4 ms·

Dwarf Fortress, the Great Ancestor

77 points by Zarkonnen 12y ago

FranOntanaya 12y ago
DF is one of the top games at creating emergent scenarios, and yet not very good at it. Many parts are tedious, broken or not very fledged. I really wish more games opened their AI, including conversation. Using them for little Turing experiments is a lot more fun than item mods.
fsiefken 12y ago
For another vast 2D game experience check Distant Worlds, 4x space strategy with tens of thousands of planets and asteroids http://www.spacesector.com/blog/2011/10/distant-worlds-return-of-the-shakturi-review/ http://www.spacesector.com/blog/2011/10/distant-worlds-retur...
hurin 12y ago
>. But at this point, DF has a relationship to modern games much like a literary classic does to other books: it will help you understand where a lot of stuff is coming from. According to wikipedia DF came out in 2006? Where does the classic book analogy come from.
- lmm 12y ago
  Yeah. DF owes a lot to nethack (interface, interaction of lots of elements, code quality), which has much more claim to be a classic (it's been popular for decades, and is still fun). DF captured a certain kind of imagination but it belongs to a long tradition of detailed modelling of civilizations in games.
- falcolas 12y ago
  They are stating that just as concepts and themes from classic books resurface in more modern books, gameplay concepts and themes from DF can be found in modern videogames. That isn't to say DF does not contain themes from previous videogames, or that it is the progenitor for modern games; just an influence.
  - hurin 12y ago
    The article is quite explicitly calling it a classic it doesn't actually mention any predecessors that it inherits from (I haven't played DwarfFortress, but reading about it suggests to me, games such as Ultima, Moria, Angband).
    - falcolas 12y ago
      We consider many of Shakespeare's works to be classics, but he pulled a lot of his themes and ideologies from the Bible, the Illiad and the Odyssey. One does not need to be first to be a classic.
      - hurin 12y ago
        Actually Shakespeare also pulled many of his themes from other writers very much closer to him in history (and he was criticized for it in his time actually), but as it remains those writers i.e. Christopher Marlowe are not well known and Shakespeare is (but it is essential to this that merely reusing-retelling-retheming of classical aspects is not enough for this, many others besides Shakespeare did this in those days, as many films, and tv-series do it now).
    - darkmighty 12y ago
      To give an idea of how revolutionary DF is, I'd say it's just as close to The Sims and Minecraft as it is to Angband.
      - Kurtz79 12y ago
        It is revolutionary because its scale and breadth, the way it integrates so many moving parts and procedural generation. But "inspirational" it's not: procedural generation has been used in games since the dawn of times (the 80s!), and same goes for huge sandbox games (Elite), economic/military simulations (civilization, sim city, star control), etc... if anything, DF it was insipired by some of these games, and merged their gameplay into something unique. In a way, it´s depressing (although understandable) how AAA titles in the last 20 years have focused on graphical improvements and standardized gameplay, instead of exploring new territory. The recent resurgence (and commercial success) of indies it's the best thing to have happened to gaming in some time.
TillE 12y ago
The handful of games inspired by Dwarf Fortress are cool, but I really hope somebody is working on a proper successor. A game that's even more ambitious with its simulation, with the software appropriately designed so it can be multithreaded and optimized. Dwarf Fortress is amazing. It's quite possibly my favorite game of all time. But at the same time, it's really only scratching the surface of what's possible with this kind of simulation. There's a whole genre of incredibly deep RPGs just waiting to be created.
- falcolas 12y ago
  That may be hard, since DF is under constant development. Being more ambitious in the sim department will be excruciatingly hard, since DF already has an almost silly level of simulation: http://www.polygon.com/2014/7/23/5926447/dwarf-fortress-will-crush-your-cpu-because-creating-history-is-hard http://www.polygon.com/2014/7/23/5926447/dwarf-fortress-will... That said, yeah, it's a cool genre which could use some real love.
  - scuba7183 12y ago
    Awesome article, thanks
  - bryondowd 12y ago
    I think it would be interesting to see something DF-inspired at an MMO scale. I'd like to imagine what a larger team could do, with access to lots of parallel CPU power. DF does a lot of work abstracting things that are off-site, since a typical PC can't simulate the entire world in realtime. But if you had enough servers sharing the work, I expect you could do much more. Throw in a bunch of players all giving some direction to their own little autonomous civilisations, and I think it would be fascinating to watch.
  - Ideka 12y ago
    DF also already has an almost silly level of ambition: http://bay12games.com/dwarves/dev.html http://bay12games.com/dwarves/dev.html
- TrevorJ 12y ago
lowboy 12y ago
Just a heads up that the majority of the page took around 15 seconds to load, and that was after a few refreshes. http://i.imgur.com/wzJAp3Y.png http://i.imgur.com/wzJAp3Y.png
- Zarkonnen 12y ago
  Huh, that's rather unfortunate. Thank you for pointing that out, I'll see that I can fix things!
nether 12y ago
dwarf fortress is the war & peace of games.
juliangamble 12y ago
This NYT story about the guys that wrote Dwarf Fortress is amazing. One of them was a Phd candidate, but now they survive on the money from DF fans - http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/24/magazine/the-brilliance-of-dwarf-fortress.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/24/magazine/the-brilliance-of...
- Natsu 12y ago
  The guys who make it are really cool and accessible. There have been lots of crazy fan projects doing research they hope for them to incorporate in the game somehow (e.g. material properties research, tree research, http://imgur.com/EPtgt http://imgur.com/EPtgt ...)
IsTom 12y ago
The author writes about balancing difficulty of DF. I've seen many people saying that DF is too easy once you figure it out. It's true that it isn't a difficult game, but I think it's missing the point. The point of DF is simulation, not being a difficult game. There's a lot of beauty in it. If you want to be challenged there are better games for that. If you want to explore virtual worlds or excercise creativity you've got a deal.

77 points by Zarkonnen 12y ago

DF is one of the top games at creating emergent scenarios, and yet not very good at it. Many parts are tedious, broken or not very fledged. I really wish more games opened their AI, including conversation. Using them for little Turing experiments is a lot more fun than item mods.

fsiefken 12y ago

For another vast 2D game experience check Distant Worlds, 4x space strategy with tens of thousands of planets and asteroids http://www.spacesector.com/blog/2011/10/distant-worlds-return-of-the-shakturi-review/ http://www.spacesector.com/blog/2011/10/distant-worlds-retur...

hurin 12y ago

>. But at this point, DF has a relationship to modern games much like a literary classic does to other books: it will help you understand where a lot of stuff is coming from. According to wikipedia DF came out in 2006? Where does the classic book analogy come from.

lmm 12y ago
Yeah. DF owes a lot to nethack (interface, interaction of lots of elements, code quality), which has much more claim to be a classic (it's been popular for decades, and is still fun). DF captured a certain kind of imagination but it belongs to a long tradition of detailed modelling of civilizations in games.
falcolas 12y ago
They are stating that just as concepts and themes from classic books resurface in more modern books, gameplay concepts and themes from DF can be found in modern videogames. That isn't to say DF does not contain themes from previous videogames, or that it is the progenitor for modern games; just an influence.
- hurin 12y ago
  The article is quite explicitly calling it a classic it doesn't actually mention any predecessors that it inherits from (I haven't played DwarfFortress, but reading about it suggests to me, games such as Ultima, Moria, Angband).
  - falcolas 12y ago
    We consider many of Shakespeare's works to be classics, but he pulled a lot of his themes and ideologies from the Bible, the Illiad and the Odyssey. One does not need to be first to be a classic.
    - hurin 12y ago
      Actually Shakespeare also pulled many of his themes from other writers very much closer to him in history (and he was criticized for it in his time actually), but as it remains those writers i.e. Christopher Marlowe are not well known and Shakespeare is (but it is essential to this that merely reusing-retelling-retheming of classical aspects is not enough for this, many others besides Shakespeare did this in those days, as many films, and tv-series do it now).
  - darkmighty 12y ago
    To give an idea of how revolutionary DF is, I'd say it's just as close to The Sims and Minecraft as it is to Angband.
    - Kurtz79 12y ago
      It is revolutionary because its scale and breadth, the way it integrates so many moving parts and procedural generation. But "inspirational" it's not: procedural generation has been used in games since the dawn of times (the 80s!), and same goes for huge sandbox games (Elite), economic/military simulations (civilization, sim city, star control), etc... if anything, DF it was insipired by some of these games, and merged their gameplay into something unique. In a way, it´s depressing (although understandable) how AAA titles in the last 20 years have focused on graphical improvements and standardized gameplay, instead of exploring new territory. The recent resurgence (and commercial success) of indies it's the best thing to have happened to gaming in some time.

TillE 12y ago

The handful of games inspired by Dwarf Fortress are cool, but I really hope somebody is working on a proper successor. A game that's even more ambitious with its simulation, with the software appropriately designed so it can be multithreaded and optimized. Dwarf Fortress is amazing. It's quite possibly my favorite game of all time. But at the same time, it's really only scratching the surface of what's possible with this kind of simulation. There's a whole genre of incredibly deep RPGs just waiting to be created.

falcolas 12y ago
That may be hard, since DF is under constant development. Being more ambitious in the sim department will be excruciatingly hard, since DF already has an almost silly level of simulation: http://www.polygon.com/2014/7/23/5926447/dwarf-fortress-will-crush-your-cpu-because-creating-history-is-hard http://www.polygon.com/2014/7/23/5926447/dwarf-fortress-will... That said, yeah, it's a cool genre which could use some real love.
- scuba7183 12y ago
  Awesome article, thanks
- bryondowd 12y ago
  I think it would be interesting to see something DF-inspired at an MMO scale. I'd like to imagine what a larger team could do, with access to lots of parallel CPU power. DF does a lot of work abstracting things that are off-site, since a typical PC can't simulate the entire world in realtime. But if you had enough servers sharing the work, I expect you could do much more. Throw in a bunch of players all giving some direction to their own little autonomous civilisations, and I think it would be fascinating to watch.
- Ideka 12y ago
  DF also already has an almost silly level of ambition: http://bay12games.com/dwarves/dev.html http://bay12games.com/dwarves/dev.html
TrevorJ 12y ago

lowboy 12y ago

Just a heads up that the majority of the page took around 15 seconds to load, and that was after a few refreshes. http://i.imgur.com/wzJAp3Y.png http://i.imgur.com/wzJAp3Y.png

Zarkonnen 12y ago
Huh, that's rather unfortunate. Thank you for pointing that out, I'll see that I can fix things!

nether 12y ago

dwarf fortress is the war & peace of games.

juliangamble 12y ago

This NYT story about the guys that wrote Dwarf Fortress is amazing. One of them was a Phd candidate, but now they survive on the money from DF fans - http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/24/magazine/the-brilliance-of-dwarf-fortress.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/24/magazine/the-brilliance-of...

Natsu 12y ago
The guys who make it are really cool and accessible. There have been lots of crazy fan projects doing research they hope for them to incorporate in the game somehow (e.g. material properties research, tree research, http://imgur.com/EPtgt http://imgur.com/EPtgt ...)

IsTom 12y ago

The author writes about balancing difficulty of DF. I've seen many people saying that DF is too easy once you figure it out. It's true that it isn't a difficult game, but I think it's missing the point. The point of DF is simulation, not being a difficult game. There's a lot of beauty in it. If you want to be challenged there are better games for that. If you want to explore virtual worlds or excercise creativity you've got a deal.