I love Rimworld and play it a lot. I frequently see posts and articles comparing the two. I got Dwarf Fortress, watched tutorials, printed out flow charts, and really gave it a try for several hours.
But I didn’t get into Dwarf Fortress :( some of the mechanics are weird. Many things are not intuitive or don’t make sense. Like seeds that are needed for growing mushrooms are defaulted to be used in cooking and the setting to turn that off is difficult to find.
I finally realized an analogy today. Rimworld is like The Sims while Dwarf Fortress is like Sim City. Rimworld you directly control people and micromanage a colony. Dwarf Fortress is Sim City - you zone things and say generally what you want to happen, but don’t control your meeples directly.
Thoughts on the comparison? Any other folks like Rimworld but not Dwarf Fortress?
Appreciate that dwarf fortress is an 18 year old game. They first released it in 2006 and even then the interface was clunky and never a priority. It is a dwarf simulation engine first and an interactive game second.
RimWorld owes its existence to Dwarf Fortress the way Halo owes its existence to Doom, or World of Warcraft owes its existence to RuneScape. Dwarf Fortress is the precursor for all games like RimWorld. So comparing their interfaces will always set Dwarf Fortress up to lose, just like if you compared the controls in Halo against the original Doom. I think you have to approach Dwarf Fortress more like playing a piece of gaming history, and a look into the world of a very interesting human, Tarn Adams, rather than a modern game competing against modern titles.
Huh, I didn’t know that history. But that makes some more sense. It’s always difficult going “backwards” in a game. Like if you play the latest in a series, the first is more “meh”. Respect where due - I appreciate that DF paved the way.
DF, even after the stream release, doesn’t have the polish that rimworld does. I don’t think either creator would argue that.
I like them both, but I was also there for the math breakdown. For the scamps lost under the bread fiasco. For the butterfly door. DF is easier to like if you’ve played it for a decade or more.
DF definitely didn’t feel as intuitive. A game like that needs a Weenie Hut Jr tutorial to introduce you since a lot of the mechanisms don’t make overt connections (to me at least). I remember some elves came to trade and I offered them a bunch of stuff but they got pissed off and rejected it. Some googling later let me figure out they don’t like wooden things :[ but I didn’t know that going in and it would have helped to know
No, and I mean NO! Dwarf Fortress post should be without the hilarious and colorful story of boatmurdered
You can read the whole log, but starkravingmad’s journal is pure LOL.
I have more time in rimworld but play both. Sometimes DF is nice when you can’t be arsed to care about the people you manage and don’t want to micromanage the way you really have to in rimworld sometimes. Plus there is no storyteller in the rimworld sense. You get more raids if you live near people who don’t like you and I feel like that makes a lot of sense.
The world building element in DF is so cool. Like the world is generated and aged and has history. Rimworld’s planet feels flat in comparison.
I was playing DF before RimWorld so it had clicked before RimWorld even existed. Then the Steam version came out and I had to relearn everything because it didn’t have the keyboard commands anymore and they rearranged the menus. lol
My RimWorld is modded up to be closer to DF, too. The only one that’s kinda wonky is the layers mod that makes it “3D” like DF is. It is as close to “sci Fi DF” as I can make without making my own game (which I also am working on).
I may be looking at it from owly playing on the Steam Deck too, like never having a keyboard and mouse made a lot of it difficult and gave me a sore thumb lol.
I wanted to play vanilla to understand the mechanics before modding, so I could appreciate the quality-of-life improvements. I definitely have a bunch I play with in Rimworld.
I played DF before Rimworld came out, never really got into it as this was before it came with a UI. Gotten back into DF the past couple of weeks and am really enjoying it. Definitely a learning curve though.
DF feel a bit better now I’ve given it some time. My only issues with it is stuff like you’ve mentioned, weird defaults. The dorfs eating seeds is one, the default game state FPS makes the game feel way too fast, the default population cap is pretty full on for beginners too. Changing both of those made it far more manageable. That and using nothing but work orders when you get the means. There a a lot of solid videos for newer players, DF you’ll need them for all the finicky things.
Playing Rimworld does makes me miss the Z levels every time though. Rimworld feels like you get a bit more breathing room and can do your own thing quicker. DF I usually take a year or two just to get my colony stable.
Yep, that’s about it. Comparison holds water. I have a very, very similar feeling about both.
I’m only a few hundred hours in to Rimworld, but have 5 or 6 times that in DF.
I very much enjoy the micro management of RW and it’s polish, but DF feels so much richer and deeper to me at least. I do prefer the longer term, macro management of DF.
Perhaps it’s nothing more than which I played first?
I can see the Sims/Sim City analogy! Hated the Sims, loved Sim City!
Oh DF is definitely a deeper world. There are a lot more knobs to turn (obvious or not). I’ve seen some really cool colonies and worlds. I’m just not very apt at building them myself.
Another comment made a good point that DF did come before, with Rimworld building on what DF made. It’s difficult (for me at least) to go backwards. Like I really enjoyed Baulder’s Gate 3 and tried the original but couldn’t get into it :/
I’m kinda in the same situation as you, hundreds of hours in rimworld, but DF hasn’t clicked.
I’ve only given it a couple of goes though, and honestly if I think back, I don’t think rimworld really clicked for me initially, so part of me is just running on the assumption I’ve not sunk enough time into the game to get comfortable with it really
I think one of the big differences is with rimworld you can kinda ignore 95% of the stuff in the game on your first few goes, and I think that makes it a bit less daunting. There are still bits of rimworld I’ve still not touched, but every playthrough I knock a few more things off (still need to really give a sanguophage run a proper try, for example). With that approach it becomes a gradual skill gradient that keeps you interested
With DF my initial reaction was a bit of a baptism of fire. I got the impression you need to interact with a lot more of the game’s systems to even get off the starting line.
If I really sat down and gave it another few runs, I know I’ll probably fall in love with the game
I hear that. I did try to pregame and watched a bunch of YouTube tutorials before jumping into DF. Still had to Google a bunch of stuff. I remember feeling frustrated trying to make soap (even with a flow chart). Like I made the workstation for it but no soap came. Then I learned I needed lye but didn’t know how to make it. Learned it came from the butcher but didn’t know how to hunt @_@ a lot of those stacked and I eventually gave up.
I only recently got Ideology for Rimworld and am exploring that now :) lots more in the other DLCs to play through too
The comparison between the two is apt since Tynan has mentioned Dwarf Fortress being a major influence on Rimworld. I’m not sure about the comparisons with Sims and SimCity, since those two games have vastly different scales (hundreds versus millions of people).
Rimworld does have drafting and there is the option to micromanage, but this isn’t all that practical in a colony of 50. At that size, the two require similar management levels.
I feel the same about enjoying Rimworld while DF not so much, but for very different reasons. See, DF is a deep simulation first and foremost. It’s all in on procedural. Rimworld, meanwhile, heavily incorporates simulation and procedural, but does not rely on it exclusively. Rimworld blends in tactical combat, lore, and partially scripted story events and quests.
Beyond that, I would say that Rimworld is more graphically polished and has more accessible controls.
Very good points. My colonies haven’t gotten quite as big as 50 - I think 14 was my max. I know about making zones and assigning people, but I haven’t had a colony that warrants that kind of macro.
I feel more of a personal connection to my pawns in Rimworld. Like I want my shooter to have a good quality gun and armor, or my guy that likes melee to have good armor. DF was like “build gauntlets” and then “assign pawns to be in a garrison”, but I didn’t really know specific pawns. Too many to manage individually. That was my comparison with Sims vs Sim City (I hear you on the scale though)
I like watching DF but imo it might not be everyone’s cup of tea. It’s probably the best game I’ll never play
