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If Dwarf Fortress sells millions on Steam, its creators will give the money away

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Re: If Dwarf Fortress sells millions on Steam, its creators will give the money away

#71

A truly American story, basically the only developed country in the world where you can be bankrupted from getting sick.

Huh? I'm pretty sure you can get bankrupted by illness in any country

I must have gotten downvoted by a bunch of American allowing in misery at the state of their healthcare, all the while ignoring the situation in other countries

/s, because I guess I was wrong, apparently?

Re: If Dwarf Fortress sells millions on Steam, its creators will give the money away

#72
post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, the idea of it is attractive, and learning the crazy UI is half the fun, but once you really get into it you realize that there is no there there. It's nowhere near as complex as it seems, and full of bugs, some decades old. Trade is so easily exploited that there is nothing exciting about the elves coming. You can kill them and start a war, but the combat is so unbalanced and exploitable that they pose no thre…

I don't think "nowhere near as complex as it seems" is anywhere close to describing what many consider the most complex game ever built, including many industry veterans. Every material has dozens of variables (such as density), every creature's limb acts differently, there are thousands of materials and object types and most are researched thoroughly. It is the most complex simulation game ever created (though not t…

If you look at the attributes of some creatures, weapons etc on the df wiki they are highly unrealistic and counter-intuitive. Moreover, the apparent complexity does not translate into fun gameplay, and actually hurts it in the form of high FPS. And the game play is still simple, almost mundane behind the hardcore veneer of inaccessibility.

Re: If Dwarf Fortress sells millions on Steam, its creators will give the money away

#73
post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are just a few (under 5) countries in the world where you will get the same treatment for "free" as you'd get in the US. The price is >65% taxation. In most of these "universal healthcare" countries, it's not that easy - a healthcare "insurance" is deducted from your wage, if you don't work, you have to pay it out of pocket (mandatory, but cheap - around $100 monthly). Social security programmes are useful just…

You are downvoted because you generalize your experience to every country except a vague set of 5... What you are saying is simply not true in most of Europe. Case in point, last year I have been treated for some serious health issue that would have immediately bankrupted me in the USA, forever. I was in the network of Charité Berlin, one of the biggest hospitals in Europe. The treatment and care was overall fantasti…

Germany is one of the five. I purposefuly left it out to see how many people will talk about Germany, trying to say that it's the same in the whole EU.

Isn't it interesting that any time someone tries to disprove me, it's always Germany, Austria and UK or Scandinavia (these are the five+UK), but never Czech Republic, Poland, Spain, Ukraine, Bulgaria, Romania, Moldavia, Serbia, Croatia, Albania, Belorussia and even Russia...? Isn't it maybe because of the issues I'm talking about?

I'm happy that your system works, meanwhile I'm starting my 5th month of waiting in line for a really needed treatment of my back. I've been skipped several times already (corruption).

Re: If Dwarf Fortress sells millions on Steam, its creators will give the money away

#74
post #66
post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The way you tell it everybody has some moment in life where they're confronted by a pile of cash and then their true nature is revealed (conveniently letting greedy people everywhere say "hey you see you're just as base and materialistic as I am"). But in real life many people show their basic disinterest in money simply by choosing to do things and pursue activities that have no financial incentive. So in fact most…

Are there truly folks “above” money? I believe so. But not a single one is or wants to be in the public light. Ever. The same drive that lends someone to desire public attention, also drives the want of money. So if there’s a public statement about “oh, I don’t care about money. I’m just going to give it all away.” I smell bullshit. Sounds more like trying to gain sympathy purchases. Nothing against dwarf fortress or…

I mean the two brothers that develop Dwarf Fortress for the past ~2 decades have made a completely free game, only asking for donations. Don't you think if they were as dirty as you say, they would have started to charge a long time ago?

Re: If Dwarf Fortress sells millions on Steam, its creators will give the money away

#75
post #32
post #28

DF seems amazing but the learning curve is so steep it's discouraging. I've yet to find a base building game that feels fair and does not put so much pressure on the player. Tried Prison Architect but my prison got burnt to the ground because guards were on strike (and they announced it 3 hours before while it takes 5 hours to be able to offer them a raise). Tried Oxygen Not Included but the water behaves SO erratica…

I'd highly recommend giving Rimworld a go. It's like a simplified version of Dwarf Fortress but with a space theme. The controls are much more friendly and there's a huge number of mods that can completely change the way you can play the game. It definitely doesn't have the level of depth that Dwarf Fortress has (there's no z-levels for example) but it'll still suck hours of your life away if you're not careful.

dungeon keeper is within the same space as well and thematically closer

Re: If Dwarf Fortress sells millions on Steam, its creators will give the money away

#76
post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, the idea of it is attractive, and learning the crazy UI is half the fun, but once you really get into it you realize that there is no there there. It's nowhere near as complex as it seems, and full of bugs, some decades old. Trade is so easily exploited that there is nothing exciting about the elves coming. You can kill them and start a war, but the combat is so unbalanced and exploitable that they pose no thre…

DF is a "create your own fun" kind of game. If you try to play in an "optimal" way by exploiting the ridiculous trade values of some items and giving your fortress just one entrance with a drawbridge you won't have as much fun indeed. The solution is to simply not do that and set your own rules and goals. I'd even say that trade and combat being exploitable is a feature, not a bug, since sometimes I simply don't want…

I understand that it's a sandbox game, but the list of self imposed restrictions you have to follow to have fun is quite long indeed. Don't wall yourself in, don't use the OP traps, don't farm indoors, don't make bone/stone crafts (really high trade value despite bones and stones being waste goods), don't build using multiple floors (stairs have no movement cost last i checked), etc, etc, etc...

The devs really don't care about making a fun game. I guess their principles don't align with mine, but I won't reward them for leaving bugs unfixed for a decade plus.

Re: If Dwarf Fortress sells millions on Steam, its creators will give the money away

#77
post #23
post #20

Everyone is always above money until they’re looking at a stack of it in front of them. The only folks I know that have the willpower to turn down a pile of money is someone who has their eyes set on a mountain of money.

The way you tell it everybody has some moment in life where they're confronted by a pile of cash and then their true nature is revealed (conveniently letting greedy people everywhere say "hey you see you're just as base and materialistic as I am"). But in real life many people show their basic disinterest in money simply by choosing to do things and pursue activities that have no financial incentive. So in fact most…

> But in real life many people show their basic disinterest in money simply by choosing to do things and pursue activities that have no financial incentive. So in fact most people are above money.

Usually the preference of staying in the comfort zone comes first, and preference for money later. People will grab money if it comes with low effort and risk. However I wouldn't say that there is generally "disinterest in money", just disinterest in money in the sense that other factors are overvalued above it.

Re: If Dwarf Fortress sells millions on Steam, its creators will give the money away

#78
post #74
post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are there truly folks “above” money? I believe so. But not a single one is or wants to be in the public light. Ever. The same drive that lends someone to desire public attention, also drives the want of money. So if there’s a public statement about “oh, I don’t care about money. I’m just going to give it all away.” I smell bullshit. Sounds more like trying to gain sympathy purchases. Nothing against dwarf fortress or…

I mean the two brothers that develop Dwarf Fortress for the past ~2 decades have made a completely free game, only asking for donations. Don't you think if they were as dirty as you say, they would have started to charge a long time ago?

They most definitely aren't dirty, but also there is nothing dirty in wanting money. Practically everyone needs money to survive, and if you want to have more money than just survive I don't think there is nothing wrong with that, if you acquire that money ethically.

Re: If Dwarf Fortress sells millions on Steam, its creators will give the money away

#79
post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

UK does not have a universal healthcare system in a comparable way to continental Europe. It is excluded from what I said, but it's not much of a change - that makes it sixth in the world. Out of 195.

How does the UK not have universal healthcare?

Sorry I was mistaken, however: Every commenter here is talking about their experiences in private clinics. These are not a part of most universal healthcare systems and it's polar opposite of what the USA liberals are proposing. That's why I didn't want to count UK in, however other commenters have proved to me that it was a mistake - if any homeless man is able to get such treatment, I have to agree it's universal - but is this true? Noone here confirmed that yet.

Re: If Dwarf Fortress sells millions on Steam, its creators will give the money away

#80
post #7

i mean.. that's nice. but damn. If they dont qualify as deserving to reap their rewards... I dont know who does! Edit: It seems like they may be vaguely referencing Markus "Notch" Persson's cash flush success after selling Minecraft. I think just being self aware enough to be worried about how "money" might change them should be enough to settle their worries. Notch had a rough time for a while, but he was always a v…

Why do you feel it's alluding to Notch? There are plenty of game developers who've struck it rich and the Dwarf Fortress authors' concerns about sudden wealth seem pretty specific to them.

They both rely on procedural generation to build worlds and give users some degree of creative control to build things.

But one became a billionaire and spends his days on twitter whining about how hard it is to be white.

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