Just posted this on RigAdvice, but thought some of you Bit Techers with 5 minutes to kill, might like to read it too! Kickstarter Needs You! Well, that’s not technically true, but recycling famous war slogans is super fashionable right now. More accurately, the developers on Kickstarter need you, and symbiotically, you need them too. You see, up until a few years ago, when the consoles started looking really tired, and Microsoft decided that a camera that tracks you flinging yourself around the room was a better way to spend their cash than making actual games, the PC games market was floundering. Of course, hyperbolic fools had been saying PC gaming was dead for years. But, even hardened PC Gamers found themselves on one hand arguing that gaming on a PC was the only way to play, whilst at the same time bemoaning the lack of innovative PC IPs, saturation of dumbed down console ports, and feeling guilty that they might have helped cause the demise of their favourite platform by pirating a copy of Unreal Tournament in 1998. During this period, Valve administered CPR by whipping out the Steam difubulator and kept blood flowing, even when the traditional retail outlets had got out the body bags and tied a tag around the toes. Much to the shock of many, PC gaming survived, and continuing the earlier trend 'never was so much owed by so many, to so few'. It had evolved, the organic nature of the platform, its users willingness to adapt to changes in game distribution, and a pool of talented and passionate developers who love PC kicked off an indie gaming revolution. The major publishers, with their sights aimed firmly at the consoles didn't see it coming. On the other hand, the developers that worked for them, the PC Games media, and the PC Gamers themselves did Which brings us up to 2012. Steam had done a remarkable job making games both more accessible to buy, but also to play. However, it was reliant on content generated by developers more often than not, funded by publishers, with an attitude towards the platform that could at best be described as apathetic. Enter Kickstarter. One of those ideas you wish you'd thought of first. Be honest though, even if you had, you'd probably have decided it'd never work and carried on playing your poorly ported version of Burnout Paradise (I still don't know how to exit that game without resorting to CTRL+ALT+DEL). Everyone has a different story about how they found out about Kickstarter. For many it may have been Tim Schafers famous ‘Double Fine Adventure’ . For others a little later to the party, it may have been Chris Roberts’ Star Citizen, but whatever you backed, the pitch videos began to give the sense that after years of pitching to ‘suits’ the developers were able to include features because they were good for the game and not just the bottom line . To those on the outside, it was a real eye opener in terms of how risk averse the industry and its publishers had become. Lost PC specific genres were revived from the ashes. Space Combat Sims had all but dried up since the late 90s with only irregular updates from the X team at Egosoft to sate desires. First Starlight Inception came along from ex Lucasarts Dev Garry Gaber, raising $158,152, then in December Chris Roberts jaw dropping Star Citizen trailer came along. “I want to build the game I always wanted to build…..and I want this to be as good as, or better than, any other game out there” said Chris in his pitch video, setting hearts aflutter. $6.3m later (now nearly $7.5m) Roberts had been given that opportunity, and had cemented Kickstarter, and crowd funding as a real way for developers to break free from the traditional publisher model. Things then got serious, as PC veterans were presented with a chance to bring to market the game they had wanted for over 20 years: Elite Dangerous “Trader. Explorer.Bounty Hunter.Pirate.” offered David Brabham in his initially shakey campaign, before promptly raising over $2.5m. The RTS genre was in a similar position. With no sign of a follow up to Supreme Commander, and the genre leaning towards micromanagement. Uber Entertainment, made up from ex Gas Powered Games employees including project lead Jon Mavor, promised to bring traditional style RTS games up to date with Planetary Annihilation. It blew through every single stretch goal with ease raising over $2.2m in 30 days. “The age of publishers has long passed, the endless conflict between funding and game developers continues to march into the vast darkness of space” pitched Uber, spoofing acknowledged genre classic Total Annihilation. PC gamers were getting the game designs they had been crying out for on forums for years, and it was clear that the developers were enjoying the renaissance as much as the gamers themselves. Whatever genre these projects fell into the one thing that all these games had in common was that there was no publisher compromise being made. No DRM, no F2P microtransaction based model, no dumbing down for the console crowd, no worldwide price fluctuations, and 50% of the budget wasn’t being spent on marketing it to brats watching Power Rangers and Gary, the pink shirt wearing HR rep asking the Senior Physics Modelling Architect what his ‘business philosophy‘ was. Mavor of Uber fame stated that he has a “small team of highly experienced people” which couldn’t be more different from the setup of a major publisher. Some games such as the mightily impressive Maia from UK dev Simon Roth, or Josh Parnells Limit theory took this further still, with teams of only one or two talented developers building the game. Not only this, but in this design environment developers were no longer under strict NDA gagging orders, and instead had an open dialogue to their audience. “One of the things I like about crowd funding is cutting out the politics and noise of the big publisher, and you’re dealing directly with the people that wanna experience the game you are making” says Chris Roberts. When asked what has happened since the Kickstarter Mavor answered ‘a tonne of interaction with the fans’. It works both ways too, backers who have contributed financially also contribute to the games development. In fact, the final stretch goal for Crate Entertainments Grim Dawn ended up being determined by a fan poll. The passion and interaction from the fans also serves one more purpose -fundamentally validating that there is (or isn’t) a market for these types of games on the PC, outside of the developers imagination. The PC platform needs your support. It has a reputation for rampant piracy, small sales figures, costly development, and a user base with extremely high expectations, that has been built up over many years. Whether or not this is true today, Kickstarter needs to be supported by PC Gamers the world over. It needs to be used as a tool to show the publishers that console ports just aren’t good enough, or what PC players want. We need it to show that if you design from the ground up, intelligent, original and fun games specifically for the PC, then there is a profit to be made. Additionally, we need it to demonstrate to the developer community that they too can have the freedom to make the game they’ve always wanted without publisher involvement, on the most advanced platform out there, and be rewarded for it. In the grand scheme of things crowd funding is still in its infancy, but amongst gamers and developers alike there is a real sense of tangible change, and for the first time, you can help shape it. I’m excited. Are you?
After Star Citizen, Planetary Annihilation, Godus, Elite Dangerous, OUYA, Murder Mystery Generator, and a few more, I am Kickstarted out for now! I agree though that KS is probably the only way that PC gaming is going to survive. Without it, none of the things I have pledged on in 2012 will have got funded and to not have these things would be a sad thing.
I see it more as a changing the industry type thing, a true revolution. Changing the industry back to being more like it was in the good ole days. For now I am supporting the good stuff I most want, Star Citizen, Project Eternity, Planetary Annihilation etc. But the industry is more about making money than it is making good games. And what I think is bound to happen, is that there are going to be some companies who via kickstarter, end up being incredibly successful and rich. It might have happened already, and probably successes are happening all the time, but what I mean is that as it grows, the successes will grow in scale too. Currently they are only making a few million to make their games, which is tiny compared to the industry as a whole. But the budgets are growing as more and more people get interested in Kickstarter... So what is bound to happen, is that eventually, any good team will be able to get £10m or more, as long as their ideas are good and they have the credentials. At that point, the big evil corporate publishers are going to HAVE to change. They will just have no choice. Because as the budgets grow to £15m and then 25 million etc.. the big publishers are going to have a serious fight on their hands! Because while they sit back mass producing Assassins Creed 14 and Dead Space 9 or whatever, there will be a team of extremely passionate gamers, who get huge budgets to make games that will totally blow gamers minds, and the budgets will get even bigger still, and that will let them advertise to even more people and it will just snowball. The writing is totally on the wall. It might take a few years to truly develop, but I think gamers (especially PC gamers) are going to be in for an amazing decade.
I think one of the good things to come out of this is that without £30M budgets, the games will be more about content and gameplay rather than Cinematics, cut scenes, and set pieces. I am sure that the big publishers are watching with interest, and there is no doubt that they will try and leverage Kickstarter for some of their funding. It will be down to us as Kickstarters to ensure that only the projects we want get funded. I don't really want to see FIFA14 on Kickstarter, but I am sure it will happen, if the already Kickstarted projects turn a profit AFTER they release the kickstarted projects. So far there isn't much evidence that other than the original funds created by Kickstarter, the projects actually continue to make money after release. The question is, do the people who kickstarted the project (and probably pledged high enough to get a copy of the game) make the total unit count after release. Interesting times!
Yep. The main thing for me is that I like how it will remove the 'injustice' of the games industry. You often see it with some old classic game, there will be forums with people saying omg please make a Baldurs Gate 3! Or please make a REAL Syndicate sequel, or "You don't get games like Wizardry anymore", etc.etc. But those sequels never come because the publishers are more interested in safer and more mainstream options. With Kickstarter, people will get what is coming to them. They can be as vocal as they want about wanting a sequel, but if there's only 10,000 of them who show up when they are needed, then they wont get their sequel. But if 500,000 of them show up and pledge $10, then they will get their sequel. And the size of the audience will dictate the budget, and players will just have to put up with that. But at least we will get great games now that have a decent number of fans, just not Call of Duty sized numbers.
The past couple of years, publishers seven times out of ten have made the wrong decision. Kickstarter is absolutely brilliant, The technology and games I see personally are fantastic. I want to see more old school games made by leading publishers but like Dolphie said, they are too scared to come out of their hole and ask what the people want.
Interesting times indeed! I agree with you there abotu the gameplay and content. A more limited budget, and furthermore 100% developer control about what goes into the game, has already led to better design decisions and money not being wasted on largely unnecessary game components. The brilliant and procedurally generated meta game in Planetary Annihilation is a good example of this. I'm sure if it was publisher funded they would have had a tickbox that said 'single player campaign' and would have forced Uber to implement one, taking dev time away from what the fans actually want - multiplayer, and/or the aforementioned procedurally generated meta game. In regards to your second point, I would argue that they do. Whether its an indie dev making the game without any funding, or a huge publisher funded title, both start in a position of negative equity, that they hope to claw back upon the games release. All kickstarter is doing is guaranteeing a shedload of pre-orders - which of course normally count towards a games day one sales. What Kickstarter also does, is the best kind of marketing possible, it builds the hype early (pitch video etc), and then brings the gamers along for the ride during development. This gives a huge amount of time for news of your game to spread via, word of mouth, forums like this, and eventually, the press. Totally agree. I (and apparently many others) had almost consigned myself to the fact that there were never going to be any more space sims, or decent RTS games, ever. But the fans voted with their wallets and between PA, Star Citizen and Elite, we've raised more than $13m.
I'll start backing Kickstarter when they prove to me that they are capable of delivering. Indies are just as capable of making f*ck ups as big publishers are. I'm still waiting for any of the big Kickstarters to come to fruition.
Given that it only really emerged last year, it'll probably be another year or so before any of the games, I've backed hit the market. That said, Faster Than Light was a Kickstarter game, as was Strike Suit Zero, and both of them have been received very well indeed!
IRRC I remember you saying it'll probably be another a year until your significant other allows you to back more kickstarter projects lol
There's not been any game-idea on Kickstarter so far that would've been worth my money really. Call me again when there's some AAA sandbox MMORPGs like EvE Online announced on Kickstarter. Unfortunately noone has the imagination or the balls to develop something like it these days anymore.
Luckily she has gone to America for a few months. Between you and me (and everyone reading BT), I've now backed 11 games.
This too. Nothing has come up that's struck me, but then I've stated time and again that I don't enjoy indie games all that much. Respect them. Don't enjoy them.
Personally I am willing to risk punting on some of these games as I think that the idea is sound and as I said before I don't think we are going to see big blockbuster PC games the traditional way so much. I decided to put my money in because I want to see Kickstarter succeed as it is only 'us' that know which games we want made, not the publishers. Also games like Star Citizen, Elite Dangerous, Godus and Planetary Annihilation are hardly 'Indy' games. All of these are being made by Industry veterans. As Parge said though, it's going to be another 12 months or so before anything comes out from these kickstarters. I can see why people are nervous about joining in, but sometimes as the great Georgios Kyriacos Panayiotou said, you just gotta have faith.
Star Citizen and PA look good but we have seen little in the way of results yet from kickstarter. Strike suit zero is a poor game compared to ZOE. ( do own it but its very short and lacks any multiplayer. ) FTL is great picked it up on a steam sale for cheap and have enjoyed it. ( cost me £1.25 ) Niether game had huge backing though. Most people want to see the $2million + projects come to light that people have backed. Ouya PA SC all fit that bill. Does not matter who makes the game in all honesty. Dungeon Defenders is an Indie game thats played by 1/2 million players acording to steam data. They gained more and more players as they kept developing the game. Asking for little amounts of cash for there work to keep on developing it some more. One thing to make a game like PA but its another thing entirely to maintain the servers and services that are expected to be there when it releases. Its lack of single player campain means it could have 1/2million players trying to access its servers on day 1. Anyone who has played a major mmo will know the issues that can cause. $40-$60 is the estimated price they are going to be charging so its not going to be cheap either, and with that sort of price estimate peoples expectations are going to be for a first rate RTS game with AAA quality. I have backed the 2 games i have on the hopes they can deliver till they do i wont be backing anymore though. ( Star and PA)
It's growing all the time, so those huge budget epic games and sandbox MMO's, they will come eventually. A kickstarter project has to be popular enough that people part with their money. But a big factor dictating the size of the budgets, is just the number of people who even know that kickstarter exists and what it is. You could be making the greatest game of all time, but unless average people know about kickstarter and then find that project, they aren't going to make the gigantic budgets. But that will happen in time. I think eventually kickstarter will become almost a household name, normal gamers will know it like they know the name Electronic Arts, Ubisoft and Rockstar. And even it does always end up being smaller budgets than the mainstream games, it will still benefit both sides. The people who love indie type games will get plenty, and the people who prefer mainstream type games, will end up getting even better mainstream games, because they are going to need to try harder to compete. Say for example in a few years they decide to make a Dead Space 4, but maybe around that time, someone will be working on a similar game with indie principles. It might not have quite the same graphics as Dead Space 4 would, but maybe the gameplay will be really interesting and they'll have a bunch of new ideas. Dead Space 4 now needs to be better to be seen as worthwhile and 'new'. The big companies will still do their thing, but they wont be able to rest on their laurels any more.
I haven't seen much that has interested me too much yet either. Where are my games like Myst? That is the single most genre I want to see reborn in all it's glory the adventure/puzzle. I need a good story line, challenging puzzles and also very importantly a control/interface system that isn't clunky and irritating.
There are some good adventure games on there, they are just a bit hard to find because their search engine is a bit crap. But I've seen stuff like a new Dreamfall Longest Journey, Asylum, and one written by the lady author behind the Gabriel Knight games. The only issue I see for games like that, is that they need to somehow reach enough people to visit their page. There are some really great ideas on there but they only get about 500 backers and a budget of 15 grand or whatever. And I don't think that reflects the game at all, it's more about how capable these people are at generating hype and word of mouth etc. p.s. Here are some possible Myst like games I found that I thought I'd share: The Five Cores http://neeblagames.com/ Kairo http://kairo.lockeddoorpuzzle.com/ ASA a Space Adventure http://2011asa.blogspot.ca/ Amarhys http://www.amarhys.com/amarhys.php# Prominence http://www.prominencegame.com/ Cradle http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y270FSjykBc Xing http://xingthegame.com/ Rhem 5
P.S. One other thing about Kickstarter that's worth re-mentioning, is that if you support a game and they don't get enough funding at the end of their campaign, no money is taken from you. It bugs me on some sites when I see people criticising kickstarter saying it's free cash etc.. as though we are a bunch of chumps throwing our money at strangers. But it's just not like that. I only ever spend about 20 pounds (usually $20), and it doesn't leave my bank unless the project is successful. And if the project is a success and the money leaves, then I don't just get the warm fuzzy feeling of supporting something I enjoy but I actually get a copy of the game when its done too. So it's not even 'giving' money. You are just buying something, it's just that you buy it before you receive it, to help out a company who deserve your help, and to stick it to the man!
And not only that, but the option is nearly always there for you to get a copy at a significantly reduced price if you only want to throw in the minimum! Everyone's a winner.
