f13.net

Another attempt at the "graphical Dwarf Fortress" holy grail. (http://stonehearth.net/stonehearth/)

Too early to say how it'll pan out, but their tech demo videos are pretty cool.  You construct buildings by drawing them in a Sketchup-like interface, and then your dudes will construct it block by block, erecting scaffolding so they can reach parts of the building that they need to work on, automatically harvesting resources if they run out, etc.  A lot of work for what is mostly just window dressing but I'm a sucker for emergent behavior so I think it's pretty goddamn cool.

(http://stonehearth.net/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/build-3.png)

Also, there's crafting, and I guess you can have a mammoth farm?  I don't know.  They briefly mentioned in their KS video that there was a tile puzzle game aspect to growing crops, which sounds very interesting to me.

(http://stonehearth.net/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/farm.jpg)

It could easily come to nothing like Game of Dwarves did, but who knows.  The guys behind it seem like they're really interested in making a cool sandboxy ant farm sort of thing more than they are in making a traditional RPG sort of thing, and that excites me because the ant farm aspect is what I enjoy most about sims.  They also are putting a really heavy emphasis on user-created content a la NWN.  Could be cool.

I wish the world had more DF clones and fewer WoW clones.

I want that to be a thing.

Someone (maybe you Sam) linked this on facebook and it looks really cool. Once they've got something playable I'll be more than happy to throw some cash their way.

Probably me.  One of my D&D friends who I've known since forever recently quit her day job to work on this thing, so I'm a little biased to root for it.  That aside though I still think it looks neat.

It's on Steam Greenlight if people want to vote for it:

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=142375476 (http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=142375476)

As someone who has never managed to get into DF, I need one of these games to work.

Needs more Dungeons.

I like the sort of Lego-brick look they're getting out of the smaller voxels.  Definitely an art style I approve of.

I also like that they believe supporting mods/extensions should be a first class feature and that they're intending to use the same APIs for internal systems as for external mods.  That's the right way to do it, rather than trying to tack something on as an afterthought.  Implementation is always the hard part, of course, but at least their design philosophy is sane.

Looks cool.  If it has tunneling and other nifty effects, I'll play it.

Bingo. Me too.

In Soviet Russia, Dwarf Fortress plays you.  Actually it does that everywhere.  So, yes, bring on the clones.  I don't even need it to be graphical, it just needs a sane interface.

Well for whatever it's worth i voted for it in Steam.  I too would like to see something like this as I simply cannot play DF with the shitty interface/graphics.

I wonder how irritated the Stonehearth people are that Hearthstone (HoWoW) is on the way, and if they have considered changing the name.

Good point. Probably better to do it now before rawrsuit.

I backed this. Looks really intriguing. Hope they can pull it off.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1590639245/stonehearth/posts


30 hours until it funds.  Funding is at 680k right now.  They added the last two stretch goals as post release items.  We want the 750k goal because Dwarves. 

If anyone wants to up their pledge to $50, I will paypal them $25. This offer is only valid to people who are "regulars" in this community.

Basically, be my buddy!

Edit: Yes, I'm breaking my rule about actual video game backing with this. Also, I don't consider Hex a video game, so don't give me no guff. It's a fucking ccg.

Edit: The $50 level doesn't say its a buddy level. I don't get it and I'm a moron.

(https://s3.amazonaws.com/ksr/assets/000/563/851/e905b6c3e62d69bc5460631c8701c86a_large.png?1367598155)

Someone make this work, no comprendo.

Every tier includes benefits of lower tiers.  $45 is the tier that gives you another beta spot.  $50 gives you that plus art.  I'm at the $30 level, so it'd only cost me $15 to up that to $45 and have an extra beta thingy.

(edit) I'll go ahead and make you my buddy.  You can put the moneys in the frontpage/rent fund.

I had already upped my pledge to $45 this morning.  This game looks like good stuff.

AWWWW SHUCKS MUCH LOVE! /fistbump

Personally, I canceled my pledge today!

because Sjofn signed up at a higher tier

stop linking me things to kickstart

i can't

dinosaur survival hnnggg

These guys have clearly put some serious time into this already (their tech demos of their current engine and game stuff look really slick) and they seem to have their heads on straight as far as modding and extensibility goes.  I have high hopes for this one.  Also, quitting your jobs, working for 18 months, building some impressive technology, and *then* asking for money to see it through to shipping is something I'm happy to support.

This.  Sometimes as a coder you look into a project from the outside and get the sense that the people involved have no idea what the fuck they're doing.  This is the exact opposite -- watching them talk about what they've done so far and what they're planning, I get the sense that they might actually be able to deliver on all their grandiose plans.

This is the first Kickstarter I'm actually tempted to back. But then I realize it's fucking Kickstarter.

I'll wait until the thing's released and get it then.

Alas, that's my view of pretty much any kickstarter.

That said, I really, really, really like the look of this.

Ach, they got me, $15. Everything looks like Minecraft these days, and I don't mind.

Is it coming out on Steam? I'm with you, I wouldn't Kickstart anything on general principle in the gaming arena.

EDIT: Nevermind, I see the Greenlight.

They hit the $750K (counting $44K via PayPal) and Dwarves will indeed be delving. Also


That would be 3 hours before Kickstarter ends at 1:00 AM EDT, so I figure starting 10:00 PM EDT.

Interesting . Looks very much like this http://www.timberandstonegame.com/

I dunno I am on fence, I played gnomoria for quite a bit and while it was not 3d and very simplistic  I had fun with . Those projects looks very interesting and have great technology but  I havent seen much gameplay in them yet

They just reiterated in the livestream that the entire game is implemented using the same tools that will be used for third party extensions / modding (Lua based) -- character classes, behaviours, UI, all game systems, etc.  An example given was if somebody wanted to do a total conversion where you colonize the moon, mine some kind of gas, build space suits and moon buggies and such, that sort of thing should be doable (though would obviously be a lot of work).

I'm thinking adding new classes and creatures will be very fertile ground for modders.  I'm actually looking forward to seeing their APIs; I haven't seen too many games ship with an SDK that doesn't seem like a perfunctory afterthought.

They did a livestream showing some of the current state of the lua scripting stuff recently:
http://www.twitch.tv/radiantentertainment/b/404681488
http://www.twitch.tv/radiantentertainment/b/404702629

Backers get access to the alpha soon.  Sounds like it's basically going to be a tech demo.


Still a better deal than that game with the ships.   :why_so_serious:  Sounds like once the alpha's out they're planning on doing regular updates to add new features, a la Prison Architect.

I think you're just jealous that they don't have a $1000 ultra-voxel-limited-edition-mammoth that you can preorder!

Also sounds farther along than TUG, I just got a notice that after months of alpha you can finally climb stairs...they're trying to recreate everything in house. It has been entertaining with the naivete.

And that's still more game than space ponzi :p Though to be fair, I'm certain there will be a much better polished game from space ponzi than most of these little KS teams put out.

Wat.

The Stonehearth guys are also building everything in-house, but thus far they appear to be moderately competent.  It seems like they're building good groundwork which will allow them (and modders) to build a lot quickly once they hit critical mass.  Here's hoping!

A more realistic in-house project, though.

Every aspect of the game they implement seems to be handled in an open, customisable way. Considering that, the progress so far is amazing. It takes much longer to develop systems than it does to code features.

Most of game is LUA and JSON driven, including AI routines, and the scripts governing game states and actions.

Yeah, they're serious about modability as a first class feature.  I'm looking forward to both the game itself and to see what others do with their engine.

It's really the smartest way to go.  They can build the base and get a more simplified, yet graphical version of DF out and make some money on it.  Then let the aspergers crowd mod it up to toady levels of detailed stupidity for free.

Necro!

Since I've been spending so much time in Gnomoria lately I thought I'd pop open the Stonehearth alpha and see how it's doing.  Much less crashy, and building actually works, unlike the last time I played.  They also added the ability to build ladders on cliffsides so your dudes can get to inaccessible parts of the map, and a few more crafting types, and farming, and automated animal trapping.  (The last time I tried trapping you had to manually point your trapper at an animal -- now you designate an area and the trapper will set traps within that area and periodically check them.)

(https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/40386/Screenshots/stonehearth.jpg)

It's still got way less depth than Gnomoria (and hence way way less than DF) but it is way prettier.

Arise! Again! I had no idea that we had a thread for this.

I'm giving it a whirl atm, and quite enjoying it. It's still somewhat buggy - I've taken to creating a fresh save every in-game day so that if something goes horribly wrong, which seems to happen on about 1/3rd of the days, I can redo that day.

There's a new playable kingdom now, Rayya’s Children, and a desert biome. There's still not a huge amount of depth to it and it looks as if the effective population limit is around 20-30 before performance grinds to a halt. But I suspect it'll keep me entertained for a week or three.

Pass. :awesome_for_real:

Yeah my estimate of a couple of weeks entertainment may have been over the mark.

One to revisit in a year or two I reckon, if they can get a lot more content into it. Plus it'd be really nice to be able to place dirt/stone blocks as well as dig them up. One mistake when carving out stairs, for instance, and it's reload.

I've been well cured of my temporary insanity of video game kickstarters  :grin: This game will take another 10 years at this pace. At least TUG has made some significant improvements, though it took destroying the company and building it back up to do so...