Dwarf Fortress Launches on Steam

Dwarf Fortress has reached a new milestone! It finally gets a Steam Release, something it’s long deserved after being in active development since 2003. The game has had an active fan following since I’ve been in grade school and has a massive legacy as one of the premier storytelling simulation games. Really the only response to this is “About dang time.”

This new release comes with some fancy new features. Most notable are features making the game more accessible for new players, including tutorials and a new UI. Also included some nifty graphical updates giving the game pixel graphics and new tile sets.

See what the devs have to say about the release here, which answers some commonly asked questions about the launch:

It’s time to strike the earth because Dwarf Fortress Steam Edition is out now!

This new version brings a brand new pixel art tileset, a new helpful tutorial to onboard unfamiliar players, new soundtrack and sound effects, new user interface and navigable menus, and other quality of life additions to the legendary civilization management and construction game.

The game will launch with the Fortress and Legends game modes that longtime players are familiar with. We plan to add the Adventure and Arena modes to these versions of Dwarf Fortress very soon.

You can learn more and see Dwarf Fortress’ development roadmap here.

Steam Workshop integration is also available making it easier for mod developers to create creative additions to the game. You can read our evolving mod guide here.

If you're a longtime player and want to know what's different in this version, the (incomplete) changelog might be interesting!

The brand new soundtrack for this version of *Dwarf Fortress*, with tracks even made in the Dwarvish language, composed by Dabu, Simon Swerwer and Águeda Macias is also available now for purchase separately on Steam.

The classic version of *Dwarf Fortress* will remain available for download at no cost, and will continue to be supported in the future on Bay 12’s website. This future support includes mouse functionality and other improvements seen in the Steam release.

Thank you to everyone in the Dwarf Fortress community for being so supportive and patient over the years. We hope that you’ll enjoy the game with it’s improvements and be be able to introduce your friends and family a lot easier.

This is just the beginning.

Kitfox Games + Bay 12 Games