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[Torak]

I hope I'm not an elitist, I try my damnedest to not be.

[Eagleon]

I have to say, watching the DF community exploding from its beginnings, it is a little difficult to keep track of the forums now. That's my only complaint about new players, and it is a small one - once a forum gets large enough I pretty much stop posting much at all and just try to get a feel for what's being done by the whole. Ah well. C'est la vie, la vieille maison est allé, ma croupe est en feu, les morts doivent avaler les vivants et les fleurs du ciel va détruire tout ce qui est bon, etc.

I doubt this would happen. Simply because I doubt Toady would censor the stuff he has planned for the sake of 3d graphics. I can see DF sparking renewed interest in in-depth simulations if a lot of his powergoals become possible, but unless the plan changes drastically, it's only going to get less PC. Hehehe.

[Akroma]

I think there is a point that many of us are underestimating:

This is the reason why DF will never ever become mainstream. Even with an easy to use interface, with grafics support, and all sort of fancy stuff (that I will turn of with an init option (I hooe there will be one)anyway) DF is still a game that you just sit down and play like other games.

For DF to be enjoyable you need to spent time and effort, you mustn't be discouraged by trial and error and losing many times and most of all, you need to be creative. Even the best sandbox games get boring when you always do the same thing over and over again, planless.

I know, I know, people will get angry at me for this, calling me an elitist, but this sort of "natural filter" made the DF community one of the best I have ever seen. And so far, I have never seen anyone not wanting new players. Whenever a new player came here, with a total noob question like my first post on here, people have always answered them seriously, and not even once (or at least as far as I remember) anyone was not answered or called a noob.
What I am afraid of would be a watered down version of DF (or how I like to call it DF-lite) making it easier for people to play the game without dedicating a little effort for it.
I would seriously dislike, HATE it when I see a 12 year old on gamefaqs shouting " LULZ DF iS tEh beSt gAEm evur "

But hey, that won't happen
Toady making an easy game without a gigantic amount of complex detail ?

yeah right....

[LASD]

About elitism:
I always forget how smart people are here. My last post had a hint of overreacting in it.  The occasional rude comments on the forums don't make it elitist, they just stand out (and are remembered), because generally everyone are so fair.

I just hate elitism, so I think it is a very important thing to discuss and prevent.

About Commercial DF:
The discussion here is just like talking about underground/indie bands. The large record companies don't sign them because these bands usually differ too much from the music that sells a lot.

I really love art (or other creative things, like DF) that are truly original and bring something new or different to the world. Large companies don't care how groundbreaking the thing they sell is.

DF is too different and unfinished for companies to start selling it in a large scale. But if it happened (or the playerbase became much much bigger in some other way) it wouldn't ruin the game for the majority of people, but like it happens with bands, some of the original fans would think that something important was "stolen" from them when it wasn't just their thing anymore, and maybe even start dislinking it.

The constant learning process (and the starting learning curve) of DF is very important reason why I like the game. Like Akroma said (and I agree that it is good), the learning curve filters out the people that are not into games like this. The learning also binds the community together because everyone has at some point gone through the hardships of the UI. If the learning was made a lot easier this would be a very different game. When people have invested much time to learn to play the game, they are more likely to keep playing, so that their investment doesn't go to waste. These among other things like the constant presence of Toady (and his enormous detail of the development process) make the game a much more personal experience, which makes the people in the community much more enthusiastic about the game.

Writing this I understood how big part of the game the community and the presence of Toady in it are.

Without the personal aspect and the community the game is still great, because of it's mind-boggling details and overall sheer awesomeness, but the personal parts make it the best game ever.

If DF became massively big, it could make it less personal. So I will have to agree with lumin that commercial DF would be a disaster if it was also simplified.

TL;DR (DF is great and original because it's personal. Commercial DF could be less personal and therefore worse)

P.S. Sorry about the confusing text, it's hard to express thoughts clearly with a foreign language.

[Neonivek]

Dwarf Fortress is possibly one of the only freeware games I saw that I fully believe should be published

I have no problems with it going mainstream

Look at your examples: X-com, Simcity, and civilisation... In all of those you STILL have the originals.

Though seeing as Dwarf Fortress is likely never to be completed (it seems to be one of those games made to be in production basically forever) and a mainstream version would not only be completed but would look pretty... I can't argue against it.

So Toady could possibly get a ability to create his version of Dwarf Fortress even while the main stream version was being made... so he would never have to worry about donations and thus not ONLY would you get the fully completed mainstream version... but you would finally start to get the completed NORMAL version. (Heck Toady could probably hire some people to do some optimisation)

And ALL the community would have to deal with is annoying fanboys who would eventually go away and stick with the Mainstream boards.

"you mustn't be discouraged by trial and error and losing many times and most of all, you need to be creative"
-Dwarf Fortress like many Freeware games does this to a fault. Requiring the player to know spoiler information or do activities to the point of being obsessive in order to make it work.
--a large portion of people who support such mechanics are usually people who like Bragging rights... those are some of the "Elitists" most a "Hey I can beat a game that you can't because I know things you do not".
---I have nothing wrong with difficulty... but I do have something wrong with needing information hoarding to play successfully. (though Dwarf fortress isnt as bad as other games where in order to win you basically need to know a sheet the size of your arm full of information you wouldn't normally know in order to win). Though Dwarf Fort does this less then a lot of games I know it still has "Ohh you didn't know this? Too bad you lose" situations and you probably played the game for hours on end to get to this point. It is kinda the difference between "difficulty" and "Cheapness"
----Though mind you that from what I read... Toady is trying to fix this problem.
-----I mean just look at your graph... it isn't "Skill required" it is knowledge. (I am soo happy I didn't try to learn the game on my own... Id have stopped playing the game quickly...).

[Armok]

Can I please go on and flame Neonivek to death, then throw his !!corpse!! to the carp?

[Neonivek]

Am I not allowed to have oppinions?

[thvaz]

Don't mind Armok, he is the forum resident clown, and the god of blood in his spare time.

[Neonivek]

That is good... I was afraid he spoke for the community as a whole

[McDoomhammer]

Everyone seems to be missing the point.

Namely that Akroma, or whoever made that graph if not him, wins the internet.  I move it be immeadiately put in the fanart thread.

[Cthulhu]

Indeed, although it should have some giant robots roaming around the flat part. Even if you know everything about DF it still screws with you(I assume, I'm still climbing)

[Lyrax]

It needs more dwarves.

I see a lot of humans, and a lot of human corpses, but where's the network of tunnels and farms that can only be accessed from the far right?  Where are the plump helmet farms?  The smelters processing adamantine?

And where are the demons that killed everybody?  Why am I asking questions?

I can't answer these.  But in all seriousness, the graph is good.  It made.  My.  Day.

You win half an internet.  You can win the other half when it has dwarves.

[Neonivek]

Not really going to debate if knowing everything really fully protects you (though there are some pretty cheap strategies though the cheapest ones are considered cheating... for good reason)

I am most likely just Jaded because of all the Roguelikes and other freeware games Ive played some which have jumped from what would be common sense deaths into "What the heck" deaths with no real purpose other then to distance the difference between a vet and someone who just started playing.

So I very well may just be letting out my frustration from those onto Dwarf Fortress.

[Cthulhu]

Lol, I remember the time I ate the contents of a tin can in Slash'em, began hallucinating vividly, and was killed by a gnome wizard I thought was a can of Red Bull.

[Kalimar]

quote:Originally posted by thvaz:
<STRONG>This elitism sickens me.</STRONG>

How so? The esoteric GUI prevents the fickle masses from lobbying Toady to include whatever-the-f* variables and anime references.

[ April 15, 2008: Message edited by: Kalimar ]