It’s Monday, and as any gaming writer knows, there’s nothing much to write about on Mondays. So here’s a link to a 6-page in-depth article about Dwarf Fortress on the New York Times’ website instead.

It’s a pretty fascinating read, not only about the game’s long and storied development, but also its two eccentric creators, one of whom lives alone with his cat, and the other with the pair’s parents.

For those of you who’ve never heard of it, Dwarf Fortress is a freeware, text- and ASCII-based roguelike / strategy / world builder game that puts you in charge of, well, a fortress inhabited by dwarves. Think of it as an old(er) skool sort of Minecraft, but with more… dwarves and fortresses, basically.

Development on the game started in 2002, and a public alpha version was released back in 2006. And it’s still in alpha, with the current release version at only 0.31.