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Dwarf Fortress now on Steam with a graphical overhaul

jungl

Augur
Joined
Mar 30, 2016
Messages
1,420
> healthcare costs

God the USA is such a 3rd world country, DF makes 5000 dollars a month with Patreon and yet healthcare costs are so high they still have to get in more money to pay for it.

I have a friend who got chest heart pain after drinking and eating cake at a party. Went to the doctor to check what it was. Doctor xrayed his heart and did guess work telling him whats wrong then he went home with no real answer to his problem lol. The bill for all this was 50k. He was unemployed at the time and ignored all their mail and calls eventually they gave up.
 

anvi

Prophet
Village Idiot
Joined
Oct 12, 2016
Messages
7,530
Location
Kelethin
I would probably try this again with those fancy graphics. I can live with the UI but an update to that would be nice too. My only issue with this game is that I want some long term struggles that I can beat if I play well. Like enemy attacks that get stronger over time, but as long as you stay ahead of the curve you can survive.
 

sser

Arcane
Developer
Joined
Mar 10, 2011
Messages
1,866,661
Surprised they didn't do this earlier. It's been awhile since I played, but the interface isn't too bad if you spend some time with it; the problem is that there's on real easy way to pick it up. If they're on Steam they need to expand its usability so you can learn how to use it instead of divesting from the game and going to websites to learn wtf anything does.

> healthcare costs

God the USA is such a 3rd world country, DF makes 5000 dollars a month with Patreon and yet healthcare costs are so high they still have to get in more money to pay for it.

I have a friend who got chest heart pain after drinking and eating cake at a party. Went to the doctor to check what it was. Doctor xrayed his heart and did guess work telling him whats wrong then he went home with no real answer to his problem lol. The bill for all this was 50k. He was unemployed at the time and ignored all their mail and calls eventually they gave up.

In all likelihood his debt is hanging out in a debt collector's storage bin.

Though yes it is a bit silly here to say the least. I didn't even bother going to the doctor for thirteen years. The real cool part was when the President would reach into my pocket and take $800 each tax season as a penalty for not having health insurance. Shout out to that genius.
 

Perkel

Arcane
Joined
Mar 28, 2014
Messages
15,805
People complaining about UI changes in fucking DF never played DF to begin with because amount of stupid in that argument is bigger than Olympus Mons.

DF is full of redundant controls becuase Toady never cared about usability.
Like arrows and uhjn which work as UI navigators only for certain parts and for some parts they are used both at the same time.

Lack of filter search, that stuff was added by moders literally years ago and toady never cared to implement it himself.
Mouse doing something was also added by modders years ago but Toady never output any hardcoded ui stuff that could be used for mouse controls.
Building stuff requires you in unmodded game to build one piece at the time again using both arrows and uhjn at the same time.
Proper work assignment ? Who cares !

If that idiot would make proper UI he would be looking already at 1 mln sales because games like that sell a lot. Prison architect and rim world already are at 1mln+

DF actually is not that hard game to grasp at start. It is UI that keeps everyone from playing it mostly.
 

HarveyBirdman

Arbiter
Joined
Jan 5, 2019
Messages
1,044
Doesn't he still get regular monthly donations of $5000 ish anyways?
I mean, not gonna lie, I'd pay you your $20 for a dwarf fortress. But not with a new tileset only. Throw in a proper UI and it's a deal!
Yeah I'm not trying to stare at farmville graphics while playing with a UI that takes a month to learn.
 
Joined
Feb 20, 2018
Messages
999
People exagerate Dwarf Fortress's complexity. If it just had a decently comprehendable UI and graphics that could actually be understood people would find it far simpler to play than it is regarded as. (No don't give me that "Use your imagination" excuse. I was playing Ascii MUDs on a dodgy Micro PC before you were shitting yourself on your mum's tit) I'm not talking about NICE graphics. I am talking about INDENTIFIABLE graphics. The sort of thing a real game designer and artist would colaborate on for maximum clarity.
 

Agame

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Mar 29, 2015
Messages
1,702
Location
I cum from a land down under
Insert Title Here
ASCII or DEATH!!!

I must admit to being upset by this, Dwarf Fortress was the closest thing we have ever had to a legitimate "game as art", and he dun fucked it all up...

Now it looks like all the shitty DF clones people have been making.

But I cant really blame him, a mans gotta make the monies to live, just sad to see it happen.
 

Kev Inkline

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Nov 17, 2015
Messages
5,072
A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
People exagerate Dwarf Fortress's complexity. If it just had a decently comprehendable UI and graphics that could actually be understood people would find it far simpler to play than it is regarded as. (No don't give me that "Use your imagination" excuse. I was playing Ascii MUDs on a dodgy Micro PC before you were shitting yourself on your mum's tit) I'm not talking about NICE graphics. I am talking about INDENTIFIABLE graphics. The sort of thing a real game designer and artist would colaborate on for maximum clarity.
Fite me kiddo, I've clocked over 5K hours in MUDs 1993-1995. And DF ASCII is not only identifiable, it's legitimately beautiful.
 
Joined
Feb 20, 2018
Messages
999
People exagerate Dwarf Fortress's complexity. If it just had a decently comprehendable UI and graphics that could actually be understood people would find it far simpler to play than it is regarded as. (No don't give me that "Use your imagination" excuse. I was playing Ascii MUDs on a dodgy Micro PC before you were shitting yourself on your mum's tit) I'm not talking about NICE graphics. I am talking about INDENTIFIABLE graphics. The sort of thing a real game designer and artist would colaborate on for maximum clarity.
Fite me kiddo, I've clocked over 5K hours in MUDs 1993-1995. And DF ASCII is not only identifiable, it's legitimately beautiful.
I've played ASCII games with more comprehendable graphics. You ain't lived till you figured out your mate's weird proclivity for bondage through his Zork MUD. Fite me round the back of Tesco's mate.
 

Space Satan

Arcane
Vatnik
Joined
May 13, 2013
Messages
6,216
Location
Space Hell
All I want from DF Steam edition is a decent mouse support. I am used to keyboard UI and used ASCII version only but it is lack of decent mouse support that annoyed me the most.
Also Tomas Biskup hired only a few guys to make STEAM version of ADOM with graphic integration and I don't think Toady will require a studio to redraw all DF, given they can generalize almost every aspect.
Also, I never realy understood burrows and how to use them effectively, apart from creating some emergency areas in times of danger.
 

Bigg Boss

Arcane
Joined
Sep 23, 2012
Messages
7,528
Couldn't they have kept the Dwarves looking more...pixel-like? Not so much like a damned mobile game...

Oh I see. Someone is dying and they need money. Or they want to cash the chips and do something else with the rest of their life.
 

rezaf

Cipher
Joined
Jan 26, 2015
Messages
650
Graphics like these have been around for many years, and I'd presume it's still possible to play in ASCII using the Steam version ... having a tileset as default setting is only so the screenshots on the steam page doesn't make uninitiated people close said page immediately. I have played with and without tileset, both work just fine - graphics aren't what this game is about. It COULD be visually spectacular, mind you, these moundainsides, rivers and caverns rendered in state-of-the-art 3D ... but that's not the focus of DF, which is a good thing.

Perkel is spot on in his description of the UI, that's the main thing holding the game back, imo, and the main thing keeping a much larger audience from playing it.
The controls aren't terrible and you CAN learn to operate the game reasonably well, especially if you use the quality of life 3rd party tools, but it's still a mess.
I once pointed at the original Rollercoaster Tycoon UI in another DF discussion - that game's UI would be a perfect fit. It has all the difficult stuff, like height levels and underground, covered.
The saddest part is, Toady probably wouldn't even have to do the UI himself, he could just expose everything with an API and some soul would go through the trouble and do all the work.
Though now that it's a commercial project, I wonder what this will do to the spirit of the community that produces all those tools and addons for the game. Otoh, I think it's written somewhere the game itself will remain free - still, money is on the table now...

The other problem the game has is that it's not friggin going anywhere. I guess you could say this IS DF, less of a game and more of an ongoing live performance style programming effort. In my very first job, almost 20 years ago, I occasionally played around with DF at work, there were brakes where there was just nothing to do and the ASCII window didn't immediately alarm anyone looking at the screen from a distance. Heh.
Anyway, the DF I played back then, two decades ago, was actually more fun to play than current DF is. It didn't have height levels yet, you just dug further and further into a mountain, and that was also your progression through the game. DF was more of a game back then than it is now - though it's quality as a simulation has been massively improved upon since.
Height levels were a huge step (you can see that most similar games, like Rimworld or Prison Architect, shy away from those), but as a game, DF has never recovered. You now have civilizations which have histories, with all that worldgen simulation stuff going on, you have fascinating subsystems, like how detailed combat is modeled, how everything has all those individual bodyparts, fantastic beasts with crazy cominations of stuff, religious stuff, poetry, ... the list goes on and on. Yet doing trivial, mundane stuff, building up your defenses, making a military, building production chains ... and having a gameplay loop of sorts which isn't completely random, these parts are in a miserable condition.
And they are never improved on, because when Toady sets out to improve the way suqads are handed, he makes an intricate squad subsystem, with schedules and seperate workout clothing and ... sweat. Yes, how about a sweat subsystem. And also the smell of sweat. This should cause unhappyness, right? But you should be able to get rid of the smell by proper ventilation. Ventilation, yes, this isn't modeled in depth yet, let's add a system for that...
 

Bigg Boss

Arcane
Joined
Sep 23, 2012
Messages
7,528
This is why I firmly believe a post apocalyptic version of this game should be ripped off and made immediately.
 
Joined
Jan 14, 2018
Messages
50,754
Codex Year of the Donut
> healthcare costs

God the USA is such a 3rd world country, DF makes 5000 dollars a month with Patreon and yet healthcare costs are so high they still have to get in more money to pay for it.
Yeah, they should have taken the European route of just dying.
CONCORD-table12.jpg
 

laclongquan

Arcane
Joined
Jan 10, 2007
Messages
1,870,144
Location
Searching for my kidnapped sister
> healthcare costs

God the USA is such a 3rd world country, DF makes 5000 dollars a month with Patreon and yet healthcare costs are so high they still have to get in more money to pay for it.
Yeah, they should have taken the European route of just dying.
CONCORD-table12.jpg
why the hell even Australia beat EU at 3rd spot? That makes no sense and paint a dirty pictures of european medicine.
 

J_C

One Bit Studio
Patron
Developer
Joined
Dec 28, 2010
Messages
16,947
Location
Pannonia
Project: Eternity Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. Pathfinder: Wrath
> healthcare costs

God the USA is such a 3rd world country, DF makes 5000 dollars a month with Patreon and yet healthcare costs are so high they still have to get in more money to pay for it.
Yeah, they should have taken the European route of just dying.
CONCORD-table12.jpg
Nice try US fag, but you are dropping faster than Europeans. Get your prostate cancer chart out of here.
1920px-Countries_by_average_life_expectancy_%282015%29.png
 

Jimmious

Arcane
Patron
Joined
May 18, 2015
Messages
5,132
Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Holy shit! AWESOME!

*By the way edgelords, the ASCII mode will still be available for you
 
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