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[Fishybang]

I was watching a minecraft LP on youtube and some troll was saying"This game sucks! But i guess its better then dwarf fortress". So after reading that i go watch some Dwarf fortress Lp's and i thought it looked cool and thats when i started playing it.

[rtg593]

Got so stinking sick of hearing about "magma trap over the throne room" and something about "goblin shredders" in the galactic channel on the f2p 3D sandbox alpha mmo too many categories to count game Shores of Hazeron. So I whipped together a quick little ship, flew other there, asked for directions...

And I've not logged on since :p

[Kestrel]

Rock, Paper, Shotgun's numerous references to DF (even referring to it as an "important game") dragged me in.  Smart blokes over at RPS; best PC game blog out there IMO.

[ObiWorm]

I don't remember, I think I was looking for a dungeon crawling game or something like that. I found a game named Dwarf Fortress. It was free, so downloaded it and generated a new world.

My head exploded at that point. The little bastard just generated a new world! With rivers, mountains, civilizations, history and everything!

Then I tried adventure mode, but that was really hard to even understand. There were a lot of keys for a lot of things and I didn't even know what to do next. I left it thinking that someday I'll try again.

And a few years later someone posted a tutorial on a videogame related spanish forum. It was an outdated tutorial for the 40d version, but enough to get me into this.

[Kestrel]

Oh, I should also mention, for the looooooooooooooooongest time, before I actually played DF (and never got past worldgen), I swear to God I thought it would be turn based and ask you questions like "Do you want to ford the river?"

Thinking back on my earliest impressions, they couldn't have been more off-base.

[Lightningfalcon]

Friend+TV tropes. 

[Phantom of The Library]

Heard two acquaintances talking about it, asked them what they were talking about.  Received a flash drive containing 40d.  Played for a year or two.  Decided to read about famous fortresses.  Started looking at the FG&RP section, fell in love with Space Voyage and Elves of Amanereli.  Lurked for a year and a half, decided to actually join and post in said games.  Rest went from there.

[FuzzyZergling]

Heard two acquaintances talking about it, asked them what they were talking about.  Received a flash drive containing 40d.  Played for a year or two.  Decided to read about famous fortresses.  Started looking at the FG&RP section, fell in love with Space Voyage and Elves of Amanereli.  Lurked for a year and a half, decided to actually join and post in said games.  Rest went from there.

When I was lurking the big game (for me) was Do Not Trust the Rainbow Snail.

[ledgekindred]

I'd heard of DF originally on some gaming site, I can't even remember.  Probably one of those "Top x best freeware games" type articles.  It looked intriguing, so I came over to the b12 website.  I was honestly disappointed, thinking, "This is kind of a crappy website."  (I'm a web developer by profession, so I tend to be unfairly snotty... I'm pretty embarrassed about it now.)  I downloaded an early 40d anyway, happy that there was a Linux version, played it for a few minutes, got hopelessly lost and gave up.

Then some months later, like so many others, I ran across the sagas of Boatmurdered, Syrupleaf and Headshoots.  I read through those in no time flat and was awed by the game's possibilities.  This time I armed myself with the wiki.  I started a fort.  Everyone died.  I started another fort, everyone died again.  Repeat for many, many forts.  Eventually I managed to get a sustainable fort running.  I could dig, farm, build traps, get some kind of industry running.  Then I had my first real siege and everyone died.  Then I embarked on a volcano and spent a lot of time building extensive magma traps for invaders.  I still fondly recall the first time I trapped a whole siege between two raised bridges and opened up the magma floodgates.

After a few more moderately successful fortresses, I was in need of advice that the wiki could no longer provide.  I sought out the forums.  And when I discovered what a bunch of sociopathic, amoral, crazy motherfuckers you all are, I realized that I had found a place I could call home.  And I could write up my own stories about things that happened in my fortresses, and you would understand instead of looking at me funny and then saying "Which one was the 'g' and which one was the asterisk?"  (The height of cleverness of Non-Gamers Who Just Don't Get It.)

I've even managed a convert of my very own - a friend of mine who is into roguelikes.  Mainly because I will not shut the fuck up about this game to anyone who will give me a moment to talk about it.  Eventually, either through inability to ignore me, or intrigued by the possibilities, he downloaded and played.  And now he's hooked as well.  Muahahahahahah!

[krenshala]

For me, I was just starting to look at Minecraft (a coworker was showing it to me, back in the Alpha days) and on the Minecraft wiki I found reference to the games that influenced it.  The reference to DF intrigued me, so I checked into it and was near immediately hooked.  I missed out on 40d, but don't regret it as I've enjoyed every lost fort I've experienced so far.  Losing most definitely IS fun!

[Castamere]

4chan /v/
Then I read BoatMurdered
I was hooked instantly

[rdnwt]

Sometime in 2011, I happened to search google for "economic simulation game", or similar. It linked me to some random post on some probably-unimportant forum, but the guy who asked the question mentioned that he knew of "dwarf fortress", and was looking for others. My next google search lead me to bay12games.com/dwarves.

Once I more or less knew how to play, I showed my friend, and he was hooked too. I think I scared him away from the new version with tales of un-killable horse husks, though.

[Loud Whispers]

Reflecting on the title, shouldn't it be the subterranean city?

[Hanslanda]

 I still fondly recall the first time I trapped a whole siege between two raised bridges and opened up the magma floodgates.

I want this on a shirt.