Though you could always go on adventures in Dwarf Fortress, with the game’s Adventure Mode expansion entering public beta today, you can now sally forth with a full complement of updated graphics.
In Adventure Mode, there are all sorts of shenanigans to get up to in the ridiculously large and detailed procedurally generated world. It’s an RPG campaign complete with character creation, quests to complete, and bandits to fight.
With the public beta, your adventures on the surface world will look a lot more detailed than smiley faces and ASCII art. There’s still the same level of granular detail in combat, allowing you to stab, punch, kick, throw, and bite just about anything on your enemies right down to their eyeballs. Check out a demo of combat in the new Adventure Mode below.
Dwarf Fortress has been around as a freemium game since 2006 with a level of detail that still defies all expectation. Players choose from one of two game modes: Fortress and Adventure. In Fortress Mode, keep your ever-growing contingent of dwarfs drunk and happy as they work through the centuries on their ever-expanding dungeon home. Should your mini-Mines of Moria ever fail either via famine, disease, or misadventure by Balrog, the deeds of your dwarfs will be etched into the game’s annals — a record of every notable event your dwarfs achieved.
Dwarf Fortress launched a premium version on Steam in 2022 with updated graphics and Steam Workshop compatibility for mod support. Its updated version of Adventure Mode is out now in public beta, and you can get the full details here. Expect the full release sometime later this year.