More than a handful of people have been asking about DF on steam for the last couple months. Try it yourself. I'll even link everything you could want to get started.
Run it like a boss with Dual Monitors.
1) Download:
Ironhand Tileset Pre-Installed2) Download:
Dwarf TherapistIronhand is the tileset I use. Entirely personal preference. You can also use any tileset on this page:
Dwarf Fortress Tilesets. I hear good things about Phoebus and Mayday. Of course, you can always use ascii(default) if that's your thing. The basic install can be downloaded here:
Dwarf Fortress. The tilesets certainly make everything seem less daunting though.
Dwarf Therapist tackles the
atrocious ui for you. Again, you can forgo this utility and make use of the in-game macro system. But I haven't bothered with it. Run Dwarf Therapist alongside Dwarf Fortress so that you can see all your dwarves skill levels, happiness, and enabled labors at a glance. Best viewed fullscreen on a second monitor. If you don't believe me, run a 100+ Dwarf Fort without it, then when you inevitably fail, run another fort with it. If you still prefer to play without Therapist, then you're more patient than I'll ever be.
If you liked Dungeon Keeper, you'll love Dwarf Fortress. It is fairly easy once you grasp the basics. So watch as many of these videos as you feel you will need:
Video Tutorials. Or read anything in here:
General Advice. The videos are for 40d(the previous major version) but the concepts are still essentially the same for DF2010. I think I watched about 10 videos before I really got the hang of what I should do. Now I can embark on evil glaciers with confidence.
Finally, you should keep a browser open with the
Dwarf Fortress Wiki at all times when you start out. Eventually you'll need it less and less, or just keep it open to read ideas for how to improve your fort. There's a ton of stuff, and the ingame help will only get you so far. Much better off using your second monitor to flip between Dwarf Therapist and DF Wiki.
Another note, there's also Adventurer Mode which is much more like other roguelikes. You control a single guy, and can convince npcs to tag along. There are no "levels" but your skills and your knowledge of what you can handle determine how good your hero is. It's not uncommon to lose 15-20 heroes in a row to
seemingly random events within an hour. But the fun part of Adventure mode is that you're playing on your world. If you had a fort already, with tons of nice gear in it, and abandoned it, you can visit that fort with your hero and reclaim whatever you can find. Next update will substantially expand adventure mode. For now, all you do is explore, accept quests from NPCs, and look for a glorious death.
Keep in mind, you're playing a World, not a group of dwarves or a hero. Your dwarves and heroes are just temporary notches in your World's Population. Some people never even really play Fort or Adventure and opt to generate world after world to see the insane things that procedurally happen in its history. Like a Female Demon becoming the king of a Dwarven Civilization and making peace with all other civilizations around the world. There are several often funny web comics devoted to Dwarf Fortresses.
Oil Furnace being one of my favorites.
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