Dwarf Fortress

[Max Sinister]

Anyone here ever heard of Dwarf Fortress? It's very much a niche game, but surpasses pretty much anything out there when we are talking about the details of the world.

Point: Whenever you start a new game, the program generates a whole new world - continents, mountains, rivers, forests, raw materials in the ground, the history of the various species/people, legendary beings (may all become important during the game, after all)... really a great, if not the greatest example of what procedural generation can do.

It's been confirmed that it uses fractals for the world generation. And if you read this description of an artifact, you'll understand. (If you don't already.)

It's even in the Museum of Modern Art now. Yes, a video game.

[Chillheimer]

yep, I actually played it quite obsessivle a few years ago..
fascinating gem - even though I love the ascii-aspect, i wished they would make a version with graphics that is more accessible and less hard to use. the learning curve is extreme.

as i understand the concept, all games that use 'seeds' to generate terrain, like minecraft or the upcoming megafractal-game no mans sky are based on fractal world generation.

edit, for the lazy:
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/v/EJgo11eaxSs&rel=1&fs=1&hd=1" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/v/EJgo11eaxSs&rel=1&fs=1&hd=1</a>

[apeirographer]

As a mostly off-topic comment... if you liked Dwarf Fortress but could not make permanent peace with its acquired-taste control scheme; check out RimWorld, a somewhat simpler but highly moddable and widely modded colony management game:

http://rimworldgame.com/

More on topic: As far as amazing landscape (and more) generation, I think Ultima Ratio Regum may be even more impressive, being a game where environment generation begins with the creation of the solar system and its planets and moons, then moves on to continents, terrain, only to eventually end with nations, religions, and (if I recall correctly) significant NPCs.

http://www.ultimaratioregum.co.uk/game/info/

[kram1032]

There are tile sets to overwrite the Ascii art and if you haven't tried it in a while you might be surprised just how different the game is nowadays. It has had pretty large expansions in fairly recent times!

Another nice game to add to the list, although one that's quite different at least in theme, would be Prison Architect

[Max Sinister]

Fractals and procedural generation... it's so fascinating and makes games so much better

[valera_rozuvan]

An interesting article on terrain generation in DF: "Beyond Terrain Generation: Bringing Worlds in DWARF FORTRESS to Life" http://aigamedev.com/open/teaser/living-worlds-dwarf-fortress/ . To quote Tarn Adams (DF author):

The original implementation uses a mid-point displacement technique; that's how it's been for 7 years. I've been thinking about playing around with diamond-square algorithms but it's actually OK the way it is. ... Once it finishes the fractal step, it applies a non-linear parabola so the mountains are bent to look more realistic.

On another topic, has anyone played "Guild Wars 2: Fractals of the Mists" https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Fractals_of_the_Mists ?

<a href="https://www.youtube.com/v/tZlia_QPUno&rel=1&fs=1&hd=1" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/v/tZlia_QPUno&rel=1&fs=1&hd=1</a>