I’d throw in my $15 if it happens.
I am not convinced it will see the same enthusiasm as Double Fine though.
Hmm… When I look at Tim Schaefer’s post-LucasArts career, I’m confident of funding his kickstarter.
When I look at Brian’s post-Interplay career, I’m not quite as sure…
Wasteland is one of my favorite games of all time, but I simply don’t understand the whole kickstarter “thing”. I’m not making an investment unless I get to share in the profits. If they release the game and it’s good, I’ll certainly buy it, though.
It’s an investment in the game happening at all, I believe. If the funding goal isn’t achieve, your credit card is never charged.
Yes. LucasArts is obviously in dire need of cash.
Actually that money should be sent to Lawrence Holland so HE can make the games. ;)
You’re getting something for a small early investment of cash. I suspect that the final game will be rather more than $15 for Double Fine’s, for instance.
Some kickstarters DO offer equity, but honestly it’s rarely a good deal.
Clearly they aren’t spending it on the project we’re interested in, so we should earmark a pile of money for them to make something interesting.
Geez, I even know who jwz is and I had to google for like five minutes before I figured out what the hell you were referring to. I’m sitting here trying to figure out if he had something to do with Fallout?
Anyway, well done.
I think I’d be willing to put money down provided there was an alpha build, otherwise it’s just blind faith.
I’m not a fan of these Kickstarter campaigns for video games. Give me the pre-paid alpha or something like that, but as much as I love Wasteland (one of my top 5), I’d have a hard time donating until I saw something tangible released.
I’ve only done one myself, for StarDrive, but it went well. Maybe something like alphafunding on Desura would be better though, I dunno.
If it would actually work that way I’d be donating in a heartbeat. A new Tie Fighter game? Count me in.
I was ok with Schafer doing it as a one off thing mainly because they seem to have gotten in a rut of low budget games as of late. That, and he never came off a guy that has buckets of money… and I guess because he was really pulling at my heart strings with talk of a new classic point-and-click game.
I do not like seeing guys like Fargo do this kind of crap though. He was the founder of the former publishing giant Interplay. He cashed in on Interplay twice thanks to his bright idea of bringing in Universal, then later by going public through an IPO. He had the time, resources, and money to make a Wasteland sequel. He didn’t lack opportunity. He was the founder of a once very successful publisher, you know damn well he had the ability to influence what Interplay’s development studios were working on.
I just view his idea of getting a Kickstarter going of his own as opportunistic exploitation, and I find it quite bothersome. I’ve watched Kickstarter since it began, and correct me if I’m wrong here, but it’s always been a service meant to help smaller scale projects raise money and get some exposure. Projects that actually need the help. Unless Fargo pulled a total MC Hammer move with the potential truckloads of money he made from offloading Interplay he’s probably got millions in the bank. I’d imagine that he can afford to take on the risk himself.
Ugh, I don’t even know what else to say. At this point those of us from the Voodoo Extreme team might abandon the idea to potentially get a Kickstarter going of our own for a new site, even though we’ve been talking about it for almost a full month. It’s just becoming too much of a “me too” thing at this point, we wouldn’t ever want to look like we were trying to hop on the bandwagon.
Edit: Wikipedia says that Fargo is a descendant of the family that created Wells Fargo and American Express. So you’re telling me Fargo needs money to build a game, and he wants to fund it with a site that typically caters to indie scale projects? Really?
Let me just go grab my chequebook…
I love this.
Twenty years to a week ago:
“What I wouldn’t do for a new Wasteland! What I wouldn’t do for a new Autoduel! Why won’t publishers take the risk? TAKE MY MONEY!”
A week ago to present:
“That has-been guy who made Wasteland is going to make it if I pre-pay $15? What a fucking loser! What a scam! Bandwagon jumper! Christ, what next, Chuckles begging for money for a new Autoduel?”
Seriously, what is wrong with you people. This is the only opportunity to get the games we loved made in genres that publishers would never, ever touch.
Oh man. A Car Wars game. I played the hell out of Autoduel on the Commodore 64. I even sent pictures of the final screens where you win to Origin. They sent me back a letter congratulating me and an Autoduel poster!
Those were the good old days.
My lawn, remove yourselves from it.
Edit: Not screenshots. Photographs of the final screens taken with a SLR, developed and sent in a damn envelope via physical mail. I knew I had beat the game and got my damn camera out. ::sigh::
My beef is more with what I perceive to be the beginning of the gaming industry’s exploitation of Kickstarter. I just don’t think it’s the right outlet for this kind of thing. I keep seeing developers spring up in interviews talking like Kickstarter is the new gold rush. That’s what bothers me right now.
There’s a reason why Double Fine broke so many records at Kickstarter. If you can’t figure it out, it’s because it’s the first project of that size to actually appear, and receive so much attention from the gaming community. While it was cool at first, Double Fine’s presence did feel a bit out of place especially once the money started reaching a level several times more than what was asked for.
With that said I’ll admit that I was part of the problem. I covered it myself on Twitter and at VE, and I donated more than I really should have given my financial situation. I just didn’t expect this kind of reaction from other devs, and in some ways I’m regretting getting behind the movement.
Allowing established developers to continue to pitch big budget ideas (in scale to what’s normally on Kickstarter) is only going to take attention away from the smaller stuff that truly does need the exposure and investment. It goes against what Kickstarter was for.
I mean look at Schafer and Fargo from a status point of view. We’re not dealing with some broke ass Al Lowe who’s presenting a pitch saying “Guys, I have no money, no studio, no employees to work with here. Help me!”. These are established businessmen with the ability to raise money in a number of ways, each of which also probably have enough money in the bank to actually kick start the project already.
Would it really take a million dollars to make top-down, party based rpg?