Originally displayed using ASCII graphics, the game is set in a detailed, procedurally generated fantasy world with randomized creatures, NPCs, and history.

Prior to Dwarf Fortress, Tarn Adams was working on a project called Slaves to Armok: God of Blood which was a role-playing game.

[13] The names depend on the area's good/evil variable (the alignment) and though in English, they are originally in one of the four in-game languages of dwarves, elves, humans and goblins; these are the four main races in any generated world.

The player can consider the environment, elevations, biome, soil types and mineral concentrations[16][17] which can pose significant challenges to the development or survival of the fortress.

[15][21] The metal industry has a very important role because it produces weapons and armor for the military,[21] trap components for defense, and high-value furniture and decorations.

Continuous stress will cause them to throw tantrums and eventually go insane, whether going berserk and attacking their comrades in a homicidal rage, becoming suicidally depressed and jumping off a cliff, or simply going "stark raving mad" and stumbling around randomly until their untimely death.

[18] Their quality of life can be improved by giving them luxurious personal bedrooms and a well-decorated dining room, medical care, and providing them with a variety of drinks and well-cooked meals.

[29] Occasionally, a vampire dwarf, with a false background history, may arrive with a migrant wave and start killing and feeding on the other citizens without being noticed.

[31] After a few in-game weeks, the work results in a legendary artifact, an item so masterfully crafted that it is usually worth more than a beginning fortress' total wealth put together.

Through this entire period of being in a strange mood, a dwarf will not eat, drink or sleep and will eventually go insane if they are unable to complete the artifact due to any reason (such as unavailability of materials).

There is a medical system where a hospital can be set up, where crutches for disabled dwarves, traction benches, plasters and cloth for casts and bandages, thread for suturing, soap for preventing infection, and splints can be provided to help with the healing process.

[30][39] Legends is the third way of interacting with a generated world, a listing of the events of historical figures, sites such as towns or fortresses, regions and civilizations.

[40] One of Tarn and Zach Adams' early works was a text based adventure game called dragslay, written in the BASIC language and influenced by Dungeons & Dragons.

"[13] Years later, before entering graduate school in mathematics, Adams began working on a project he called Slaves to Armok: God of Blood.

Mutant Miner involved the player digging underneath buildings, searching for ores, fighting monsters, and carrying radioactive "goo" back to the surface to grow extra limbs and gain other abilities.

[36] A tough part of the game for him to implement was the A* search algorithm for in-game character's pathfinding which, depending on their numbers and complexity of the path, can cause a heavy load on a computer.

[53] In March 2019, the Adams brothers announced they would be releasing a paid edition of Dwarf Fortress, featuring a new graphical tileset and music through Steam and Itch.io, published by Kitfox Games.

Adams stated this would not affect the ongoing free version of Dwarf Fortress, but due to family situations at the time and the waning income from Patreon, they wanted to find another way to monetize the game.

[39] Wired and Rock Paper Shotgun called some of its bug fixes unintentional and funny, with PC Gamer saying it makes an entertaining RSS feed to subscribe to.

One is about a farmer dwarf planting his own bed, and the other involves a dwarven executioner, with broken arms, thus unable to use his hammer, delivering punishments by biting his victims and tearing off their limbs, keeping one in his mouth for years.

[65] Adams considers Dwarf Fortress his life's work, and has stated in 2011 that he does not expect version 1.0 to be released for at least another twenty years, and even after that, he would still continue to update it.

[41] The game's code base is proprietary, and Adams has stated he has no plans to release it into the open-source domain, citing the risk of them going into financial trouble.

[47] Adams describes version 1.0 having an Adventurer mode that would be a regular role-playing game, with changing plots and ordering subordinates to perform various tasks.

"[13] Wired magazine, following one of its updates, described it as an "obtuse, wildly ambitious work-in-progress [that] mashes the brutal dungeon crawling of roguelikes with the detail-oriented creativity of city-building sims.

"[41] PC Gamer's Steve Hogarty commented, "Dwarf Fortress's reluctance to expend even a joule of energy in prettying itself results in astonishing hidden complexity.

"[15] Regarding the open-ended nature and emergent gameplay, Rock Paper Shotgun's Graham Smith found that with its procedurally generated world and characters simulated "down to the most minute detail", the game's results are "often hilarious, occasionally tragic, and always surprising.

"[16] Ars Technica's Casey Johnston highlighted the difficulty in performing basic actions and felt that tinkering or experimenting ended up being unproductive; she compared it to "trying to build a skyscraper by banging two rocks together".

[17] She pointed out the lack of in-game tutorial and said how players can learn by themselves in other games, which are also open-ended or have intuitive mechanics, but in Dwarf Fortress, there is no autonomy "even after hours" of gameplay.

[47] In 2006, a saga called Boatmurdered, where fans passed around a single fortress and each played the game and saved it before sending it to another, was portrayed in detail from the start to its destructive end.

[46] On June 11, 2016, an event called Dwarfmoot was held at Mox Boarding House in Bellevue, Washington, to celebrate the ten-year anniversary of the game's release.