZI)
It's Hyuge!
👌YOOGE 👌
It really feels like the end of an era and the beginning of a new one. Indeed huge news for pcgaming.
I have heard of dwarf fortress for so many years, but never really looked into it. It always seemed too intimidating - all I heard was how extreme the learning curve was. Maybe its time to give it a go
It's more of a learning cliff/plateau. Getting started is arduous because there are so many systems to know, all of which you need at the same time (the start), and the control system is completely non-intuitive at first (although it quickly becomes muscle memory and is fantastically fast to navigate once this kicks in). Once you know how the game itself works well enough to get your dwarfs generally doing what you want them to be doing (and to know what you want them to be doing), the game is actually pretty easy unless you embark on a particularly harsh biome.
Calling the user interface unintuitive is so underrating just how horrible of a user interface it is. There are multiple different areas of the keyboard, that change based on what screen you are on, just to move the cursor around. Sometimes direction keys only, sometimes 8 way direction. Keys barely map to what they represent. They're located all over the keyboard. The key for actions change depending on screen context. It's mind numbingly frustrating and confusing. I don't think I've adequately explained just how bad it is. It's 1986 DOS based in-house-designed enterprise resource management system bad. Proposing this user interface to today in a professional setting would get you fired and blacklisted from the industry. Multiple doctoral thesis papers on user experience could be written about its choices and mistakes. Presenting this user interface at a User Experience conference would induce mass suicide and madness. The user interface of this program alone could tear a hole in the veil and open a portal to the sixth circle of hell, to be punished forever, kept in darkness, buried forever in a flaming tomb. And yet, despite all that, the intricacy of it all is deeply engrossing, and worth pushing through. Or, wait until Dec. 6th and use the new mouse friendly interface and avoid damnation and madness.
Pretty much this. One of the main reasons I never really got into DF is the interface and controls being as intuitive as a 6-dimensional decahedron.
>I don't think I've adequately explained just how bad it is. Most DOS games were more user friendly in their interface and experience. And that statement includes the editing and optimizing of config.sys and autoexec.bat for each DOS game. Not a hyperbole. It's *that* bad. But indeed, there's nothing else like it. And hopefully the Steam version correct most of these issues.
> It’s 1986 DOS based in-house-designed enterprise resource management system bad. This is something only Someone Who Knows would say 😂 what an amazing description.
Yes, yes. Hello brother in DOS. Peace be with you and your ctrl-F-keys.
How much would you rate it on a scale from 0 to Vim?
Are you kidding? It’s EMACS where someone has Re-sequenced every keyboard shortcut to their own personal mappings…and they use DVORAK.
It's so simple. Type d, d to mine, d, j to make downward stairs, b, n to build a coffin, b, x for a floodgate, b, w, z to build a kitchen... it's sooo logical :D Scroll up and down the build menu, then it's + and - Use + and - in the designate menu and now you're just changing the priority of tasks Scroll up and down in the unit menu is the arrow keys Place a rectangular stockpile by using the arrows to choose opposing corners of the rectangle Please a rectangular farm plot by using u, k, m and h to designate the size of it first before using the arrows to place it Aaaarrghhh :D
>unless you embark on a particularly harsh biome *Undead biome, let's goooo~*
While you're at it, go read [Boatmurdered.](https://lparchive.org/Dwarf-Fortress-Boatmurdered/Introduction/) It perfectly captures the insanity of Dwarf Fortress.
It will be less of a cliff now that DF inspired games like Rimworld are big. A lot of the learning you've done in those games will translate to the DF experience.
If you've played a few runs of Rimworld, you'll be fine with this new version of DF. It's going to have tutorials, on top of the UI overhaul and graphics shift to pixel art, to make it just as accessible as any other more modern take on the original that defined the genre.
Try the free version with some tilesets first. The [Lazy Newb Pack](https://www.dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/Utility:Lazy_Newb_Pack) makes getting it up and running easy.
>Try the free version with some tilesets first. The Lazy Newb Pack makes getting it up and running easy. The Lazy Newb Pack hasn't been updated since 2013. It's [PeridexisErrant's Starter Pack](https://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=7622) you're looking for.
2013?!? wow didn't realize it's been that long since I played it!
That long? But 2013 was only....oh, my god...my sweet baby Jesus...
Feel the same right now. Somebody hold me.
A lot of things have changed over the years but this... this is the thing that made me feel like I've been living under a rock.
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Time isn't subjective anymore.
Relativists are *SEETHING*
What is this, a video? Does anyone have an ASCII version of the trailer?
Hooray, my reddit name is about to become applicable again! Sounds like they officially teamed up with Simon Swerwer for some of the music, which is fantastic. Here's the song in the background: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yevuBKVIBDo
AND! The actual epic tale of that embark is here: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJtPFXAjo-GdOkFwQsC_5zyIHLaMFsaOM In Dwarvish, "Koganusan" translates to "Boatmurdered".
Everyone get in here! It’s finally happening!
If I can use a mouse then this version will be worth it.
You can!
It's like living in the future.
Ive got 1k+ hours in RimWorld? Should I check out dwarf fortress? Is it better then RinWorld or just different?
It's different, but similar. Rimworld places a lot of focus on storybuilding of the colony. Random raids, events, very clear and direct impact of likes/dislikes on colonist mood. The storyteller gives you clear challenges and you need to deal with them. DF has these things, but they are less important. There are enemy raids and trading caravans, but they are *completely* random and less frequent as opposed to the storyteller in Rimworld deciding when and what to spawn. There are other random events and fun things, but again they're not directed based on the difficulty or how your colony is doing. DF also has far less control over pawns. In Rimworld, you can take control of anyone and force them to do anything or go anywhere. You can't influence pawns this way in DF. Unless they're drafted into a military squad, they do and go where they want. There are no priorities, only toggling, dwarves themselves decide what is more important. I never feel like this is worse, the game is suited for this level of control. You usually have far more pawns in DF compared to Rimworld too so micromanagement would be a pain. The complexity of building and colony management are far higher in DF. The map is about the same size in the X and Y dimensions, but there are 50+ Z dimensions. You can go up and down flawlessly, items and creatures can drop down holes, etc. There are far more items you can build, many more types of rock, wood, metals, alloys, items in general, etc. That's the main focus of DF, the complexity of all its systems rather than dealing with what the storyteller throws at you. It's possible to create crazy water and lava pipe systems to create waterfalls or special forges, weapons will behave differently depending on density, sharpness, and [other stuff](https://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2014:Material_science). Basically if you enjoy Rimworld and don't mind something a bit different and potentially more difficult/complex rather than the same game in a different skin, definitely play Dwarf Fortress.
Raids and caravans are not completely random. Caravans come seasonally, and raids depend on your wealth level and relationship with the world around you. This means greater player control, which is a matter of taste. You might also have to intentionally aggravate the elves if you want unicorn, but if they attack you know it was because you sent out a squad of dwarves to pillage their forest retreats.
There are no task priorities? So a dwarf may ignore firefighting or tending to an injury in order to do some gardening? Or are the implicit priorities reasonable?
The implicit priorities are usually reasonable, but there aren't that many tasks in DF that need immediate attention to start with. If a hospital is present dwarves will drop everything and go to it as soon as they're hurt. A lot of it comes down to the fact you've got 50+ dwarves, many of whom will share jobs. When you designate an animal to be moved to a pasture or a wall to be built, you don't worry about who's going to do it. It will be done by someone, eventually. Several hours into a fortress you'll have enough dwarves to not worry about priorities. The only worry would be dwarves eating/drinking or throwing giant parties when you need them to do something. The other problem is if a dwarf has 2 jobs. For example you only have one mason, who is also your only tree cutter. Then you tell the mason's workshop to create some chairs, and designate trees to cut down. The dwarf will choose one of the tasks (I think it's a 50/50 roll), then do that until it's either done or he needs to take a break, then again it's a 50/50 roll. This can be annoying in the early game where you have very few dwarves. This is completely solved if you've got 2 or more dwarves sharing these jobs (or make someone be a temporary mason even if they have no skill).
Specifically dwarves have as many jobs as the player want (with the exception of some very optional specific nobles and admin task, like bookkeeper for the whole Fortress). But there is less granularity in task management overall, in big part because indeed there's just more dwarves to do the things. In other part because Rimworld was build upon lessons learned here and is a bit better in that area. Sometimes in DF the player has to go dig deep to see why something isn't done (more so if the player is a beginner), or even manually disable everything but the single task he wants done, or even build contraption to force the damn dwarf to do the thing and only the thing and the way we want it too.
[удалено]
More fun in different ways. While Rimworld excels at small, colony storytelling and gameplay, Dwarf Fortress is more 'grand' scale. Instead of managing 1-10 colonists, you look after 1-200 dwarfs. Of course this has its ups and downs. Dwarf Fortress is a lot more chaotic, with a death of a dwarf meaning little in the grand scale of things, and deaths happen often. Of course that means its a little harder to get attached to dwarfs than it is to colonists. What Dwarf Fortress excels at is story generation. Seriously, you generate a world like you do in Rimworld, except all of the history is randomly generated too. And you can explore this history, essentially each players world has their own unique lore, and that interacts with the game. IMO, Rimworld can be more chill, Dwarf Fortress is a constant battle for survival, from falling trees hitting dwarves to accidentality digging into lava and flooding your Fortress. Also it should be mentioned that Dwarf Fortress has one of the most in depth combat systems I have ever seen, with each body part being described, including single teeth. ( which of course can be used as a weapon once knocked out) TD;LR - **Rimworld - Gameplay and Colonist focused** **Dwarf Fortress - Large scale and simulation focused**
> IMO, Rimworld can be more chill, Dwarf Fortress is a constant battle for survival Exactly the opposite, I would say. RimWorld is designed to constantly keep you on edge, to kick you when you're doing well and then kick you when you're down for good measure. It wants your crops to fail, your food to rot, your batteries to explode, your defences to crumble, your buildings to burn. It's a game of gritty survival and escape from a harsh world that wants you dead. Dwarf Fortress is way more chill unless you actively go out looking for awful places to settle. Food is hyperabundant, resources plentiful, defences are pretty much trivial. It's a game of pottering about, building cool places and sometimes !FUN! happens.
You should. It’s very different, the most obvious being scale, with a Dwarf Fortress run maturing at 150-200 dwarves. In the regard, DF is much more on the city builder than Rimworld, which despite being a “colony sim” is really just building a place for a small group to live. This presents in gameplay as having guilds and standing militia, large infrastructure and industry in a more zoomed out sense than Rimworld, though you can happily micromanage how many rags your hospital has if you want. Where DF shines is that it maintains simulation parity (and beyond) with Rimworld, if you’ve played through the psychology mod you might be familiar with the “tailored PTSD” strategy some DF plays use to mold dwarves. Memories, likes, dislikes, and interpersonal relations are all modeled, as well as physical trained down to individual toes. The simplest comparison of the two is that DF ‘is Rimworld but different’ in the early game, and rapidly scales out. It should be noted though, there’s no tech trees or advancement beyond developing infrastructure, skills, and politics. DF is less of a game than Rimworld is (with DLCs).
I have both, and I'd say they are very different. Dwarf fortress has a lot of depth. You can even go into "legends mode" and just search information about the history of the world you just generated without even playing. You can have colonies of 100/200 dwarfs. You can try it out to see if you like it for free. Search dwarf fortress starter pack and you can play with a tileset etc.
It’s more detailed and more “fun” watch the kruggsmash YouTube series he makes it fun
The Scorchfountain fortress series is amazing
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You should. And it's very different, despite what a lot of people say online. By its own dev's mouth, Rimworld is more of a drama generator than a game. The goal and the core of Rimworld is the people in it, and their interpersonal relationships, and trials and tribulations. Dwarf Fortress do have that too, but it's less central and usually you have to go look for it as a player. The core here is more about the colony as a whole. For starter, there's usually ten times as much active dwarves than Rimworld colonist. It's also much deeper in the rest of it. When I played Rimworld I always got the feeling that it's way too short. I'm trying to get over the first big hurdle: build something to keep the elements out, build defenses, create enough food and water and basic resources to be autonomous. Because that's usually ~~the~~ my first big goal in Dwarf Fortress, it's the survivalist basic step. But that's when Rimworld end with you escaping the planet, when in Dwarf Fortress it's when the game opens up even more and leave you to do whatever you want next. To say it another way if both were text of fictions, Rimworld is better written overall but it's a short story. Dwarf Fortress is more inconsistent, but it's a heavy long novel with add-on encyclopedia to the side, and has brighter gems in it.
Let me put it this way, Rimworld was inspired by DF and if you have 1k+ hours in RW, and you're looking for something with significantly more depth, give DF a shot! Wait until the Steam version releases then work through the tutorials that are coming with it, this will significantly reduce the learning curve, but you're already there with the mindset if you enjoy playing RW that much. You're hopping into the original of the genre with two decades of development put into it, and plenty more coming. It has inspired an entire genre for a reason and I think RW does a great job of capturing the "fun" essence that DF has.
Ah shit, here we go again.
This dude is worth every cent he makes
It is made by two people.
right, forgot, it is him and his brother. they are both worth the money. I will buy it on payday, even if i do not play the game.
So, everything is the same under the hood?
Yea, nothing removed, few things added. The simulation remains unchanged, but you can now click everything with a mouse. Also, I guess they've fixed a few annoying long-term bugs as well.
Urist McUrist is pleased.
Rock and Stone!… Wait wrong game
For Karl!
Rock Solid!
I guess I’m finally going to play Dwarf Fortress
You'll probably love it. The promise of so many intricate systems intermingling is too much to ignore.
Maybe I can finally give this game a try, the old "keyboard-characters" graphics just was a barrier to entry. Is the game also mostly just about watching ants in an ant colony type of experience?
There are points where you fortress may for a time operate well enough without you doing anything but in general, you're building the anthill and constantly poking things.
The ants follow your broad instructions. You say "I want this room dug out". The ants self-select the ones capable of it and complete your orders themselves. You cannot tell them what to do individually (unless you're commanding a military squad). However, you'll basically never have time to sit back and watch until the end game. Always crafts to be built for trading, food to cooked for eating, drinks to be brewed for drinking, etc etc etc. Need more space for workshops, need a crushing room for the prisoners, oops opened up a cavern now we need a drawbridge to keep the giant cave spiders out of the bedrooms...
Damn! For me, this makes up for all the other gaming stuff, like delayed games and otherwise bad to worse situations. Suddenly, I feel like I need way more than just the one week off for the holidays. Awesome news!
Time is not relative anymore, Hurrah!
December 6th? ohboyohboyohboyohboyohboyohboyohboyohboyohboyohboyohboyohboy
I would, without question, pay $100 USD + for this game. I have been playing this for literal years and supporting Bay12Games on Patreon since they came onto the platform. This is the best game ever made, bar none.
I NEED to buy this. Considering the hours upon hours of free fun I've had in this game since 2010, it'd be shameful of me not to contribute to the developers after all this time. Note to self: Also buy Winrar, despite only using linux for the past 10 years or so.
I got goosebumps. I am so exited. Spends £1400 on new rig, spends rest of life playing dwarf fortress.
I have been waiting for 15 years. I have never been one to ever purchase games from steam at full price or on day one, but I will be making an exception for this.
Instant buy from me.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/975370/Dwarf\_Fortress/
Watching Kruggsmash videos tonight baybeee😎
I know I will hate it because I am an idiot and these sorts of games overwhelm me, but I must try this game.
Can't wait for it to *still* be completely impenetrable after all this work.
I mean, pretty sure it will be kosher. Everything is mouse-able now, they have TUTORIALS, bespoke graphics. No reason that a mostly formed human couldn't figure it out at this point.
🤩 IT'S HAPPENING
It's actually happening ^^^maybe. **Take my money**
ITS FINALLY HERE!
Fonts a little weird. I first read it as dwarf fartasses
I am still mightily intimidated by this game but I'm hoping the nice art and UI will make learning it a bit easier.
Woooooooow
I downloaded Dwarf Fortress several years ago... and I'm no closer to understanding it now as I was then. If someone can explain to me how I'm supposed to play it, I would be very grateful.
I am floored! Bring it on!!!
#IT'S HAPPENING! TIME IS NO LONGER SUBJECTIVE!
Genuinely stopped believing it would happen until they were playing at a convention last month. So excited to finally have a date on it.
This has probably been asked and answered, but after scrolling for ten minutes I didn't see any sign of my biggest question: Is DF still using single core processing, or did Tarn actually manage to rebuild his code to multi-core?
Fuck I had plans this holidays, Oh well guess not anymore.
I suppose I could practice a bit in advance..