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[h3lblad3]

*jumps in time machine*
*flies back in time*
*Tells Pollock to stop trading his paintings away for a quick beer because some dumb schmuck will buy it regardless of quality*
*flies back to future*

Hey, might not have gotten him what he wanted, but dangit, at least someone made a buck out of the idea that everything must be sold for a premium.

[Saeldanya]

I only read the first two pages, so I'm not sure if anyone said it before. But one of the beauties of the game is the modding community, which exists because of the freeware model. In a way, there IS a team working on the game - but each team member creates a slightly different game, and whenever you've seen all there was to see, you can move on to the next mod and have fun all over again.

A commercial launch would kill the modding community.

Two thumbs and three toes (attention: pun!) up to Toady for not giving in to the monetary demon.

[DFPongo]

Lots of commercial games have modding communities. Most I would say.
The two issues are not contradictory at all.

[Lectorog]

I only read the first two pages, so I'm not sure if anyone said it before. But one of the beauties of the game is the modding community, which exists because of the freeware model. In a way, there IS a team working on the game - but each team member creates a slightly different game, and whenever you've seen all there was to see, you can move on to the next mod and have fun all over again.

A commercial launch would kill the modding community.

Two thumbs and three toes (attention: pun!) up to Toady for not giving in to the monetary demon.

Oblivion is one of the best-selling and most-modded games ever. The reason that DF is modded so much is because of the game design, not because it's independently produced. Unless a company (for some reason) absorbed the raws into a game proper, the modding potential would remain the same.

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

Lots of commercial games have modding communities. Most I would say.
The two issues are not contradictory at all.

Yeah, it's kindof amazing to me how many responses seem to be "commercializing would ruin

• about DF", when there are hundreds of examples of successfully commercialized games or websites that have something similar to
• but haven't been ruined by commercialization. Penny Arcade used to be run on a donation model, just like DF. Apparently, because they sell advertising and t-shirts, they must be a failing business by now . . . .

[kaijyuu]

DF is niche. Penny Arcade and mainstream games are not.

Do you really thing Toady could survive on selling t-shirts or the game itself? To be perfectly honest the amount of donations he gets right now is astounding to me. Converting over to a more traditional revenue model is risky, to say the least.

[Lectorog]

DF is niche. Penny Arcade and mainstream games are not.

Do you really thing Toady could survive on selling t-shirts or the game itself? To be perfectly honest the amount of donations he gets right now is astounding to me. Converting over to a more traditional revenue model is risky, to say the least.

He is surviving off of "selling" the game right now. T-shirts certainly wouldn't hurt - I'd buy a couple.

DF, how it is, cannot be a mainstream game - it's too hard, simply put; among other top reasons, its UI is terrible (no offense intended, I'm speaking relative to the masses). It could not survive off of standard sales, so it has to settle for the installment donations it has going right now.

[Jelle]

Huh what a dumb article, how can you argue over wether or not the game needs to be sold for big money or not if the game itself is still in alpha stage. Can't really go about selling a game in developement.

Sounds to me he just wants dwarf fortress to be mainstream and accessible to the masses, wich would defeat the whole point since it would take away what makes dwarf fortress so fun.

[DFPongo]

No it wouldn't, there is an interface problem that's all, and a developer that doesn't like interface problems.(or likes them less) It would take nothing from the game at all to give it an interface what would expose its depth in a more intuitive way.

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

DF is niche. Penny Arcade and mainstream games are not.

Do you really thing Toady could survive on selling t-shirts or the game itself? To be perfectly honest the amount of donations he gets right now is astounding to me. Converting over to a more traditional revenue model is risky, to say the least.

I think he could sell t-shirts and  start web advertisements and the like and the only difference it would make would be that he'd make more money. I doubt the donations would change.

There's a reason that Penny Arcade doesn't have a tip jar any more, they don't need it. All the websites that had tip jars ten years ago have google ads now, because they make more money that way. Toady's just afraid to change. It's understandable, but he'd be better off if he switched.

The sad thing is, the change would be essentially zero-risk; anyone who'd be pissed off at him for running ads, isn't the sort of person who'd be donating anyway, and if the ads and so forth didn't generate enough revenue, he could still say "hey, the site's not making enough money, can anyone ante up?" and people still would.