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[Tormy]

There have been a few more reports lately, so I've posted some guidelines to help people out.

Thanks Toady, that was more then welcome I guess. 

The one person who's opinion really IS important is Toady, and although I would love the ability to better customize my graphics I understand I'll have to wait for him to finish off all of his higher priority stuff first. All I can really do is let him know there's one more person who eagerly awaits that day.

I couldn't agree more...well said Glyph.
In fact I think that these would be excellent closing lines of the topic. 

[DG]

It's as has already been mentioned, Toady probably does take notice of which things are requested most and that's why people keep posting the same things (usually with a nominal twist) even if they know that they've been suggested umpteenth times before. For some people graphical improvement (whatever form that takes) would bring them most joy, that's why they post about it in hope that they'll influence Toady to work on it now rather than whatever else he is currently doing or planning on doing next that doesn't interest them as much. The people who are not excited by graphical improvements (at this stage or at all) will voice their disagreement in the very same thread in hope of showing Toady that there are more people interested in features other than graphics so as to encourage him to keep bumping graphical work until later. That many individuals say "we" or "lots of people" instead of "I" or "me" when talking about their own opinion is no big deal. Complaining about people asking for graphics is as pointless as complaining about the people who disagree with them in their threads. If you understand someones motives it's more difficult to despise them, I feel.

So, having said that, I'll now do my best to influence Toady toward my own selfish and no doubt terribly elitist ends by mentioning that I much prefer the ascii to anything else I've seen and am happy to have the graphical work delayed indefinately.

[Silverionmox]

Concerning user friendliness for newbies, it might help if their was a notice on the start screen that said that a lot of tweaking can be done in init.txt... including graphics.

[Tormy]

For some people graphical improvement (whatever form that takes) would bring them most joy, that's why they post about it in hope that they'll influence Toady to work on it now rather than whatever else he is currently doing or planning on doing next that doesn't interest them as much.

Nop, I don't agree. The OP just registered on the forum. I suppose he never thought that we have lot of similar topics already.
I suppose you also noticed, that most of the people can't be bothered to use the search function at all...well in some cases it's not working perfectly, but regardless, they should at least try to search for certain keywords..in this case "presentation, graphics etc." for example.

The people who are not excited by graphical improvements (at this stage or at all) will voice their disagreement in the very same thread in hope of showing Toady that there are more people interested in features other than graphics so as to encourage him to keep bumping graphical work until later. That many individuals say "we" or "lots of people" instead of "I" or "me" when talking about their own opinion is no big deal. Complaining about people asking for graphics is as pointless as complaining about the people who disagree with them in their threads. If you understand someones motives it's more difficult to despise them, I feel.

Yeah, I agree. Well said. I find that kind of behaviour very immature/childish to be honest.

So, having said that, I'll now do my best to influence Toady toward my own selfish and no doubt terribly elitist ends by mentioning that I much prefer the ascii to anything else I've seen and am happy to have the graphical work delayed indefinately.

See my reply after the first quotation. I hope that this sentence of yours was sarcastic. 

[RedWick]

In any case, Toady probably isn't going to stop work on the current arc (Army Arc) to switch gears to another arc (Presentation Arc) midstream.  At the very least, he'd wait until the current stuff he's working on is finished up, and by his estimates that puts any potential change in development focus out to sometime in February.  That'd be another four months, and realistically you're looking at probably another year or more before he'd be sufficiently satisfied with the current arc and wanted to shift gears.

Like I mentioned, until the donations start to lag, there's not much impetus for him to work on stuff he doesn't find all that interesting.

[Impaler[WrG]]

Hence, I look it as this; we take a significant chunk of time off developing something that is going to be enjoyed by all (seriously, army arc + adventurer skills? I might just get me a credit card so I can actually donate), to spend it instead on something that is going to be enjoyed by maybe half the population? I'd rather not.

As I've said time and time again the "silent majority" is the 90% of players who reject DF as unplayable because of the three massive barriers to entry, ASCII graphics, cludgy UI and the Learning Wall.  Everyone knows this is true, you've show the game to friends and they just gave up on it after a few minutes.  Much more total enjoyment would be reaped by lowering barriers to entry as more people can then be enjoying the game in any way.  Adding features to an already feature crammed game that most people find unplayable is a very inefficient way to improve the game, and I am by no means a less-is-more kind of person.  I'll say it plain and simple I think Toady's current priorities are wrong and he's been mis-guided by the fan base in a BIG way. 

Currently the 14th ranked suggestion is "Full Graphics Support", but its got no description too it and no link to a thread, I propose that it be linked to this thread (or a new, more civilized one) as Zoals original post is a very well defined set of achievable goals, he should write a summary to add to the suggestion which currently has none.  I urge everyone to put one of their three suggestions on Full Graphics Support.  I don't know who posted/owns the FGS suggestion but I presume it can be opened up and edited or even transfered by Toady.

[Zoal]

Toady should spend more time on...
toady probably isn't going to stop...
toady has more important...
toady's time is best...
toady doesn't want to code...
against toady spending...
Why not let Toady concentrate on...
Toady should get around to...
There is PLENTY of better stuff for Toady to be...
yes, Toady will get to...
Toady certainly doesn't need the additional donat...
Toady allows those who want to to play it...


What is wrong with you people?
Why do the ASCII fetishists constantly speak for the developer?

As if you know exactly how the guy thinks, you decide his plans for him, you know what he is/isn't going to do.
As if the guy is some kind of committee controlled code automaton, and you've got to make sure you get your word of control in.

Seriously, all I posted was a feature request, and then all these insane Toady-controllers show up.

[RedWick]

Hey, I'm just basing my posts on the various interview he's given where he's said as much.

[Silverionmox]

As I've said time and time again the "silent majority" is the 90% of players who reject DF as unplayable because of the three massive barriers to entry, ASCII graphics, cludgy UI and the Learning Wall.

It's always difficult to assess the silent majority... I think the barriers of entry are not really that big of an issue: the learning wall is due to the game's complexity, the only thing to alleviate that would to simplify the game, which is out of the question. Maybe later there will be starting scenarios, or a set of easy raws. Anyway, losing is fun - we have been warned.
Graphics are only a problem insofar they contribute to the third barrier: UI. The UI most certainly can stand cleaning up, streamlining, simplication, consistency checks, etc. Players who would reject DF, with a digestible UI and starter scenarios, for graphics alone are not the kind of player for whom DF's strong points are important. And there is no way DF will be able to compete graphically with eg. WoW, Dungeon Keeper, etc.

[Impaler[WrG]]

I think the learning Wall has more to do with the lack of in-game documentation and things like hints and helps that are standard in any kind of modern city builder/manager game.  I'd estimate that DF is only about twice as complex in its supply chain as games like Pharaoh or Populous, DF has more varieties of materials and products and more random and unpredictable situations thats true but its not really as complex as it seems because 2/3rds of the learning curve is Interface and memorizing things off the Wiki that should be available in-game.  With better interface and a bit of streamlining in the production control systems the economy would be much more manageable and could easily accommodate additional features like Religion, Guilds, movable wagons, and new production chains like Pottery and Magic, all things I'd like to see added at some point AFTER the barriers to entry issues are addressed.  Whats important is the ratio of complexity to important game-play decisions, the more interface drill down or minimizing the game to go search the wiki your doing the less real playing your doing.

[Brendan]

ASCII fetishists

your word of control

insane Toady-controllers

ASCII graphics "individuals" seem to "speak for the whole community." They assume the collective "we."

Why is THE BARE MINIMUM so hard to grasp? Don't you get it...

And then...

Seriously, all I posted was a feature request,

One of these is not like the others...

[Mikademus]

PALM OF BUDDHA *SPLAT*

:awe:

[Virex]

One thing that seems to be forgotten is that there is a rather hard limit on how much different objects can be represented by ASCII graphics, and DF has already crossed that border. As said, goats and goblins having the same sing can get confusing at times. With the underground diversity comming p soon, and many other features planned that will introduce new objects, these problems might become less trivial quite fast. So eventualy, Toady has to expand the amount of availible sprites some way, either by going to a more sprite-based tileset or by expanding into other alphabets. I'd prefere the first because I tend to be able to extract more information from a tileset then from ASCII graphics, especialy when the screen is big.

[Salmeuk]

I'm sorry, I'm all for defending the traditional values of pure ASCII, but I fail to see how NOT having more people getting into the game is a good thing.

Anyone can argue that the effort spent into coding it is not worth it compared to the amount of new blood Toady is going to get by doing it, but it takes a strange mind to actually NOT want any new people that like graphics getting into the game.

Are we getting into anti-"spreading the DF wealth" territory here? Do people think that the more people play Dwarf Fortress, the less Dwarf Fortress will there be for everybody? This is just weird. Are we being 'socialists' by wishing for more players? Is DF supposed to be an elitist game and stay an elitist game forever even if bringing it "to the masses" doesn't imply a loss of quality?

Does it mean that making room for better graphics is just as bad as "palin' around" with the pro-graphics terrorists that hate America's youth?

Eh, I'm speaking from my viewpoint, but I feel that as soon as Dwarf Fortress becomes popular, The forums will be flooded with newbies who have no idea what to do. This in itself is not a bad thing, but I'm afraid that those unsure newbies will bring the internet with them. This is very selfish on my part, as it's true that the more DF players there are the more donations Toady will receive, its also true the mean level of nicety on this forum will go down. I love these forums because as an old fart who's enjoyed DF since 2d, I really see the nice people and the pleasantness that pervades the pores of this place.

I am truly afraid that DF will get big and popular.

Selfishness aside, ASCII graphics should be left in even when Toady gets around to the presentation arc. I personally enjoy the game the best when the graphics are there, but not noticeable. The colors in DF are very beautiful most of the time (Fall colors anyone? When I first saw the tress changing, I was pretty amazed), and have an abstract beauty to them.

I don't speak for anyone else when I say this, but I prefer ASCII graphics.

[Sabin Stargem]

I suppose we could go with expanding the tileset and ASCII capabilities of Dwarf Fortress.  ASCII currently has passed it's ability to present all things seperately, and unforseen limitations of the graphics implementation has prevented tilesets from being full-bodied.  So, maybe Toady can allow new alphabets and languages to be used for ASCII, while at the same time add in the things that Zoan wanted in his first post.  Both sides walk away with something useful - the ability to modify the game to be presented better in their respective graphical styles.