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[Anticipation]

The first time I played dwarf fortress I put in a solid half a hour and then left it for roughly a year and a half. What about everyone else? What got you past the bad graphics and RATHER steep learning curve?

[ein]

I had no trouble with the graphics.
I played nethack for a couple of years, then adom, then I found DF.

The learning curve though...
Let's just say I went through 2 metric shit-tonnes of trial and error.
There was a little bit of wiki hugging, but not much.
I was too impatient to read the wiki thoroughly at first.

[Anticipation]

I didn't even know about the wiki the first time. The only thing that made me give it a go was the absultly glowing reports that PCPowerPlay kept on giving it.

[ein]

I don't know how I found the game itself, but the forums and wiki were easy.
I found the link here from the bay12 homepage.
Then I found the wiki immediately after hitting the forums.
Then I found Boatmurdered before I browsed the forums much.

[shadow_archmagi]

There was actually apparently a Team Fortress 2 thread on my forum, but the admins misunderstood and posted about Dwarf Fortress in it, and by the time I got there the thread was called "SIGH. FINE. DWARF FORTRESS THREAD."

[Skorpion]

What got me past the graphics and learning curve WAS the graphics and learning curve. It insulted me personally, so I took it as a challenge.
And I actually LIKE the ASCII. It's coded, and I can recognise the symbols easily.
Granted, I can't tell a black bear from a giant bat, but still.

[Slackratchet]

I was forwarded to the Boatmurdered history and being a long time fan of Roguelike games it was just like adding gas to a fire, I've played almost daily since.

[ac31]

although i found out about this game from baotmurdered it was the world generation which did it for me

how many random world generators do YOU know of that individually tracks the life of each individual man, woman, dwarf and animal for 1000 years, and creates a rich history and culture from it.

[Awayfarer]

although i found out about this game from baotmurdered it was the world generation which did it for me

how many random world generators do YOU know of that individually tracks the life of each individual man, woman, dwarf and animal for 1000 years, and creates a rich history and culture from it.

Same here. My jaw dropped when I first saw worldgen. The game was a confusing at first but the level of depth and the incredible number of possibilities kept me playing. I don't remember where I first found out about it though. I vaguely recall seeing a link to it in some one's sig on another forum I used to frequent.

Though I'd argue that DF doesn't have "bad" graphics so much as it has "no" graphics.

[Untelligent]

I had no trouble with the graphics for some reason, despite never playing any roguelike before.

I also learn very quickly, so the learning curve didn't bother me much either.

[Greiger]

I discovered the game through a magizine I mysteriously got in the mail.  Don't recall the name of the mag but the first issue I got had a special edition version of a section called "The Freeloader".  DF was mentioned, and I decided to try it out.

The graphics didn't bother me at all.  Before I was playing DF I was playing hengband.

I spent my first 3 days and first 6 forts not knowing how to use the labor menu.  My last one was actually kinda successful, because if there was a job, I had at least 1 dwarf that was novice in it.  Unfortunately that last one died because the "food guy" was too buzy fishing all day to actually clean the fish he fished...or even carry them to a stockpile. 

Once I figured out the labor menu from reading the forums(not certain the wiki was around then, or at least it wasn't advertised much) I had a much easier time surviving.

[Aldaris]

What got me past the graphics and learning curve WAS the graphics and learning curve. It insulted me personally, so I took it as a challenge.

This, the first few of Captn Duck's video tutorials, and wikihugging. I ran into the game a few times but didn't investigate untill those tutorials were mentioned on Rock Paper Shotgun.

[Scarpa]

I found out about the game via Penny Arcade when they linked to TinyPirate's tutorial.

After reading the tutorial I realized I *had* to download and play the game. The more I played and and discovered the incredible depth the more addicted I became. Now I play daily and lurk on the forums and tell stories about dwarves to my friends... Just yesterday I was telling a friend I think I'll play this game for years.

[Jude]

The first time I "played" it I just looked at the ASCII graphics, and the controls, and - keep in mind, this was as a SEVEN YEAR veteran of Angband - I called it quits. Then a few days later I called up a computer gaming friend, told him about it, we downloaded a version with graphics already set up, and went about figuring it out together, using the wiki liberally.

[Bloogonis]

My first view was a few years ago, and I liked it, but i didnt understand it. then a few months ago, the community at Infinity-universe.com started up a succession game, just to kill time and I got back into it. And this time I spent a good month Wiki-hugging, it really is so very helpful.