Wasteland 2 devs open Kickstarter

SockMan! said:
Wasteland 2 just recently passed $1.5 million with almost 30,000 backers and 24 days remaining. Any bets on whether this will surpass Double Fine's $3.3 million?
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Not gonna happen. I think this one will stop at about $2.25MM, if that. I think the only company raising more monies at this moment is probably Obsidian.
 
Update #6: We just made our next major milestone, thanks to you all, which means more content plus a Mac and Linux version. And the number continues to grow, and that means a better product for all as we can hire more writers and scripters to add even more depth of consequence to the world, add more music and sound to set the atmosphere, and make the world larger to explore. Let's keep the number increasing and really knock it out of the ballpark. I have been having a blast reading the messages of excitement from the RPG players who feel neglected over the years.

We wanted to have a little fun and make another comical video so I hope you enjoy it. The next video I put up will also be more informative as I will answer some of the more common questions from the forums. We are still deciding on the tech, and we don't know what the final budget is, so it can be difficult to have answers for everything right now.

So see our thoughts on Multi-player as well as a list of links to some of the great press we have been getting, go to our updates page by clicking "Updates " at the top of this page.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hk-baSDDJ14&feature=youtu.be
 
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defiant007 said:
I am aware Obsidian have commented that they are considering it, but your post insinuates that they are in the process of raising money via crowd funding which they apparently aren't actually doing atm.
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Poor choice of words on my part. My bad :eek:
 
I'll trust Obsidian and give them my money again when they make a game that isn't a big, fat, steaming pile of crap.


On a good note though, Wasteland 2 preordered. :D
 
LeninGHOLA said:
Heres a good read. Fargo interview, 4 pages.
http://www.ripten.com/2012/03/27/br...mal-publisher-treatment-and-having-fun-again/

It serves as a good "state of game dev vs publisher" break down, too.
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Pretty damning stuff in terms of the extent to which publishers interfere with the development process, inflate development costs and are responsible for buggy releases and lack of patches to address issues. I will have to bookmark that interview so I can repost it every time some apologist spews out the tired old excuse "X company is only the publisher, blame Y developer for the buggy release".
 
What's funny to me is the publishers have themselves to thank for this in a large way not only with not making games fans want but with pushing preorders. They've been so big on the "Give us your money before the product comes out, and you can't return it since you bought it digital!" thing that people have gotten conditioned to the idea that paying for a game in advance is ok. So something like this comes along and they say "Ya looks good, and the price is low, I predorder." For some people, yes they are giving a lot more, it is a gift because they want to see the game and so on. However for many it is a case of they like what they see and are willing to preorder it for a discount.

Why not? You see the shit on Steam all the time, and for much less of a discount. A publisher will put a title up for preorder months before it comes out and you'll get a hat or day 1 DLC or something. So this is the same thing but better discount, and a longer wait. They really did help make Kickstarter an idea people would be ok with.


The only thing I will defend the publishers a bit on is with regards to buggy releases. It can be their fault, but it can also be the devs' fault. There are just some bad programmers out there, no two ways about it. Their skills are not up to what they believe their skills to be. So they will say they "can't" fix a bug or they'll take way, WAY too long (and remember time is money when you are talking development) and so on. Also programmers are good at getting stuck in the past in terms of how they do things.

I have plenty of stories about this I could post but what it comes down to is not all developers are good at what they do and some of them suck at fixing bugs. The QA team may well find them and report them in a reasonable time frame, and the developer just proves unable to fix them.

This isn't always the case I'm sure but it isn't fair to lay it all at the feet of the publishers in all cases.
 
MF: Why don’t we hear more about it…?

BF: Because they are afraid to talk, because they’ll never get another contract if they do. That’s why. You cannot believe… it’s awful. It’s really bad. You should try to dig in and get some stories out there. Look at the most recent one with those poor guys at Obsidian. They did Fallout: New Vegas, the ship date got moved up and, who does the QA on a project? The publisher is always in charge of QA. When a project goes out buggy, it’s not the developer. The developer never says, “I refuse to fix the bug,” or, “I don’t know how.” They never do that. It’s the publisher that does the QA, so if a product goes out buggy, it’s not the developer’s fault. So, (Fallout: New Vegas) goes out buggy and they didn’t do the QA, their ship date got moved up and they missed their metacritic rating by one point. Did they get a bonus? No. Do you think that’s fair? I tried to get some of my publisher friends, who I used to make a lot of money for, to donate. Do you think they donated? No. Their employees did.
 
IsaacMM said:
I'm gonna laugh when all these kickstarter projects turn out crap and steal your monies.
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As opposed to the non kickstarter projects we have now that turn out to be crap and steal your "monies"?.

:rolleyes:

Brian Fargo is a stand up guy. If only the industry had more people like him willing to make it better for everyone and not just there wallets. I think the 5% kick it forward program is a great idea. Not only do we get the game, we help other developers make games.
Gotta start somewhere.
 
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Krenum said:
As opposed to the non kickstarter projects we have now that turn out to be crap and steal your "monies"?.

:rolleyes:

Brian Fargo is a stand up guy. If only the industry had more people like him willing to make it better for everyone and not just there wallets. I think the 5% kick it forward program is a great idea. Not only do we get the game, we help other developers make games.
Gotta start somewhere.
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No kidding. I mean yes, you need to vet the projects you donate to. You wouldn't want to go in on some big game being developed by a guy who'd never done it before but wants to get in to games "Because it sounds cool and stuff."

However in this case, I'm pretty confident they deliver. They have a real design doc/idea, there is a real company behind it (inXile has like 200 employees and has released titles), both the company and Fargo have resources of their own so it won't be a crisis that stops the game if a bit more money is needed and finally Brian Fargo has about 30 titles to his name in one role or another between Interplay and inXile.

So there's a good chance they have the resources and skills. There's also good motivation since taking the money and running wouldn't be feasible. It would be grounds for a big class action suit (and as mentioned, they have something to lose) and if willful criminal prosecution.

Now the game could end up sucking for sure. But then that is always a risk when you preorder. Man did I get shafted on Brink. What a shitty game. Looked so good in the previews, so bad when it came out. $50 I'll never get back. In fact I have like 12 games in a Steam category called "shitty games" which are games I wish I could get a refund for.

Always risk in life however this looks like a minimal one, and with a real good potential reward.
 
^

Man I am stoked, I get to hear new music from Mark Morgan! That guy makes amazing sound.

I don't think he would spend the time and effort on a game if he didn't think it was worth while.
 
Fargo has a long term goal here. He wants to make a successful and quality RPG, get enough money, backing, and consumer goodwill to go back into the business of both developing and publishing RPG games. Imagine some of the best developers in the business having their own creative freedom again.
 
The announcement of Chris Avellone helping design the game has raised over $50k so far today.
 
That is incredibly exciting news. And yeah, it's pretty much the real Fallout 3 now.
 
Krenum said:
Woohoo!
Brian Fargo, Chris Avellone & Mark Morgan!

Bring on the TRUE Fallout 3!

Put that in your pipe and smoke it Bethesda!
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Hey don't hate on Bethesda. While Fallout 3 is a very different style of game, it is a good one. I don't mind trying different things with games, and I see merit in what they did. I enjoyed it quite a bit.

Obviously I want a traditional Iso turn based game, that's why I've kicked in on this and encouraged others to. However I'm not hating on the 3d first person stuff either. Bethesda makes some great RPGs too, just a different style.

Same general shit with Fallout Tactics. Some people hated on it because it wasn't an RPG. I say who cares, it was a really fun game. I'm ok with different directions for games if they are still fun.

Really looking forward to Wasteland 2.
 
Initial reaction: "Awesome!!"

But then I started to think about if from Obsidian's perspective, and... damn, are things really that bad over that, that the few people want/need to piggy back on inXiles cake? No doubt they will reach the $2.1 now, but it really does make me wonder.

Either way, I upped my pledge.
 
Fargo actually approached Obsidian. Basically, Obsidian is lending them art assets, writing, some game mechanics, and a bit of Chris Avellone flair. Fargo's team is doing all the coding. It makes sense, they want more Fallout and Wasteland devs on board, which obviously boosts their publicity.
 
HOLY SHIT! /mind blown!

Could this turn out to be the greatest RPG released in the last decade?! (by reason that there has not been a proper RPG released in the last decade!) :eek:

I god damn hope so!
 
defiant007 said:
HOLY SHIT! /mind blown!

Could this turn out to be the greatest RPG released in the last decade?! (by reason that there has not been a proper RPG released in the last decade!) :eek:

I god damn hope so!
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It could be the greatest RPG in history!

I'll throw more money down their money-holes!
 
I'm in for this.

My dad, god rest his soul, and I used to play the original together when I was a kid(12 or so). I remember I'd wait for him to get home from work, and then we'd fire up the PC together, and just have a good time talking about what to do, what to have our squad members do. Really good times we had.

Wasteland was the game that really solidified my love for PC gaming.

I hope the sequel has the same formula.
 
Its so weird that they could make a game like Fallout 3 so long after Fallout 2, have it be extremely well received, and then turn around and poo-poo a Wasteland follow up. Publishers must be out of their retarded fucking minds.

If Obsidian is involved, they basically have everything they need to make this the next Fallout 3 and if they succeed. I mean if it becomes a leftfield hit like Fallout 3 was it could seriously start a chain reaction. Keep in mind this is all going to the Developers who are taking no money from this and have already committed %5 minimum of the profits to other independent studios. I'd have to dredge up the actual make on it but it easily surpassed 60 million.

So Obsidian and Inxile get together and make 100 million with this and then kick it forward.

inconceivable.jpg



Brian Fargo and Chris A have already just said fuck publishers. I cant wait to see who else shows up on the list.

I can't wait to see the day when Publishers no longer decide when games and sequels are made. Ok except Valve and Tripwire. You're cool aint hatin.
 
AFAIK, Fargo is the only cat not pulling a paycheck from this kickstarter. Who knows what they will make from Steam/GoG sales once it is released? I'm sure they will all get royalties.
 
LeninGHOLA said:
AFAIK, Fargo is the only cat not pulling a paycheck from this kickstarter. Who knows what they will make from Steam/GoG sales once it is released? I'm sure they will all get royalties.
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You gotta wonder though. I mean Brian got the door slammed in his face so many times if now that Obsidian, who has recently really gotten the shaft from publishers, publishers arent starting to get a little like "oh fuck its itunes again."

People just dont seem to get that EA and Actvision don't make games. They're just some idiot suits probably leapfrogging from the RIAA or where ever who thought they'd cash in on this new great "gaming" thing now that the ship has sailed on music labels or whatever cash cow has run out of milk.

They buy or contract studios. Buy an IP and hit the GO button. These fucks need to be taught a lesson and kicked the fuck out. They can go back to ruining the housing market or whatever the next big scam is.


Whats more interesting is Valve's "Big Box" plan. They plan to allow you to stream the steam client to your TV which means indie Devs don't need consoles anymore. The PC will no longer be in the office it will be in the living room. They can write games for PC and call it done. All the console games that have been ported to Steam I'm playing on my TV with HDMI to my PC. Xbox and PS3 joysticks work just fine. Mark my words when Steam finishes the "box" project with a nice consolely interface Consoles publishers are gonna be in trouble.
 
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I am really excited about developers doing things for the love of the game rather than the love of money.

They are doing it partially for the money of course; I mean, who doesn't want to make a comfortable living? But their desire for riches and their desire for making a good game are in different proportions to, say, John Riticello.
 
piscian18 said:
Its so weird that they could make a game like Fallout 3 so long after Fallout 2, have it be extremely well received, and then turn around and poo-poo a Wasteland follow up. Publishers must be out of their retarded fucking minds.
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I think the problem is that Fargo was insisting it be an oldschool game. So the Fallout sequel was in the same universe, but was a modern game in every other way. The important ones:

-- PC/console cross platform, not PC only.
-- 3D first person/3rd person.
-- Realtime.

Those seem to be the things that publishers believe you gotta have. No big deal in Bethesda's case, for one they were self publishing and also it was a sci-fi world remake of their Elder Scrolls type of games. They already made RPG like that, just fantasy.

Fargo seemed very set on that not being what he wants. He wants Wasteland 2 to be like the original in the whole overhead, turn based, tactical, all of that shit. So while I'm sure some publishers just said no period, others were interested but then wanted to change it in ways he wasn't ok with.

Now I think that is dumb, I think there's a market for this and I think this funding is showing there is.
 
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