Another Successfully Kickstarted Game Cancelled

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There sure seems to be a lot of successfully funded games that fail lately. In this case, the developer got twice the amount of money it was asking for and still failed to deliver a game. :(

Yogventures raised nearly $570,000 for indie studio Winterkewl Games during the title's Kickstarter campaign back in 2012, more than double its original goal of $250k. But the project has since petered out, and has now been disowned by celebrity YouTube partners Yogscast.
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I'm definitely in the minority here, but I still think that kickstarted gaming is going on full retard. IMO, this whole preorder craze, where people are buying on hype with very little peer realworld gameplay out yet is bad enough, but paying for a game before it even exists... just not a good thing.
 
Define "a lot" ... there have been a few examples from smaller startup studios (the higher risk ones for failure) ... all of the high profile titles from the professional developers are still in progress and appear to be on a path to eventual release (and there have been some notable releases like FTL that are already complete and successful) ... there is certainly some risk for a KS project (which is why it isn't for everyone and you must be very selective on which projects you choose to sponsor) but I think the benefits of crowdfunding still outweigh the penalties (at least for now) ;)
 
Ducman69 said:
I'm definitely in the minority here, but I still think that kickstarted gaming is going on full retard. IMO, this whole preorder craze, where people are buying on hype with very little peer realworld gameplay out yet is bad enough, but paying for a game before it even exists... just not a good thing.
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I don't think you are a minority. As a matter of principal I do not support KS for game developers because it turns them into beggars. I do not want more KS funded games or for it to be the norm. I want studios to earn my dollar and sell me an entertainment product with value.
 
fdiaz78 said:
I don't think you are a minority. As a matter of principal I do not support KS for game developers because it turns them into beggars. I do not want more KS funded games or for it to be the norm. I want studios to earn my dollar and sell me an entertainment product with value.
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The one downside of eliminating the crowdfunding models is that only leaves two other sources of funding (publishers and venture capitalists) ... we all know how much love and devotion the publishers receive here (and on other gaming forums) and the traditional venture capitalists are not usually Angel Investors so they bring their own baggage into the equation

I would not want to see KS (or other crowdfunding mechanisms) become the sole source of funding but it does provide a nice bridge between self funding (which means extremely low budget indie projects) and the publishers/VCs (multi million dollar projects with mass market appeal) ... crowdfunding lets us see projects in the 1 million to 4 million range (too much for self funding but too low to interest most publishers) that have more of a niche audience
 
jpm100 said:
They don't see the money unless they deliver, unless, they somehow get a loan against it. If a bank was foolish enough
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Are you sure about that? I thought lots of peeps were angry because they can use the money, say they tried but went bankrupt, and voila.
 
Today's lesson boys and girls would be its unwise to throw money at everything that comes along...
 
jpm100 said:
They don't see the money unless they deliver, unless, they somehow get a loan against it. If a bank was foolish enough
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You get the funding for the product development. That phase happens before you are required to distribute your 'rewards' for the different level of funding options.
 
Oh why doesn't someone think of the children!! One less video game in this world for them to play!!

27322922d1348819622_lets_see_some_not_so_cool_st.jpg
 
when KS stops taking a %, then they will start to care if a project never comes to completion.
that's why they have the different funding levels.

either way, it doesn't matter. the market will work itself out, and the fools will either learn to stop throwing their money away, or they will go broke. in the mean time, some sweet games will get made, and some vaporware will get #HYPE'd enough to pay for a free year of partying for a few scammers.

tell me, what has changed, except for the venue. no longer do snake oil salesmen have to go door to door, or town to town. now they flock to the sites online where the general populous tells them they want to give their money away...

it's so easy to senselessly spend money on hope and cha... a promise of something great while at the same time the peanut gallery is shaking their head wondering how so many could be so foolish
 
What happens to the backers when a project is canceled? Are they out of their money?
 
PCunicorn said:
What happens to the backers when a project is canceled? Are they out of their money?
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You take a risk as a backer.

If the company doesn't reach their goal, youre out nothing.
If they do.....then you just have to sit back and wait to see if they come through.

In this case, every backer is out whatever they threw in.

I put 50 bucks towards AREAL, and they haven't reached their goal yet....it was really a low set goal, and caught a lot of negative on the internet. I think they are doomed.

On the other hand, I invested in Neal Young's Pono music and fully expect that project to be viable.:D They raised a ton of money.
 
How people don't get that kickstarter is nothing more than a legal racket is beyond me. You have better odds playing the lottery.
 
I've had very good results from Kickstarter:
https://www.kickstarter.com/profile/821804826

I have gotten my "rewards" from all but one (the people running it were flakes, friend who was involved apologized and took me out to dinner - cost him more than I pledged). There are Two games in development still - Wasteland 2 and Torment -- I get regular updates from them. Most are "local" projects, or people that I know. Not all get funded.

Funding a game is tricksy. For a physical game, I'm more apt to get behind it. For a PC game - for me it needs to be a studio that's been around for a while. They know how to budget, and complete projects. For something brand new... I am quite iffy.

I don't think the crowd funding model will go away anytime soon. It works for the most part.
 
It's hard to get angry about dipshits throwing money at products that don't exist yet. Especially software, the one thing in the world that is nearly zero cost to produce. If someone was good at making software, they'd make it and sell it. Someone who needs money in advance has already signaled that they're inept.
 
I wouldn't have Divinity: Original Sin without Kickstarter, so while I've never backed a project, I'm happy that it works.
 
Kick starting and Steam Early Access has rubbed me the wrong way since day one. Hopefully the market will eventually balance itself out like someone already mentioned.

I'm still amazed the way Star Citizen continues to rake in the dough. I really believe that's heading for one colossal bankruptcy disaster.
 
1. Can't get loan from bank for half baked idea with no business plan
2. Get marketing guy with last 5K
3. Make some pretty tech demos/mock-ups
4. Turn to people on net and hype half baked idea as next coming of Christ
5. Kick start that bitch (how indie!) and allow feature creep to further muddy the ideas
???
6. Go broke.
 
I'm really curious about that money, is there any accountability? Okay, the game failed. Fine. Shit happens. That is a lot of money though... I'd bet all the devs have new cars now.

If the money wasn't going 100% toward game development, the shit needs to hit the fan.
 
m heisty said:
How people don't get that kickstarter is nothing more than a legal racket is beyond me. You have better odds playing the lottery.
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It's not a lottery. It's an investment. Just because you invested something, don't guarantee returns.
 
GotNoRice said:
I'm really curious about that money, is there any accountability? Okay, the game failed. Fine. Shit happens. That is a lot of money though... I'd bet all the devs have new cars now.
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;)

For every legit dev, you can bet there are dozens that are there to rob stupid people blind. PT Barnum baby, PT Barnum.
 
I put something like $60 or $80 into Star Citizen, and if it goes to nothing, oh well. It's not like I've never wasted money before and I feel like I'm helping push a genre I really like to fruition. As for other kickstart projects, I've never spent a cent.
 
Not a fan of kickstarter and the early access schemes, its almost like gambling. But as with gambling as long as the people who throw their money in knows the risks and they should by now, i don't really see an issue, I just wont personally do it.
 
Maybe the lesson is simply don't invest in companies that spell the world 'cool' as 'kewl'?
 
DocSavage said:
I put something like $60 or $80 into Star Citizen, and if it goes to nothing, oh well. It's not like I've never wasted money before and I feel like I'm helping push a genre I really like to fruition. As for other kickstart projects, I've never spent a cent.
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This is the way I looked at it as well. I've backed 9 or 10 projects, including the Light Pack, Star Citizen, Elite, Drifter, Kinetic Void, Limit Theory.... Light Pack is neat but has some severe problems that make it nearly unusable that they have refused to even acknowledge even after multiple attempts at contacting them through pretty much every method they use to communicate. Most of the games though are coming along.

I look at it more as I'm helping to nudge video gaming in the direction that I would like to see rather than just buying a game up front. I do find it funny that projects backed by VC's or publishers fail all the time, but as soon as it's Kick Starter it makes headlines everywhere.
 
Traciatim said:
I look at it more as I'm helping to nudge video gaming in the direction that I would like to see rather than just buying a game up front.
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Exactly. It lets the people make a game they want to make instead of answering to a publisher or investors who want to cater to the largest target audience possible.
 
m heisty said:
How people don't get that kickstarter is nothing more than a legal racket is beyond me. You have better odds playing the lottery.
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I think that if what you say were true, I'd be a millionaire. I've backed numerous of games that have come to fruition (see Tabletop Simulator, Divinity: Original Sin, Chivalry, etc). I've also backed a number of non-games such as Artisan Dice. Almost all of them took much longer than expected, which is fine by me.

I think it's obvious, but I'll say it anyways: if you're going to back a KS project you need to research the parties involved and determine if it's an acceptable risk for you to take. I haven't backed a single project that has failed, but others have. Realize that KS is not an online store. Rather, you're investing in a project. Investment = risk.

Personally, I like KS because it allows me to vote with my wallet. My favorite games are cRPGs, but almost nobody makes those any more. However, with KS, I was able to help fund Project Eternity, Divinity: Original Sin, Wasteland 2, Torment: Tides of Numenera, Shadowrun: Returns, Paper Sorcerer, and others. Even if only half of them were to reach a formal release, I think it was money well spent (although I do fully expect all of them to actually be released and some of them already have been released), but that's just my comfort level with the risk I took backing the projects.
 
So what percentage of Kickstarter'd games have fallen through? Or does that even matter because LOLZ KICKSTARTERZ DUM?
 
PCunicorn said:
What happens to the backers when a project is canceled? Are they out of their money?
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Once the Kickstart completes, they're billed.

They have exactly no rights after that to get their money back.


There are two big problems with Kickstarting a game.

1) Underestimating exactly how expensive it's going to be.
2) Overestimating the speed and talent of your development pool.

There's also one minor problem that an sink you too.

Extreme Kickstart Success. There are times when blowing WAYYYYYYY past your goal can be a Bad Thing™. The money can suddenly open up LOTS of opportunities to you that might not have been within your purview (and budget) previously. In some cases, unless the studio is VERY rigorous about sticking to their plans and being workmanlike, these extra choices (and the ability to just throw money at things) can SERIOUSLY derail a project.
 
These sorts of threads tend to attract the two diametrically opposed camps on KS so both sides can preach to their respective choirs (since there doesn't seem to be much middle ground on KS, or the other crowdfunding mechanisms). I think KS actually does extremely well on the non-electronics and non-software side, but the projects are much more niche there and attract their small but loyal followings.

The electronics side is probably the highest risk side (even more so than software). Some of the projects received massive funding but building an actual device is hard. You have to have a functional design. You have to have a manufacturable design. You have to contend with IP, supply chain, and many other obstacles. Inexperienced dreamers with a big idea are not usually up to this and the lure of selling a potentially useful IP to a bigger player for the cashout is a much higher risk.

For software, the risk is for the smaller startup companies with less experienced leaders or, as others have mentioned, the risk of stretch goal creep (that can make your reasonably high risk project into an impossible project). For the experienced developers (like inXile and Obsidian) I don't think there is any risk of the projects going bust. They are being led by professional teams with many successful publisher projects under their belts. They were also careful with their stretch goals to make them goals that built on capabilities they already had or had planned.

KS is, for the most part, a good thing. It gives much more power to consumers to choose a project they want to nurture and it encourages development of more user centric projects (at least if the company ever wants to try to do another KS project). Does KS have risk (certainly)? But, if the investor is careful about which projects they choose, the risk is no more than a preorder of a high profile publisher title (the title might suck but it will eventually launch). And I don't have any substantial fears of the Obsidian or inXile projects sucking. There, I preached to my choir so off my soapbox :cool:
 
Ducman69 said:
I'm definitely in the minority here, but I still think that kickstarted gaming is going on full retard. IMO, this whole preorder craze, where people are buying on hype with very little peer realworld gameplay out yet is bad enough, but paying for a game before it even exists... just not a good thing.
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I'm with you man, hell I go a step further and think that most kickstarter projects (whether games or anything else) is simply the latest scam of "need money for food" so that people don't need to have a full time job that actually pays them. 6 person team, they raised $750k, sounds like a good 2 year salary for all of them, now the money has run out and they haven't finished the game, they can go onto something else.
 
Simple question: have legitimate, high-quality games been produced as a result of Kickstarter?

Then what the fuck is people's problem? If it can work for one, it can work for others. Don't want to take the risk? Don't do so. You want the stock market outlawed, too?
 
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