After 16 Years of Freeware, 'Dwarf Fortress' Creators Get $7M Payday (arstechnica.com) 57
An anonymous reader shares a report from Ars Technica:
The month before Dwarf Fortress was released on Steam (and Itch.io), the brothers Zach and Tarn Adams made $15,635 in revenue, mostly from donations for their 16-year freeware project. The month after the game's commercial debut, they made $7,230,123, or 462 times that amount....
Tarn Adams noted that "a little less than half will go to taxes," and that other people and expenses must be paid. But enough of it will reach the brothers themselves that "we've solved the main issues of health/retirement that are troubling for independent people." It also means that Putnam, a longtime modder and scripter and community member, can continue their work on the Dwarf Fortress code base, having been hired in December.
The "issues of health/retirement" became very real to the brothers in 2019 when Zach had to seek treatment for skin cancer. The $10,000 cost, mostly covered through his wife's employer-provided insurance, made them realize the need for more robust sustainability. "You're not just going to run GoFundMes until you can't and then die when you're 50," Tarn told The Guardian in late 2022. "That is not cool." This realization pushed them toward a (relatively) more accessible commercial release with traditional graphics, music, and tutorials.
Tarn Adams noted that "a little less than half will go to taxes," and that other people and expenses must be paid. But enough of it will reach the brothers themselves that "we've solved the main issues of health/retirement that are troubling for independent people." It also means that Putnam, a longtime modder and scripter and community member, can continue their work on the Dwarf Fortress code base, having been hired in December.
The "issues of health/retirement" became very real to the brothers in 2019 when Zach had to seek treatment for skin cancer. The $10,000 cost, mostly covered through his wife's employer-provided insurance, made them realize the need for more robust sustainability. "You're not just going to run GoFundMes until you can't and then die when you're 50," Tarn told The Guardian in late 2022. "That is not cool." This realization pushed them toward a (relatively) more accessible commercial release with traditional graphics, music, and tutorials.
issues of health/retirement - minimum required? (Score:1)
How much money do you and your family need to retire at 40 in the US today? Assuming there is no nuclear war, I'd reckon this as the absolute minimum:
1. You must fully own and have paid off your home (unless u live in NYC in a coop or rent control situation), which must be solar powered and off-grid as much as possible.
2. You must own at least two EVs so you don't depend on gas.
3. You must have $2 million in various investments of which at least one million are strongly protected against inflation (such as
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This almost entirely depends on where you live. That would be a comfortable retirement outside of major population centers - but not in them. The "safe" rule, where investing in a moderate ETF strategy is your primary holding, is 2.7% withdraw rate per year - see https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
At 2.7% of $2M, you're looking at just $54k per year. How many places in the US could that cover? Granted your transportation and housing costs are low, but they aren't zero, and you're still paying taxes. You
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You are right $54K is low, but I was aiming for "minimum required." Comfortable is a lot higher, depending on wants.
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Yeah, it will limit our "luxury" purchases (international travel, multiple vacations/year) but it's completely possible.
Home ownership is always going to be key to comfortable retirement. Unfortunately that trend is going in the wrong direction currently.
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At 2.7% of $2M, you're looking at just $54k per year. How many places in the US could that cover?
Quite a fucking lot I'd imagine, if your house and cars and utility bills are all paid for.
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I've been looking around, and sadly the number of places like that are quite small if you want to live in a place that has things like fast internet, a decent job market and things like a hospital or air port nearby.
even in utah where it use to be cheap...
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First what do EVs and solar panels have to do with socialism? If anything going off-grid is libertarian. Second, you seem to be a supporter of the socialist USPS yourself while accusing ME of socialism. Comedic.
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it's 2023 and you're still using Venezuela as some sort of gotcha insult?
Got some rage memes or other Obama-era jokes to share grandpa? At this point bringing up Venezuela is just a self report that you have literally nothing else.
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Yeah I've seen a few people scoff at how much this is supposed to be (I actually thought they'd get a lot more but I guess Steam and Kitfox have to take their cut)
But really once you take out tax, thats gonna look closer to $3.5mil. Split 3 ways ($1.25mil each and a mil in the kitty to cover business costs, they have employees now), that really isn't as much as it looks. And if they purchase houses in middle class suburbs (These guys where pretty much bones-of-ass broke, I'd assume they are renting, it migh
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Why are you trying to retire at 40? Retirement age is 66. Early retirement might be appealing to people who hate their jobs, but for the vast majority of people it simply isn't realistic. You need those extra 26 years to save-and-invest enough to retire properly.
I will also point out that it is naive to expect that you can retire at 40 and just lounge around on hammocks drinking alcohol and maybe playing video games all day, and remain happy. Most humans (especially at that age) have a psychological nee
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The quicker you get to "I can retire at any time," it is one less stressor. It's not about stopping work and going to sip coladas all day in the Bahamas. It's about having the freedom to take more risks and involve yourself in a lot more activities. It's the inflection point at which you don't have to do a job you hate and do one you like instead. I never said you should actually retire at 40.
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Either those people are workaholics or I am exceptionally lazy, but I would absolutely love not having to work for a living, but having enough money to do things that are interesting to me but do not generate any income. For me, having a job is not about "feeling productive" or "useful", but to get money. There's a limit though - II really dislike working overtime even if it brings more money - I'd like to have time for my hobbies. If I have a big pile of money but no time, it's pretty much the same as havi
Well deserved (Score:3, Insightful)
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Good on them! (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Good on them! (Score:5, Interesting)
Have a try of the new Steam Version. Its *much* easier to approach than the old ASCII version. Theres even a basic tutorial.
I used to play the old version about once a year, just run a fort until it ended in !!FUN!! (absolute ruin), and then be somewhat disuaeded from continuing because the mental logistics involved in just playing the damn thing was too much. But I've been obsessed with this new version.
Especially the wrestling demon I found. The game procedurally generated a demon lord who had spawned at the beginning of time and just after the creation of the world escaped hell and led an army of rampaging orcs around the world conquring and generally Sauron-ing about. Then after a few hundred years of general evil doing he invaded a dwarf fortress where the annual dwarven wrestling championships where taking place and decided he wanted to participate. He enjoyed this so immensely he abandoned his orc army and spent the next 30 years as a drunkard in the fortress tavern, participating in wrestling matches, foot races and Crossbow *throwing* tournaments. Eventually he got really drunk one day, went for a walk and got killed trying to fight a an eagle, thus ending this once world dominating Demon lords epit tale in an orgy of mind shattering, albeit drunken, violence.
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Oh that was just it autogenerating it. I did nothing. The trick to finding these madcap stories is to just read everything, and every now and then retire the fort on an alternative save and go into "Legends" mode, and start reading the history. In this case I went to the origin stories legends and just started reading the Bios of some of the starting gods it created and came across that madcap story.
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Hopefully they are careful with the money since they plan to use it for retirement.
In other words... (Score:2, Troll)
The US is a bad place to start a small owner-operated business, since affordable healthcare insurance is tied to employment. Without it, you're one cancer treatment away from bankruptcy. "Land of opportunity" indeed.
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First, check your American Exceptionalism. After that, cite your stats.
healthcare exchange (Score:2)
healthcare exchange
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This. I started a company in Canada and didn't have to worry about health insurance for myself or for my staff. Once we grew enough, I did eventually offer health benefits to pay for things not covered by the public system, but the costs were minimal. This gave us a competitive advantage against similarly-sized US companies.
I sold my company in 2018, and I'm months away from retirement... I can afford to retire in my 50s because I don't need to pay thousands per year for medical insurance and I know a
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Whoa whoa, first of all, the price of your product has nothing to do with its costs, because the price is chosen by the market, not the business owner. Ok, now that we've got that out of the way, lets tackle the issue of provider choice. Universal healthcare still lets you choose your health care provider, or to put it another way, we could make it work that way. Keep in mind that the healthcare system we have now incentivizes bad experiences because it is motivated by profit, leading to systemically b
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No, that's not how it works. Unless you can make a profit from selling your product after all of the costs of doing business are covered, you're not going to be in business for very long. And that includes everything, including taxes and whatever employee benefits you provide, such as health care.
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Unless you can make a profit from selling your product after all of the costs of doing business are covered, you're not going to be in business for very long. And that includes everything, including taxes and whatever employee benefits you provide, such as health care.
That's all fine and good but unless you are living in a soviet style planned economy, the market determines price, not cost of manufacture.
they sold the debt (Score:2)
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So you're OK with a successful business going bankrupt because the owner gets cancer?
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It's not that bad at all.
I've been a 1099 contractor for a LONG time.
I incorporated myself into a Sub Chapter S corp....(S-Corp).
I set up a HSA (Health Savings Account) that you can load up for a person about $3500/yr roughly....and I use that for my routine expenses (office visits, meds, et
wow, publishers took a lot (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: wow, publishers took a lot (Score:2)
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Regarding the publisher, sure they pocketed a lot of money but they also made it more accessible to the masses
To be honest, if they had just dumped their freeware version on Steam and itch.io without a publisher, the actual developers might have made more money, but the general public is better off with the link to the publisher, as the product ended up being better and more accessible
I think it was good that the d
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Typically for every steam review, there's 38 sales (this changes a bit so it's definitely a rough estimate, but look up the stats and make your own guesses).
Yes, people can check games that have leaderboards and show a total player count. One such title I checked had only 1% of the players leaving a Steam review.
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I have not read the devs say they are anything but pleased with how the financials worked out.
Kitfox put a ton of work into the release.
Steam it is what it is. As others have commented, you can buy it form itch.io as well, and Steam has sold a crapton more copies. So clearly they have done something to encourage sales.
I'm happy to admit the limits of capitalism, but in this case it really looks like everyone has come out a winner. I'm so, so happy that Tarn and Zach can make a comfortable living on this abs
Re: wow, publishers took a lot (Score:3)
hmm (Score:2)
Good for them. I never understood exactly how those dudes lived. I guess one at least is married, so maybe she supports him.