15 ms·

Dwarf Fortress 0.42.01 released

330 points by robinhoodexe 11y ago

hodwik 11y ago
This is why text-based games are king. One dot release and we're seeing a mountain of new features. I've always dreamed of getting together a big budget to make a text adventure (e.g. Zork) of incredible scope, both in depth and "interactibility" -- a complex object typologies system, bring in learning chat bots for NPCs, and a system where users can add new objects, rooms and descriptions while they play, a complete object relational system (so it can tell "on", from "next to", from "above"), a very complete state system and so on. Perhaps an "adjectives system", so it knows a huge amount of adjectives relating to any one object, and can generate simple novel sentences about that object on repeat views. I think that at some point someone will be crazy enough to do it, and it's going to be most excellent.
- isxek 11y ago
  There were attempts at implementing some of what you suggested - here's one: https://www.guncho.com/ https://www.guncho.com/
  - jplur 11y ago
    So Guncho interfaces a mud server to inform7 runtimes? I used inform7's function dispatching as the basis for a python MUD engine, fun stuff - https://github.com/selfsame/mud.tilde.town https://github.com/selfsame/mud.tilde.town
- macintux 11y ago
  How would this be substantively different from Muds?
  - hodwik2 11y ago
    Right, yes, some of these features were added to various MUDs with some amount of success. The big difference I'm arguing for is scope, and engineering. If you have NPC chat bots that can learn, and an adjectives and typologies system for object, combine them so that chat bots can talk about objects adjectives and typologies. That sort of thing, really engineer the hell out of it. In the end it would all be a massive NLP problem. As major advances in NLP happen the possibilities for MUDs is massive.
    - dkersten 11y ago
      Some of the more modern MUDs are pretty advanced. I was reading a bunch of stuff by the GodWars 2 guy and he has some pretty cool features (eg the areas are very dynamic). Not the same scope as DF, of course, but still surprisingly fancy. There's still a lot of room for more, though :) I'd personally love to see or make something like what you describe too... I even started tinkering with my own home grown little MUD server written in Clojure, where I had intended to try out some fancy ideas... but lost interest because it would take a huge time investment and I'd be the only player in a multiplayer environment - maybe a single player game like you say would be better after all.
  - 0xdeadbeefbabe 11y ago
    It is single player or SUD.
- jplur 11y ago
  Fun to note DF is a massive voxel simulation that displays a 2D slice as ascii. There's some neat third party visualizers that can hook into it's memory to show more. http://i.imgur.com/PTj1QpL.jpg http://i.imgur.com/PTj1QpL.jpg
  - scotty79 11y ago
    Wow. I'd definitely play it with that UI. I often wonder why games almost never have swappable (or even just scriptable) UI-s that could allow player to use shorthands through UI drudgery.
    - kbenson 11y ago
      For many popular roguelike games different tilesets are common. Search for "dwarf fortress tileset".
      - wagglycocks 11y ago
        I'd recommend installing the Lazy Newb Pack instead. It has all the tools and tileset you need preconfigured: http://lazynewbpack.com/ http://lazynewbpack.com/
        Raphmedia 11y ago
        Now that's what I needed to try this game. Last time I tried, I spent hours and hours downloading tools and never ever got to play the actual game!
        qznc 11y ago
        Also read some introductions. Some tips like "no aquifer" for your first settlement really ease it. http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2014:Quickstart_guide http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2014:Quickstart_gui...
    - zyxley 11y ago
- ajuc 11y ago
  Making it a text game instead of minecraft-like would limit the audience and save next to nothing in development time IMHO.
  - hodwik2 11y ago
    At the very beginning of Zork you are wandering through the forest. At one point, after branching around for a while you hear a bird singing above. If you say 'climb the tree' you read "You are about ten feet above the ground nestled among some large branches. The nearest branch above you is beyond your reach." If you 'climb higher' you see "On the branch is a small birds nest. " If you look in the nest, "In the bird's nest is a large egg encrusted with precious jewels, apparently scavenged somewhere by a childless songbird. The egg is covered with fine gold inlay and ornamented in lapis lazuli and mother-of-pearl. Unlike most eggs, this one is hinged and has a delicate looking clasp holding it closed. The egg appears extremely fragile." If you open the egg roughly, "There is a golden clockwork canary nestled in the egg. It seems to have recently had a bad experience. The mountings for its jewel-like eyes are empty, and its silver beak is crumpled. Through a cracked crystal window below its left wing you can see the remains of intricate machinery. It is not clear what result winding it would have, as the mainspring appears sprung." If you wind it, "There is an unpleasant grinding noise from inside the canary." If you open the egg gently, "The canary chirps, slightly off key, an aria from a forgotten opera. From out of the greenery flies a lovely song bird. It perches on a limb just over your head and opens its beak to sing. As it does so, a beautiful brass bauble drops from its mouth, bounces off the top of your head, and lands glimmering in the grass. As the canary winds down, the song bird flies away." When I found that as a 7 year old, sitting in the dark after everyone in my family had gone to bed, peering into the screen of my 286, I knew that text adventures are the only game worth making.
    - moultano 11y ago
      Check out 80 days if you haven't already. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.inkle.eightydays&hl=en https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.inkle.eigh... It has lots of wonderful text.
- eropple 11y ago
  > One dot release and we're seeing a mountain of new features. A "dot release" (who really cares about numbering schemes?) that took ten months and included a number of incremental and ultimately minor features--yes, they sound very cool, but having played it last night they don't change the way the game plays all that much. I like games like this quite a lot, but this is the same cheetodusting that makes people take Linux-on-the-desktop people with all the unseriousness they demand.
  - jacobolus 11y ago
    Can you explain what you mean? Cheeto dust is bright orange goop that sticks to your fingers. I don’t understand how it relates to “ultimately minor” new game features or “unserious Linux people”.
    - eropple 11y ago
      I figured it'd be obvious in context, but if you've never had somebody way, way too into something and trying to pump up its importance get all spittle-flecked and food-spewy (literal Cheetos, in the case I most vividly recall) at you in person...well, I envy you. =)
  - metalliqaz 11y ago
    "cheetodusting" -- I don't believe I've ever seen that verb before.
  - thoth 11y ago
    >A "dot release" (who really cares about numbering schemes?) DF numbers its releases differently than most software. The developers made a list of features ("core components") they would like to implement and the version number increases for each one finished. So a "dot release" for DF means a significant new subsystem was added. v0.42.1 translates to 42 core components implemented, 1 minor release. The leading 0 means "less than 100 core components finished".
    - eropple 11y ago
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- blinks 11y ago
  I highly recommend looking into Inform7, effectively a text adventure IDE (though the community tends to call it "interactive fiction"). The language is a bit odd, and attempts to "read like English", but it provides so much scaffolding I feel like it's worth it.
  - douche 11y ago
    I used to play around with Inform 6 when I was starting to program. It was an interesting step up from QBasic, and they had a really great tutorial that stepped you through writing a William Tell based story. I never could get the hang of Inform 7, the syntax is just too free-form, and I couldn't work out how to get things right.
- qznc 11y ago
  It is not what you wish for interactibility, but you might enjoy http://seltani.net/ http://seltani.net/
- shostack 11y ago
  Case in point--I just got back into DragonRealms last night for the first time in over a decade now that they have a F2P option. I thought I'd just spend an hour playing around in The Crossing and killing some rats with my warrior mage, and that turned into three hours where I mostly was trying to remember where things were and running branches back and forth to Mags to make some starter scratch. But in those three hours I felt infinitely more addicted and immersed than I did in playing many more hours of Elder Scrolls Online, WoW, etc. While I need to find some ways of tweaking the Stormfront client more, there is truly something to be said from requiring imagination to enjoy the game.
aymeric 11y ago
It is unfortunate that a game as famous as Dwarf Fortress only makes so little in money: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=152358.0 http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=152358.0
- cfontes 11y ago
  Wow, just that. They must trully love their job.
- ta0o0o0 11y ago
  I seem to recall a profile of the game and it's creators that said it's mostly by choice. Found it: they were offered 300K just to license the name. He has refused a programming job at a major developer (he asked that I keep its name off the record) and turned down a $300,000 offer from another company to license the Dwarf Fortress name, fearing that the proposed sum wouldn’t sufficiently offset the long-term donations drop that would likely result. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/24/magazine/the-brilliance-of-dwarf-fortress.html?_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/24/magazine/the-brilliance-of...
  - lmm 11y ago
    A one-off 300K isn't a lot for two people to live on if it would cut off their donation stream completely, and if you've been doing this for 10 years it may not be easy to find a job.
    - thedavinci2000 11y ago
      Serious question. Why would it not be easy?
      - moron4hire 11y ago
        There are still a lot of employers who see time spent on your own venture as a gap in employment history. I mean, I guess it literally is, since you aren't an "employee". But they completely discount any applicable experience during that time.
epaga 11y ago
For anyone who is thinking about giving it a spin for the first time, do yourself a favor and don't get this .01 version. Either wait for a few patches or download the far more stable and mature 0.40.24 (http://www.bay12games.com/dwarves/older_versions.html http://www.bay12games.com/dwarves/older_versions.html) Dwarf Fortress is basically a perpetual beta with lots of major bugs as it is, but especially brand new major versions like this one usually have multiple game-breaking bugs, including crashes, corrupted saves, etc. It would be a shame if people willing to give it a try would give it up due to the poor quality of the initial release of a new major version. Dwarf Fortress is a truly unique game and really worth putting in the effort to learn simply due to the stories it generates as you play. Here's an example of a story that happened to me. https://www.reddit.com/r/dwarffortress/comments/1mb0cw/the_sad_story_of_môsom/ https://www.reddit.com/r/dwarffortress/comments/1mb0cw/the_s... Note this story is in no way embellished by me. Everything described there was actually simulated within the game.
- AdmiralAsshat 11y ago
  Not as engaging as the story of Boatmurdered, but amusing nonetheless.
  - traspler 11y ago
    If you like DF stories, check out Bravemule's Matul Remrit or Bronzemurder.
    - SixSigma 11y ago
      Roomcarnage is the ongoing state of the art http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=139393.0 http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=139393.0
      - saulrh 11y ago
        > Before the end of the first month, a weight is lifted off my shoulders. The dwarves will still gain unhappy thoughts when caught in the freakish weather, but compared to some of the procedurally generated horrors I've dealt with in the past, elf blood blizzards look like a fluffy wambler infestation. > Besides, an active volcano comprised entirely of ice and coated in crimson snowdrifts of frozen gore? Fucking metal. I love this game. I love Dwarf Fortress.
dpeck 11y ago
I admire the forever project, and the dedication of the brothers. I've played the game way too much in the past, but I grew increasingly frustrated with the single threaded model combined with their disinterest in fixing it. Building an expansive fortress and number of dwarfs is a lot of fun (honestly, probably the most fun I've had with a game since Dungeon Keeper and Settlers way back) but then FPS starts dropping and you find yourself doing dumb things to counteract that. The fun bits fade away and it gets tedious. To me, DF is best looked at and enjoyed as an amazing art project and an inspiration for other game devs.
- mordocai 11y ago
  To be fair, from what I understand the code was written in such a way that a very large portion of it would have to be rewritten in order for DF to be multi threaded. It's a shame it wasn't designed with multi threading as an idea in the first place, but I don't think multi core was a big thing back then.
  - dpeck 11y ago
    Somewhat true, though first release was 2006 and it was pretty clear everything was going multi-core by then. But regardless, its their pool and they choose how they want to operate it. We're fortunate that they share it with everyone because it is a very cool project, but that doesn't mean we can't take note that it falls under the weight of itself fairly quickly in practice.
    - bjz_ 11y ago
      They weren't really professional programmers though, from what I gather? Tarn was a professional mathematician. And the code base was started earlier than 2006.
- dracul104 11y ago
  There's some mods out there that try and help with fps by simplifying certain systems in the game, such as reducing the amount of material and plant types, things like that. I know Masterwork mod does this.
codewithcheese 11y ago
I've seen some mods that make Minecraft beautiful, I wonder if the same can be done for DF?
- brianwawok 11y ago
  There are some GUIs for it... but I think the complexity is so high it would be a lot of work ;)
- snerbles 11y ago
  The Lazy Newb Pack is a start, it has artwork that makes the game much more accessible.
ctdonath 11y ago
Summary of the maddening complexity of Dwarf Fortress: http://dwarffortresswiki.org/images/4/40/FunComic.png http://dwarffortresswiki.org/images/4/40/FunComic.png
- jdmichal 11y ago
  Also, for those that aren't in on the joke: In Dwarf Fortress lingo, "Fun" is a euphemism for losing. As in, Dwarf Fortress is a lot of Fun.
  - wingerlang 11y ago
    I don't think so. Because at the end the Df guy has lots of fun. I think it is just intended that once you get over the many many deaths, you will find the fun.
    - jdmichal 11y ago
      This isn't something I made up. http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php?title=DF2014:Fun&redirect=no http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php?title=DF2014:Fun&redi...
      - wingerlang 11y ago
        I understand, I just don't think the comic was referring to that.
aresant 11y ago
>First time playing dorf >Make a nice, tidy fort, everything is going great >Out of booze and it’s winter >”Oh well, the farm’s still working” >suddenly >”Urist McFarmer has gone berserk!” >and, soon after >”New migrants have arrived.” >there are like 3 children with them >they are on the entrance, where there’s a gigantic moat and a bridge >Urist McFarmer is on the other side >he pulls the lever to the bridge >all of the children are on the bridge >they fall down >they are all still alive, they fell like 12 z-levels though >the moat is almost completely red >they’re crawling around, everything is broken oh god >Urist McFarmer is finally put down by one of the miners >children aren’t even starving or dehydrating, they’re just crawling there >have to lock up the non-important people in a room so that they don’t diminish the food reserves >the nobles are sad now, the miasma is getting to them >dump the corpses in the moat, including urist mcfarmer >the children are puking and still crawling, not even starving or dehydrating, just endless agony >the migrants are still on the other side, they die too >the only people left alive are a few miners and a farmer >and the children >they never die via http://dfstories.com/ http://dfstories.com/
- shostack 11y ago
  >children aren’t even starving or dehydrating, they’re just crawling there >dump the corpses in the moat, including urist mcfarmer >the children are puking and still crawling, not even starving or dehydrating, just endless agony As morbid as it may be, I think I may have pieced together why the children didn't starve...
KirinDave 11y ago
If you'd like to learn to play the game, it's not easy. I've created a multipart video tutorial to help you sort of find your feet, learn a few of the keybinds, and get a checklist of things you need. It also talks about how to get better graphics and an isometric view. https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBrdUj1adIBD-vgUodaaxebcdqQ4oEWtg https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBrdUj1adIBD-vgUodaax... Enjoy all the fun. Dwarf Fortress is one of the only single player games that has held my attention consistently over the years. I suspect you might find it engaging as well.
- clock_tower 11y ago
  If memory serves, there's even an O'Reilly Press book on this -- "Getting Started with Dwarf Fortress" or thereabouts. (And it's for two major releases ago!)
  - richard_mcp 11y ago
    I have a copy of the book. It was pretty good when it came out and the author promised to update the digital version as the game changed.
  - KirinDave 11y ago
    I have referred to this book, and very much enjoyed it. Some people prefer a video start just to hear the thought process out loud, so I made one available.
- kdamken 11y ago
  Just wanted to say I really enjoyed watching this and that you're very good at doing tutorials. Thanks!
  - KirinDave 11y ago
    I have some other DF content on that channel if you are interested.
awakeasleep 11y ago
People who really 'got into' DF- What age were you when it clicked?
- pnathan 11y ago
  29. :-)
- snerbles 11y ago
  Eight years ago, at 22.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- parshimers 11y ago
  20. I tried it earlier, but I just couldn't figure out the interface.
snake_plissken 11y ago
Dwarf Fortress is a truly special endeavor. The gameplay is unique and engrossing. And completely maddening, in a the best way. The quirky bitmap graphics are mesmerizing. Each time you start a new game, it's a new world with new areas to explore and new chances to make your kingdom last longer than the last one. But the music! Amazing! Honestly the music is my favorite part. In a lot of ways DF is similar to the early days Minecraft. It was just "special". You can get lost in it for hours on end. Girlfriend - "You want to go out tonight?" Me - "Nah I'm good. I am just going to play Dwarf Fortress for 10 hours..." Girlfriend - "Well I am going to go to Dim Sum Garden!" Me "Iiee decisions, decisions!"
ndarilek 11y ago
Does anyone know enough about how this game works internally to know if alternative interfaces and presentations are possible? I'm blind, and have wanted to play this game ever since I heard of it years ago. I used to play console-based roguelikes, and while they were a bit slow to interact with, RLs were a refreshing tactical change from text-based IF. Reading lots of DF stories would suggest that there's some sort of internal eventbus-style system by which the characters themselves interpret their surroundings, and if you could hook into that, you could describe the world textually to some extent. You might even add audio cues for certain events to increase the non-visual fidelity of the UI. I see in some of the below comments that there's a text-based mode. Might give that a try to see if it's playable on the same scale as Nethack/Angband were for me.
- gcb0 11y ago
  how did you worked out the maze map of nethack?
  - ndarilek 11y ago
    An old 90s-era laptop with a monochrome display whose brightness I could turn down to 0, a screen reader that let me arrow around all the tiles, and a bunch of long boring high school classes where teachers thought I was such a diligent student, always taking such great notes. :P
    - crocal 11y ago
      You need to tell us more about this. It sounds like an extraordinary story!
  - bhaak 11y ago
    There's a Roguelike Radio episode called "Designing for the Visually Impaired" where they play an excerpt from a blind player playing a game of ADOM (IIRC, could also have been DCSS). http://www.roguelikeradio.com/2012/10/episode-48-designing-for-visually.html http://www.roguelikeradio.com/2012/10/episode-48-designing-f... They also touch on games that have been developed especially for blind player, without graphics only audio.
dccoolgai 11y ago
Word to those who want to begin their DF journey: counter to what you might expect for a text-based game, DF can chew a lot of CPU cycles. I always pick small world size and very short world history at worldgen, bc the larger/longer worlds have a lot more stuff for the game to keep track of and can slow it down, IME. Strike the earth!
vessenes 11y ago
The only thing that is frustrating for me about DF (well ex-game frustration, not in-game) is that getting visualizations and interface changes in is gated by Toady. I dearly wish that this part could be taken over by the open source community; it would let him keep writing the simulator, and we would get some amazing VR-friendly worlds on top of the simulator. I know that he doesn't want to support an open developer community because he, you know, wants to write his simulator and make it even more incredibly awesome than it is, but if only there were a way to get that code unlinked and into an API, it would make millions of people very happy.
AndyKelley 11y ago
I tried to play this game, and I think that the interface is a complete bottleneck. Once you have more than 12 dwarves, which you are completely intended to do, it's tedious and difficult to access them, organize them, and generally, the interface to the simulator you have is like drinking through a straw. I think the fun would be massively improved with making it easier to interact with the simulator.
- sageabilly 11y ago
  Check out Dwarf Therapist. It is what makes the game accessible IMHO.
  - dccoolgai 11y ago
    Yeah, I know a lot of people that use DFHack too, but that always seemed a little "cheat"-y to me. Therapist makes managing the labors of the dwarves (the most intensive thing in the game, really) a lot easier. I use Therapist with the regular ASCII tileset and I love it.
  - AndyKelley 11y ago
    I've heard this suggestion before, and I may have even attempted to install it at one point, but this is exactly my point. To really have a good gameplay experience one must turn to community-made tools. But the game is not open source, and really, it's kind of a fundamental user experience problem with the game. Seems like it might be worth putting into the actual game. I'm hoping that in 10-20 years, the devs have a change of heart about the importance of the user interface, or they open source the code so the community can really step in, and then I'll give it another shot :-)
    - intended 11y ago
      If you are on HN, it's quite likely you will find the issues trivial to overcome. The support tools really are ridiculously good now, and you'll find that the cost of running them is ideological, while the pay off is magical, if not inspirational. Minecraft came after notch got irritated with DF. The entire dwarf-lite genre is inspired from wanting to do DF better. Now DF has been improving it's adventure more gaming, something which had been vestigial for 90% of the dwarf fortress Dev cycle. Take a look at the kisat dur thread (Dwarven martial arts) on the bay12games forum. Go for it, you can always put it down and come back later.
sageabilly 11y ago
Anyone else compare every other game they play to Dwarf Fortress? The only game I've ever played that even comes close (IMHO) is The Long Dark, and that's only because I know the studio pours their heart and soul into the game. So glad this is still going. I hope development never stops!
lips 11y ago
Home of the best bug tracker ticket titles evar: "Lye in wood barrels can't be used for making soap" "Dwarves upset from not seeing family not in fort" "Zombies start conversation with necromancer adventurer who tries to sleep in their house"
- Zikes 11y ago
  More: https://twitter.com/TheStrangeLog https://twitter.com/TheStrangeLog
jmnicolas 11y ago
There has been a lot of articles about emacs on HN recently, so now I wonder why Dwarf Fortress is not an emacs mode ;-)
listic 11y ago
What language is Dwarf Fortress written in? It is closed source, isn't it? I assume it is, like ADOM, to keep the secrets. Though there is an obvious solution: you could separate the game data from the engine, and open-source the engine, for public benefit and participation.
- duffdevice 11y ago
  Yep, it's closed source. I dream of a day where they open-source it, but IIRC the creator has turned down various monetary offers so as to retain complete control of the game, so it seems unlikely that he'd ever release the code.
- db48x 11y ago
  It's written in C++. There are no secrets to keep; it's not like an RPG where the ending can be spoiled. Well, not really any secrets, anyway. Anyone who lives in a country where Tolkien ever published a book will have some ideas about what to expect. It's really just about creative control. He has let people help in limited ways in the past though. There were some improvements to the way it uses the OpenGL API and to the way it renders fonts (it can now use TrueType fonts for most purely-textual elements) that were contributed by a fan. he later stated that although it was a good improvement to the game, it wasn't an unalloyed good. The changes _worked_, but he no longer understood that part of the code very well.
nodivbyzero 11y ago
Is Dwarf Fortress open source?

330 points by robinhoodexe 11y ago

This is why text-based games are king. One dot release and we're seeing a mountain of new features. I've always dreamed of getting together a big budget to make a text adventure (e.g. Zork) of incredible scope, both in depth and "interactibility" -- a complex object typologies system, bring in learning chat bots for NPCs, and a system where users can add new objects, rooms and descriptions while they play, a complete object relational system (so it can tell "on", from "next to", from "above"), a very complete state system and so on. Perhaps an "adjectives system", so it knows a huge amount of adjectives relating to any one object, and can generate simple novel sentences about that object on repeat views. I think that at some point someone will be crazy enough to do it, and it's going to be most excellent.

isxek 11y ago
There were attempts at implementing some of what you suggested - here's one: https://www.guncho.com/ https://www.guncho.com/
- jplur 11y ago
  So Guncho interfaces a mud server to inform7 runtimes? I used inform7's function dispatching as the basis for a python MUD engine, fun stuff - https://github.com/selfsame/mud.tilde.town https://github.com/selfsame/mud.tilde.town
macintux 11y ago
How would this be substantively different from Muds?
- hodwik2 11y ago
  Right, yes, some of these features were added to various MUDs with some amount of success. The big difference I'm arguing for is scope, and engineering. If you have NPC chat bots that can learn, and an adjectives and typologies system for object, combine them so that chat bots can talk about objects adjectives and typologies. That sort of thing, really engineer the hell out of it. In the end it would all be a massive NLP problem. As major advances in NLP happen the possibilities for MUDs is massive.
  - dkersten 11y ago
    Some of the more modern MUDs are pretty advanced. I was reading a bunch of stuff by the GodWars 2 guy and he has some pretty cool features (eg the areas are very dynamic). Not the same scope as DF, of course, but still surprisingly fancy. There's still a lot of room for more, though :) I'd personally love to see or make something like what you describe too... I even started tinkering with my own home grown little MUD server written in Clojure, where I had intended to try out some fancy ideas... but lost interest because it would take a huge time investment and I'd be the only player in a multiplayer environment - maybe a single player game like you say would be better after all.
- 0xdeadbeefbabe 11y ago
  It is single player or SUD.
jplur 11y ago
Fun to note DF is a massive voxel simulation that displays a 2D slice as ascii. There's some neat third party visualizers that can hook into it's memory to show more. http://i.imgur.com/PTj1QpL.jpg http://i.imgur.com/PTj1QpL.jpg
- scotty79 11y ago
  Wow. I'd definitely play it with that UI. I often wonder why games almost never have swappable (or even just scriptable) UI-s that could allow player to use shorthands through UI drudgery.
  - kbenson 11y ago
    For many popular roguelike games different tilesets are common. Search for "dwarf fortress tileset".
    - wagglycocks 11y ago
      I'd recommend installing the Lazy Newb Pack instead. It has all the tools and tileset you need preconfigured: http://lazynewbpack.com/ http://lazynewbpack.com/
      - Raphmedia 11y ago
        Now that's what I needed to try this game. Last time I tried, I spent hours and hours downloading tools and never ever got to play the actual game!
        qznc 11y ago
        Also read some introductions. Some tips like "no aquifer" for your first settlement really ease it. http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2014:Quickstart_guide http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2014:Quickstart_gui...
  - zyxley 11y ago
ajuc 11y ago
Making it a text game instead of minecraft-like would limit the audience and save next to nothing in development time IMHO.
- hodwik2 11y ago
  At the very beginning of Zork you are wandering through the forest. At one point, after branching around for a while you hear a bird singing above. If you say 'climb the tree' you read "You are about ten feet above the ground nestled among some large branches. The nearest branch above you is beyond your reach." If you 'climb higher' you see "On the branch is a small birds nest. " If you look in the nest, "In the bird's nest is a large egg encrusted with precious jewels, apparently scavenged somewhere by a childless songbird. The egg is covered with fine gold inlay and ornamented in lapis lazuli and mother-of-pearl. Unlike most eggs, this one is hinged and has a delicate looking clasp holding it closed. The egg appears extremely fragile." If you open the egg roughly, "There is a golden clockwork canary nestled in the egg. It seems to have recently had a bad experience. The mountings for its jewel-like eyes are empty, and its silver beak is crumpled. Through a cracked crystal window below its left wing you can see the remains of intricate machinery. It is not clear what result winding it would have, as the mainspring appears sprung." If you wind it, "There is an unpleasant grinding noise from inside the canary." If you open the egg gently, "The canary chirps, slightly off key, an aria from a forgotten opera. From out of the greenery flies a lovely song bird. It perches on a limb just over your head and opens its beak to sing. As it does so, a beautiful brass bauble drops from its mouth, bounces off the top of your head, and lands glimmering in the grass. As the canary winds down, the song bird flies away." When I found that as a 7 year old, sitting in the dark after everyone in my family had gone to bed, peering into the screen of my 286, I knew that text adventures are the only game worth making.
  - moultano 11y ago
    Check out 80 days if you haven't already. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.inkle.eightydays&hl=en https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.inkle.eigh... It has lots of wonderful text.
eropple 11y ago
> One dot release and we're seeing a mountain of new features. A "dot release" (who really cares about numbering schemes?) that took ten months and included a number of incremental and ultimately minor features--yes, they sound very cool, but having played it last night they don't change the way the game plays all that much. I like games like this quite a lot, but this is the same cheetodusting that makes people take Linux-on-the-desktop people with all the unseriousness they demand.
- jacobolus 11y ago
  Can you explain what you mean? Cheeto dust is bright orange goop that sticks to your fingers. I don’t understand how it relates to “ultimately minor” new game features or “unserious Linux people”.
  - eropple 11y ago
    I figured it'd be obvious in context, but if you've never had somebody way, way too into something and trying to pump up its importance get all spittle-flecked and food-spewy (literal Cheetos, in the case I most vividly recall) at you in person...well, I envy you. =)
- metalliqaz 11y ago
  "cheetodusting" -- I don't believe I've ever seen that verb before.
- thoth 11y ago
  >A "dot release" (who really cares about numbering schemes?) DF numbers its releases differently than most software. The developers made a list of features ("core components") they would like to implement and the version number increases for each one finished. So a "dot release" for DF means a significant new subsystem was added. v0.42.1 translates to 42 core components implemented, 1 minor release. The leading 0 means "less than 100 core components finished".
  - eropple 11y ago
deleted 11y ago
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blinks 11y ago
I highly recommend looking into Inform7, effectively a text adventure IDE (though the community tends to call it "interactive fiction"). The language is a bit odd, and attempts to "read like English", but it provides so much scaffolding I feel like it's worth it.
- douche 11y ago
  I used to play around with Inform 6 when I was starting to program. It was an interesting step up from QBasic, and they had a really great tutorial that stepped you through writing a William Tell based story. I never could get the hang of Inform 7, the syntax is just too free-form, and I couldn't work out how to get things right.
qznc 11y ago
It is not what you wish for interactibility, but you might enjoy http://seltani.net/ http://seltani.net/
shostack 11y ago
Case in point--I just got back into DragonRealms last night for the first time in over a decade now that they have a F2P option. I thought I'd just spend an hour playing around in The Crossing and killing some rats with my warrior mage, and that turned into three hours where I mostly was trying to remember where things were and running branches back and forth to Mags to make some starter scratch. But in those three hours I felt infinitely more addicted and immersed than I did in playing many more hours of Elder Scrolls Online, WoW, etc. While I need to find some ways of tweaking the Stormfront client more, there is truly something to be said from requiring imagination to enjoy the game.

aymeric 11y ago

It is unfortunate that a game as famous as Dwarf Fortress only makes so little in money: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=152358.0 http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=152358.0

cfontes 11y ago
Wow, just that. They must trully love their job.
ta0o0o0 11y ago
I seem to recall a profile of the game and it's creators that said it's mostly by choice. Found it: they were offered 300K just to license the name. He has refused a programming job at a major developer (he asked that I keep its name off the record) and turned down a $300,000 offer from another company to license the Dwarf Fortress name, fearing that the proposed sum wouldn’t sufficiently offset the long-term donations drop that would likely result. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/24/magazine/the-brilliance-of-dwarf-fortress.html?_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/24/magazine/the-brilliance-of...
- lmm 11y ago
  A one-off 300K isn't a lot for two people to live on if it would cut off their donation stream completely, and if you've been doing this for 10 years it may not be easy to find a job.
  - thedavinci2000 11y ago
    Serious question. Why would it not be easy?
    - moron4hire 11y ago
      There are still a lot of employers who see time spent on your own venture as a gap in employment history. I mean, I guess it literally is, since you aren't an "employee". But they completely discount any applicable experience during that time.

epaga 11y ago

For anyone who is thinking about giving it a spin for the first time, do yourself a favor and don't get this .01 version. Either wait for a few patches or download the far more stable and mature 0.40.24 (http://www.bay12games.com/dwarves/older_versions.html http://www.bay12games.com/dwarves/older_versions.html) Dwarf Fortress is basically a perpetual beta with lots of major bugs as it is, but especially brand new major versions like this one usually have multiple game-breaking bugs, including crashes, corrupted saves, etc. It would be a shame if people willing to give it a try would give it up due to the poor quality of the initial release of a new major version. Dwarf Fortress is a truly unique game and really worth putting in the effort to learn simply due to the stories it generates as you play. Here's an example of a story that happened to me. https://www.reddit.com/r/dwarffortress/comments/1mb0cw/the_sad_story_of_môsom/ https://www.reddit.com/r/dwarffortress/comments/1mb0cw/the_s... Note this story is in no way embellished by me. Everything described there was actually simulated within the game.

AdmiralAsshat 11y ago
Not as engaging as the story of Boatmurdered, but amusing nonetheless.
- traspler 11y ago
  If you like DF stories, check out Bravemule's Matul Remrit or Bronzemurder.
  - SixSigma 11y ago
    Roomcarnage is the ongoing state of the art http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=139393.0 http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=139393.0
    - saulrh 11y ago
      > Before the end of the first month, a weight is lifted off my shoulders. The dwarves will still gain unhappy thoughts when caught in the freakish weather, but compared to some of the procedurally generated horrors I've dealt with in the past, elf blood blizzards look like a fluffy wambler infestation. > Besides, an active volcano comprised entirely of ice and coated in crimson snowdrifts of frozen gore? Fucking metal. I love this game. I love Dwarf Fortress.

dpeck 11y ago

I admire the forever project, and the dedication of the brothers. I've played the game way too much in the past, but I grew increasingly frustrated with the single threaded model combined with their disinterest in fixing it. Building an expansive fortress and number of dwarfs is a lot of fun (honestly, probably the most fun I've had with a game since Dungeon Keeper and Settlers way back) but then FPS starts dropping and you find yourself doing dumb things to counteract that. The fun bits fade away and it gets tedious. To me, DF is best looked at and enjoyed as an amazing art project and an inspiration for other game devs.

mordocai 11y ago
To be fair, from what I understand the code was written in such a way that a very large portion of it would have to be rewritten in order for DF to be multi threaded. It's a shame it wasn't designed with multi threading as an idea in the first place, but I don't think multi core was a big thing back then.
- dpeck 11y ago
  Somewhat true, though first release was 2006 and it was pretty clear everything was going multi-core by then. But regardless, its their pool and they choose how they want to operate it. We're fortunate that they share it with everyone because it is a very cool project, but that doesn't mean we can't take note that it falls under the weight of itself fairly quickly in practice.
  - bjz_ 11y ago
    They weren't really professional programmers though, from what I gather? Tarn was a professional mathematician. And the code base was started earlier than 2006.
dracul104 11y ago
There's some mods out there that try and help with fps by simplifying certain systems in the game, such as reducing the amount of material and plant types, things like that. I know Masterwork mod does this.

codewithcheese 11y ago

I've seen some mods that make Minecraft beautiful, I wonder if the same can be done for DF?

brianwawok 11y ago
There are some GUIs for it... but I think the complexity is so high it would be a lot of work ;)
snerbles 11y ago
The Lazy Newb Pack is a start, it has artwork that makes the game much more accessible.

ctdonath 11y ago

Summary of the maddening complexity of Dwarf Fortress: http://dwarffortresswiki.org/images/4/40/FunComic.png http://dwarffortresswiki.org/images/4/40/FunComic.png

jdmichal 11y ago
Also, for those that aren't in on the joke: In Dwarf Fortress lingo, "Fun" is a euphemism for losing. As in, Dwarf Fortress is a lot of Fun.
- wingerlang 11y ago
  I don't think so. Because at the end the Df guy has lots of fun. I think it is just intended that once you get over the many many deaths, you will find the fun.
  - jdmichal 11y ago
    This isn't something I made up. http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php?title=DF2014:Fun&redirect=no http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php?title=DF2014:Fun&redi...
    - wingerlang 11y ago
      I understand, I just don't think the comic was referring to that.

aresant 11y ago

>First time playing dorf >Make a nice, tidy fort, everything is going great >Out of booze and it’s winter >”Oh well, the farm’s still working” >suddenly >”Urist McFarmer has gone berserk!” >and, soon after >”New migrants have arrived.” >there are like 3 children with them >they are on the entrance, where there’s a gigantic moat and a bridge >Urist McFarmer is on the other side >he pulls the lever to the bridge >all of the children are on the bridge >they fall down >they are all still alive, they fell like 12 z-levels though >the moat is almost completely red >they’re crawling around, everything is broken oh god >Urist McFarmer is finally put down by one of the miners >children aren’t even starving or dehydrating, they’re just crawling there >have to lock up the non-important people in a room so that they don’t diminish the food reserves >the nobles are sad now, the miasma is getting to them >dump the corpses in the moat, including urist mcfarmer >the children are puking and still crawling, not even starving or dehydrating, just endless agony >the migrants are still on the other side, they die too >the only people left alive are a few miners and a farmer >and the children >they never die via http://dfstories.com/ http://dfstories.com/

shostack 11y ago
>children aren’t even starving or dehydrating, they’re just crawling there >dump the corpses in the moat, including urist mcfarmer >the children are puking and still crawling, not even starving or dehydrating, just endless agony As morbid as it may be, I think I may have pieced together why the children didn't starve...

KirinDave 11y ago

If you'd like to learn to play the game, it's not easy. I've created a multipart video tutorial to help you sort of find your feet, learn a few of the keybinds, and get a checklist of things you need. It also talks about how to get better graphics and an isometric view. https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBrdUj1adIBD-vgUodaaxebcdqQ4oEWtg https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBrdUj1adIBD-vgUodaax... Enjoy all the fun. Dwarf Fortress is one of the only single player games that has held my attention consistently over the years. I suspect you might find it engaging as well.

clock_tower 11y ago
If memory serves, there's even an O'Reilly Press book on this -- "Getting Started with Dwarf Fortress" or thereabouts. (And it's for two major releases ago!)
- richard_mcp 11y ago
  I have a copy of the book. It was pretty good when it came out and the author promised to update the digital version as the game changed.
- KirinDave 11y ago
  I have referred to this book, and very much enjoyed it. Some people prefer a video start just to hear the thought process out loud, so I made one available.
kdamken 11y ago
Just wanted to say I really enjoyed watching this and that you're very good at doing tutorials. Thanks!
- KirinDave 11y ago
  I have some other DF content on that channel if you are interested.

awakeasleep 11y ago

People who really 'got into' DF- What age were you when it clicked?

pnathan 11y ago
29. :-)
snerbles 11y ago
Eight years ago, at 22.
deleted 11y ago
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parshimers 11y ago
20. I tried it earlier, but I just couldn't figure out the interface.

snake_plissken 11y ago

Dwarf Fortress is a truly special endeavor. The gameplay is unique and engrossing. And completely maddening, in a the best way. The quirky bitmap graphics are mesmerizing. Each time you start a new game, it's a new world with new areas to explore and new chances to make your kingdom last longer than the last one. But the music! Amazing! Honestly the music is my favorite part. In a lot of ways DF is similar to the early days Minecraft. It was just "special". You can get lost in it for hours on end. Girlfriend - "You want to go out tonight?" Me - "Nah I'm good. I am just going to play Dwarf Fortress for 10 hours..." Girlfriend - "Well I am going to go to Dim Sum Garden!" Me "Iiee decisions, decisions!"

ndarilek 11y ago

Does anyone know enough about how this game works internally to know if alternative interfaces and presentations are possible? I'm blind, and have wanted to play this game ever since I heard of it years ago. I used to play console-based roguelikes, and while they were a bit slow to interact with, RLs were a refreshing tactical change from text-based IF. Reading lots of DF stories would suggest that there's some sort of internal eventbus-style system by which the characters themselves interpret their surroundings, and if you could hook into that, you could describe the world textually to some extent. You might even add audio cues for certain events to increase the non-visual fidelity of the UI. I see in some of the below comments that there's a text-based mode. Might give that a try to see if it's playable on the same scale as Nethack/Angband were for me.

gcb0 11y ago
how did you worked out the maze map of nethack?
- ndarilek 11y ago
  An old 90s-era laptop with a monochrome display whose brightness I could turn down to 0, a screen reader that let me arrow around all the tiles, and a bunch of long boring high school classes where teachers thought I was such a diligent student, always taking such great notes. :P
  - crocal 11y ago
    You need to tell us more about this. It sounds like an extraordinary story!
- bhaak 11y ago
  There's a Roguelike Radio episode called "Designing for the Visually Impaired" where they play an excerpt from a blind player playing a game of ADOM (IIRC, could also have been DCSS). http://www.roguelikeradio.com/2012/10/episode-48-designing-for-visually.html http://www.roguelikeradio.com/2012/10/episode-48-designing-f... They also touch on games that have been developed especially for blind player, without graphics only audio.

dccoolgai 11y ago

Word to those who want to begin their DF journey: counter to what you might expect for a text-based game, DF can chew a lot of CPU cycles. I always pick small world size and very short world history at worldgen, bc the larger/longer worlds have a lot more stuff for the game to keep track of and can slow it down, IME. Strike the earth!

vessenes 11y ago

The only thing that is frustrating for me about DF (well ex-game frustration, not in-game) is that getting visualizations and interface changes in is gated by Toady. I dearly wish that this part could be taken over by the open source community; it would let him keep writing the simulator, and we would get some amazing VR-friendly worlds on top of the simulator. I know that he doesn't want to support an open developer community because he, you know, wants to write his simulator and make it even more incredibly awesome than it is, but if only there were a way to get that code unlinked and into an API, it would make millions of people very happy.

AndyKelley 11y ago

I tried to play this game, and I think that the interface is a complete bottleneck. Once you have more than 12 dwarves, which you are completely intended to do, it's tedious and difficult to access them, organize them, and generally, the interface to the simulator you have is like drinking through a straw. I think the fun would be massively improved with making it easier to interact with the simulator.

sageabilly 11y ago
Check out Dwarf Therapist. It is what makes the game accessible IMHO.
- dccoolgai 11y ago
  Yeah, I know a lot of people that use DFHack too, but that always seemed a little "cheat"-y to me. Therapist makes managing the labors of the dwarves (the most intensive thing in the game, really) a lot easier. I use Therapist with the regular ASCII tileset and I love it.
- AndyKelley 11y ago
  I've heard this suggestion before, and I may have even attempted to install it at one point, but this is exactly my point. To really have a good gameplay experience one must turn to community-made tools. But the game is not open source, and really, it's kind of a fundamental user experience problem with the game. Seems like it might be worth putting into the actual game. I'm hoping that in 10-20 years, the devs have a change of heart about the importance of the user interface, or they open source the code so the community can really step in, and then I'll give it another shot :-)
  - intended 11y ago
    If you are on HN, it's quite likely you will find the issues trivial to overcome. The support tools really are ridiculously good now, and you'll find that the cost of running them is ideological, while the pay off is magical, if not inspirational. Minecraft came after notch got irritated with DF. The entire dwarf-lite genre is inspired from wanting to do DF better. Now DF has been improving it's adventure more gaming, something which had been vestigial for 90% of the dwarf fortress Dev cycle. Take a look at the kisat dur thread (Dwarven martial arts) on the bay12games forum. Go for it, you can always put it down and come back later.

sageabilly 11y ago

Anyone else compare every other game they play to Dwarf Fortress? The only game I've ever played that even comes close (IMHO) is The Long Dark, and that's only because I know the studio pours their heart and soul into the game. So glad this is still going. I hope development never stops!

lips 11y ago

Home of the best bug tracker ticket titles evar: "Lye in wood barrels can't be used for making soap" "Dwarves upset from not seeing family not in fort" "Zombies start conversation with necromancer adventurer who tries to sleep in their house"

Zikes 11y ago
More: https://twitter.com/TheStrangeLog https://twitter.com/TheStrangeLog

jmnicolas 11y ago

There has been a lot of articles about emacs on HN recently, so now I wonder why Dwarf Fortress is not an emacs mode ;-)

listic 11y ago

What language is Dwarf Fortress written in? It is closed source, isn't it? I assume it is, like ADOM, to keep the secrets. Though there is an obvious solution: you could separate the game data from the engine, and open-source the engine, for public benefit and participation.

duffdevice 11y ago
Yep, it's closed source. I dream of a day where they open-source it, but IIRC the creator has turned down various monetary offers so as to retain complete control of the game, so it seems unlikely that he'd ever release the code.
db48x 11y ago
It's written in C++. There are no secrets to keep; it's not like an RPG where the ending can be spoiled. Well, not really any secrets, anyway. Anyone who lives in a country where Tolkien ever published a book will have some ideas about what to expect. It's really just about creative control. He has let people help in limited ways in the past though. There were some improvements to the way it uses the OpenGL API and to the way it renders fonts (it can now use TrueType fonts for most purely-textual elements) that were contributed by a fan. he later stated that although it was a good improvement to the game, it wasn't an unalloyed good. The changes _worked_, but he no longer understood that part of the code very well.

nodivbyzero 11y ago

Is Dwarf Fortress open source?