9 ms·

Dwarf Fortress desperately needs multithreading and optimization for data locality. Without that it is permanently limited in scope. But it will never ever hap

by TillE 10y ago

Dwarf Fortress desperately needs multithreading and optimization for data locality. Without that it is permanently limited in scope. But it will never ever happen. Forget it. Anyone dreaming about open source DF should go make their own game. And I mean that sincerely: Dwarf Fortress is very good, but there are even greater things that will come. Build those things!

RangerScience 10y ago
This has somewhat happened a lot. To an extent, the entire crafting genre owes itself to DF, which inspired Minecraft, and between the two of them, a genre was born... However, as yet, no-one's come close to the epicness of the generated world and story, even if they've made progress on the core gameplay.
- andrepd 10y ago
  I hear that claim, but do you have sources to back the fact that Minecraft was significantly influenced by DF? I mean, there was a crafting mechanic before DF, right? And not many gameplay elements from DF found their way into Minecraft at all.
  - praccu 10y ago
    http://www.wired.com/2013/11/minecraft-book/ http://www.wired.com/2013/11/minecraft-book/
  - beardog 10y ago
    http://notch.tumblr.com/post/227922045/the-origins-of-minecraft#_=_ http://notch.tumblr.com/post/227922045/the-origins-of-minecr...
    - placeybordeaux 10y ago
      Dead links galore, the way back version has the images, but not the games nor videos: https://web.archive.org/web/20091102174928/http://notch.tumblr.com/post/227922045/the-origins-of-minecraft https://web.archive.org/web/20091102174928/http://notch.tumb...
  - peterashford 10y ago
    Notch cited DF and Infiminer as influences.
  - anothermouse 10y ago
    Surely Sim City be classed as being based around a crafting mechanic?
    - eru 10y ago
      How so?
- vacri 10y ago
  Not to mention the dozens of "DF with graphics!" clones currently living on Steam... none of which remotely approach the complexity and flexibility of the original (though they do look better and have better UIs)
  - timlyo 10y ago
    It's very different, but Rimworld gives me a similar feel to dwarf fortress in regards to depth, and has a far better interface. Not that it's close to done yet.
    - qznc 10y ago
      Rimworld is a very direct clone of Dwarf Fortress, but in a Sci Fi setting and by a professional game dev. Tynan Sylvester previously worked on BioShock Infinite. It has proper graphics (though simple, it is a one man project). It includes utilities like Dwarf Therapist. The random events are not so random, but tries for better story telling. There are some limitations, which might or might not be fixed. For example, there is no digging down, only one z layer, so you cannot build elaborate fatal traps. Overall, I really like it. :)
      - RangerScience 10y ago
        That sounds kind of like old schools DF, where you dug to the right instead of down.
  - exDM69 10y ago
    Prison Architect may be more influenced by Dungeon Keeper than Dwarf Fortress but it's pretty deep and complex. I haven't tried other DF inspired games from Steam, though...
    - pluma 10y ago
      Chris Delay has called PA "my very own Dwarf Fortress" and it was directly inspired by his work on Subversion, a failed "universal simulation" game based on similar ideas as DF. Subversion tried to generate everything and have deeply complex simulations -- mostly because he realized Introversion couldn't design every last detail by hand at the scale the project was trying to provide. PA itself was actually directly the result of Chris realizing that he had more fun trying to build these intricate simulated scenarios than actually playing them. There's a beautiful demonstration of Subversion where he shows a heist scenario with intricate alarm and security systems and how the player could just bypass all of it by simply shooting people -- that was apparently the dying blow to the project.
- em3rgent0rdr 10y ago
  >> "To an extent, the entire crafting genre owes itself to DF" There's plenty of crafting games way before DF. In fact, some of the earliest RPGs I played, like Neverwinter Nights (1991), allowed crafting weapons and armour. Maybe crafting has taken off a bit (too much) since DF.
  - RangerScience 10y ago
    Different kinds of crafting, definitely. Not just a quantitative difference. DF and it's descendants, you take apart the world to rebuild it. RPG crafting is just fetch quests and recipes.
- qznc 10y ago
  There is no name for this genre, though. I'd try "survival sandbox". In Minecraft and Dwarf Fortress the initial goal is to survive. Later the game turns into a sandbox where you can build magnificent structures. For the sandboxing there is some complex simulation going on (biomes,fluid dynamics,etc).
  - RangerScience 10y ago
    Survival sandbox seems pretty good... but I don't think that difficulty curve description is accurate. http://i.imgur.com/YzevDTs.png http://i.imgur.com/YzevDTs.png http://dwarffortresswiki.org/images/4/40/FunComic.png http://dwarffortresswiki.org/images/4/40/FunComic.png
    - ethbro 10y ago
      Interesting point, apparently no one knows where that image originated, or what it originally said. I know EVE was in the original version I saw years back, and there seems to be some misattribution to XKCD (presumably due to the art style and humorous graphs?). Bonus points if anyone knows the POTBS reference offhand. http://images.mmorpg.com/features/4577/images/LearningCurve.jpg http://images.mmorpg.com/features/4577/images/LearningCurve.... https://m.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/3m1ahz/which_games_have_the_most_ridiculous/ https://m.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/3m1ahz/which_games...
dave_sullivan 10y ago
Throwing it out there, but if anyone is interested in building an open source DF, email me. It's been a side project of mine (more specifically, the story/history generation components) but I haven't pursued it as much as I'd like.
simbalion 10y ago
There are already games that are better than DF available today. Several of them, some 3D, some 2D, all of them are superior games. The only thing DF has going for it is the depth of detail. That is a significant feature, but some day one of these superior games is going to have that too. I am a huge DF fan, I wish they'd hire an art developer or something. It's just ridiculous.
- deiangeorgiev 10y ago
  What's some of those games? Interested in trying out some new stuff
  - simbalion 10y ago
    Gnomoria is my personal favorite. There is a great 3D one that lacks features but the interface is great, that one is called Dwarves! if I recall correctly.
    - viraptor 10y ago
      I tried Gnomoria and it simply doesn't compare to DF. You could read multiple reviews on steam to find out lots of stupid bugs, but here's a taste: gnomes don't comprehend levels and path finding across levels fails badly - if you want to build a fence around some tunnel entrance, you'll find them running around confused until they die. (https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=675591192 https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=67559...) And it won't be fixed. Gnomoria is "complete" as far as I know and no updates are planned. My next favorite is that gnomes will happily do any work when injured, but if you have a hospital? They'll lay on the bed and die out of hunger just because nobody is assigned to care for them. (http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=675590886 http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=675590...) And that's ignoring the lack of any story component, complex interactions, any interesting events apart from "something came to attack your area", etc. It's just boring once you play it a few times.
      - 10y ago
cothalesr 10y ago
It seems that the project is now dead, sadly. But you could easily pick up where they left off since it's open source. http://www.goblincamp.com/ http://www.goblincamp.com/
em3rgent0rdr 10y ago
Second that mulithreading and optimization. My computer is 8-core, but each core is only maxes at 1.8 Ghz, which prevents me from playing on large maps, which basically caused me to give up on the game. There are tons of smart people out there who would gladly volunteer time to improve the code if it was open source.
intended 10y ago
Dwarf fortress is the Bloomberg of gaming - used by a niche set of users, uglier than sin, non trivial entry barriers, and a focus on depth and breadth of services which are unmatched. And in the same way, they are honey traps for young coders who don't get the sheer amount of different games which are working together here. (With the commensurate gripes about interfaces as well)
- 946789987649 10y ago
  When is the Reuters Eikon competitor coming out for DF then? I want something pretty with an intuitive UI!
  - outworlder 10y ago
    Rimworld certainly delivers on the intuitive UI aspect. It is a baby compared to Dwarf Fortress though.
stefs 10y ago
i think the type of programmer who fusses over data locality and multi threading isn't the same one who happily implements sand in the eye making the creature blind (until it's washed out by rain or splashing fluids).

by TillE 10y ago

RangerScience 10y ago

This has somewhat happened a lot. To an extent, the entire crafting genre owes itself to DF, which inspired Minecraft, and between the two of them, a genre was born... However, as yet, no-one's come close to the epicness of the generated world and story, even if they've made progress on the core gameplay.

andrepd 10y ago
I hear that claim, but do you have sources to back the fact that Minecraft was significantly influenced by DF? I mean, there was a crafting mechanic before DF, right? And not many gameplay elements from DF found their way into Minecraft at all.
- praccu 10y ago
  http://www.wired.com/2013/11/minecraft-book/ http://www.wired.com/2013/11/minecraft-book/
- beardog 10y ago
  http://notch.tumblr.com/post/227922045/the-origins-of-minecraft#_=_ http://notch.tumblr.com/post/227922045/the-origins-of-minecr...
  - placeybordeaux 10y ago
    Dead links galore, the way back version has the images, but not the games nor videos: https://web.archive.org/web/20091102174928/http://notch.tumblr.com/post/227922045/the-origins-of-minecraft https://web.archive.org/web/20091102174928/http://notch.tumb...
- peterashford 10y ago
  Notch cited DF and Infiminer as influences.
- anothermouse 10y ago
  Surely Sim City be classed as being based around a crafting mechanic?
  - eru 10y ago
    How so?
vacri 10y ago
Not to mention the dozens of "DF with graphics!" clones currently living on Steam... none of which remotely approach the complexity and flexibility of the original (though they do look better and have better UIs)
- timlyo 10y ago
  It's very different, but Rimworld gives me a similar feel to dwarf fortress in regards to depth, and has a far better interface. Not that it's close to done yet.
  - qznc 10y ago
    Rimworld is a very direct clone of Dwarf Fortress, but in a Sci Fi setting and by a professional game dev. Tynan Sylvester previously worked on BioShock Infinite. It has proper graphics (though simple, it is a one man project). It includes utilities like Dwarf Therapist. The random events are not so random, but tries for better story telling. There are some limitations, which might or might not be fixed. For example, there is no digging down, only one z layer, so you cannot build elaborate fatal traps. Overall, I really like it. :)
    - RangerScience 10y ago
      That sounds kind of like old schools DF, where you dug to the right instead of down.
- exDM69 10y ago
  Prison Architect may be more influenced by Dungeon Keeper than Dwarf Fortress but it's pretty deep and complex. I haven't tried other DF inspired games from Steam, though...
  - pluma 10y ago
    Chris Delay has called PA "my very own Dwarf Fortress" and it was directly inspired by his work on Subversion, a failed "universal simulation" game based on similar ideas as DF. Subversion tried to generate everything and have deeply complex simulations -- mostly because he realized Introversion couldn't design every last detail by hand at the scale the project was trying to provide. PA itself was actually directly the result of Chris realizing that he had more fun trying to build these intricate simulated scenarios than actually playing them. There's a beautiful demonstration of Subversion where he shows a heist scenario with intricate alarm and security systems and how the player could just bypass all of it by simply shooting people -- that was apparently the dying blow to the project.
em3rgent0rdr 10y ago
>> "To an extent, the entire crafting genre owes itself to DF" There's plenty of crafting games way before DF. In fact, some of the earliest RPGs I played, like Neverwinter Nights (1991), allowed crafting weapons and armour. Maybe crafting has taken off a bit (too much) since DF.
- RangerScience 10y ago
  Different kinds of crafting, definitely. Not just a quantitative difference. DF and it's descendants, you take apart the world to rebuild it. RPG crafting is just fetch quests and recipes.
qznc 10y ago
There is no name for this genre, though. I'd try "survival sandbox". In Minecraft and Dwarf Fortress the initial goal is to survive. Later the game turns into a sandbox where you can build magnificent structures. For the sandboxing there is some complex simulation going on (biomes,fluid dynamics,etc).
- RangerScience 10y ago
  Survival sandbox seems pretty good... but I don't think that difficulty curve description is accurate. http://i.imgur.com/YzevDTs.png http://i.imgur.com/YzevDTs.png http://dwarffortresswiki.org/images/4/40/FunComic.png http://dwarffortresswiki.org/images/4/40/FunComic.png
  - ethbro 10y ago
    Interesting point, apparently no one knows where that image originated, or what it originally said. I know EVE was in the original version I saw years back, and there seems to be some misattribution to XKCD (presumably due to the art style and humorous graphs?). Bonus points if anyone knows the POTBS reference offhand. http://images.mmorpg.com/features/4577/images/LearningCurve.jpg http://images.mmorpg.com/features/4577/images/LearningCurve.... https://m.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/3m1ahz/which_games_have_the_most_ridiculous/ https://m.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/3m1ahz/which_games...

dave_sullivan 10y ago

Throwing it out there, but if anyone is interested in building an open source DF, email me. It's been a side project of mine (more specifically, the story/history generation components) but I haven't pursued it as much as I'd like.

simbalion 10y ago

There are already games that are better than DF available today. Several of them, some 3D, some 2D, all of them are superior games. The only thing DF has going for it is the depth of detail. That is a significant feature, but some day one of these superior games is going to have that too. I am a huge DF fan, I wish they'd hire an art developer or something. It's just ridiculous.

deiangeorgiev 10y ago
What's some of those games? Interested in trying out some new stuff
- simbalion 10y ago
  Gnomoria is my personal favorite. There is a great 3D one that lacks features but the interface is great, that one is called Dwarves! if I recall correctly.
  - viraptor 10y ago
    I tried Gnomoria and it simply doesn't compare to DF. You could read multiple reviews on steam to find out lots of stupid bugs, but here's a taste: gnomes don't comprehend levels and path finding across levels fails badly - if you want to build a fence around some tunnel entrance, you'll find them running around confused until they die. (https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=675591192 https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=67559...) And it won't be fixed. Gnomoria is "complete" as far as I know and no updates are planned. My next favorite is that gnomes will happily do any work when injured, but if you have a hospital? They'll lay on the bed and die out of hunger just because nobody is assigned to care for them. (http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=675590886 http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=675590...) And that's ignoring the lack of any story component, complex interactions, any interesting events apart from "something came to attack your area", etc. It's just boring once you play it a few times.
    - 10y ago

cothalesr 10y ago

It seems that the project is now dead, sadly. But you could easily pick up where they left off since it's open source. http://www.goblincamp.com/ http://www.goblincamp.com/

em3rgent0rdr 10y ago

Second that mulithreading and optimization. My computer is 8-core, but each core is only maxes at 1.8 Ghz, which prevents me from playing on large maps, which basically caused me to give up on the game. There are tons of smart people out there who would gladly volunteer time to improve the code if it was open source.

intended 10y ago

Dwarf fortress is the Bloomberg of gaming - used by a niche set of users, uglier than sin, non trivial entry barriers, and a focus on depth and breadth of services which are unmatched. And in the same way, they are honey traps for young coders who don't get the sheer amount of different games which are working together here. (With the commensurate gripes about interfaces as well)

946789987649 10y ago
When is the Reuters Eikon competitor coming out for DF then? I want something pretty with an intuitive UI!
- outworlder 10y ago
  Rimworld certainly delivers on the intuitive UI aspect. It is a baby compared to Dwarf Fortress though.

stefs 10y ago

i think the type of programmer who fusses over data locality and multi threading isn't the same one who happily implements sand in the eye making the creature blind (until it's washed out by rain or splashing fluids).