Currently for $1,99 on the Humble Store:
https://www.humblebundle.com/store
For those of you who always wanted to try Dwarf Fortress but never managed to overcome its many hurdles, playing Dwarf Fortress for you suddenly went from this:
to this:
Welcome to candy heaven.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
| Info Box |
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Click this link for the Desura link, where you can buy or INSTALL THE DEMO
Official Page, including forums and a buy-directly-through-us-option: www.gnomoria.com
6,39€ now/7,99€ usually
7,99$ now/9,99$ usually
Still in Alpha Beta Gamma Delta Epsilon
Win Only
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
| Whats this game? |
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Its a very true to the roots Dwarf Fortress clone in the making. Click here for the the neoGAF thread of DF.
Short description of the game type for those who never heard of DF: Its basically a fortress simulator. You'll dig into a mountain, set up your workshops, work wood and stone into crafts and weapons and fend of enemies while digging further down. The main issue with Dwarf Fortress for Newcomers are the unwelcoming graphics (which can be remedied with new tile sets) and a UI that will take some getting used to. In this game, everything can be done with the mouse!
Another general description for both Gnomoria and Dwarf Fortress: You dont actually order your units individually (like in most RTS), but you actually only designate what needs to be done, and the units with the appropriate skill get to doing it, meaning its more a simulator than you having total control over your units.
These games are also very open natured, and dont have a definite goal. Just play around and survive as long as you can, giving your Dwarves the best life they can possibly get. Later on you'll be asked to defend yourself against enemies (Goblins etc), which sort of provides the difficulty progression for these games. Due to the vast, vast number of mechanics present in DF that are still missing in Gnomoria, Gnomoria really just feels like a giant "welcoming package" to ease people into Dwarf Fortress atm. I sure hope they continue adding stuff so that in the end most of the main mechanics of DF will be represented here too.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
| Impressions |
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Pictures speak more than a thousand words:
From what I tinkered around with it, its really Dwarf Fortress in isometric 2D with mouse input. Of course there is still tons of stuff missing, but I wouldnt have thought they'd already be this far along. I just discovered it a few minutes ago myself, so I have no clue WHATSOEVER about anything these devs are doing. I am hopefully able to buy the game to follow how far these guys come along with this project. Apparently they put out 4 releases with content/mechanics/bugfixes and art within 9 days, which is quite massive.
This is no replacement of Dwarf Fortress and probably never will be, but the devs seem to have a promising developing/patching speed and it is definitely a good way to get your feet wet, since this will teach you the basics of HOW to play Dwarf Fortress, since the basics are the same. You still need to figure out how to perform the actions in Dwarf Fortress, but knowing what to do next at all seems pretty helpful for getting into DF later.
There is still no proper tutorial ingame so you either might want to fire up their forums or ask here for how you might want to progress in this game.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
| Features in Gnomoria |
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- Digging
- Digging deeper
- Farming
- Building 20+ Workshops and corresponding Items
- Traps
- Fighting
- Collecting items into piles
- 7 types of furniture made from several kind of material
- Areas: Stockpile, Farm, Pastures, Personal Quarters, Dormitory, Guard Area, Patrol Route
...
What am I missing?
Changelogs:
Current version
v0.8.3
v0.8.2.1
v0.8.2
v0.8.1
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
| Whats possibly next? |
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- squashing bugs
- more aesthetic options, more furniture (mostly decorative)
- new challenges and new ways to overcome them (new traps)
- Gnomes simulation, lifetime quests for each gnomes that will give them permanent bonuses, more interaction, rewarding micromanagement
- Underground crops and livestock
- More automatization for some processes: Grove destination for automatic log production, orchard to farm apples.
- "Stock this" function for single items
- UI/HUD/Feedback improvements (telling/warning the player about fights, more insight on why jobs arent performed
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
| How do I play? |
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Complete Getting Started Guide from the Wiki
The Mouse interface simplifies alot, but without knowing what to do, you still will feel a bit hopeless. First of all get to know 4 things:
1. Space is your friend. It pauses and unpauses the game.
2. Right click anywhere for the menu of all the things you can designate your gnomes to do.
3. Press Esc once in a while to save. Game might crash on you and your progress is lost.
4. Left Click on something will show you what it is
Now step by step mini-tutorial (bolded text means: CLICK THE RIGHT MOUSE BUTTON):
I. First things you might want to do in Dwar... err, Gnome Fortress, is digging a tunnel. Terrain -> Mine -> Wall , now LC(left click) once on the first spot you want your tunnel to start, and then LC another time on where it should end. Doing this your designated-to-mine area now could look like this:
II. Now just keep adding rooms to your tunnel like this:
III-1. Start collecting resources part 1! For that you will now Designate->Stockpile one of your newly build rooms. In the same way as choosing the area to dig, you can now choose the area where you want to pile your goods. A window pops up asking what kind of goods you want to store there. That is useful so that you can later make single stockpiles near the workshops which need them since this will reduce the time it takes them to get material and produce their goods. For now just mark (x in the box) all of the options to the right:
III-2. Start collecting ressources part 1! Since your gnorves can't live from stone alone, use Agriculture -> Fell trees and designate an area outside with trees. They'll get taken down and then collected as wood in your work place.
IV... to come later... maybe...
Now just poke around! Build workshops, try building items in workshops, set up traps in your dungeon entrance (hint: you'll need work shops and mechanism for that) and see what this DF "Lite" has to offer currently.
No excuse anymore,
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
| Miscellaneous hints |
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
If you experience massive slowdown, there is probably an item that your gnomes try to access but cant. Right click your stockpile and uncheck the different categories one by one until the lag disappears. That way you can check what the item is and get rid of the lag. Check all the boxes again that were not the issue, though.
Save before you UNCHECK an option in your stockpiles. Seems like that leads still to common crashes if there is another stockpile that will immediately pick up the goods that previously have been in the stockpile you now unchecked. Or better even: Always save before working changing something in your existing stockpiles.
Additional Controls:
Ctrl+mousewheel to zoom
"," + "." to turn the camera
"r" to rotate items while placing them in buildmode
Magic trick #1 & 2
https://www.humblebundle.com/store
For those of you who always wanted to try Dwarf Fortress but never managed to overcome its many hurdles, playing Dwarf Fortress for you suddenly went from this:
to this:
Welcome to candy heaven.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
| Info Box |
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Click this link for the Desura link, where you can buy or INSTALL THE DEMO
Official Page, including forums and a buy-directly-through-us-option: www.gnomoria.com
6,39€ now/7,99€ usually
7,99$ now/9,99$ usually
Still in Alpha Beta Gamma Delta Epsilon
Win Only
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
| Whats this game? |
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Its a very true to the roots Dwarf Fortress clone in the making. Click here for the the neoGAF thread of DF.
Short description of the game type for those who never heard of DF: Its basically a fortress simulator. You'll dig into a mountain, set up your workshops, work wood and stone into crafts and weapons and fend of enemies while digging further down. The main issue with Dwarf Fortress for Newcomers are the unwelcoming graphics (which can be remedied with new tile sets) and a UI that will take some getting used to. In this game, everything can be done with the mouse!
Another general description for both Gnomoria and Dwarf Fortress: You dont actually order your units individually (like in most RTS), but you actually only designate what needs to be done, and the units with the appropriate skill get to doing it, meaning its more a simulator than you having total control over your units.
These games are also very open natured, and dont have a definite goal. Just play around and survive as long as you can, giving your Dwarves the best life they can possibly get. Later on you'll be asked to defend yourself against enemies (Goblins etc), which sort of provides the difficulty progression for these games. Due to the vast, vast number of mechanics present in DF that are still missing in Gnomoria, Gnomoria really just feels like a giant "welcoming package" to ease people into Dwarf Fortress atm. I sure hope they continue adding stuff so that in the end most of the main mechanics of DF will be represented here too.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
| Impressions |
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Pictures speak more than a thousand words:
From what I tinkered around with it, its really Dwarf Fortress in isometric 2D with mouse input. Of course there is still tons of stuff missing, but I wouldnt have thought they'd already be this far along. I just discovered it a few minutes ago myself, so I have no clue WHATSOEVER about anything these devs are doing. I am hopefully able to buy the game to follow how far these guys come along with this project. Apparently they put out 4 releases with content/mechanics/bugfixes and art within 9 days, which is quite massive.
This is no replacement of Dwarf Fortress and probably never will be, but the devs seem to have a promising developing/patching speed and it is definitely a good way to get your feet wet, since this will teach you the basics of HOW to play Dwarf Fortress, since the basics are the same. You still need to figure out how to perform the actions in Dwarf Fortress, but knowing what to do next at all seems pretty helpful for getting into DF later.
There is still no proper tutorial ingame so you either might want to fire up their forums or ask here for how you might want to progress in this game.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
| Features in Gnomoria |
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- Digging
- Digging deeper
- Farming
- Building 20+ Workshops and corresponding Items
- Traps
- Fighting
- Collecting items into piles
- 7 types of furniture made from several kind of material
- Areas: Stockpile, Farm, Pastures, Personal Quarters, Dormitory, Guard Area, Patrol Route
...
What am I missing?
Changelogs:
Current version
v0.8.3
v0.8.2.1
v0.8.2
v0.8.1
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
| Whats possibly next? |
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- squashing bugs
- more aesthetic options, more furniture (mostly decorative)
- new challenges and new ways to overcome them (new traps)
- Gnomes simulation, lifetime quests for each gnomes that will give them permanent bonuses, more interaction, rewarding micromanagement
- Underground crops and livestock
- More automatization for some processes: Grove destination for automatic log production, orchard to farm apples.
- "Stock this" function for single items
- UI/HUD/Feedback improvements (telling/warning the player about fights, more insight on why jobs arent performed
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
| How do I play? |
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Complete Getting Started Guide from the Wiki
The Mouse interface simplifies alot, but without knowing what to do, you still will feel a bit hopeless. First of all get to know 4 things:
1. Space is your friend. It pauses and unpauses the game.
2. Right click anywhere for the menu of all the things you can designate your gnomes to do.
3. Press Esc once in a while to save. Game might crash on you and your progress is lost.
4. Left Click on something will show you what it is
Now step by step mini-tutorial (bolded text means: CLICK THE RIGHT MOUSE BUTTON):
I. First things you might want to do in Dwar... err, Gnome Fortress, is digging a tunnel. Terrain -> Mine -> Wall , now LC(left click) once on the first spot you want your tunnel to start, and then LC another time on where it should end. Doing this your designated-to-mine area now could look like this:
Note: If you ever designated too much Right Click-> Cancel Job
II. Now just keep adding rooms to your tunnel like this:
If you havent done so yet, press space to unpause and press space again once they are done digging.
III-1. Start collecting resources part 1! For that you will now Designate->Stockpile one of your newly build rooms. In the same way as choosing the area to dig, you can now choose the area where you want to pile your goods. A window pops up asking what kind of goods you want to store there. That is useful so that you can later make single stockpiles near the workshops which need them since this will reduce the time it takes them to get material and produce their goods. For now just mark (x in the box) all of the options to the right:
Now they will start collecting any stone lying around and gathering it there.
III-2. Start collecting ressources part 1! Since your gnorves can't live from stone alone, use Agriculture -> Fell trees and designate an area outside with trees. They'll get taken down and then collected as wood in your work place.
IV... to come later... maybe...
Now just poke around! Build workshops, try building items in workshops, set up traps in your dungeon entrance (hint: you'll need work shops and mechanism for that) and see what this DF "Lite" has to offer currently.
No excuse anymore,
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
| Miscellaneous hints |
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
If you experience massive slowdown, there is probably an item that your gnomes try to access but cant. Right click your stockpile and uncheck the different categories one by one until the lag disappears. That way you can check what the item is and get rid of the lag. Check all the boxes again that were not the issue, though.
Save before you UNCHECK an option in your stockpiles. Seems like that leads still to common crashes if there is another stockpile that will immediately pick up the goods that previously have been in the stockpile you now unchecked. Or better even: Always save before working changing something in your existing stockpiles.
Additional Controls:
Ctrl+mousewheel to zoom
"," + "." to turn the camera
"r" to rotate items while placing them in buildmode
Magic trick #1 & 2