You read that headline right, good ole Dwarf Fortress is getting an update. After starting a Patreon and raising over 4,000$ a month, developer Bay 12 games has delivered on their promise. The first of what I assume will be many releases is now live, and it features a few new things as well as all the classic Dwarf Fortress goodness, and of course its still free.
The launch announcement does not mince words, it states: “The flow of fortress life is quite a bit different now—specific breaks and parties have been replaced by taverns and performances and needs and inebriation. You can designate a tavern, temple or library from a meeting area zone, bedroom or dining room using the new Assign Location option. The location list (‘l’) will let you know what sort of furniture and items you need, and you can set tavern keepers, scribes and other occupations there as well. You’ll need to set up a drink stockpile and a chest for goblets in taverns for drink service to work properly, but dwarves can still drink without a tavern as before. You can assign multiple rooms/zones to a single location.”
There’s a whole bunch more content in this update as well, new materials, new crafting, and some new intresting social stuff revolving around the tavern. Dwarves can now get drunk, pass out, and even die from drinking. So basically they added frat houses, ok maybe thats too mean, but this is certinly an interesting thing to add to a crafting a building game. Is a drunk dwarf still able to build? Harvest resources? I have no idea! Going to have to head over to http://www.bay12games.com/dwarves/ to find out, good luck if you never played before because this game is deeeeep.
New features on a game that was released almost 10 years ago is something we don’t often see, and unless I am much mistaken this method of using Patreons month to month support model to fund a game that has been “infinidev” for almost 10 years is a first. I cant say I dislike it, but based simply on how much they are getting, if they dont keep pooping out content I fear the masses may get restless and the end result not be too pretty.
