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[Strangething]

I found an interesting DF review on this blog.

http://codecritique.wordpress.com/2009/04/22/439/

The article is mostly about interface, so it's mostly negative. He actually calls it the worst interface ever designed.

Dwarf Fortress here is perhaps one of the best games ever to grace the face of the earth, and it’s also an even better example of bad design than those troublesome phone systems or even the dreaded glass doors.

It's true, of course. It's a terrible interface, even if most of the players here have struggled with it long enough to commit it to memory.

But the author seems to have missed a couple things. He says you have to go though to the military screen to draft a dwarf. That's a common misconception. It's not obvious that you can activate from [v], [p].

But then there's this doozy:

If the player wants to set quotas for a workshop, for example, he has to go into a menu and select from a list of all the buildings he’s built - and putting his cursor over the workshop does nothing.

Sweet Armok, does he not know about [q]? It sounds like he's using [r] for all his production. That poor bastard. If there were comments on that blog, I would set him straight.

[Duke 2.0]

 Alas, I can think of many, and I mean MANY, roguelikes that are much worse than DF, simply because they need you to check the help menu every five seconds to figure out what the heck what does what. DF does not require that, and shows you all of your options at almost all times.

 Still, this is saying an interface is good for roguelikes, which are horrible. Heck, most of them don't even have interfaces! But let it be known that DF is being compared to completed games.

Worst. Looking. Game. Ever.

 ...And thus what we must keep in mind. This is not a final design decision, but a placeholder because core features must be addressed.

[jockmo42]

I hate reviewers that don't do their homework.
First of all, this guy is playing the game in the most inefficient way possible.
Second, DF isn't done.
Third, he stated that it was one of the best games in the world,  and then bashed it with abandon through the entire article, just because the unfinished interface takes a bit of getting used to.

[Dasleah]

Aw hell yeah, Starcraft running through the Warcraft 2 engine.

[penguinofhonor]

My god, creep used to be neon purple? Ew.

[Vugor]

wow those screenshots burned my eyes alittle........

But, i think this person has sort of interfacepobia or something, after reading it i wonder if it was even worth reading since he just blabed about the interface......

I must agree that the reviewer should have really put alittle more work into his homeowrk about the game, because knowing a few extra tricks to get things done and the overall fact that there are more important things then interface.....are things that I would think to be important to a review.

[Neruz]

He does kind of have a point though; i shouldn't have to research a games interface just to work out how to use it.

[vanarbulax]

I'm sorry it has already been officaly decided that EVE online has the worst interface ever. And this is comparing a one man programmed alpha to a full release MMO.

[Neruz]

True, EVE probably gets the cake for worst interface ever, on the other hand it is very good from a simulationist point of view.

Wheras alot of things in DF just don't make sense, at all.

[Footkerchief]

The article is ABOUT INTERFACES.  It's not a "review."  It doesn't matter whether DF is unfinished, either -- what he wanted was an example of a spectacularly bad interface, and the current version of DF provides that nicely.

You are not being attacked.  DF is not being attacked.  Stand down, y'all.

[Duke 2.0]

The article is ABOUT INTERFACES.  It's not a "review."  It doesn't matter whether DF is unfinished, either -- what he wanted was an example of a spectacularly bad interface, and the current version of DF provides that nicely.

You are not being attacked.  DF is not being attacked.  Stand down, y'all.

Still, I always try to make it a point to point out that the interface was not an intentional design because there are a lot of people out there who complain about how Toady is not fixing it yet.
 So not so much malice towards this reviewer who is comparing different types of interfaces than towards hypothetical...
 I'm not sure what to call them, but I suppose my dislike and effort was not directed entirely to the topic at hand.

[Neonivek]

I don't want to be technical... but can there seriously be "Reviews" on Dwarf Fortress? shouldn't they be "Previews"?

Then again perhaps I am mistaking tendencies for definition.

[Strangething]

The article is ABOUT INTERFACES.  It's not a "review."  It doesn't matter whether DF is unfinished, either -- what he wanted was an example of a spectacularly bad interface, and the current version of DF provides that nicely.

You are not being attacked.  DF is not being attacked.  Stand down, y'all.

This. He isn't really reviewing the whole game, just the interface. I just thought it was funny that two of the things that he gripes about are actually his own mistakes.

[Footkerchief]

They can hardly be called his mistakes when it's indisputably the game's fault in the first place for not having a coherent interface.

[Neonivek]

One possibility: he is trying to bully the creator into fixing the Interface in the immediate future.

He wouldn't be the first person (or group of people) to have tried to get Independent/Fan projects to go in the dirrection they want by bad reviews, ranting posts, or online petitions.

You could even point a few out on this very forum (but I won't... It would only cause problems)