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After 20 years the Dwarf Fortress devs have to get used to being millionaires
- Aleksdev 4y ago>"We found a foolproof way of saving our money, which was to not sell anything for 20 years and then drop it all," Zach deadpanned. Lol
- TrevorJ 4y agoThey are definitely in 'set for life if we make wise choices' territory. In another month I'm betting they will be in 'set for life even if we make foolish choices' territory. I'm really happy for them. They really stayed true to their passion and I'm happy to see them rewarded for this.
- eadmund 4y ago> In another month I'm betting they will be in 'set for life even if we make foolish choices' territory. I hope so, but it is amazing how quickly one can burn through money by making foolish choices. Or just being unlucky. I can’t be the only one who remembers esr being worth tens of millions on paper, then losing basically all of it.
- syeare 4y agoAre you talking about Eric Raymond? The Cathedral and The Bazaar? I never knew he struck it rich
- bhaak 4y agohttps://lwn.net/1999/1216/a/esr-rich.html https://lwn.net/1999/1216/a/esr-rich.html IIRC the stock price fell quite a bit before he could sell.
- DonHopkins 4y agoIt wasn't bad luck, it was bad karma. ESR earned so much bad karma by being such a terrible racist jackass that he deserved to lose it all.
- datalopers 4y agoAre they? 300,000 units * $30 = $9M - 30% Steam tax = $6.3M in a single year take out federal taxes (just gonna call it 36% and ignore SFJ/MFJ), leaves them about $2M each. I'm sure they're some sort of a legal entity in WA state and will owe the b&o tax too. They deserve it absolutely but $2M each does not put them in a position of "fuck you" [1]. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xdfeXqHFmPI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xdfeXqHFmPI
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- Arrath 4y agoI also read, though who knows whether the source was at all accurate, that after the Steam cut, Kitfox takes a goodly chunk (north of 50% IIRC) out until their own expenses for development are paid, and then their cut ratchets down to 20% or so.
- datalopers 4y agoOh, I didn't realize they had a publisher involved too. Yeah, this is a nice payday but it's just a start before it's life-changing for these two hackers. Let's see another 300k in sales!
- bombcar 4y agoPeople who want to support Tarn and Zach but don't want to buy the game can "donate" directly: http://www.bay12games.com/support.html http://www.bay12games.com/support.html
- DonHopkins 4y agoOr who thought they deserve more than their game cost! I just sent them $100 on top of the $30 I spent on the game.
- 4y ago
- jujube3 4y ago> They are definitely in 'set for life if we make wise choices' territory Sure it seems that way now, but what happens when a volcano appears under their house and it floods with lava? Or they go to war with the elves?
- lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y agoI'm sure they'll be able to afford volcano insurance. I bet they could even find someone who's willing to insure their homes against Elf invasions.
- PointyFluff 4y agoThat's a thing, in Washington.
- qup 4y agoWhere does Washington get elves from?
- kennymeyers 4y agoCanada
- tormeh 4y agoThey came from across the veil to join him in his fight against the English. Obviously.
- sitkack 4y agoMostly Skamania county.
- DoubleFree 4y agoThey'll just have to remember that losing is fun
- opportune 4y ago
- ilyt 4y agoNot with american healthcare, could burn thru that pretty quickly. ...which was entire reason for Steam release in the first place
- falcolas 4y agoHeartbreaking. Even with millions, cancer could destroy you financially. One paramedic prices having a heart attack at about $400k pre-insurance† (or no insurance). Check those limits on your plan... † Healthline has an article with another example from 2012 priced at $500k
- sgerenser 4y agoWhy would someone with millions not at least have an ACA plan? Even the worst ACA plan has an out-of-pocket max of around $10K individual and $20K family.
- ryandrake 4y agoPersonally, I don't trust "words from an insurance company." My health insurance company has more money and lawyers than I do. If I get cancer or something and they want to drain my life savings, they probably have some words on page 561 of my insurance policy allowing them to do it. What am I going to do about it, hire an attorney with my $0 balance and sue them?
- bornfreddy 4y agoCan you pay some "insurance of insurance", where someone guarantees they will win your fight, otherwise they lose a big chunk of their money as collateral?
- falcolas 4y agoOut of pocket maximums and limits (or aggregate limits) are two different concepts. Once the insurance plan's limit has been reached, it doesn't matter how much you've paid out of pocket. The ACA does prohibit these limits for certain "essential health benefits", but there's a lot of wiggle room that insurance providers will take advantage of.
- NaturalPhallacy 4y agoI hope they read this thread: "So, what the hell DO you do if you are unlucky enough to win the lottery?" https://old.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/24vo34/whats_the_happiest_5word_sentence_you_could_hear/chb4v05/ https://old.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/24vo34/whats_the... It's got some dark news, but real advice that seems legit.
- Firmwarrior 4y ago~~I feel like HackerNews has enough reasonably financially-literate people that we can do better for advice to someone than that If you're going the Reddit route, at least link to /r/fatfire or /r/personalfinance A competent business owner coming into a windfall this size is in a pretty good spot compared to your average rando off /r/askreddit~~ EDIT: Please disregard this comment, just left it here as a monument to my own jerkness
- ghiculescu 4y agoWhat advice would you give that’s different to that post?
- Firmwarrior 4y agoAh, sorry, that was actually good advice, haha. I saw "AskReddit", quickly skimmed and saw something along the lines of "Every lottery winner gets murdered by family", and jumped to the conclusion that this was your typical /r/AntiWork-esque "Mediocrity is good" viral post. I think all the advice he posted about setting up trusts, buying index funds and treasuries, etc would fit in great here, on /r/fatfire, MMM or anywhere else.
- ElijahLynn 4y agoWow, this is such a #goodnews story! > "I'll have to rework… my, uh, whole life, figure out what the heck's going on there. I don't really have any ideas or plans right now. I've just been thinking about dwarf stuff." > "My wife has plans," Zach said. "We live in a tiny little house, so buying a new house, that's a major goal."
- lostmsu 4y agoThis is a goodnews day. This, fusion announcement, and the Apple forced to allow 3rd party stores. Haven't had anything like it in a while. Just bought the game out of respect even if I don't get to play it.
- ElijahLynn 4y agoOh good point on the other good news announcements!
- Firmwarrior 4y agoThere's also progress in gene-editing cancer treatments, China throwing in the towel on their "COVID 1984" plan, a LOT of progress the last few years on space commercialization, serious conversations about how we're generating our energy.. It's pretty wild. My whole life from the 80s up until the late 2010s was under this dark cloud. The wild optimism of the mid-1900s was gone, and more and more it felt like we were settling into this grim expectation that Humanity was going to slowly die off. Then over the course of just a few years things completely changed
- bartvk 4y agoI wonder why not he but his wife thought about improving their material circumstances? So content with his life, or so focused on the code, or something else?
- bregma 4y agoI suspect the part of the spectrum he is on provides the ability for very intense but very narrow focus.
- ElijahLynn 4y agoWorth noting that in the Steam store it says Windows only right now. (no Penguin/Linux yet)
- brianwawok 4y agoYah I just looked today.. Has anyone heard? If it were Linux I would buy it now..
- drmidnight 4y agoI've been playing on Linux. Both on desktop and my Steam deck. Runs fine under Proton.
- brianwawok 4y agoSweet! It's low GPU / high CPU, so it should be a ripe candidate for Wine and friends..
- ozarker 4y agoWorks great on Proton!
- ElijahLynn 4y agoThanks, I have been on Linux for 10+ years but really haven't played much games yet, I did buy Portal on Steam for Linux ages ago. But, I hadn't heard of Proton until just now from you all! I guess I'll go see how to get that up and running.
- sophacles 4y agoAnother long-time linux user here: During the pandemic I finally decided to get a little bit more into gaming and figured I'll try it on linux to see if it'll work and if nothing else, the technical challenge would be fun. Fortunately I like games after all, because there wasn't any real challenge to getting things working the wine/proton folks have done A LOT to make this stuff just work. I play overwatch and other AAA titles on my linux box just fine.
- fwsgonzo 4y agoThis is so amazing and inspiring. I was actually sitting down lately and thinking about what my next project is, as I've been working on a few other projects for a few years now, but nothing that will make any money. I think it could be fun to work on that kind of game for a long time, and not feel that pressure to deliver anything. Then hire some people at the end to make it more palatable, I guess. Question is, how much is luck when you work on something for that long? I think that in that time-frame you can do anything you set your mind to!
- ElijahLynn 4y agoI love the voiceover screencapture of how to play the game on the Steam demo videos. Would like it if more apps had tutorials like that from the creators. source: https://store.steampowered.com/app/975370/Dwarf_Fortress/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/975370/Dwarf_Fortress/
- tibbydudeza 4y agoI hope they can handle this unlike Notch (Minecraft) - reckoned becoming a billionaire overnight ruined his life.
- ilyt 4y agoIt looks more like it showed that he's an asshole to entirety of the world. Ruining he did of his own
- Minor49er 4y agoI heard he gave millions of dollars to his dev team. What did he do wrong?
- brianwawok 4y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Markus_Persson https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Markus_Persson There is a Controversial Views section
- jedberg 4y agoHe said some pretty awful stuff about race and gender on Twitter.
- decremental 4y agoNo he didn't.
- jedberg 4y agoHe said he found gay pride parades offensive, suggested that there should be hetero parades in response, and then said that anyone that disagrees with him should be shot. He's certainly entitled to his opinions on being offended by pride parades, but suggesting those that don't agree should be shot certainly crosses the line. That is just one example. He also has been very anti-trans.
- LAC-Tech 4y agoI am so happy for them. I remember reading about how they struggled living with their parents in their 30s. I could imagine how much self doubt they must have had executing the long term plan of doing a user friendly steam release... will it actually work? And it has! Bravo.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- agentwiggles 4y agoAs of right now, and barring any future misfortune, this is a great feel-good story for any engineer. These guys brought their passion to life and created something unique and special that has been meaningful to thousands upon thousands of people over the last 20 years. It feels great to see them succeed in this way, and I hope they can continue to work on this for as long as they enjoy it. Congrats to Zach and Tarn, wishing them all the continued success.
- jdhn 4y agoCongrats to them! Very rare to see people who follow their dreams no matter what their field become millionaires. On a side note, I feel like I should like Dwarf Fortress, but every time I look at it, it seems completely daunting.
- vermilingua 4y agoIt might sound condescending, but the daunting is part of the !fun! I strongly recommend just digging in, and it's never been easier than right now. The DF Wiki is one of the most comprehensive video-game wikis that exist due to a very passionate, very tight-knit community; and has excellent guides on how to play your first game. I'd recommend playing one fort while strictly following a guide so that you can learn the interface and concepts, then try another fort totally on your own to experience the chaos in full.
- flanbiscuit 4y agoThe new release adds graphics (instead of the ascii art styled graphics) so maybe that might be less daunting. I say this only from observation, having never played the game. I saw a headline recently about the graphics update and you can see it in the videos on the Steam page: https://store.steampowered.com/app/975370/Dwarf_Fortress/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/975370/Dwarf_Fortress/
- Y_Y 4y agoStrike the earth!
- _carbyau_ 4y agoYeah. I like the idea of this game. But I'd love the idea if I could romp around in it with a friend or 15. But multiplayer is hard baked in from the start. This game will never happen. So someone else will copy what they've done and add multiplayer and get that bag.
- OkayPhysicist 4y agoDwarf Fortress is basically uncopyable. Lots of games have tried: RimWorld is a good example. But they end up feeling like shallow imitations, because Dwarf Fortress has been continuously upgraded for 16 years. It's the game that every first year game dev dreams of making, with incredibly deep simulation and a myriad of mechanics to play with, before they realize that it would take decades to build. The Toady One is just the madman who actually did it.
- chaostheory 4y agoCongrats to the Adams brothers. To my knowledge, Dwarf Fortress is the closest thing to Hari Seldon’s Prime Radiant
- commandersaki 4y agoSite unreadable due to ads.
- DennisP 4y agoYou care about that enough to complain, but you don't have an adblocker? I don't see any ads.
- wardedVibe 4y agohttps://github.com/StevenBlack/hosts https://github.com/StevenBlack/hosts
- jjwiseman 4y agoPlease don't pull a notch, please don't pull a notch...
- Ericson2314 4y agoNotch took orders of magnitude less time for orders of magnitude more money. I think they're safe. Put on your https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moishe_Postone https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moishe_Postone hat and the time portion is especially key here.
- felipemnoa 4y agoI do not get your Moishe Postone reference either. What does it mean?
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- Ericson2314 4y agoHis most famous book, Time, Labor and Social Domination, is not the clearest writing to say the least, but really dumb basic idea is that the downside of work during capitalism are less "boss mean" than the rat race / treadmill of more hours, more deadlines etc. Whatever you say about the Dwarf Fortress creators, one thing that is clear is that they hopped way the fuck off that treadmill. Money gave Notch a "rush" (pun very much intended!) but the Adam's brothers were clearly in no rush. I think that means this success will not get to their heads. He who was never running won't trip.
- felipemnoa 4y agoThank you for this very clear explanation!
- felipemnoa 4y agoWhat do you mean? I don't get the reference.
- ergonaught 4y agoI'm super happy for them. When they've got this version available off of Windows, I'll contribute some more to their, uh, new reality.
- whalesalad 4y agoHopefully they don't go the way of Notch and spiral out of control
- haunter 4y agoI love that they straight up said the game won't get any big discounts in the near (~2 years) future >Q: When is the game going on sale? >Not soon! And not for very much discount! Bay 12 and Kitfox are going to keep working on this for ~30 years, so it doesn’t make sense to follow normal Steam discounting. For example, we might discount 10% in a couple of months, but we also might not! We certainly won’t be discounting for more than 15% for at least two years! https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/975370/view/3631620553379809112?l=english https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/975370/view/36316205...
- armchairhacker 4y agoSame as Factorio, which also never goes on sale. When I know a game discounts 50+% it just makes me put off buying it.
- baobabKoodaa 4y agoSome games are great even if they are "done" and no longer under active development. Frostpunk is a good example. When you see it on a large discount, pick it up.
- bombcar 4y agoI have no problem at all with both methods (a "one and done" game/movie that will sell high for awhile and then go discounted, and a "work in progress" that continues to evolve over time and never discounts) - but it is very nice to know ahead of time.
- falcolas 4y agoFactorio did see a sale! I believe it was just on the Switch version though.
- chaostheory 4y agoYou can get a discount on humble bundle if you’re a subscriber
- cletus 4y agoI'm so happy for these guys. Selling 300,000 copies @ $30 each is life-changing money. Over the years they've accepted donations but from what I've seen it's tended to a few thousand dollars a month. Decent but not a lot for 2 people. I still find DF really inaccessible but this Steam release will prompt me to give it another go. Whatever the case, I'm happy for their success.
- dvzk 4y agoAs an observer since the initial release, Tarn repeatedly refused requests to compromise by expanding the team or involving a publisher. It was a genuine passion project the sort of which rarely succeed financially. I couldn't be happier for them!
- colechristensen 4y agoClassic DF is inaccessible during the first hour only if you follow a good tutorial. Most anybody willing to slog through that hour will be able to get it. Lots of AAA games these days won’t even have you playing that quick (though for different reasons)
- justadolphin 4y agoBack in the day the 10hr+ youtube tutorial series was considered prime viewing before even playing dorf fort, for someone without any traditional rogue experience. Even watching a condensed video and starting, I don't imagine the game would feel accessible for many hours for the average AAA enjoyer. My 6yr old however, is able to pick up and finish most any appropriately age rated AAA game. 5 minutes of experimenting with the controls and they are as good to go.
- dan-g 4y agoCongrats! I bought it with no intention falling down the rabbit hole again; rather, I owe them for all the time I spent playing in high school. So happy for them both!
- satvikpendem 4y agoI'm happy for their success. However, I'm dismayed that it was their inability to pay for healthcare that landed them in this (albeit good) situation. It's not a situation that should be forced on citizens in a modern country, for which this particular example is a feel-good ending, but there are many more (orders of magnitude more) feel-bad endings, so to speak.
- Y_Y 4y agoOur fortunes rise and fall together
- serverholic 4y agoHealthcare and basic income are crucial for moving towards the next stage of civilizaiton. Like you said, I'm really glad it worked out for them but so, so many people don't get so lucky or are willing to take such a big risk. How many more dwarf fortresses could we have if we gave people the safety net to follow their dreams? Instead of worrying about basic necessities like food, shelter, and healthcare.
- vkoskiv 4y ago> How many more dwarf fortresses could we have if we gave people the safety net to follow their dreams? So, so many. Linux is a good example. Linus has talked about how he was able to spend a lot of time on getting Linux off the ground because back in the 80s and 90s, study allowances in Finland were very, very generous. Took him like 8 years to graduate, and during that time he didn't have to worry at all about finding a job to pay rent and buy food. These days, the system is similar, but they do monitor your progress more closely and will cut off the allowance if you don't progress in your studies. (ask me how I know :P)
- serverholic 4y agoImagine if he had a boss breathing down his neck and daily standups lol. I don't think people realize how much our society saps our humanity and kills our creative energies and our desires to build things.
- matt3210 4y agoNeed to run macOS
- PointyFluff 4y ago
- dabeeeenster 4y agoSo this happened to a guy that worked for me. Loved video games, super talented front end dev. Made a horror game in Unity at evenings and weekends with his best friend. Launched it on Steam. Very low sales. But he learnt a huge amount about marketing and game design based on player feedback. Designed a second game, put all the marketing learnings into it, 48 hours after launch the biggest streamer on twitch was streaming it. 4 days later he quit working for me. Couldnt be happier for him. The biggest thing I saw was that 2 guys, Unity, unity asset store and some upwork artists made a really pretty decent game. I love how this has come full circle. I'm 47 and back in the 8 bit days games were made by 1 or 2 people. 15 years ago this just wasnt possible, but now with unity, unity assets, remote for hire work, steam and twitch for marketing you can legit make it as a 2 person studio. I love it. The distribution of Steam and viral marketing of Twitch have revolutionised indie development for the better. In addition to this, as an asset he now has a Discord server with 10ksss+ subscribers. I doubt he will ever pay for a $ of traditional above or below the line marketing.
- darkteflon 4y agoThat’s awesome. Would you mind sharing which game it was?
- dabeeeenster 4y agoI'm not sure if he would be upset with me if I were to publish how small his team was, sorry! Maybe the reasons above will change this.
- schmorptron 4y agoThat's very considerate!
- darkteflon 4y agoFair enough! Great story though and wonderful outcome for him.
- ngcc_hk 4y ago
- darkteflon 4y agoI’ve often marvelled at these guys and their approach: making one game into your life’s work. Rimworld is perhaps another example of continuously added depth/complexity (although perhaps too soon to call that Tynan’s “life’s work”). Perhaps it’s something peculiar to this genre - so-called management sims. It seems to me a phenomenon that - while perhaps not unique in art - is both rare and very well suited to this medium.
- OkayPhysicist 4y agoI'd wager it's because of the step back the player takes from the actual world. Like, Dwarf Fortress adventure mode exists, but it gets tedious. Carefully deciding which molar of your opponent to grab while grappling isn't the most engaging gameplay. But when you take a step back, and are making general instructions to your dwarves like "Go fight these goblins", the added complexity makes for some very memorable moments. Combine that with a gameplay loop that basically demands a sprawling amount of new things to do (since the dwarves basically handle themselves in the steady state), and you've got a recipe for some truly expansive games. Plus every modern game in the genre is directly inspired by Dwarf Fortress, who is made by someone who really seems like he just wanted a way to get people interested in his high fantasy world simulator.
- ImprobableTruth 4y agoNow that money worries are (hopefully) not an issue anymore, I really hope they consider releasing the source code. Due to being written in C++, mods are quite restricted in what they can do (especially in comparison to more recent games like Rimworld that are trivial to decompile due to using C#). Especially frustrating because performance really isn't up to par - a lot of the old generational forts from a decade+ ago are really only possible now if you tailor your gameplay to account for performance issues.
- nonethewiser 4y agoYeah I have some doubts about its optimization. Would be great to get fresh eyes on it.
- jskulski 4y agoHad they talked about releasing the source code? I would love to see the machine behind DF. I think about it all the time. Either is a complete mess that no one else can understand, or they nailed the abstractions and it is infinitely extendable. I’m really curious to see how they implemented a system that provides such depth and subtlety.
- ImprobableTruth 4y agoTarn has made an off hand comment about it before [1], but I'm not sure how serious it actually was. [1] https://www.pcgamer.com/if-dwarf-fortress-sells-millions-on-steam-its-creators-will-give-the-money-away-as-fast-as-possible/ https://www.pcgamer.com/if-dwarf-fortress-sells-millions-on-...
- newobj 4y agoPeople are making a lot of assumptions about the finances of the publishing deal with Kitfox
- User23 4y agoI’ve played for about two hours over the last decade. So playing the game hasn’t given me all that much pleasure. But I got considerably more pleasure reading Let’s Plays, so I dropped the 30bux on general principle. Congratulations to them.
- coorski 4y ago
- TEP_Kim_Il_Sung 4y ago
- Lapsa 4y agopeople like complex games as opposed to tunnel runners. and no AAA studio can compete with what dwarf fortress got.
- npteljes 4y agoPeople like both. If you think about it, books, music and film are linear too. There's nothing wrong with being entertained by a story, but I too find it fascinating to see how indie developers push gaming as a medium.
- GaryPalmer 4y agoRespect to the developers for their effort. But I would never get into dwarf fortress because to me the idea is kind of insane. I get that it is fascinating to try and model complex real-world behaviour into a video game. But the truth is you can spend 100 lifetimes worth of time perfecting these systems that try to appear like a physical world (but really aren't) by trying to preprare for every possible situation the player can get into. And in the end you don't even come close to preparing for 0.1% of the possibilites. So on one end you are mercilessly sacrificing gameplay for complexity to the point where the game devolves into manual reading. And on the other hand the complexity is never going to be enough. Maybe in the future AI Networks will be able to come up with convicing game-systems like in dwarf fortress on the fly to offer an illusion of complex emergent behaviour.
- Swalden123 4y agoReally happy for these guys. I've loved this game for 15 years.
- s_dev 4y agoCongrats to the guys but my selfish hope is this helps spur some life back in to the Real Time Strategy genre -- so good news even if you aren't in to DF per se.
- tranxen 4y agoThey deserve all the money they will get from their game. I am really happy for them, they allowed us to play DF for free for so long that I would not be mad if the sell price on steam was higher. DF is an awesome game and I hope they continue to improve it and to add content. Good job guys !
- nameless912 4y agoPartner: "What the hell are you playing?" Me: "Dwarf fortress! It's that game I used to play when I was in college working at the IT helpdesk. They finally added graphics!" Partner: "I wouldn't exactly call those graphics..." Me: pulls up copy of DF Classic Partner: "...I see your point. And this game is fun?" Me: "Imagine The Sims, if your sims could fight and you can only instruct them to build rather than building it yourself. And then set it in Lord of the Rings." Partner: "Oooookay. How long have you been playing today?" Me: looks at clock looks at clock again "Would you be mad if I told you six hours?" Partner: "...I'm going to leave you to it." 11/10, amazing game. So happy for Tarn and Zach, they deserve every last penny of this.
- shever73 4y ago100% well deserved. I'm disappointed that there's no Mac release yet, but I'm sure it will come. As soon as it does, I'll be switching from the Patreon brigade to paid-for on Steam. I love Dwarf Fortress, and I'm delighted that this labour of love has paid off for them.
- dnadler 4y agoLots of talk about the financials here, so I thought people might be interested in this financial simulator I've been working on. Here's a very simple scenario that I set up to forecast Tarn and Zach's windfall: https://thetortoise.io/shared-scenario/72ff9de5d4f64a408f83c30765e3fa26 https://thetortoise.io/shared-scenario/72ff9de5d4f64a408f83c... I just set it up with an initial $4m balance and a 100k annual drawdown. It uses some fairly standard market assumptions and is all in real terms. Feel free to experiment with it, and always happy to get feedback!
- suzannejoanne21 4y ago