Dwarf Fortress publisher isn't bothered about the cult classic hitting its 120,000 player peak again: "We're not here to make as much money as possible"
Jul. 17, 2024“It’s fine if we’ve ‘peaked’”
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.
Dwarf Fortress' publisher reckons the smash hit management game will never reignite the 120,000-concurrent-player success from its Steam launch again, but that’s not even remotely a problem for them or the developers.
Kitfox Games, which publishes everything fromCaves of Qudand Boyfriend Dungeons to Six Ages, recently put out ablog postdelving into the advantages and potential pitfalls of early access development because “the human element has been largely missing from the conversation,” as well as the different types of early access that studios might pursue.
Kitfox Games co-founder Tanya X. Short and community manager Alexandra Orlando explain that one possible avenue for early access developers is to simply “Skip It” or, in other words, do it like Dwarf Fortress. “A cheeky answer for many reasons, chief among which is that it was never actually in the official Steam Early Access program at all,” the blog explains. “Partly because Early Access didn’t exist back in 2006 (let’s be honest, Steam itself barely did), but partly because the creators wanted to keep expectations low, by giving it away for free/donations.”
“It’s fine if we’ve ‘peaked’. We’re not here to make as much money as possible,” the blog post continues, since the developers “don’t really care” about “capitalizing” on their success - “they just want to live a comfortable life working on their game.” As we’ve seen fromHooded Horse’s strategy hits, 1.0 launches often lead to record player countsand give years-old games a nice second wind, but that’s just not what the Dwarf Fortress team were interested in.
So Dwarf Fortress skipped an official early access tag because it had already been in the works for years before its Steam release, and in a sense, it’s a game that can never really be complete. The developers are planning to continually update it for years to come, so who’s to say when the game is ‘done’ or ready for a 1.0 label? Side-stepping early access means the developers don’t need to work on complicated roadmaps and semi-frequent updates fuelled by angry online forums, though it’s not a full-proof way to “escape the gamer-demand treadmill either” since “the marathon doesn’t end with 1.0.”
Early access pipelines were the subject of much debate earlier this month whenManor Lords’ publisher argued against the idea that games need to force their developers to pump out updates as quickly as possible.
Sign up to the GamesRadar+ Newsletter
Weekly digests, tales from the communities you love, and more
Kaan freelances for various websites including Rock Paper Shotgun, Eurogamer, and this one, Gamesradar. He particularly enjoys writing about spooky indies, throwback RPGs, and anything that’s vaguely silly. Also has an English Literature and Film Studies degree that he’ll soon forget.
I failed at my favorite Steam Next Fest city-builder because I was too distracted by the amazing movement to actually build anything
The long-awaited Stardew Valley 1.6 update will finally arrive on console and mobile in November
Kraven the Hunter called a “drag”, “disappointment”, and a “waste of Aaron Taylor Johnson” in first reactions to new Sony Marvel movie
