[HN Gopher] Dwarf Fortress - randomly generated, persistent fant...
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Dwarf Fortress - randomly generated, persistent fantasy world
Author : loa_in_
Score : 395 points
Date : 2022-11-22 20:45 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.bay12games.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.bay12games.com)
| jrm4 wrote:
| Decided to read the whole thing. For some reason the very last
| line where they make sure that you know that they have the color
| black included, twice, is hilarious to me.
|
| There's probably some reason for it though? Anyone know?
| shrx wrote:
| I think they just want to point out that black is one of the
| available 16 colors, meaning that there are just 15 colors not
| counting black.
| mtrpcic wrote:
| I'm always fascinated by Dwarf Fortress whenever I cross paths
| with it, particularly from a technical architecture point of
| view. How did they architect the history simulation? How do they
| efficiently update everything on each tick? What is the game loop
| like?
|
| If anyone has any resources or links to articles, either
| definitive from the DW developer, or conjecture based on
| exploration and research, I'd love to learn more about how DF
| works.
| knoebber wrote:
| > How do they efficiently update everything on each tick?
|
| The player is responsible for some aspects of keeping their
| game running efficiently.
|
| See:
| https://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2014:Maximizing_fr...
| thoughtFrame wrote:
| There's another game like that that surprised me: Amazing
| Cultivation Simulator. I got this video (
| https://youtube.com/watch?v=wJxM3POU92w ) recommended on
| youtube and I watched it start to end with my jaw dropping more
| every time a new mechanic was described. Before that I had
| thought that big systemic games were stuff like Zelda Breath of
| the Wild, Minecraft or Dward Fortress. But this simulator game
| is one I'd like to see the code of
| praptak wrote:
| Last time I checked they didn't do it particularly efficiently
| and avoiding "FPS death" was an important part of the lore: cap
| the number of dwarves, avoid flowing water, wall off unused
| parts of the mine to reduce costs of pathfinding, add
| pathfinding weights to tiles, etc.
|
| There's not much published about the internals because the
| creators keep it to themselves.
| WastingMyTime89 wrote:
| Cats are the death of fortress. Dwarf fortress is an
| incredible game but you are right that it's actually amusing
| the amount of weird things you know you should avoid or
| manage as a regular player.
| jonchurch_ wrote:
| One of the creators (Tarn, specifically) does interviews fairly
| often, talking about the game and progress.
|
| Here's a video telling a very famous story about tracking down
| a bug that involved alcoholic cats
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAhHkJQ3KgY
|
| There was also a recent article about Dwarf Fortress published
| to the Stack Overflow blog
| https://stackoverflow.blog/2021/12/31/700000-lines-of-code-2...
|
| Edit: There's really a decent amount of stuff out there,
| they've been making the game for almost 20 years now. So here
| is a talk that tries to explain DF to an audience, and does
| talk a little about the simulation.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ykLm2o_cX9w
|
| I adore DF and am one of those folks who enjoys playing, not
| just watching videos on youtube. If you do want to give it a
| go, make sure you find an "Intro to DF" type video and follow
| it. It's a big learning curve but I love the game so much, and
| knowing the story of it's creation over time makes me love it
| even more. It is truly a labor of love by two brothers who have
| chosen to make it their life's work.
| professoretc wrote:
| I read the SO blog post and thought it was a pretty cool
| coincidence that Adams was talking about SplitMix64 when I
| had just recently given a talk about it. Then I scrolled down
| and saw the video _of my talk_.
| nonethewiser wrote:
| that's amazing. congrats
| ilyt wrote:
| > If you do want to give it a go, make sure you find an
| "Intro to DF" type video and follow it.
|
| Honestly if someone don't mind spending few bucks waiting for
| Steam release and incoming slew of tutorials might be a
| better option.
|
| And if you do mind, well,free ascii version will eventually
| get the new UI too
| tstrimple wrote:
| The level of detail in Dwarf Fortress is amazing. Just take a
| look at this bug report:
| https://www.bay12games.com/dwarves/mantisbt/view.php?id=9195
|
| TLDR: Code was added that allowed substances to accumulate on
| fur. Cats lick their fur to clean themselves. Due to the
| calculation used for intoxication and body weight, cats kept
| getting lethally drunk from walking through spilled beer and
| licking it off of their feet.
|
| This level of detail leads to tons of emergent game play and
| stories.
| lstodd wrote:
| Haha lol. I maybe still have a screenshot of a Forgotten Beast
| killing himself by kicking up a dead cat's tooth (the cat was
| killed by some previous FB) (and the tooth deals a fatality).
|
| The level of detail is amazing.
| ilyt wrote:
| Yeah there were pretty interesting edge cases with
| calculations. Like, for example, there is still [1] a bug for
| a whip doing unreasonable amount of damage in some cases
| because armour penetration logic was pretty much
| strength/area = penetration power.
|
| And because whip hit only with tiny end, it pretty much went
| thru any armour
|
| https://www.bay12games.com/dwarves/mantisbt/view.php?id=2712
| bombcar wrote:
| It's worth studying some of the more famous bug reports as
| they're perfect examples of emergent issues that can arise in
| complex situations.
| chx wrote:
| That's like the legendary carps bug.
|
| > fish and all other creatures are coded similar to Dwarfs for
| level progression, so training a skill not only improves the
| skill but also the relevant physical stats. Well, Carps have
| swimming as a skill. And they are always swimming. So within
| minutes of spawning every carp was a dwarf-sized mass of angry
| muscle and razor sharp teeth.
| Daunk wrote:
| I'm so happy seeing DF reach a larger audience with the Steam
| release, it's been such a joy to experiment with over the years,
| and I feel like Zach and Tarn deserve a lot more recognition.
|
| Here's my personal DF tileset - https://github.com/Hezkore/dwarf-
| fortress-assets
| lstodd wrote:
| What is more spectacular than even the Dwarf Fortress itself (and
| it is), are the C++ reverse-engineering tools developed in Common
| Lisp back in 2010-s. DFHack and Dwarf Therapist were rebased on
| top of them.
| jrm4 wrote:
| It's weird to read a line that feels like typical overhyped
| advertising copy next to a Steam game but that you realize is
| probably 100% accurate?
|
| Namely "The deepest, most intricate simulation of a world that's
| ever been created?"
| praptak wrote:
| This deep and intricate world is inhabited by dumbest, most
| stubborn dwarves who throw players into depth of frustration,
| despair and a solid dose of hilarity.
| LAC-Tech wrote:
| I was really keen on the idea of adventure mode, after watching a
| fantastic lets play of it [0].
|
| But when I got there I didn't really know what to do inside the
| sandbox.
|
| [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tDX5hmtjqtw
| specproc wrote:
| Has anyone actually played this? Like, really played it. I've
| tried a couple of times and never got that far. I'm in awe from
| one perspective, but not entirely sure what of, from another.
| ink_13 wrote:
| Yes. Once it clicked it was so engrossing I found I could think
| of nothing else. Focusing on work was difficult. Dwarf
| Therapist became indispensable. I knew all of my dwarfs by
| name, and I had a plan for all of them. My focus became all
| consuming. I built a windowed tower that could only be
| comprehensible if you grokked the Z-layer system. I was very
| close to having a moat filled with lava. In the end, I dug too
| deep.
|
| I don't allow myself to play DF any more. It's just too good.
| tptacek wrote:
| Yes. It's one of those things I have to keep uninstalled or
| it'll randomly suck me back in. AMA.
| hristov wrote:
| Yes. It is not really that hard, if you consider how they have
| probably the best wiki of any computer game and a lot of high
| quality helper programs. If you alt-tab between dwarf fortress,
| the wiki and dwarf therapist, it is totally doable. And once
| you play a couple of games you start to get the internal logic
| of DF and becomes kind of fun.
| ilyt wrote:
| Steam version with better UI and graphics released 6th December
|
| I did "actually played it", think the biggest thing I did was a
| lava cannon that flooded the area aboveground when invasion
| game, that was "interesting" build...
|
| Having to relearn everything on interface stopped me from
| picking it up again, and from what I watched new UI look so
| much more user friendly
| robomc wrote:
| Nearly a decade ago I played it a bit over a couple of months.
| I'd guess 30 hours or so (which is a lot for me, I'm a gaming
| dabbler, aside from the civ and fromsoft games). It was pretty
| playable IMO, and would really pull you in, just tedious to
| navigate the menus.
|
| I eventually got kind of tired of investing so much effort into
| a fortress that would just randomly fall apart. People say
| that's part of the fun but I dunno... I found that aspect a bit
| annoying. It also ran really poorly for me in late game and
| that kind of put me off too.
|
| Great concept, the ascii is less of a problem than you'd think,
| but overall just a bit too much effort to keep wanting to come
| back for more.
| praptak wrote:
| I can get to 80-100 dwarves without huge problems but then I
| usually get bored with the micromanagement.
|
| DF is not hard if you follow the quickstart guide.
| rpastuszak wrote:
| Fantasy World is a _bit_ of an understatement. It 's one of the
| toughest and deepest simulations one can find.
| helf wrote:
| I've played DF off an on for ~15 years. Love it always get an
| upvote.
| Loughla wrote:
| I go back to read boatmurdered at least once a year just for
| the chuckles (and the reminiscing about SA forums back in the
| day).
|
| Then I play DF for a month or so and remember just how
| intricate and IMPOSSIBLE it is to understand completely.
|
| What an amazing game.
| [deleted]
| Ancalagon wrote:
| I really need to get into this. But on the other hand, if I start
| playing I have a feeling I might not stop.
| ilyt wrote:
| It's actually not bad game to have running on second screen and
| just poke at it from time to time as your dwarves are working
| and building stuff. Kinda perfect "podcast game"
| namuol wrote:
| Frontend UX developer perspective on DF: The ascii interface is
| actually fine and mostly a superficial complaint. The real
| problem is just how hard the many interfaces are to navigate and
| learn, and how unconventional their designs are. If I could pick
| one thing for the UI team to focus on: DF needs a "command
| palette" to help find/learn all of the game's many functions.
| bombcar wrote:
| The Steam version has a much-cleaned up UI including things
| like normalizing menu items, commands, etc.
|
| I agree that it isn't actually that bad, and there is (was?) a
| form of logic to it and it eventually became second nature.
| Buttons840 wrote:
| Will those improvements make it to non-Steam versions? I'm
| kind of bummed the Steam version is Windows only (according
| to Steam at least).
| chmod775 wrote:
| At release. A Mac and Linux release is planned for later.
|
| > [..] We also have the Classic ASCII mode to support, and
| we are also working on Mac and Linux builds.
|
| https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/975370/view/3099043
| 8...
| mlatu wrote:
| "once you get into it its actually quite easy to navigate in"
| is something i would have said back when i played, at least ten
| years ago though
| namuol wrote:
| I agree, but pretty much every UI has its own learning curve
| to get over, and taken together it's just overwhelming to get
| started with. Curious to see how the tutorial system in the
| premium version helps address this. I'm cautiously hopeful
| but still doubt I will have the time to properly run a
| fortress. Maybe we'll see the premium version lead to a jump
| in DF as a spectator sport given the much richer graphics
| library.
| coder-3 wrote:
| Time is what's been preventing me from getting into DF. Do
| I need to spend a significant amount of time on this game
| to get a good experience? Could I get away with, say, one
| hour once in a while? I'd probably need to invest time
| upfront to learn the basics though.
| sdenton4 wrote:
| It's genuinely terrible. I played enough to 'get it' at one
| point, then walked away for six months. When I came back had
| forgotten how to navigate the menus and just gave up, as it
| didn't seem worth it. Different kinds of branching per menu,
| different idioms for hotkey letters per menu.... just a mess.
| MiddleEndian wrote:
| I've always played with the help of Dwarf Therapist, a second
| program that helps you manage everything spreadsheet-style.
| Buttons840 wrote:
| Last time I played I used Dwarf Therapist, and it definitely
| helps with min-maxing, but I've been thinking maybe min-
| maxing isn't the right way to play this game and I should
| just be happy with the in-game interface?
| hinkley wrote:
| So we have spreadsheets in space (Eve Online) and now
| spreadsheets underground...
| bombcar wrote:
| One of the things I love is that you can generate a world, play a
| fortress, eventually lose (it's fun!(tm)) and then start another
| fortress in the same world, _and your new fortress will have
| references to your old one_ - in the carvings, legends, etc.
| hinkley wrote:
| Kruggsmash likes to play necromancers, and then has to fight
| necromancers two games later. What goes around comes around.
| ilyt wrote:
| More than that. Artifact can be stolen from your fortress then
| you can go in adventure mode to track it down and steal it
| back. Well the "track down" part would probably be done in
| legends mode coz it would be hard to scour the whole world to
| find a single artifact but still
| Shared404 wrote:
| One thing I want to jump into is the Adventurer mode! Nothing
| quite like the idea of building (and losing) several
| fortresses, and then going through them to explore as the "new
| generation". Haven't played DF yet, but it's very much on my
| list.
| mttyng wrote:
| Is that what Adventure Mode is? I've been playing DF off-and-
| on since 2013(ish), but I've never tried adventure mode.
| bombcar wrote:
| Adventure mode is more like a 'standard' RPG-style
| adventure, similar to nethack but entirely generated. https
| ://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2014:Adventurer_mo...
|
| It doesn't have as much polish as Fortress mode, but it can
| be quite fun if you like the nethack style of "die early,
| die awesome, die often".
| bombcar wrote:
| Even if you don't actually play, _Legends_ mode alone can be
| interesting.
|
| https://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2014:Legends
| xnx wrote:
| I want to get into this, but the randomly generated nature has
| always been an (irrational?) turn-off. I guess I want more
| editorial choice in the level design.
| MiddleEndian wrote:
| On top of what bombcar mentioned, you also get to choose your
| embark spot within your tuned world.
| bombcar wrote:
| And you can post a world on the forums and ask people for a
| "good embark spot" and they'll find different ones for you.
|
| It's amusing what people consider "necessities" and
| "absolutely not" in embark spots; some people will never
| touch an aquifer, others it's not even something to look at.
| bombcar wrote:
| You do control a large number of aspects of world generation,
| which can be used to "tune" the game from very easy to
| impossibly difficult.
|
| And once you have parameters you like, you can try different
| seeds.
|
| https://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2014:World_generat...
|
| https://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2014:Advanced_worl...
|
| Also, people will post seeds and world parameters for "good
| worlds" they've found:
| https://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2014:Worldgen_exam...
| ilyt wrote:
| The better UI(and paid) version drops on Steam 6th of December.
| Probably the best time to give it a shot.
|
| And it is not "just" randomly generated. For example, the
| rivers flow where there are rocky paths in the terrain
|
| Rocky paths are there because during worldgen game simulated
| erosion.
|
| Erosion is made by simulated rainfall
|
| Simulated rainfall depends in winds and location of a given
| terrain.
|
| And only at the start of that chain there is "random
| generation".
|
| > I guess I want more editorial choice in the level design.
|
| Then tell your dwarves to build what you want, you can make
| pretty grand scale things in it.
| brown wrote:
| Not sure why Dwarf Fortress is on the front page, but I will
| always upvote.
|
| If you're intimidated by ASCII visuals, consider wishlisting the
| graphics release, scheduled for Dec 6, 2022:
| https://store.steampowered.com/app/975370/Dwarf_Fortress/
| schlauerfox wrote:
| The technical complexity got me through a really tough time
| where I could hide in the world, ascii only on a pavilion
| convertible laptop. Good times, impenetrable gameplay.
| ilyt wrote:
| The Steam version OP mentioned fixes that
| PhasmaFelis wrote:
| Is the UI getting an overhaul as well? I could probably deal
| with the ASCII, but I'm picky about UI design, and what I've
| heard about the interface sounds like it would make me have a
| tantrum and smash my menacing rhyolite cave sock.
| jibe wrote:
| They've revamped the UI. Here is a dev blog post with an
| early screenshot from 2021.
|
| https://steamcommunity.com/games/975370/announcements/detail.
| ..
| tptacek wrote:
| Careful what you wish for. Some of the Dwarf Fortress
| endorphins are a product of the horrible user interface;
| asking for a more intuitive interface (at times) is like
| asking for an easier Soulsborne boss. Ask enough times and
| you have Horizon Forbidden West instead of Bloodborne.
| bombcar wrote:
| The old UI is like a well-worn sock for me, fits perfectly
| and I know where the holes are.
|
| But yes, the new version has an entirely redone UI to greatly
| organize and simplify things.
|
| The updates here: https://steamcommunity.com/app/975370 go
| into more details - there's even a tutorial!
| jrm4 wrote:
| Whoooaaa.
|
| So, this has been a game that's always fascinated me, though
| when trying to play myself I nope out within minutes.
|
| On one hand, graphics might get me there -- and yet, even to
| me, it feels kinda wrong :)
| rococode wrote:
| As a Rimworld lover who couldn't quite get past the ASCII in
| Dwarf Fortress, I'm super excited for the upcoming release!
| Rimworld has been a blast and I've heard the two games have
| many similarities (with Rimworld maybe being a slightly more
| approachable game that's a bit shallower).
| tstrimple wrote:
| I love ribworld as well! It's my most played game by far at
| this point. The mod ecosystem is simply outstanding. That
| being said, it doesn't even attempt to be the simulation
| engine that Dwarf Fortress does. It feels like DF is a
| simulation engine first, with emergent game play almost as a
| side effect. As much as I like DF, that simulation first
| development process can be felt during almost every
| interaction in the game. It's not so bad once you've
| committed everything to muscle memory, but the learning curve
| is no joke.
|
| https://i.stack.imgur.com/iECXl.jpg
| bombcar wrote:
| The new version is going to fix some of that; the
| normalization of menus, etc, will go a long way to "making
| it feel more game-like".
| krisroadruck wrote:
| if you like these games you might also like Oxygen Not
| Included. It's side-on view instead of top down, but is
| another excellent little ant farm to sink a couple thousand
| hours into. Sort of a Rimworld meets Factorio type vibe.
| ericbarrett wrote:
| > is another excellent little ant farm
|
| I call ONI my "dollhouse."
|
| It's such a sleeper compared to similar games. The art
| and sound effects really elevate it. Klei has such a
| unique art style and it's really shown off. Also has a
| much more interesting "survival" curve than most; you'll
| be presented with many _many_ hours of challenges trying
| to get a sustainable base, without cheap tricks like
| ever-escalating interruptions based on quantitative
| progress (looking at you, Rimworld.)
| intelVISA wrote:
| You'll definitely love DF then, I believe the Steam release
| is soon and includes some nice QoL improvements like a
| tileset and mouse UX.
| munk-a wrote:
| If you can stomach the adjustment period for ASCII I'd really
| recommend it. I think it does something a lot of modern games
| miss out on - it encourages imagination first. The
| information given to the player is extremely dense and easy
| to parse once you've adjusted and you're giving your brain a
| chance to try and play inside your own head. I've built a
| glorious six floor tavern (slowly) with engravings on every
| surface - even those not reachable by pathing, why? because I
| had an image of a tavern floor full of rowdy miners with
| opera boxes circling the room above them for dwarves of a
| more refined taste... in the end it's just a box you need to
| floor scroll to see on the screen but the carved pillars in
| the middle of the room - the enclaves for dwarves to, in
| hushed voices, discuss just how beautiful gold is - and the
| grand skylight in the middle of the ceiling casting a rainbow
| of different colored light on the ground below... that's
| awesome.
|
| Dwarf fortress is the first thing since MUDing that's really
| scratched the imagination itch in quite that way and, as
| someone who has worked in game development themselves, I
| think it's something that is only possible if you keep to the
| lowest tech. If you use words or abstract symbols then each
| player will fill in the details themselves, usually in their
| head but sometimes in artwork (see Kruggsmash as an
| approachable example here[1]) which can be extremely
| fulfilling.
|
| I hope to see the non-ASCII version work as a gateway drug to
| get more people into the imagination of what they're
| building. And I hope this didn't come off as ranty or
| judgemental - each person enjoys games in different ways...
| but low detail art has a way of really spurring the
| imagination on!
|
| 1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojT99rDmq5M
| omoikane wrote:
| I agree with the "encourages imagination" argument, and
| also that ASCII modes might be more practical. I have
| played Nethack in ASCII mode and tried a few graphical
| variants, and always returned to the ASCII version because
| it's easier to tell the enemies apart and easier to see
| what's going on.
| bombcar wrote:
| This is the key for me - DF is like Sim City or other
| building games (including Minecraft) - you have to be able
| to create your _own_ goals. Sure, you can keep trying more
| and more difficult embark locations, but after awhile you
| 'll have DF down well enough that you can survive
| 'indefinitely' on underground farms behind impenetrable
| walls.
|
| So you begin to do other things, mega projects are a common
| one.
| kgwxd wrote:
| I played Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead in ASCII long before I
| even looked at screenshots of the tiles. Worse than getting
| stuck with Ben Affleck in the movie of a book you loved.
| The Jabberwocky was in the screen shot I saw, the
| description gave such a spooky mental image, but now all I
| see in my head is the 8-bit swamp monster thingy, like
| something from the original Castlevania.
| dwringer wrote:
| My favorite thing about the engravings (and statues and
| similar art) is that not only is it based on real dwarves,
| gods, etc. from the current game world, but you can
| commission pieces about specific dwarves and the artisans
| will commemorate battles or other milestone events that
| involved them.
|
| In one of the last times I played, some invader had broken
| through my defenses and killed a couple of highly respected
| dwarves (one of whom was a skilled fighter), but finally
| came face to face with a young girl dwarf who confronted
| him in one of the dining halls and, though she lost a leg,
| managed to kill him (eventually recovering to grow up to be
| a skilled craftsdwarf). I had a some statues made of her,
| and most of them came out depicting the heroic deed in
| different levels of detail (so of course the best one was
| put up in that dining hall).
|
| There's also a sort-of-exploit related to this, where if
| there's a stranger in your fortress whom you suspect of
| having a nefarious background, you can commission artwork
| of them and sometimes it will reveal malicious traits about
| them if you examine it. The artists always seem to have
| perfect knowledge of their subjects.
| ilyt wrote:
| Clearly we need to feed DF generated descriptions to AI and
| generate tilesets for that /s
|
| ASCII version will get the new UI Soon(tm)
|
| Personally I don't think the new look they're going with
| will be problem with imagination for me - the new look adds
| just enough detail that you can spot dwarf by their look
| alone but there is still plenty of space to imagine how
| exactly the described things look
| hinkley wrote:
| I watched about 30 hours of Kruggsmash's narrations of his
| Dwarf Fortress runs on Youtube, hoping it would 'sell' me on
| DF. What happened instead is that I played way more Rimworld
| and Oxygen Not Included than I had been playing.
|
| Most days I preferred ONI due having to go way out of your
| way to commit war crimes, whereas in Rimworld it's just
| clicking a couple buttons.
| bergenty wrote:
| Same, ended up intensely playing rimworld for a month
| before it got too repetitive for me and I stopped.
| ilyt wrote:
| Here is new UI with someone new to DF and developer guiding
| them:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bLN8cOcTjdo&
| sdenton4 wrote:
| Does the framerate still decline steadily to zero as you expand
| your fortress?
| andremedeiros wrote:
| Thank you for reminding me, I've been meaning to wishlist this
| for a while. Excited they finally have a release date set!
| etempleton wrote:
| I am excited for the graphics release as I have always been
| fascinated by Dwarf Fortress, but do not think I have the
| patience to learn how to parse the ASCII visuals.
| kennu wrote:
| Nice to see there is a release date now! Wishlisted quite a
| while ago already, when no date was set.
| RektBoy wrote:
| ASCII is not a problem, since there is ton of graphics packs.
|
| But controls, controls are ridiculous. I can't just enjoy it.
| And I play very hard games, indie games, Ultima Online which
| you need to script own things to play properly. But DF is
| another beast.
| jessfyi wrote:
| The version being released on steam also includes extensive
| UX/UI updates, OP just left that out.
| ilyt wrote:
| The graphics version also did MASSIVE pass on every control.
|
| Like, instead of going "select bed, make bedroom, repeat 40
| times", you can just make rooms, put beds, doors, etc, then
| just select whole area and it will make a bedroom out of each
| of those rooms.
|
| camera controls are normal WASD now, most of the things can
| be done with mouse, there are tabs on panels and hyperlinks
| in legend browser and thousand other little things.
|
| It will be coming eventually to free ASCII version too
| PeterisP wrote:
| The Lazy Newb Pack (and other third-party options) has been an
| easy way to get cute graphics for Dwarf Fortress for many, many
| years now.
| signalToNose wrote:
| But the UI has all joy and ease of Emacs
| bombcar wrote:
| But it has the power and learning curve of Emacs, too!
| ilyt wrote:
| The commenter above did mention the new UI is coming this
| december.
|
| Long story short it got upgraded from Emacs to IntelliJ
| IDEA.
| tptacek wrote:
| The ease is like 80% of the joy.
| agiacalone wrote:
| Love the ASCII version, but totally buying to support the devs.
| mjamesaustin wrote:
| Just a heads up, if you purchase on itch.io rather than
| Steam, the devs receive a larger share of the revenue.
| (Though obviously it's not integrated into Steam, if you
| prefer that.)
|
| https://kitfoxgames.itch.io/dwarf-fortress
| Daunk wrote:
| Noted. I will buy it on both itch.io and Steam then.
| munk-a wrote:
| Considering I've given them a few bucks a month for a
| decade and a bit now which doesn't even come close to the
| value I've gotten that is a great idea.
| deelowe wrote:
| As soon as I learned why Tarn needed to put out a paid
| release on Steam, I committed to purchasing even if I never
| play it.
| MikeTheGreat wrote:
| You can't just leave a comment like that and walk away from
| it. :)
|
| Why did Tarn need to put out a paid release?
|
| (I think I know / I kinda remember, but hey - there's no
| better place to tell us why we should be helping a fellow
| geek)
| nonethewiser wrote:
| As I recall he had some medical issues to pay for. The
| other brother didnt have insurance nor a regular
| income... just his split of the DF donation money.
|
| It bring up a lot of criticism of healthcare in the US
| which I don't quite understand. Yes, healthcare is
| expensive in the US, especially without insurance. It has
| been for a while, so dont be surprised when not having a
| regular income nor insurance puts you in a bad spot. It
| was poor planning as much as it is expensive healthcare.
|
| It basically amounts to one day realizing "oh shit,
| $35,000/year and no health insurance isn't enough money.
| This is the fault of the United States."
| munk-a wrote:
| Very briefly as a counter example - these folks made a
| thing that thousands maybe tens of thousands of people
| treasure. They've worked on it as a passion project and
| when ill luck befell them they had to scramble to secure
| funds. Yes, we live in a capitalist system but supporting
| neat art like this and exploratory projects is a societal
| investment that the US has stiffly refused to make. The
| more we provide social safety nets the more folks will be
| free to do experimental and artistic work and give us
| gems like dwarf fortress.
|
| This isn't the fault of the United States - the US has
| made a choice in how the game works and they weren't
| playing by the rules laid out for them to follow. The
| expected course was for them to work in some job that
| robs them of their free time to produce a work of this
| caliber and if they had done so they'd be just fine...
| and we wouldn't have dwarf fortress.
| deelowe wrote:
| https://gamerant.com/dwarf-fortress-interview-new-age-
| health...
| bombcar wrote:
| A hospital/illness scare made them realize they have
| nothing setup for illness/insurance and need a more
| secure source of income.
|
| It's probably true that if word got out that Tarn or Zack
| needed medical care, the donations would flow like water,
| but it's understandable wanting to prepare.
| ilyt wrote:
| American healthcare system
| [deleted]
| mminer237 wrote:
| You can also just donate directly:
| http://www.bay12games.com/support.html
|
| They used to personally make a crayon drawing for each person
| who donated. They stopped in 2020, but I made sure to get one
| of the final ones before then:
| http://www.bay12games.com/support.html
|
| My $10 was a small price to pay for all the hours of fun I
| got. (I'll surely buy the Steam version too though.)
| pearjuice wrote:
| I've tried playing and actually getting into this game a few
| times (including installing tile packs, walkthrough saves and
| what not), but the game mechanics are obtuse and have such a high
| learning curve that frustration is easier found than any sense of
| enjoyment. For a game focused on being so meticulous and extra-
| vagant in its mechanics, it's sad that enjoying it or "having
| fun" seems something completely out of reach with hours of
| gameplay, reading third-party wikis and starter guides.
| jiggawatts wrote:
| The thing that gets me about Dwarf Fortress is that it's a 64-bit
| text-mode game.
|
| As a grey-haired developer who got excited about "DOS Extenders"
| that allowed 32-bit mode, seeing a text-mode game written as a
| native 64-bit application is bizarrely anachronistic.
|
| I get a similar feeling from text-mode GUI frameworks for Rust,
| which allow multi-threading and 64-bit but are essentially clones
| of Borland Turbo Vision, where you had to be mindful to keep
| lists smaller than 64KB: https://github.com/gyscos/cursive
| babuskov wrote:
| You might find Rogue Bit interesting:
|
| https://store.steampowered.com/app/949790/Rogue_Bit/
|
| It's a modern game about hacking internals of an 8-bit computer
| by walking a single bit through it's memory.
|
| Visually it looks like an ASCII roguelike game, but it's
| actually a niche puzzle game for people who like machine
| language, assembly and computer internals.
| ilyt wrote:
| Not for long
|
| https://store.steampowered.com/app/975370/Dwarf_Fortress/
|
| Graphical+UI/controls rewrite in few weeks!
| stolen_biscuit wrote:
| Both versions will be supported :) "Classic" DF isn't going
| anywhere
| PointyFluff wrote:
| this.
|
| not the lame knock-off that is rimworld.
| Kiro wrote:
| What made you randomly post Dwarf Fortress now with this
| undescriptive and confusing title? Very peculiar.
| loa_in_ wrote:
| Titles need to be short, and relevant to the content. I took
| words straight from the Features section.
|
| Now, because with all the talk about AI agents I was thinking
| about the environments, and that's when I remembered this. It
| very much can be inspiring, even if it's not strictly relevant
| technology-wise.
| Kiro wrote:
| I understand but I don't think the title is very
| representative of the game. Regardless, Dwarf Fortress gets
| posted here a lot so I definitely think it's relevant:
| https://hn.algolia.com/?q=dwarf+fortress
| lcnPylGDnU4H9OF wrote:
| The story of Boatmurdered[0] has given me a good go-to seed for
| other games with procedural generation. It's well worth the read
| if you have an afternoon.
|
| [0] https://lparchive.org/Dwarf-Fortress-Boatmurdered/
| jameshart wrote:
| Boatmurdered is representative of a very old version of the
| game.
|
| For more modern DF storytelling I would encourage you to check
| out Kruggsmash on YouTube, in particular his Scorchfountain
| series:
| https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLXX7Rp0iXj0l998LmVC6xIRHj...
|
| Krugg gives due reverence to the generated descriptions of his
| dwarves and their world and incorporates them into his emergent
| storytelling and illustration in a very elegant way.
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