Bay 12 Games Forum

I'm just curious to see what is being added or changed in the new update that's due soon. I don't see a list anywhere, and I don't really want to scroll through all the news posted on the site for the last year since I played. Or if someone is kind enough to let me know here that would be great .

Oh come on, we were all "outsiders" once.

Most gamers of my age group (late 20s to early 30s) that I have met IRL are pretty casual (as in mobile gaming casual). Even the hardcore gamers (those that owned gaming stations and/or gaming laptops and also owned and played a prodigious amount of games) I know of have little to no idea what DF is. They are more preoccupied with the latest titles and hyped games from previously known quality game developers to bother with some indie game that has been around for some time that they've never even noticed. In my opinion, DF caters to a very VERY niche audience that knows what it wants from their gaming experience, isn't afraid of "insane" difficulty, non-existent "graphics" and horrible UI and has the patience to slog through a game as intimidating and time engaging as DF is or is rumored to be. Does that sound like the average gamer to you? It sounds pretty masochistic to me. Most people I know are looking for some quick entertainment provided in a neatly bundled package. Whereas all the entertainment value in DF is usually gleaned in between the lines. You'll have to have some imagination AND engage in that imagination while playing to derive entertainment from DF. Otherwise, its just a slog to play through. I reckon that's why I burn out on DF sometimes.

Most casual gamers I know would take a look at DF and decide then and there that they aren't interested in it at all. To them, DF is not even on their radar, so they wouldn't give it a second glance. If it wasn't for coming across, reading, enjoying and being intrigued by the quirky playthrough of Boatmurdered from the LP archive, I too would not have been interested enough to pick up DF. Even then it still took some convincing before I was sure that DF was the game for me, I read more playthroughs from the Hall of Legends here (and discovered that I really enjoyed them) and lurked around on the forums for quite awhile before even deciding to download the game and giving it a go myself. From then on, I was hooked. If not for a background in playing MUDs and ASCII games like The Two Towers, Nethack, Angband, as well as games that involved a modicum of reading like Kingdom of Loathing and so on, I doubt Dwarf Fortress would have sustained my interest. Indeed the ASCII had a certain charm of its on that harkens back to these older games.

Does that describe most us in a nutshell? I doubt it. Just like in real life, we are likely to be of a very diverse gaming backgrounds. Its just that if you aren't looking for something like DF, you aren't likely to stumble across it. Even then, it might take some time to harness the courage to take the dive and actually download and play. For the general gaming public, I reckon we probably don't exist. Does it even matter? Other than as some intellectual exercise, nope, not at all. I'll be happy building my own imaginary microcline castles in the sky, pursuing some megaproject or something and lining up my dwarves for the slaughter thank you very much.

I'm 30 and have noticed this as well. I found df when I was 23 and have played on and off since. I grew up playing muds(act of War mostly and actually never played nethack) with a friend though in the 90s whereas most people I have met don't know what a mud is. It gave me a bit of nostalgia to that time when I first played df and does still sometimes. Good memories since that friend died when we were in high school.

Anyone I know around my age now though, at work, or friends have no clue what df is or think it looks stupid because of the graphics. Its crazy how shallow people are. If it's fun I play it and could care less about such trivial things like graphics. I'm the odd one out it seems though. I don't understand the casual games like mobile phone games either. They seem like a waste of time because of how shallow they are when I can just resume my df game or other rpg, or strategy games I also play. I don't use my phone for that, and never will. If I'm in public I talk to people or do things, and at home I game.  My phone is to talk to people, browse forums, or check the news/weather. Hrm come to think of it, it makes perfect sense a shallow person would like something shallow to fill their time with..

Then there's my son at age 10. And all his generation does is sit around and watch YouTube. It drives me nuts. I'm like "hey let's play a game. " As my son stares at the monitor, "nah, I'm watching jacksepticeye play this." I would have done anything at his age to play a game with my dad, granted all we had was an nes, 56k(more like 22k) AOL for chat rooms or muds, or n64 as I got older.  I hope he grows out of it in the next few years.

So odds are if you want to actually play the new update long-term on a relatively 'stable' version, you might be waiting until 2018, I think.
It's not gonna stop me because I'm dying to try out the new features and I'm used to trying out bleeding edge stuff, but still.

This is what I do each year. I wait until 3 or so patches after the big release to start playing. Then I get a bit bored after a few months and wait again till the next winter lol.

Hey great videos! I have not played in a few years and decided to give this another go. I used the 2015 series to catch up, but now I am sure DF is a few updates ahead of these videos. Comparing notes it looks like the main things added the last year since these videos are taverns, libraries, temples, bug fixes, and adventure mode stuff correct?

Alright thanks ill look into it!

DF2012 - mostly adventure mode.

DF2014 - mostly fortress mode

That seems sort of backwards considering this last update..

So where is the Windows lazy newb pack out of curiosity? That is the pack I used to use a few years ago when I played last.

Lets be honest, we have ALL been through this..

It seems like every few months you will read an article along the lines of...
"If you liked Dwarf Fortress, you will LOVE this game!"
or
"This game! It's like Blank, meets Dwarf Fortress!"

And usually to say they are Underwhelming is an Over statement...
The other day my brother, who knows i am a Dwarf Fortress fantastic comes at me with Castle Story!
A game he SWEARS is JUST like Dwarf Fortress!
"Look, you control lots of little guys, and they BUILD things! And you have to defend your castle against monsters! It's TOTALLY like Dwarf Fortress!!"
 

SO... How often do the rest of you have to deal with this?

It seems like this thread has gone way off-topic lol. But I get that sometimes, and the closest game I have found and liked is Gnomoria. He is doing a great job, though that game is 2D it is a major step up on the UI and graphics department. Obviously the depth is not there, but it is getting there slowly.