What Dwarf Fortress asks me to build is a world--not like Cities: Skylines or The Sims does, but a whole world, a world where records are later written as myths. Sometimes I log back into old, doomed fortresses in the game’s Legend mode just to read that solid chunk of lore. What separates this from the tomes of fantasy novels is that I made these worlds, just like I made Corrin and Jakob get married in Fire Emblem Fates: Conquest, just like I built the house my sims live in, with the exposed brick and charming breakfast nook. It asks me to build a neighborhood, one where you know everyone walking down the street. Dwarf Fortress isn’t just asking you to play it, but to play with it; not just to be a reader, but to be a co-author, to create the story you want within it. It is a mirror asking for your reflection. It is a fiction waiting for you to tell it your perspective, waiting for you, for you to tell it how to be.
What a great paragraph! I've been a co-author of worlds within games and that is some of my most treasured memories. I spent dozens of hours in the franchise mode of one of the Madden games for Nintendo 64 as a 12 year old. My 'character' was a coach/GM that went through many seasons of ups and downs with a team, losing long-time players to free agency, drafting and watching players grow, and winning superbowls. I didn't play most of the games, I simulated past them to get to the off-season which was where I lived. But I grew to love the randomly-generated players of random drafts in the 2020s who became stars on my team, and when they retired I took a moment of silence to appreciate their contribution. I haven't thought of that in a long time, but this paragraph really brought that back. Wonderful job, great read.
Great article! I've only started playing tabletop within the last six months (a scheduled excuse to hangout over Roll20 with friends who have moved out of town), and supplementing a video game universe is a great idea for a future game.
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