Bearded women, war possums, Pokemon, and other unhinged Dwarf Fortress mods

(Image credit: Lielac on Steam)

Dwarf Fortress has been on Steam for two weeks, and the mod list on the Workshop is already beyond unhinged.

Have you ever wanted to lead a troop of trained warrior marsupials into battle? The War Possums mod is here to - and I quote from the mod page - allow "your dwarves to train possums in the art of war." If you want to get pedantic about 'opossums,' mod creator Elsie will argue with you in the comments.

Okay, that one's a bit silly, but what if you want historically accurate female dwarves? Plenty of fantasy fiction is willing to put bearded dwarven women in the lore without actually letting bearded women be on-screen, but Dwarf Fortress at least lets you fix that with the Let Dwarven Women Have Beards mod. It is, after all, the dwarves that go swimming with little hairy women.

Well, that one's cosmetic. What if you want to get drunk on milk? The Fermented Milk mod lets you turn the, uh, maternal drippings of creatures like cows, goats, yaks, kangaroos, and purring maggots into an alcoholic beverage. If you want to add to the list of creatures that can be milked, the Milkable Cats mod will let you do so while referencing very bad Ben Stiller films.

Alright, things are getting weird now, and maybe a bit uncomfortable. What if you just don't have time to read the entire title screen every time you launch the game? There's a mod that will simply turn the title to 'Dorf Fort'. Eight letters, all thriller, no filler.

No no no don't close the tab yet! The Dwarvemon mod is legitimately cool - it adds 905 Pokemon, complete with evolutions, status conditions, berries and other items, and more. Optional add-ons for this one will even let you play the TCG or collect an infamous glitched Pokemon.

Finally, if you just can't wait for The Elder Scrolls 6, there's a mod to turn Dwarf Fortress into Skyrim - or whichever TES game you fancy. The Vvardenfell mod (named for the vibes, not necessarily the location where Morrowind takes place) adds all the playable races from the Elder Scrolls series, alongside dragon shouts and a handful of familiar creatures.

There are no plans for Dwarf Fortress 2, but maybe that's for the best when you've got players trying to build genocidal mermaid farms.

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Dustin Bailey joined the GamesRadar team as a Staff Writer in May 2022, and is currently based in Missouri. He's been covering games (with occasional dalliances in the worlds of anime and pro wrestling) since 2015, first as a freelancer, then as a news writer at PCGamesN for nearly five years. His love for games was sparked somewhere between Metal Gear Solid 2 and Knights of the Old Republic, and these days you can usually find him splitting his entertainment time between retro gaming, the latest big action-adventure title, or a long haul in American Truck Simulator.