Slaves to Armok: God Of Blood, Chapter 2.0

October 29, 2007 9:57 PM

Dwarf Fortress
Version 0.27.169.32a, released October 29, 2007 A.D.
You are now free to waste the remainder your life.(prev)
posted by BlackLeotardFront (43 comments total)

(if this is too close to being a dupe, I'm sorry. I'd have commented it in the last thread if it was still open)
posted by BlackLeotardFront at 9:59 PM on October 29, 2007

Dude, get out of my head. I've been working on terrain generation algorithms all day and was marveling at the wonders of Dwarf Fortress.
posted by ryoshu at 10:10 PM on October 29, 2007

Goodbye productivity.
posted by TwelveTwo at 10:11 PM on October 29, 2007

Wikipedia article, for the WTFers.
posted by limon at 10:13 PM on October 29, 2007 [1 favorite]

You've got to read the saga of Boatmurdered in the previous thread, but only download this game if you don't need to sleep or eat for the next few weeks.
posted by Rock Steady at 10:14 PM on October 29, 2007

I just installed it, and it has re-mystified me. I don't even know where to start, and the documentation is scanty as hell.
posted by BlackLeotardFront at 10:26 PM on October 29, 2007

But enough about Linux!
posted by cortex at 10:28 PM on October 29, 2007 [17 favorites]

cortex, ftw!
posted by pmbuko at 10:34 PM on October 29, 2007

I clicked,
I downloaded,
I ran,
I took one look,
I ran.
mommy...
posted by blue_beetle at 10:40 PM on October 29, 2007

Cortex wins.

Every time I try and play Dwarf Fortress I get lost, confused, frustrated, and angry, in that order. That doesn't mean I'll stop trying to play, but it definitely seems like the type of game I need a few weeks of pure free time to devote to, which I never ever seem to have. Oh well. Downloading now...
posted by threetoed at 10:41 PM on October 29, 2007

But enough about Linux!

Somebody explain the reference?
posted by limon at 11:08 PM on October 29, 2007

Wow, this new version hits you with a metric assload of new options at once, and my old standbys don't seem to keep my guys from starving or dying of thirst.

Losing is fun.
posted by Sphinx at 11:09 PM on October 29, 2007

win.
posted by Addiction at 11:18 PM on October 29, 2007

my God this is the kind of shit I want to write when I grow up.

Much like Langston Empire, even though I've never played this (and never will) its mere presence has informed my vision a little bit more.
posted by Heywood Mogroot at 11:28 PM on October 29, 2007

I'm reading the Boatmurdered thread, and I think this is one of the best pages because of the watercolor at the bottom.
posted by user92371 at 11:41 PM on October 29, 2007 [1 favorite]

Cool!
Could you add the 'game' tag?
posted by algreer at 11:42 PM on October 29, 2007

Somebody explain the reference?

BlackLeotardFront: "I just installed it, and it has re-mystified me. I don't even know where to start, and the documentation is scanty as hell."
Cortex: "But enough about Linux!"

This is an unfair comparison though. The programmers of Linux are well aware of the invention of the mouse.
posted by aeschenkarnos at 11:43 PM on October 29, 2007 [1 favorite]

For your NetHack-related needs. One of THE classic Metafilter posts.
posted by BlackLeotardFront at 12:40 AM on October 30, 2007

but does it run under WINE?
posted by grubby at 12:54 AM on October 30, 2007

> but does it run under WINE?

Yes, it works perfectly, as far as I can tell.
posted by SteelyDuran at 1:00 AM on October 30, 2007

I lost enough time to Angband...the first time I read about Dwarf Fortress, I swore never to play it.
posted by GavinR at 1:25 AM on October 30, 2007

Wow, a textmode game which eats.. er.. (watches it in Task Manager slightly alarmed).. 330MB of memory.

Also spotted via the Bay 12 forums: Noctis. Woa! Maybe Elite 4 can wait a bit longer. At least, assuming I can find a link...
posted by Freaky at 1:36 AM on October 30, 2007

I see the cave populations have recently been tweaked.
Doesn't that make them angry?
posted by MtDewd at 2:30 AM on October 30, 2007 [2 favorites]

This just got a whole lot more fun. Instead of plotting one single front door entrance, identical in each fortress, I have logical use for a series of multipurpose exits. Hurrah!
posted by maus at 2:48 AM on October 30, 2007

Call me when it gets to version 1.0. I've wasted too much time on versions of stuff in the 0.xx range.
posted by Justinian at 3:14 AM on October 30, 2007

Dillonlikescookies writes "One deep and complex but utterly user-hostile rpg is enough to sate my needs."

Aye, matey ! While people are safe asleep and dreaming of electric sheeps, my bytes, these little quanta of info, securely and quickly travel the lines, telnetting me into a router. Little did they know that > isn't only an half assed smiley, but for the power of Cron, by tomorrow morning I shall be the Ruler of the SpyGlass.
posted by elpapacito at 5:13 AM on October 30, 2007 [2 favorites]

Works great under Parallels on Mac, too.
posted by jtron at 5:30 AM on October 30, 2007

A big barrier to starting Dwarf Fortress is that there's so much to do to get a fortress started, it's easy to lose track of it all and leave something not done. The great majority of people, I'm certain, learn this stuff by finding a forum thread to help them out, or they consult the Dwarf Fortress Wiki's page on starting out. (The wiki has been reset for the new version, but possibly much of the info in the old wiki is accurate. The quickstart guide of the old wiki is now here.)

Beyond that, learning all the keys is troublesome, and terribly inconsistent in different places.
posted by JHarris at 5:53 AM on October 30, 2007

Well, there goes NanoWriMo.
posted by loquacious at 6:17 AM on October 30, 2007 [1 favorite]

> Wow, a textmode game which eats.. er.. (watches it in Task Manager slightly alarmed).. 330MB of memory.

While it sticks to the textmode style, it actually uses opengl for performance. And when you understand the depth of the game, 330Mb are peanuts.
posted by CautionToTheWind at 6:29 AM on October 30, 2007

Well, there goes NanoWriMo.

Evidence of yet another public service performed by the authors of Dwarf Fortress.
posted by grouse at 7:26 AM on October 30, 2007 [3 favorites]

After playing it for a while, it seems that Dwarf Fortress has become a markedly different game. No longer can we rely on the old mountain structure. The first game I started had a horizontal cliff face, and it doesn't even extend very deep into the top of the map. Digging down, "into the screen," isn't just a few feature, it's downright necessary. To maneuver across depth, use the lesser-than (up) and greater-than (down) keys.

To players digging their first tunnels and wondering why they aren't finding any stone to work, check: is the earth you're digging peat? Peat mining doesn't leave stone! I apparently picked a less mountainous region to dig in, so I've got a lot of peat.

Also, water seems to work very differently now. Instead of unmovable, infinite water sources, water has amount. If you dig into a pond from its side, it'll run into the tunnel. But it won't flood the world, instead the pond will drain over time. If it was a shallow pond, the resulting drainage water, while looking dangerous, will actually be fairly weak.
posted by JHarris at 7:27 AM on October 30, 2007

Dwarf Fortress DOES recognize the mouse, but it's only really used to help designate places to mine (and detail stone and anything else under the Designations menu) and there's no helpful mouse cursor to indicate that, oh, wait, you can use the mouse here (you have to turn it on in the preferences file, but you'd have to know there was one in order to edit it). And of course it's not really documented at all. Welcome to Dwarf Fortress.
posted by chrominance at 8:44 AM on October 30, 2007

The mouse can also be handy for scrolling around, fwiw.
posted by cortex at 9:09 AM on October 30, 2007

Seeing that terrifying coloured-ASCII map I am reminded of a more naive time in my life, say last June, when you soulless bastards made me discover Nethack.

I am still angry.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 9:16 AM on October 30, 2007 [2 favorites]

JHarris, I'm glad I'm not the only one who carved out a whole main hall, dining room, kitchens, storage, and bedrooms from the SAND before learning that you need to dig down to get to the good stuff.

Another tip: When you are selecting a site for your fortress, pick one with only one layer of sand, peat, etc - it's easier to dig down and you don't have to change layers so much. You can also (in the shortcuts menu) set spots to zoom to for all the F keys. I got a spot with one layer of sand, a river head, and native veins of platinum, calcite, and magnetite.... it's looking good for the Ace Diamonds of Alacrity, or whatever my group is called.

I guess this info should be going in the wiki...
posted by BlackLeotardFront at 11:55 AM on October 30, 2007

Argh. Don't tell me I need to get Parallels just to play this. :(
posted by nihraguk at 12:17 PM on October 30, 2007

I just tired it a couple of weeks ago. The perfect charm with Nethack is how you learn really basic stuff really quickly and you can really slowly add the more advanced stuff to your reportoire. This game just dumps stuff on you that you have to do. It certainly is very expansive and holds so much promise, maybe just making the learning curve not so steep, but then again, very few real time strategies don't have steep curves.

Also, works fine for me under wine, except for sound problems, but that is probably more wine on my system than anything.
posted by Phantomx at 12:40 PM on October 30, 2007

First, metafilter introduced me to nethack, which was bad, bad, bad. Nearly ruined me. But I got better! Until I found out about ADOM, which is basically nethack, but way, way, way more. In every way. And which has completely ruined me.
Now, with this grim specter looming on the horizon, I fear that I shall live on only as a shadowy memory, occasionally surfacing in the back of my graduate advisor's mind.
posted by Baby_Balrog at 5:11 PM on October 30, 2007 [1 favorite]

The manual doesn't seem to be very instructive. Is there a better instructional walkthrough to get going? I'm feeling kinda overwhelmed by the options and menus and submenus.
posted by Andrew Brinton at 5:15 PM on October 30, 2007

The forum seems to indicate lots of live bug fixing going on.

I wrote out a post complaining about things, but then I played some more. God damnit. Still, figuring out the "tech tree" is going to be a nightmare.
posted by a robot made out of meat at 7:18 PM on October 30, 2007

if someone told me i was to be stuck on a desert island for ten years, i'd take a computer with a copy of nethack and dwarf fortress. and hopefully a good warranty.
posted by Dillonlikescookies at 2:47 AM on October 31, 2007 [1 favorite]

after trying it a little bit - damn. this thing is harder to work out than nethack, and that's saying something. i think i'll pass on it. one opressively demanding needy game that expects you to do everything for you and yet you keep going back to is enough.
posted by Dillonlikescookies at 4:11 PM on November 25, 2007