Dwarf Fortress is one of my favourite games of all time. The graphics are bested by games on the Apple Lisa from 1982.
The game doesn’t even have consistent interface. But as far as creativity goes, few games top it—Think of a game that has elements in common with Crusader Kings 2, Victoria 2, and Minecraft. Minecraft actually started as a cross section of Dwarf Fortress.
Unfortunately, Dwarf Fortress is too intimidating for many gamers—despite not being even close to as difficult as its reputation. But a much less intimidating version of the game is due out on Steam next month.
Also, the lack of creativity on realistic games has much more to do with the production side of development, not the creative team trading off creativity to stay realistic. The unfortunate side-effect of high fidelity are design-lawyers who use market research of existing products to dictate how elements of a game have to be. Indie companies can avoid this, but in the end, money is chief motivation of developers, they will trade off creative freedom for extra money. In the end, critics and gamers alike are far harsher on games that buck the trends than unoriginality in games. Talking, gamers tend to be much harsher with relatively benign monetization tactics in creative games than they are much more punishing monetization tactics that have been done a lot before.
I describe myself as a little dose of toxic masculinity.
