2006: Dwarf Fortress

https://if50.substack.com/p/2006-dwarf-fortress

289 95 5 years ago

if50.substack.com

roenxi• 5 years ago

It is important, when contemplating Dwarf Fortress, to realise a couple of things.

Firstly, and most obviously, the game is clearly some sort of work of art. The exact nature of the art is a bit difficult to pin down - certainly isn't an exercise in graphics and the plot is inconsistent between playthroughs - but nevertheless.

The second thing to observe is it appears to be a life's work. A lifetime has not actually passed, but still there is a singleminded dedication here that is unusual.

Thirdly, it is impossible for this sort of art to be a true lifetimes work because computers havn't been powerful enough to do this sort of thing for the full 50 years it takes to dedicate a life to one thing. Furthermore, not enough people have been exposed to computers yet.

If humanity survives to 2121, there are going to be some amazing games. Gamemakers like Tarn, possible multiple generations of gamemakers, polishing these things will have some remarkable outcomes. I am glad to be around now at the birth of computing, but it is all too easy to envy the people who will be young in the 22nd century.

sshagent• 5 years ago

Nicely put. DF is simply the best game I've ever played, and I've been hooked by many from many genres. The stories told within are insane.

I only play it every couple of years when the desire catches me, yet still patreon to DF. This is what games should be.

Obviously an insane barrier of entry, took me a few goes to 'get it' and even now i barely get it despite playing many varingly 'fun' forts. I watched many youtube lets plays to make different aspects be learnt.

Its a beautiful piece of art for sure.

imdsm• 5 years ago

I've played since 2006 and while I don't find much time these days, I return to it every few years to scratch an itch. I played a lot of ADOM in the old days, and naturally jumped onto DF when it appeared. With tilesets, things became easier, and then with Dwarf Therapist, easier too. Then we got packs like the "Lazy Newb" pack, and with Steam coming too, it'll become even more accessible to folks.

The depth of what can be achieved is what amazes me as an engineer. I can build cisterns to hold water, underground reservoirs, a series of mechanisms to refill the water, and to move it to consumption points, through the use of labelled levers, but be sure to smooth the stone, lest you get dusty water. Have some drain away to create mist in a common area, everyone loves mist. And another floodgate to create a defensive section, should invaders breach the entrance.

This is but one such area that can be brought about through the mechanics of the game, not to mention swimming practise in 1/2 depth water (7 is fully deep) and more.

A truly wonderful game, and I'm honoured to have a crayon drawing from them, to have been like yourself a part of its history. Strike the earth!

intended2• 5 years ago

I kinda liked the earlier version of the game, before guides and tools made it easier to get into.

This is not a dig on guides, its instead an appreciation for what the game taught me - the idea that losing could be fun.

Before that I would always play in a manner that guaranteed success, re-loading if something went wrong.

With DF it was either something going spectacularly wrong, or utter boredom when I decided to play safe.

standardUser2• 5 years ago

I'm no stranger to involved and complicated games (Crusader Kings, Kerbal Space Program, as examples) but the Dwarf Fortress interface appeared to me to be some sort of elaborate ruse designed to test my patience, or to simply mock me. I'm glad the folks who have the patience to navigate those menus and decipher those "graphics" have rewarding experiences, but I'll wait for the Steam version with actual graphics, and god-willing a UI that isn't optimized to waste my time, before I give it another go.

indigochill• 5 years ago

Although I'm usually a bazaar man when it comes to talking about the Cathedral and Bazaar, in theory there can be some awesome cathedrals, too. A digital equivalent to La Sagrada Familia, if you will.

On the other hand, digital cathedrals are theoretically vulnerable to operating systems changes in a way physical cathedrals don't have to wrestle with as much (I guess maybe changing building code could be the closest analog?)

bitwize• 5 years ago

I worked (technically still work) with a fellow who was a real long term thinker, and kept bringing up La Sagrada Familia. He kept saying "I just want to build a software equivalent."

I showed him the demo 8088MPH, which took seven years to complete. He said, "Okay, that's the software equivalent of La Sagrada Familia".

pimterry• 5 years ago

A digital equivalent to La Sagrada Familia, if you will.
On the other hand, digital cathedrals are theoretically vulnerable to operating systems changes in a way physical cathedrals don't have to wrestle with as much (I guess maybe changing building code could be the closest analog?)

Sagrada Familia actually does have analogous problems.

When they started ~130 years ago, there was little in the way of planning regulation. In 2019 they had to go back and file for formal planning permits & licenses, and pay 4.6 million in taxes and fees to do so so that they could continue construction, more than a century after starting: https://www.barcelona.cat/infobarcelona/en/tema/urban-planni...

They also have an ongoing battle because during that 130 years of construction, somebody went and built a city block in the place where the original designs put the front door: https://elpais.com/espana/catalunya/2020-03-05/barcelona-qui... [Spanish]

queuebert• 5 years ago

In 2121, NetHack will be approaching a 4.0 release candidate.

GLGirty• 5 years ago

Do you think software is a medium that can create one-person (or small team) masterworks in any form but games? Candidates that come to my mind are lisp, unix, and visicalc. I wonder if the nature of software means that craft code is destined to fossilize.

If humanity survives to 2121, there are going to be some amazing games.

My great grandkids can enjoy that if they survive antibiotic resistant microbes and the water wars.

jameshart• 5 years ago

TeX, certainly. Specialized fields have their own little masterworks (Leland Smith’s SCORE perhaps?) - but these are maybe more analogous to the great works of Victorian engineering like the Brooklyn Bridge or the SS Great Britain than they resemble a symphony or a great painting.

ajuc2• 5 years ago

If humanity survives to 2121, there are going to be some amazing games

Check out nethack if you want to see what a few decades of development can do to a simple game.

Cthulhu_• 5 years ago

If humanity survives to 2121, there are going to be some amazing games. Gamemakers like Tarn, possible multiple generations of gamemakers, polishing these things will have some remarkable outcomes. I am glad to be around now at the birth of computing, but it is all too easy to envy the people who will be young in the 22nd century.

I too share your optimism, and I feel fortunate to be alive in this period (and who knows, maybe in 2121), however at the same time I feel like Dwarf Fortress is unique in its complexity; I feel like its complexity and attention to detail requires a mind unlike anyone else's, like the singular geniuses of the scientific communities that came out with breakthrough discoveries and incredibly complicated maths.

I find it hard to imagine DF but even deeper. But that might be my lack of imagination. I for one am happy to wait and see and be proven wrong.

dafoex• 5 years ago

Art feels like the wrong word here. Art, to my mind, is impressive but ultimately gathers dust on a shelf. DF on the other hand is a complex machine that simulates whole worlds, and produces a different result each time you run it, and varies those results even more as you continue to interact.

Its a living world that grows and evolves with you, and shows its technical prowess not through anything as mundane as graphics, but instead through the very beating heart that makes it such an interesting machine. It demonstrates the author's skill, determination, and ongoing mastery of their craft. Dwarf Fortress is a masterpiece, but to call it simply art doesn't do it justice.

Losing is fun.

jl6• 5 years ago

It's a rare and beautiful thing indeed. NetHack is the other obvious comparison, but my impression is that development has happened in bursts of activity rather than as a continuous effort.

Some MUDs have this kind of longitudinal development - like the Discworld MUD or LambdaMOO.

And of course the AAA commercial MMORPGs with huge budgets and cattle users that get milked $14.99/month. Though I suspect those are unsustainable in the long run.

marttt• 5 years ago

If humanity survives to 2121, there are going to be some amazing games.

This would make a great Ask HN: which computer games of today might be remembered in 100 years? Or: which genres have the best chances for a 100+ year lifespan.

I think I realized just now that we really do live in a time where games as cultural artefacts are stepping into the shoes of books. Wow.

I've never been much of a gamer, but, uh, who knows, maybe my grand-grand-whatever-children of 2100 would also enjoy the first parts of Leisure Suit Larry? [1] It did tackle universal human problems, after all.

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leisure_Suit_Larry_in_the_Land...

Razengan2• 5 years ago

I am glad to be around now at the birth of computing

That was like 40-50 years ago, along with birth of games, including many innovative ones from that era which have still yet to be remade. We just recently lost one of the last pioneers of this frontier, Sir Clive Sinclair. RIP

ajvs• 5 years ago

Can't wait for it's Steam release, the new UI looks awesome.

edem• 5 years ago

I wanted to write a comment with this exact same text!

riksucks2• 5 years ago

The fact that dwarf fortress generates lores and story, makes me feel like I need to try out this game. But it always seems hard to get into

tokai• 5 years ago

You can go through and read the lore of a world without having to play.

annowiki• 5 years ago

Speaking of this, I've yet to play the game for more than five minutes, but there are some great YouTubers that let you get into the game through lets play without having to master it: https://www.youtube.com/user/kruggsmash

beaconstudios• 5 years ago

if you install one of the "lazy newb pack" mods (this is the typical recommendation: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=126076.0) and watch a tutorial or two on how to use the interface, it's actually quite intuitive. Its interface is similar to vim in many ways.

riksucks2• 5 years ago

ah if its similar to vim, then I might give it a try, thank you so much beacon. Sometimes I feel like that these are essential things in nerd culture lol, and I dont feel cultured enough because I dont know these. But yeah lemme fire this up and try

oefnak• 5 years ago

You could also wait for the steam version, which will have a much more intuitive UI.

eropple2• 5 years ago

Consider trying Rimworld--it's a more approachable (and in turn, shallower, though not as shallow as you'd expect) riff on the "story generator"/ant-farm approach to game design.

andagainagain4• 5 years ago

It's definitely has major design philosophy differences that make it scratch a very different itch then dwarf fortress. Both good games, but not really equivalent imo.

RimWorld randomizes difficulty through the game. So when things go crazy the response tends to be Angst against rngesus.

In dwarf fortress when problems arise the answer is almost always that it could have been prevented and or dealt with in many many ways (some that the developer never considered).

cupofjoakim• 5 years ago

Dwarf Fortress is amazing. It's not for me, but I strongly feel that it's the most fascinating game out there. I'm happy it's out there and I hope the newly refreshed UI in the steam version lets others be as fascinated by it as I have. May it inspire a future generation of game makers!

29athrowaway3• 5 years ago

There are a few games inspired in Dwarf Fortress, such as Gnomeria and Rimworld, for audiences that are a more casual.

Dwarf Fortress is hard to master.

jtms• 5 years ago

Rimworld is an absolute masterpiece. As a long time DF player I highly, highly recommend Rimworld!

INTPenis• 5 years ago

Rimworld made me forget all my DF keyboard menu commands. From 2009 I had mastered DF keyboard shortcuts like a total maniac.

But then I discovered Rimworld, I bought it when it wasn't even on Steam yet so the author e-mailed the download link to you. But I stopped playing when they introduced a bunch of royalty, ESP and religion. Now I'm waiting for the new DF UI in Steam because I wouldn't want to re-learn all the shortcuts.

untech• 5 years ago

Well, “Royalty” adds quite interesting magic system, and “Ideology” adds belief systems, which are fun and are not required to be religious. You can have transhumanist female supremacists, who require their men to go around naked and really like weed parties.

Anyway, Royalty and Ideology are DLCs, so you can totally play without them.

tastyfreeze• 5 years ago

Minecraft was inspired in part by Dwarf Fortress as well.

29athrowaway3• 5 years ago

Nice, I did not know this.

dadro• 5 years ago

Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead also comes to mind. https://cataclysmdda.org/

X6S1x6Okd1st• 5 years ago

I love CDDA, but it's not nearly about simulation as DF is.

qudat• 5 years ago

It's funny because I also feel like Rimworld is a really difficult game to play, but it's a blast once you get the hang of it.

kibwen• 5 years ago

The heights to which that complexity has now reached are evidenced by two famous bugs: one involved too low a melting point for the fat layer of dwarven skin, and the other saw cats getting wildly drunk from licking their paws after walking over tavern floors sticky with spilled beer.

These are the ones that always get mentioned, but over the game's whole history there are too many great bugs to name. One infamous one that I recall from the early days had to do with the lethality of carp. You see, Dwarf Fortress features character progression. Your dwarves have not just skills (armorsmith, record keeper, surgeon, conversationalist, cheese maker, etc.), but also basic stats: strength, agility, toughness. The way that you increase your stats is by exercising your skills. And of course every entity in the world is simulated in the same way, because why wouldn't it be? So what made carp so dangerous? Well, every game tick every carp on the map had to make a swim check to stay afloat... and swimming is a skill! So shortly after loading a map for the first time, your carp will have leveled up into legendarily tough, fast, and strong terrors. And because world generation often populates maps with tiny disconnected pools, and then places carp in those pools, the carp AI considered itself perpetually cornered, making them extremely aggressive! Thus the result is that any dwarf walking adjacent to a pool (which they often will of their own accord, to drink or (ironically) fish) will find themselves being bitten by a hulking super-carp and wrestled beneath the surface of the water to drown.

So what do you do against this existential threat? Well, you wait for the first winter, at which point the map freezes over and all the carp asphyxiate. Fun!

AndrewOMartin• 5 years ago

Another case of "The Simpsons predicted it" ;)

"No, that's the beautiful part. When wintertime rolls around, the gorillas simply freeze to death."

https://comb.io/lthy2e

triggercut• 5 years ago

Thankyou! So many playthroughs full of messages about fighting carp suddenly all make sense!

Octopodes• 5 years ago

That was fixed ages ago, but still exists as a running inside joke.

coremoff2• 5 years ago

don't know how it was fixed in DF, however that feels like a problem that was "solved" in DND; if you try and move via a medium for which you don't have a natural speed, you make a check - if you have a natural speed you don't need to make the check. Thus characters don't need to make "walking" checks, but they do have to make "climb" checks. Similarly fish have a swim speed, so they never have to make swim checks. In the event that your ability is impeded in some way (e.g. grease on a ladder) then you might have to make a check against your (normally not-tested) skill, which would be high for your natural movement modes.

BeefySwain• 5 years ago

This is not in 5E, right?

vintermann• 5 years ago

One of my favourites was the supergoblin bug, which I ran into myself.

To defend the fortress from invading, I had a narrow walkway with spike-filled pits on both sides. The idea was that as the goblins ran over, they would be peppered with arrows, and if they managed to dodge they stood a good chance of falling off in the process. It worked, as far as it went.

The problem was that a very few goblins survived both the fall and the spikes at the bottom, and those goblins became truly nasty.

The thing is, when someone deflects a weapon in that version of DF, they got a small bit of training to their weapon skill, depending on the size and weight of their opponent. Unfortunately, they also got a chance to block the upright spikes at the bottom of my moat. Which were technically "wielded" by the ground itself.

So the few goblins that survived by blocking the upright spike as they fell, instantly became supreme grand masters of their weapon. If they dodged it instead, they likewise became inhumanity good at dodging. The worst was, the moat was constructed so that if they survived, they could run up and try again, and this time they had a very good chance of dodging and blocking, boosting their skill even further.

Thus ended one fort of mine to ninja goblins.

Tepix• 5 years ago

What's the situation regarding Dwarf fortress and Macs with the Apple M1 silicon? Last time i checked it didn't work (crashed during world generation) after Apple released macOS 11.1.

I sure would like to give it a try!

sprkwd• 5 years ago

yup it works.

Here's a post: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=158322.msg701...

Direct link: http://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=12202

overcast• 5 years ago

The obligatory greatest bug report ever. Dwarf Fortress developer gets in depth about it. So great. The complexity of this game is mind boggling.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAhHkJQ3KgY

TOMDM• 5 years ago

I knew what this would be before I clicked and still ended up watching the whole story again.

I think it makes up the crux of what makes Dwarf Fort great.

You don't need two massive hideously complex systems, when hundreds of smaller ones that all interact are so much more satisfying.

Dwarf Fortress seems to do both though, many large systems with hundreds of smaller interactions that build up to the whole.

I really look forward to seeing where it ends up in a few decades.

andagainagain4• 5 years ago

Honestly I though it was going to be the story of an early bug where dwarves would carry around an arm in their mouth forever.

wisienkas• 5 years ago

Dwarf Fortress is an inspiration to drive upon for any other simulation like games.

The depth of this game is truly incredible. I'd imagine if it could exists for a port to nintendo switch

triceratops• 5 years ago

I've tried playing DF a couple of times but gave up because it's too hard. Even though I couldn't "get" it, I'm glad it exists.

samvher• 5 years ago

I've tried playing DF a couple of times but gave up because I couldn't figure out the install/launch process. One day I will persevere.

MetallicCloud• 5 years ago

The easiest way is to get a Lazy Newb Pack https://www.dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/Utility:Lazy_New...

db48x4• 5 years ago

Really? You just unzip the thing somewhere, then run the program. No install necessary.

hughrlomas• 5 years ago

The upcoming steam release may help it be more accessible, you could retry then if you still have any interest.

traspler• 5 years ago

I really, really love all the retold stories people experienced while playing the game (embelished or not), two of my favourite:

Bronzemurder - https://dfstories.com/bronzemurder/

Bravemule's Matul Remrit - https://www.bravemule.com/matulremrit

klondike_klive• 5 years ago

One thing I've never seen asked or answered is whether the name Bay 12 is a reference to the film Aliens - when Ripley picks up a crate with the loader and asks Apone "where do you want it?" he laughs and says "Bay twelve, please." Surely too obscure to be a coincidence?

andagainagain4• 5 years ago

That is indeed the reference. I don't remember where I read it, but it came from toadyone I'm pretty sure. Might have been one of his early podcasts?

gowld• 5 years ago

Is there a self-playing/idle mode in Dwarf Fortress?

Where you set some initial conditions and then watch the world evolve without having to take care of it?

Crespyl• 5 years ago

There isn't exactly any truly "self playing" mode, but you can always set up a fortress and then just see how long it runs before falling apart. The dwarves all have their own needs that they'll try to deal with on their own, and you can assign standing orders for things like farms and food production, as well as guard schedules and patrol routes for basic defenses.

There's also the worldgen process which is probably the closest, but doesn't really let you inspect anything while it's happening. The "legends" gamemode lets you explore the history of the world after it's been established, and there's some 3rd party tools to make exploring the maps and timelines a little easier.

ranger207• 5 years ago

I saw this post on reddit[0] the other day which uses something called df-ai[1]

[0] https://old.reddit.com/r/dwarffortress/comments/pqp9p2/dwarf... [1] https://github.com/BenLubar/df-ai

gunfighthacksaw• 5 years ago

Just an FYI for anyone who might be thinking of getting into the game.

It took me about 6 weeks playing along with the wiki to “git gud” enough to have a mostly stable fort. I used tilesets for eye candy and eventually moved to some of the memory hacking tools like dwarf therapist for a better management UI.

YMMV but if you are thinking “gosh it’s too complicated for me” just be patient with it and don’t be afraid to read the vast amount of documentation around the game.

DF is an extremely rewarding mindf*ck. It’s probably the only game now that I can get so immersed that I blow past my bedtime and spend the next day, fatigued, thinking of what to try in game next.

srcreigh• 5 years ago

I first tried DF a few weeks ago. I tend to avoid wikis for games (Factorio, RuneScape, Minecraft, Valheim) since it can "ruin the fun".

Can you comment on the experience of reading the wiki and still having fun? Does the wiki have spoilers? Is the game just too complex to spoil with any amount of reading about it?

Paul_S2• 5 years ago

It's not an adventure game - the wiki will not spoil it for you. It just gives you the tools. The fun is in using these and you are guaranteed to face a unique set of issues in your playtrhough.

andagainagain4• 5 years ago

Use the wiki. Even better, abuse the wiki, and use tutorials excessively.

Even better imo is to play until you get really confused, then use all the internet resources possible to understand wtf is going on.Then repeat.

I tend to avoid things like the lazy been pack or graphics packs. That's up to your taste though.

Paul_S2• 5 years ago

I love Dwarf Fortress but I don't understand the criteria for inclusion of games after 1990. Almost all the titles previous to that are more or less industry milestones but after that the choice become more and more aribtrary and obscure.

2006: Dwarf Fortress

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