GameBanshee Forums

Since it has been months since fable last mentioned King of the Dragon pass, and after I repeatedly promised myself no to title this thread "Best game ever" followed by a large number of exclamation marks, I've decided to advertise another much underappreciated title on this board.

Dwarf Fortress is the game in question, made by Bay 12 Games, and available for free. The purpose is to take 7 dwarfs out in the wilderness, build a fortress and help them prosper. The most frequent complaints about games I see on this board is that nowadays it's all graphics, no depth and always too easy and forgiving. Dwarf fortress certainly can't be faulted for any of that. In fact the crude graphics might contribute to making the learning curve a bit more steep than it has to be.

Anyone playing it already? Anyone interested in trying? If so I would love to write more about why it's so nice.

Okay Dottie, let's hear about it. I might be interested.

Playing it right now.

Have to say, it has been a long time since I encountered this difficult Strategy/Simulation game. But that doesn't mean the game is bad, in contrary it's very good and hooking game.

The biggest problem is that the game itself lacks a manual, and the interface and controlling system is very difficult to comprehend without such. Luckily, there are couple of good guides on web:
Your first fortress - Dwarf Fortress Wiki
http://afteractionreporter.files.wordpr ... orials.pdf (PDF File)

The second one is using some saved game which you possibly can download somewhere, though it's not necessary. All the points get through there even without the save.

Also, for that matter, all those who want to try the game, I suggest downloading thisversion, which contains a tad clearer graphics (yes, the game isn't about the graphics, but the clearer ones helps you to see what's really going on there) and supports bigger resolution.

Very good game, but I really suggest reading at least on of the "manuals" before AND during playing. It might get pretty confusing otherwise.

Oh, and not to Mods, all the links (even link to download the game) was found while searching either the official site or official forums. I just can't remember where I found them there, so I put direct links to the files. If that's problem, I will remove them and find the sources better.

It always looked like a strategically deep but unnecessarily difficult game to get into, to me. But there are people who love it, and who am I to tell them they're wrong? There's a lot of love and work in the thing, clearly.

@Chanak: Basically it's mostly a design game. You can't give orders directly to a dwarf, and even if you could I believe it would be of limited use. The main thing you spend your time doing is building their fortress, designate which areas to excavate, what furniture to place where and what the workshops should do etc. While you do have a military, and are forced to use it every now and then success in that area depends much more on your fortress design than the exact number of troops you command.

The lovely thing, for me at least, is that there are thousands of ways you can shoot yourself in the foot, and in most cases in a way that makes you think you should have seen it coming rather then being annoyed that you didn't get a warning before. For example I've felt stupid numerous times concerning everything from not moving dead goblins out of my dining hall to leaving a single floodgate between my entire fortress and my water reservoir on top. The possibilities of failure are endless, at least for me.

That said, the game has some quirks, and some unexpected behaviour that might lead to frustration. I've avoided most of it by looking at the wiki kipi linked to whenever things don't seem straightforward.

Sorry if I'm sounding a bit like a salesperson, but as you might have guessed I've become quite enamoured.

@Fable: Certainly the game would be easier to get into with a little bit of graphic improvement, an interface update and a manual. The question is if that would be the best use of development time. I'm not so sure there...

gonna tried it after playing for a whole night of world of goo and age of decadence i need something to keep me going before going back to studying.

ps. do you need dosbox or something i cant open the game im downloading from the link kipi gave

No, you do not need dosbox. Even though the game looks as it's from that era it isn't. It's actually a quite demanding game computer wise. I'm not running the version kipi linked to though, so I'm afraid I can't give any advice.

DID IT


im a bit overwhelm but will give it a few days to sink in, probably going to use a guide to get a foothold