How can one describe Dwarf Fortress? This is a computer game. All the programing is of the highest quality. It is decorated with ASCII "graphics" and menaces with spikes of certain catastrophe... and !!magma!! lots and lots of magma.
In-jokes aside, this game really does allow you to do whatever you want. Want to build a giant obsidian tower which you use to drop magma 100 stories onto unsuspecting elven traders? Go for it! Want to leave the surface behind and have you dwarfs live out their lives on the shore of an large underground magma lake? Be our guest! Build a computer using pumps and magma? Sure! If you're willing to put in the effort (and magma) nothing is too crazy or to big for you and your dwarfs. There is no hard-coded goal in Dwarf Fortress. You play until the game is "over," by whatever definition you've chosen. Whether that's once you've become the capitol of your civilization, when every last one of your dwarfs is dead, or when you sealed up your fortress and flooded the rest of the map with magma, its up to you!
The game's sound consists of one unimpressive music track that lasts about 30 sec and loops ad. nauseam. Turning the sound off was one of the first things I learned how to do.
Unfortunately, the graphics are... well... there are no graphics. By default, the game uses colored ASCII characters to represent everything from your dwarfs, to various rocks, to goblins, to magma. So looking at Dwarf Fortress looks a bit like looking at a very strange and complicated report which was probably typed up in Sanskrit and has been put through an incredibly bad translation program then printed off by a severely broken printer. For example: A dwarf is a color-coded ☺or ☻, a tree is represented by ♣, metal is (usually) £, and a goblin is a 'g' (not to be confused with a giant: which is 'G') You can download other, user-made tile sets which are more self-explanatory if the ASCII art is too much for you. The "Lazy Newb Pack" (yes that is its actual name) is quite good.
Deciphering the user interface aside, the game is complicated almost beyond usability by the average human being. The game is has enough menus, commands, and hotkeys to fill a book. Properly explaining them all would probably take a textbook, which fortunately, the game has: USE THE WIKI!! If you do not use the wiki, you will utterly fail to comprehend this game. Hands up, who knows what common metal can be smelted from the ore Cassiterite? Anyone? Well then how about Malachite? I need something that won't melt in magma, does someone here know the melting point of Marcasite? Hmm... no geology Ph.Ds in the crowd, I guess. Yeah, you're going to need the wiki. And even with the wiki to guide you, it will be hours if not days before you really know what you're doing.
So, why do we do it? We do it for !!Science!! We do it because we think of something so wacky, so ridiculously complicated, or so inhumanely cruel, that no game in its right mind would allow its players to do such a thing. Fortunately, there is a game which looks sanity in the face and laughs. That game is Dwarf Fortress. So embrace your inner evil mastermind or insane architect: give Dwarf Fortress a try. It will be FUN™