/games/ - Games

Toady did a demo for adventure mode. I like that if you hover over someone's name in dialogue it shows their portrait.

>>33805
If you don't like the game, you don't like it. Nobody would tell you it was polished or finished. The messiness is one of the core parts of DF's reputation.
>Making fortress sustainable is simple
Well yeah, that's step one. After that it's open-ended but there's a variety of goals to pursue. The simplest one and the one the game nudges you towards is just raising the value of the fortress by turning more resources into treasures. That levels up the significance of the fortress in your civilization and you can eventually become the capital. You also start getting requests like guildhalls after you have enough skilled workers. Then there are all the locations in the outside world to explore, raid, conquer, etc. If you train enough soldiers you can fight wars against your neighbors and take over their settlements. Or you could try to build a fortress around a specific goal, like producing musical instruments and trained musicians. The worlds are compatible between modes, so you can also build a fortress and share the file for other players to explore in adventure mode.
>crap performance after couple of years even with a relatively small fortress
You probably have an issue with trash accumulating and slowing things down. The game doesn't purge trash items automatically, but there are ways to do it manually, most popularly the "atom smasher" method using a bridge to crush items.
Another possible problem is using a layout that messes with the pathfinding algorithm (A*). More open areas is better, and fewer, centralized stairways in contained rooms is better.

>>33806
Settlements look nice on the map.
I agree the dialogue portraits seem very helpful in keeping track of who's who.
Surprised that the combat options look pretty intuitive for how complicated the system is.

>>33807
>If you don't like the game, you don't like it. Nobody would tell you it was polished or finished.
Just wanted to vent tbh. Spent 20 hours on trying to find good game underneath all of that and came out incredibly dissapointed.

None of those goals looks hard, or all that interesting, just more of a chore. Compared to stuff like Factorio, the level of complexity is…just not there, i guess.

>You probably have an issue with trash accumulating and slowing things down.
Well, that's on dev, who in 20 years couldn't make it work better. Again, Factorio is MUCH larger in scale and doesn't have such problems.

>most popularly the "atom smasher" method using a bridge to crush items.
Oh, yeah, that's one of the things - almost everything, even something simple like farming, feels like an exploit or workaround. Meachanics works seemingly incidentally with each other rather than intentionally.

>>33805
>bought it
You what?

>>33809
Bought. Purchased. Paid for.

>>33810
There's a free version on the game's website.

>>33811
Sure. Money is not the issue tho, i do have some disposable income.

>>33808
>Just wanted to vent tbh
I am other anon just in case. I feel you fam. I still find DF fun, but it feels like you need very particular mindset to make it engaging. I have days when I can play it day after day, then don't feel like it for a year or so.

Anyways, the mindset I have in mind is particularly autistic "I want to create emergent stories about stupid stuff". This is why people do succession games, this is why people start doing merpeople holocaust, this is why carp is memetic.

>>33813
Yeah, i guess i was looking for something else, which is why i was this dissapointed to come here with rant. All the time i was playing i had a feeling that it is the game that i could like, but never found myself enjoying fully, always halfway there. Guess it blueballed me, lol

>>33814
Understandable, if anything many people prefer to read about DF than actually play it. The fact that Boardmurdered succession game having own wikipedia page is enough of a proof for this.

>>33808
>Again, Factorio is MUCH larger in scale and doesn't have such problems.
Based, and it's also libre software, maybe you're right. But are the the same kind of games really?

>>33808
The appeal of DF is like the appeal of minecraft, as a way to flex your creative muscles more than solve difficult problems.

>>27737
>Each new fortress needs the same unfun gameplay loop to get going
Colony sims will have colony sim shit in them. Fortresses are different if you build them in different environments, yet they have the same basic building blocks because it is logical: stockpiles store materials, etc. how would you have do it differently? Guessing it's too hard to use the painting the area tool, or maybe it's the allowed items menu or what. Never used traps or dwarf therapist, labor is for nerds and personally speaking I've had 15-ish labors max at my largest fortresses. You are simply unskilled if you think this is bad.
>Once you get going, "winning" is actually easy: once your fortress is self-sustaining, build a drawbridge and almost never open it. DF is such a brilliant game that drawbridges are indescrutible!
Dearie me, I found an exploitable bug. Better ruin the gameplay experience. Playing the meta in any game is a good way quaranteed ruin your experience. Rimworld is not fun if you build 2x2 bedrooms and killboxes. TES V is not fun if you use stealth archer. Meatspace sports aren't fun if you go out of your way to do all you can to win either. All of this applies to dwarf fortress.
>Military and combat are absolute dogshit to handle. The military is so obtuse and complex to wrangle that it feels like a job trying to get shit to work. In fact, DF's shit UI ruins more than just the military.
The only issue I found is that the arrow system was bugged for a while (archers didn't get them automatically, you couldn't assign them any) but even that got fixed. After having done the army stuff for 20 minutes I figured it out almost completely. It's a list of equipment and a schedule, easiest shit ever. After having played the game for a week, I was waging war and fighting defensive battles like second nature. Got my brother to test this due to your reply, he does not like management games, took him about an hour on a prebuilt fortress (including setting up equipment manufacturing orders, training schedules, etc.) so he could start doing raids on others and defend. Does not describe it as frustrating, simply time consuming. Did you ever play the game expecting an advisor icon popping up every second telling you what to do, or did you even play the game? Genuine fucking question.
>Entire classes can be taught showing how DF fails at UI at all fronts and how this results in an unfun and miserable experience for those without rose-tinted glasses.
It's a programmers' UI, utilitarian and working. The learning curve is so hecking steeperino it takes a whole two days max to test and learn all it's elements. Actually reading back your "argument" is all UI issues. Have you checked if you have issues in remembering what for example objects in real life are without actively using them yourself?

>>33820
>The appeal of DF is like the appeal of minecraft, as a way to flex your creative muscles more than solve difficult problems.
Those are the same thing. And DF is pretty crappy for that, unless you consider making pixel art out of fortress layout creative, but then again there are games that would suit it thousand times better because people wouldn't have to deal with crappy UI.

>>33819
>But are the the same kind of games really?
I would say it tries to be (a lot of fans will try to make it look like one), but fails. I has many of the elements that could make it one - production chains, automation, management and so on, but the guy who develops the game doesn't really understand what it takes to make it work, and didn't manage to learn it in 20 years, from what i have seen and read about him, he only interested in procgen.

>>33824
>It's a programmers' UI, utilitarian and working.
It's not. It's a complete fucking dumpster fire of the UI. It is neither utilitarian nor working. It's not about being ugly, it's about being disfunctional.

>>33831
>I would say it tries to be
Dwarf Fortress came out earlier. So it's Factorio that's trying to be Dwarf Fortress if anything.

>>33805
Youtube algo randomly blessed me with this video that seems to respond directly to this sentiment.

>>33837
I didn't say it tries to be Factorio specifically. They are different games after all, though they have similar elements. I said it tries to be the kind of game, what they call a colony sim, which is exactly why i played it and i would say it fails miserably at being a good sim game.

Anon here >>33813 said he played it mainly for "emergent stories". I guess i will agree that if you play it that way, it can be fun for you. It is unfortunate that many people try to pass it for something else.

>>33844
That sucks if someone sold it as a colony sim game. That's the "genre" you'd put it in but the appeal of it is in the detailed interactions. The colony sim is like the framework that creates a context for all the stories to happen within. The actual colony building part isn't really that challenging or deep in itself because it's not the focus but rather the foundation for everything else.

>>33846
>That sucks if someone sold it as a colony sim game.
Even in this thread people call it that, like this guy >>33824

And on steam it is being tagged by players as colony sim too.

Yeah, i guess i was looking for the wrong thing in the wrong place. It happens. If other people are having fun with it, good for them.

>>33848
Well it is technically a colony sim but it's not what it's about or its appeal. Idk if steam has a tag that's more suitable to describe the story generation. Some games like this are a little outside the box and hard to put into those kinds of categories.

Sucks that you got led to expect the wrong things and wasted your time and money.

>>33849
You can refund a game on Steam thankfully. I'm sure the anon did that.

>>33850
If you played more than 2 hours, you can't. I played quite a bit more than that.

Anyway, i think i'm over it, so thanks guys for letting me vent.

>>33851
Should have played the free version instead.

You know what? That's why Steam SUCKS and GOG is based, might as well pirate. It's just stupid, that kind of thing happened to me to. Like, how much can one really do for 2 hours in a game? Pass the tutorial?

That's why the developers don't bother with later-game content, they expect you to not be able to refund the game in time.

>>33853
>Like, how much can one really do for 2 hours in a game? Pass the tutorial?
Especially since a lot of game companies make them longer and longer specifically so that you won't be able to refund the game after.

Factorio devs are based because they provide a free demo.

>That's why the developers don't bother with later-game content, they expect you to not be able to refund the game in time.
Yeah, why bother polishing the game when marketing did it's job and shitload of preorders are in, and they won't be able to refund them if they've just passed tutorial stage.

>>33854
>Factorio devs are based because they provide a free demo.
The game's also libre so you can compile it if you wanted to. Though I'm not sure if the in-game sprites are also libre.

>>33808
Try Songs of Syx. It's like Dwarf Fortress mixed with Sim City or Pharaoh, and has an extensive free "demo" that basically lets you play forever, unless they updated that.

adventure mode beta is april 17th with the full release a few weeks after

Hate the new controls and menu system. None of the hot keys work anymore, weird mouse stuff and thry stopped updating to Linux almost instantly after they sold out to steam.
Anyone else hate it?
This all genuinely made me depressed as the game (and bay12 games generally) was a big part of shared enjoyment between me and my sibling as kids.

>>34037
>Anyone else hate it?
I don't hate it, but i started playing again (waiting for adventure mode) and damn i'm fucking lost.

>>34037
I get it's supposed to appeal to people who like the idea of DF but got filtered by the old UI, but I wish there was an option to go back to the old UI. It's way faster to do things with once you built the muscle memory for it compared to having to use a mouse.

smh Dwarf Fortress got political

>>34123
after trying out the updated version and finding out the controls were different i immediately lost interest, maybe this is what becoming a boomer feels like

>>34155
lol there was a meltdown on 4chan back when he posted the announcement in support of BLM, maybe they'll rally to defend the honor of EA and microsoft execs this time

>>34123
>It's way faster to do things with once you built the muscle memory for it compared to having to use a mouse
Yes. I never really got the kvetching about oldUI, the new one makes the game monotonous, slow and repetitive.
>>34122
It took me days to get the hang of it and I still found myself trying to press shortcuts that no longer do anything.
Building things like zones and bridges is actually a nightmare now too.
>>34159
>maybe this is what becoming a boomer feels like
Yes. Part of my miserable NewDF experience was realising I am old and its no longer for us oldheads who were pro.ised thst Because of our donations the game would never be commercialised etc. The fact is we've been discarded for the prospect of a new audience bringing more cash than us.
Deeply sad.

>>34171
>The fact is we've been discarded for the prospect of a new audience bringing more cash than us.
Aren't they still releasing it in the old version with the same UI?

>>34171
>I never really got the kvetching about oldUI
There's a lot of a fair criticisms of it. Some stuff isn't placed logically in the categories you'd think they'd be, inconsistencies with specifying the size of a designation requiring you use -/+/*,uhkm, or wasdx, lack of searching in certain menus without DFhack, mouse controls being in a dogshit state (until recently of course), etc. But it still should've been refined alongside mouse controls instead of the latter virtually superseding it.

>>34172
If you're talking about the free version, no. It has the same UI as the steam version. The only way to play the game with the old UI is to play any version before .50.

>>34175
>If you're talking about the free version, no. It has the same UI as the steam version. The only way to play the game with the old UI is to play any version before .50.
Oh damn that does suck. Hopefully they fix this with restoring hotkey functions or modders do it.

adventure mode beta's live

I've come to terms with that we will never see the Myth & Magic update, and that the steam release ruined the game. I don't blame the Tarns for working on it, it's not like they had much of a choice, but it killed the game all the same. Very sad.

>>34675
I checked the site yesterday actually.
Barely any updates unlike how it used to be even if progress was slow
Literally still pandering to the steam crowd
Hasn't even started work on M+M despite claiming to be just about to before the Steam pivot.

I have 0 respect for Toady now, which is sad i used to think of him highly and have donated to DF back in the day at various points.
Money grubbing freaks.

>>25036
You should go make this case on their forums. It's not like Toady and bro are completely unresponsive to feedback, you just need to popularize it. Hit em with the David Graeber and Michael Hudson ancient monetary histories. If you refuse this call, tell me, I feel like doing it now. I already troll like 57 forums. One more is nothin

>>34705
Oh God forbid they start taking community feedback and compensation after like 100 years of doing it for the art.

>>34675
Bitch: the steam version STILL IS NOT FINISHED. They released early.

>Money grubbing freaks
It's inexhaustibly funny to me how myopia is a plague on all blackflags.

>>34708
This but unironically.

>>34675
There was an interview where there's upcoming features for adventure mode that's supposed to help further lay the foundation for myth and magic (things like magic potions), but honestly even before the steam version myth and magic was kinda a "never ever." I just hope Tarn brings on more programmers beyond Putnam. That's the only way I see development not taking 2 decades to get out the "Graphics & UI" arc.

>>34734
>even before the steam version myth and magic was kinda a "never ever."
If you actually believe this you are dumb as hell.

>>34734
>I just hope Tarn brings on more programmers beyond Putnam.
This, there's no reason it needs to be such a small team.

>>34705
tarn adams was literally broke and had health problems and needed moeny

>>27737
the type of uygha to play FIFA and then get upset that you can't shoot the keeper in the face with a glock

>>34823
sorry man interesting indie games that appeal to niches shouldnt exist they should be slop that only appeals to meeeeeeeee