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Comment by caycep | Hacker News Reader

Wait, dwarf fortress is in 3D now?

Depends what you mean “3D”. It is still ASCII sprites, but is considered 3D by way of multiple z-levels (each only visible one at a time).

Except last year a new UI was released for the Steam debut, which also features new graphics akin to the fan made tilesets. Those tile sets add a lot of visual interest and increase the 3D feel (even allowing you to see down to levels below your current level).

And, for many years now, there have been visualizer plugins like Stonesense that could render your fort in isometric view.

You can see more of the asset upgrade here[1].

[1] https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2022/12/dwarf-fortresss-graph...

From dwarffortresswiki.org Version history: "0.27.169.32a - 2007-10-29 - The very first fully 3D version"

2D before the addition of the Z-levels.

For at least a decade.

I remember playing it in like 2010 and it had z-levels.

The Third Dimension was added sixteen years ago.

Feel old yet?

There has been a renderer for a long time, but you can't play the game with it.

One of my favorite experiences was reading Boatmurder or boatsmurdered in the original ascii, and then looking at the renderings and realizing I can't understand characters at all.

The closest I've ever come to that matrix scene with the characters - is Dwarf Fortress.

For anyone who hasn't played the "ASCII" (technically modified Unicode iirc but eh, whatevers) it's worth doing so. After a short enough time you'll recognize the various characters quite well.

c+||@++c+cc+@@||,.,,.U,ggCgggT

https://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/ASCII_art_reward/A-F...

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