Again, the menu said Happy Meals include fries. And you’re calling me an asshole for complaining about not getting fries.
This is so fundamental that it is honestly hilarious to me that you guys are even arguing it. Internet pedantry at its worst.
Agonising over the technicalities of the Kickstarter system is pointless. They promised stretch goals over and above the minimum expected to deliver the game, hit the targets and got the money. There’s no question of gamer entitlement or any shame in asking where these things are a month from release, or expressing disappointment, or getting refunds where appropriate (Italian translation). Shit happens, and Fargo et al should have been more open about this than spending the time it took them to pen numerous flowery backer update emails that meander towards the announcement of another delay. The fault is all theirs.
That’s where your analogy between crowdsourcing a game and buying a happy meal breaks down, doesn’t it?
But this is derailing the Torment thread. I’d be happy to continue discussing it in a more appropriate place.
It seems some of you guys are arguing from a legal POV. As in “Kickstarter stretch goals are not a legally binding contract and pledgers should not expect them to be fulfilled.”
I think this where the hang-up is because @stusser and I are saying regardless of what they’re legally beholden to do, human nature is to think you’re entitled to everything the developer says they’re going to give you during the drive, including reached stretch goals. It’s silly to say otherwise.
It’s human nature to think that, perhaps, but said entitlement does not exist. It exists for the things that you actually, directly pay for.
Right! So what is the argument here? Most reasonable people will think they should get the stretch goals they reached in the campaign, therefore…? Help me out. I have no idea what the debate is about at this point.
We agree inXile should’ve kept their backers informed better.
We agree stretch goals are not legally binding, but should be fulfilled if met, lest you raise the ire of your audience.
I think we agree that a bunch of projects blowing out their stretch goals would be bad for crowd-sourcing. Yes?
So what am I missing?
Well I tried to move the discussion to:
But to be clear I don’t see much difference.
I’m wondering what societal obligations a crowd funded project have to deliver specific parts of their scope. And as to whether there is a difference between scope form the original pitch and scope that is added during the campaign as ‘stretch goals’.
My argument is that the compact is not specific, that the project must simply deliver something ‘close enough’ to the described scope to have satisfied their requirements. And that there is no difference between goals regarding how they were added to the project.
“Their requirements”? So now the seller gets to decide what to deliver. I order a Happy Meal and get a rock in the box.
If it’s on the webpage and they accept money for it, my reasonable expectation is to get what I paid for. Any argument to the contrary is laughable.
Realities of development being what they are, they should be more circumspect and only offer stretch goals they’re positive they can deliver. That’s all I’m saying. That’s what you’re (hilariously) arguing against.
I don’t see how your happy meal analogy is helping anyone here.
Anyway, I don’t buy the idea that crowd funded developers shouldn’t have the flexibility to change their scope during the development process. Saying such a thing amounts to arguing against the idea of crowd funding video game development at all; because no complex video game came be made with anything other than continuous willingness to change objectives and ideas.
Literally the only thing I have been arguing against this whole time is the idea that stretch goals constitute some kind of contract that entitles backers to them being fulfilled because they have explicitly paid money for them, because that simply isn’t true and has been repeatedly argued here. I don’t dispute any of what you just wrote.
Well, I would say that they should make a good faith effort to fulfill stretch goals instead of should fulfill them, because I think a blanket expectation for fulfillment does not reflect the reality of development or necessarily make for the best game possible. But other than that.
And again, I think @stusser and I are both saying (in our clumsy roundabout way) that while no legal entitlement exists, developers abandon reached stretch goals at their peril. I guarantee that there will be some potential backers giving inXile the side-eye on their stretch goals when the next project comes up.
If you put it on the page and tell people you’re going to deliver X for Y pledged dollars, people will expect X. Not X minus some stuff.
The only way to mitigate that is to keep people in the loop. inXile fucked up by trying to slide this past everyone.
Yes. They overpromised, were unable to deliver, and then failed to communicate with their customers.
This has nothing to do with legality, as I believe I posted 40 or so posts back. It’s about reasonable expectations.
Being disappointed is reasonable. Asking for a refund is reasonable. Getting mad or giving them the side eye in future because of a mythical entitlement isn’t.
The side eye is always reasonable.
On the contrary, I now know that I can’t trust them to deliver the game they said they would. I might will trust them to deliver a very good, albeit somewhat different game, but now I know to weigh their words and campaigns differently.
Mind, the “I” here is generalized, as actually-me-I am at the point of assuming all Kickstarters will fail miserably by the end and deliver nothing :-)
But customers who see nice, intriguing things listed in inxile stretch goals in the future will understand that however it’s worded in the marketing materials, they are only suggestions, not reliable features to be counted on and paid for.
That is a healthy thing to generally understand about crowdfunding. Along with the “this might actually tank and not ever even deliver at all” understanding. Because they are realities of crowdfunding in general and videogame development specifically.
I do not believe this has anything to do with entitlement - it has to do with expectations. If you establish a certain expectation with a client as a company and do not meet it it becomes much harder to do business in your speciality. Stretch goals are setting customer/client expectations and when you do not meet them there will be a backlash.
Also, it’s absolutely possible to deliver on every promise, even if it is to the detriment of the game. Obsidian did this with PoE1. Remember all those useless NPCs that you occasionally spoke to by accident with inane stories and an annoying sound effect? Those were backers. The game would have been markedly superior without them.
PoE1’s stretch goals all made it into the game. Would PoE1 have been better without the second giant city in Twin Elms? Perhaps. But they were ALL in there.
Yes we do. The stretch goals are a conditional promise, the condition that funding hits a certain level. To suggest they are just hopes and wishes that can be discarded at will by the campaigner is a complete misunderstanding of how Kickstarter functions.
At the very least, this group is probably not going to have much luck with KS in the future. They’re probably jump to another funding site and hope everyone forgets what happens.
Game design changes over 3+ years. News @ 11.
No one will care if the game is good.