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[artemonster]

Ok, got it. But why so rude? Seriosly, there is no need in such shitty words.

It has nothing to do with butthurtdeness. People here know what they're talking about, because they program, and your hubris is pretty galling considering you don't know thing one about what you're describing.

Put another way, there's about one of you every month.

[Werdna]

Toady's gone on strong 6 years now with the game quite playable and no sign of dying off; either he has listened sufficiently enough to his community in that time, or you need to adjust your evaluation of just how important 'community demands' are to game design.

[NullForceOmega]

As to 'why so rude?', this is Toady's site, Toady's community, and Toady's project.  You have been denigrating towards the individual responsible for the very forum you are posting on, so you should expect members of the community to be very upset with you.

[MoLAoS]

Highly recommend you take a coding class, so you can get a better grasp between the stark differences between the effort and knowledge required to code a game versus modding a game.

+1

Also recommend you figure out what Open-Source means, because it definitely does not involve managers. Or money. Or paying people.

You aren't serious right? Multiple open source games including 0AD involve money, managers and even paid programmers. Furthermore a lot of major companies pay people to work with open source stuff. Open source just means the source is open. You seem to be describing hobbyist game development or something.

As far as the OP goes, it will take way more than a year, although its certainly not as difficult as some other posters are implying. DF development does go rather slowly because Toady is only one person. Single person projects tend to proceed at a stately pace.

[sebcool]

*totally called this*

Ok, got it. But why so rude? Seriosly, there is no need in such shitty words.

It has nothing to do with butthurtdeness. People here know what they're talking about, because they program, and your hubris is pretty galling considering you don't know thing one about what you're describing.

Put another way, there's about one of you every month.

Because there pretty much is one of you every month, hell, we got a troll over at the cataclysm topic doing exactly this. Actually, he did more. At least he had something to show, even though it was bad. And no matter how politely you say it, having your first post be a topic saying that Toady ain't doing his job right and that you could do better is pretty damn arrogant. Not to mention insulting.

Highly recommend you take a coding class, so you can get a better grasp between the stark differences between the effort and knowledge required to code a game versus modding a game.

+1

Also recommend you figure out what Open-Source means, because it definitely does not involve managers. Or money. Or paying people.

You aren't serious right? Multiple open source games including 0AD involve money, managers and even paid programmers. Furthermore a lot of major companies pay people to work with open source stuff. Open source just means the source is open. You seem to be describing hobbyist game development or something.

As far as the OP goes, it will take way more than a year, although its certainly not as difficult as some other posters are implying. DF development does go rather slowly because Toady is only one person. Single person projects tend to proceed at a stately pace.

I admit, I wasn't actually thinking of the actual definition of open-source, but the games that are. Open-source games are hobbyist, or at least not made with the intent to make money, cause that doesn't really work, since the source is open. When posting here, it's usually about community projects, like cataclysm dda (a project to continue the development after the previous dev left), this seems more like a recruiting drive for this guy's pet project to make DF the way he wants it. I should probably had written: "You should really consider if this actually is what you say it is, because it's getting kinda blurry."

[GlyphGryph]

I think the biggest problem is that... you don't really understand the problem?

I mean, if someone came in with a solid workable proposal, and a clear understanding of what they were getting into (and actually had something to show to indicate they have at least a passing commitment to implementing such a project) then you might get a better response.

You may have experience coding, but your OP makes it clear you don't have experience managing game development projects, especially not ones of this complexity.

And you... don't actually offer anything desirable that people might want?

I mean, I actually have no idea what you want to accomplish here, but you've successfully communicated the idea that you won't be able to do it.

[artemonster]

I really have a little idea of the whole picture now. And I thought that before I continue investing my time preparing solid workable proposal and etc. I will just ask the community about their opinion, because you always can pack your idea in a sentence or two.
And you are right, I have no experience managing game dev. projects, but a littlle amount of people do, when they start their own projects, right? And I'll gladly resign this job and will just do other stuff, when things get spinning.
Instead of sharing ideas and maybe getting some useful feedback (your one is, by far, most useful), I was accused of infinite assholeness and stupidity by some angry oracles, which knew absolutely every aspect of me and my knowledge right away and judged by that already

Well, I should have expected this.

I think the biggest problem is that... you don't really understand the problem?

I mean, if someone came in with a solid workable proposal, and a clear understanding of what they were getting into (and actually had something to show to indicate they have at least a passing commitment to implementing such a project) then you might get a better response.

You may have experience coding, but your OP makes it clear you don't have experience managing game development projects, especially not ones of this complexity.

And you... don't actually offer anything desirable that people might want?

I mean, I actually have no idea what you want to accomplish here, but you've successfully communicated the idea that you won't be able to do it.

[Sean Mirrsen]

Put another way, there's about one of you every month.

Quoted For Truth. Or half-truth, actually, since for every one that posts seriously about it there are about two dozen who are dissuaded the moment they so much as mention the idea.

The reason is simple, really. Copying Dwarf Fortress is an exercise in futility. Anybody with any knowledge of its scope and depth knows that creating a game like Dwarf Fortress is a monumental undertaking, with miniscule chances of payoff considering that the specific genre itself is terribly niche, and the project leeches off a technically free game that will, in all likelihood, still outshine the copy because of coherent planning and lack of feature creep.

I really have a little idea of the whole picture now. And I thought that before I continue investing my time preparing solid workable proposal and etc. I will just ask the community about their opinion, because you always can pack your idea in a sentence or two.
And you are right, I have no experience managing game dev. projects, but a littlle amount of people do, when they start their own projects, right? And I'll gladly resign this place, when things get spinning.
Instead of sharing ideas and maybe getting some useful feedback (your one is, by far, most useful), I was accused of infinite assholeness and stupidity by some angry oracles, which knew absolutely every aspect of me and my knowledge right away and judged by that already

Well, I should have expected this.

Coming into a well-established long-runner forum without a coherent project, management skills, prior involvement in anything and even as little as doing some research on the matter you were proposing?

Yes. You totally should have.

[sebcool]

It was kinda inevitable, really. There are quite a few people here who are paranoid about people copying DF, which is kinda understandable, since people try all the time. There are even more who aren't, but will still get pissed off about someone literally posting that he's gonna make a clone of DF, and asking for help, no less. You may mean well by it, but what you just posted would piss off quite a lot of regulars. I'm actually surprised that it's this civil, cause this topic is such huge flamebait, you can see it from orbit. If you're not a troll, and you actually mean this. . . Well, how in the world could you possibly think this was a good idea? Most lurkers here would know what happens to topics like this, just look at peoples reaction to Towns, or Gnomoria, or any DF-like, really.

I would suggest you drop this. Because no matter what, it ain't gonna work. There is no possible way this would work. It will be a mess. Just drop it. Maybe if Toady stops developing, you might get enough support.

[cerapa]

I came into this thread and saw people acting dickish. Was ready to call you all out on it.

1. If you do not adapt to the needs of the community, you will die. Toady is not adapting. He is arrogant and stubborn, and I think there is nothing amoral in making a competing and living product, which will give much more than he is giving.

Okay then... seems that won't be necessary.

[Nerjin]

Now now my fellow Bay12 lovers, let's not simply jump on the guy. I say we hear him out:

What exactly do you plan on doing that Toady himself is not capable of or will not do? Is it truly enough that you think an entirely different project could result from it?

Personally? I think you've made a bad choice coming here with as little as you did but I'm hoping to help you learn from this. So if you could humor me and answer the questions that'd be great.

ALso, put quotes first and then respond to them because if you don't it's a little harder to follow. Just a small lesson in formatting.

[jhxmt]

Hi All,

you all know, there are plenty alternatives to DF (Towns, Gnomoria, RimWorld, TimberAndStone, etc.), which are trying to have a piece of this big "complex-manager-god-sim"-pie. But I think all their efforts are totally useless, because they will just run out of money eventually (buy-once model will not work for such long-development projects) and will never reach depth and complexy of DF.

...

Once some initial playable stage is achieved (I'd say something on goblin-camp level), we launch a funding campaign and distribute the money between main contributors and project managers slowly in time. Then, try to establish a donation model to continue development.

Avoiding the questionable morality of choosing to copy someone else's game for monetary gain, which others have covered:

1) If, as you claim, one of the problems with other DF-inspired games is that they'll run out of money because a "buy-once" model won't sustain them, why would a donation-based model be any more successful, particularly if your donors will be paying for something they can acquire for free (or for an equivalent donation) elsewhere i.e. DF itself?

2) If the projects you've mentioned will "NEVER" reach the complexity of DF, what makes your proposed project different?  What is it about this project that makes you think it will have a better level of complexity than its competitors - particularly since you've said that you find some features of DF are "too deep"?

3) Basically, what do you want the project to be?  Is it a straight DF-clone, community-built and donation funded?  Is it DF but with some complexity stripped out?  What, to use marketing speak, is your Unique Selling Point for this project?

That's ignoring the multiple, manager-level questions that then open up e.g. how do you set your scope, how do you handle the inevitable playerbase fragmentation, etc.

I'm going to have to echo the sentiments of some other posters in this thread - it's unclear why this project would be a positive thing for the community, and a worthwhile investment of time/effort.

(From a personal perspective, I also find the idea of "this guy's ideas are good, I'm going to hire a bunch of people to copy them and then sell them" rather distasteful - which is how your plan is coming across.)

[LeoLeonardoIII]

I think OP should go do it. Maybe a fun game of some kind will result, and we can always use more fun games! If it's gonna be open source, you might wanna start with an existing open source game and try to make it what you want. For example, if you started with Nethack, there's a lot of stuff you wouldn't have to do on the bottom.

And, if you can't mod Nethack, perhaps a more ambitious project is unattainable. You'd find that out long before investing too much into it.

[Darkmere]

Yeah I'm with the more level-headed responses here. There's nothing lost for actually trying, and who knows? Success might grow the genre a bit. *shrug* My point was people need a solid idea to latch on to that comes pre-packaged with results and a selling point, because we really do get a lot of these types of ideas and very few ever pan out.

[i2amroy]

1. If you do not adapt to the needs of the community, you will die. Toady is not adapting. He is arrogant and stubborn, and I think there is nothing amoral in making a competing and living product, which will give much more than he is giving.

Toady has made it pretty clear that he gives very little about what we care about (besides the occasional bug-fix or feature implementation order). He's making the game the way he wants it to be, and he's going to keep doing that. He's gathered a large enough fan base to live off of donations as well (Heck, he makes more then some of the teachers where I live), and I don't really see that changing at any point in the future. Plus when Toady eventually kicks the bucket (assuming he isn't murdered, it's in his will) then DF goes open source anyways.

Lastly yeah, you need more experience project managing before you can understand the amount of work this would require, and unless you somehow managed to gather a team of very competent and dedicated people, it would probably still be 5-10 years before you would even begin to approach the complexity and depth of DF now, while Toady would have probably put out another 2-3 releases in that period.