#bravemule

Circus Reviews - Mama Possum

FANTASY/ACTION/DRAMA/VIDEO GAME/SFW/FINISHED

Sorry for the wait, had some writers block related issues, exacerbated by me weapons-grade laziness. But I’m going to make it up to all two of you with something interesting! Something bizarre! Something… Video game related! Buckled up kids, it’s time for a corner-case.

Bravemule, by Kevin Snow, George Kavallines, Eidolon Orpheus, and Andi McClure (largest creative team yet!) is a partially illustrated, partially animated playthrough of Dwarf Fortress. It focu-

Sorry, what?

Dwarf Fortress? Well, if you insist…

Slaves to Armok: God of Blood - Chapter II: Dwarf Fortress , by Zach and Tarn Adams (The Toady One and Threetoe) is a fantasy setting simulator with a couple of insanely complex little game-modes attached. It’s amazing, and I love it. It’s not for everyone, as evidenced by my continued difficulties in sharing it with friends, but hey, the works you tend to find the most valuable and important also tend to be the ones with a very specific sort of appeal. It ain’t for everyone, but boy-howdy is it for me. This is a game where you ‘control’ a colony of mad alcoholics trying to eke out a living in a dangerous world of horrible monsters, poorly planned magma smelting projects, and cannibalistic elves. And as with all things complex and niche, it has some weird and wonderful little fan projects. Oilfurnace is a good example of a short little comic based on a failed (and they tend to be failed) fortress. It sums up the experience nicely.

Anyway.

Bravemule is a little different. Chronicling the rise and fall of the eponymous fortress, it gives us a story of madness and violence, greed and avarice, mules and moustaches. Presented as a series of personal journals by the dwarves themselves, it was based on an actual playthrough of the game, with details and elaborations inserted through the writing. And what writing! The dwarves of Bravemule seem to have an… Odd mode of speaking. Or thinking. One-part antiquated, one-part total insanity, the voice of the dwarves of Bravemule helps to make the madness of their actions feel more coherent. The creatures who write down their thoughts like this probably WOULD be driven to gibbering by the presence of an octagonal room. They call everything that isn’t a dwarf or a favoured pet some kind of elf, all forms of fighting and killing are called murders. At one point, a ‘farmer’ murders a crop by drowning…

Or, y’know. She waters the plants.

The art, while not used heavily, comes in several flavours. From the detailed character portraits and occasional comic panels, to the ‘in-game’ images produced by a mod that turns the minimalist 2D art of the game itself into 3D stills. It even has a few animated, and musically enhanced updates that cover the most dramatic sections of the tale. Overall, it’s pretty great stuff! Sure, the word-to-image ratio probably doesn’t let me paint this as a webcomic on some kind of arbitrary technicality, but what we do have is good stuff. If I’m counting Erfworld as a webcomic, this isn’t THAT far from the mark. Still, if you’re not looking to do a lot of reading, maybe look elsewhere.

The biggest barrier for entry to Bravemule is, of course, context. Without some knowledge of Dwarf Fortress, it’s not going to make a whole lot of sense. Well, the basic thrust of the matter is easy enough to follow, but not the details. This is a comic for, and about, Dwarf Fortress. It’s very much a fan-work, with all the provisos that come with it. You won’t miss out on everything if you go in raw, but it will certainly be a less-than-complete experience. Many of the little jokes, lie the image above, only really tracks with an understanding of the game. And it’s really not an easy game to understand to begin with. I recently spent over an hour walking a friend through his first fortress, and while we made a lot of headway (and got insanely lucky with metal deposits, damn!) the poor guy is a dozen fortress failures away from really getting it down-pat.

Simply put, there is a LOT of work needed to really appreciate Bravemule to the fullest. If you don’t have that going in, you may not get much out of it. That’s OK! But the warning is important. It’s certainly not a bad little comic, but it isn’t one I can freely recommend like some others. And not just for that reason, either. The actual content of the comic is pretty dark. Nobody gets out of this story, and none of them have a good time on the way there. The relentless, almost whimsically grim feel of the game has been well-portrayed, and any connection you feel to individual characters will not be rewarded. They’re nasty, cruel little bastards these dwarves, and they mostly get what’s coming to them.

Still. If any of that sounds good? Could be worth a look!

Strike the earth! And, of course…

Matul Remrit endures!