Secret Identities in Dwarf Fortress

Abstract

Chairs’ Note: In this invited industry case study, Tarn Adams discusses recent extensions to Dwarf Fortress’s systems for character deception. A noted opus in the history of videogames, Dwarf Fortress is a roguelike set in procedurally generated fantasy universes. It has been shown at the Museum of Modern Art and has been featured in The New York Times, The New Yorker, Wired, and many other press publications. Currently, Tarn and his brother, Zach Adams, are roughly midway through its famous 30-year development cycle. As Tarn explains in this paper, an upcoming update centered around artifacts—and what characters know about them—has had the fun consequence of necessitating that a certain class of non-player characters cultivate secret identities. This major extension has brought both technical and design challenges, as this paper illustrates. —James Ryan